potty training

Jax is potty trained! It is amazing watching him and his super colon live on his all fruit and fiber diet and know that for once I will not bear the brunt of it's violence.
We introduced him to the potty 11 months ago, just on the off chance that we didn't realize it, but he was ready for potty training and just wanted us to push him in the right direction. We quickly realized that this was not the case, and so after many unsuccessful attempts and countless celebrations of "movements" and a bottomless pit of potty bribes we have finally achieved a victory on the porcelain front. Enough of the potty talk, lets move on...
Ivy has expanded her vocabulary to dada, boof (Jax), mmmmmmmmm, babababa, and gagagagagggggg, anytime I try to get her to say, "mama" she just smiles and laughs in my face. At that moment, I have psychic visions of her teenage years and I am not excited. I think that when the time comes, I will let Jax potty train her.
She has finally started eating solids and she isn't really that thrilled about it. I thought she would love a little variety in her diet and yet whenever we feed her she gazes wistfully off in the distance thinking of simpler times when she didn't have to try and chew before she swallowed. However, once we introduce a newer 'new' food, if we revert back to an old 'new' food it is like she is experiencing a meal at a 5 star restaurant. Other than finding a sensitivity to squash it has mostly been your run-of-the-mill introducing solids to a baby stage.
We went on a little family adventure about 2 weeks ago. Ivan had a doctor's appointment down in sunny Florida, so we as a family packed up and joined him for a 3 day trip down to the sunshine state. He had a day off between appointments, so we woke up early and drove down to Orlando and spent the day at Sea World. All was going well until around 4:00 when the sky decided to open up and give us a whole year's worth of rain in a very concentrated hour and then continue to storm until we left at 9 that night. The boys were dressed in their bathing suits in preparedness for sitting in the infamous "splash zones" during the shows, Ivy and I were not so well equipped and I still found myself soaking wet after a 3 hour car ride back to the hotel (we changed Ivy into some dry clothes when we got back into the car).Even with the storm , we still had a great time there and I am excited we went. Jax got to see his beloved alligators and Ivy was entranced by the jumping orcas.

16 months later!

Wow! what a difference a year and some change can make! after the last post we had a few small and BIG changes. we got a new car, a sweet minivan, ivan and i are officially soccer moms. we moved, not anything big, just around the corner from our old house into a newly renovated larger one because... we had a baby! our new baby is already 7 months old! little ivy pepper was welcomed into the world on november 4th 2010 weighing in at a whooping 8lbs 4 oz and 20 inches long. she is growing like a weed and was a healthy 17lbs 5 oz at her 6 month dr. appointment, not too bad for a kid who had only had breastmilk at that point! we also experienced our first deployment, it wasn't as near as difficult as future tours will be. the sub ivan works on needed to go into drydock, so it was taken 7 hours away into another state that had facilities to handle the repairs. we (jax and i) were able to take aforementioned sweet minivan to drive back and forth to see him every few weeks.Jax and i also took our first cross-country trip about 13 months ago to go meet his newest cousin. We got there just in time, baby Ruby was born less than 24 hours after our plane landed! It was a great experience to be able to be there for my sister and brother in law as they were in the hospital, Jax got to spend some serious one on one time with his cousin gus and it gave us both a break from missing ivan. This past year has also been the year of hospital visits, Jax had an episode of severe croup and needed to be hospitalized overnight until swelling in his throat went down and his oxygen levels went up. We had to make an er visit with ivan because he became very ill, and ended up being diagnosed with pneumonia, sinusitis and a urinary tract infection all at once, then little ivy was born and it was my turn to be in the hospital for a few days, she was quite the stubborn kid and had a labor twice as long as her brother's, and then most recently the kids and i spent a Saturday night in the er waiting to be seen so that Jax could have a dried cranberry removed from his right nostril. i tried to be a good mom and make him some healthy trail mix to snack on, and he returned the favor by sticking it up, and having it get stuck in his nose. hopefully we can go without any more visits to the hospital for some time, otherwise i think they need to give us a frequent visitor punch card and give us a free shirt.
I think that's the majority of the big changes we've had. It is time to get ready for the next round of life's surprises!

So many updates!

Many apologies from us to you about our lack of upkeep on here, hopefully we won't have another 8 month lapse in posts.
lets see if i can do the quick abridged version of the past few months:

June:
The weekend after father's day Ivan had one of his long weekends between shift changes so we took advantage of it and went away on our first family vacation. We went to Atlanta and got there about lunchtime to go straight to the zoo. Jax was really excited to see all the animals, but we agree that the elephants were his favorites. The next day we went to the World of coca-cola which is something of a mix of a museum, bottling factory and shrine to all things coke. we ate the varsity, the largest drive in in the world and walked around the Olympic park. our last day there we went to stone mountain, which is a little northeast of Atlanta. It is a huge monument (3 times the size of mount Rushmore) dedicated to the confederacy from the civil war. there is a relief carved into the side of a large granite mountain. from there we came home.

July:
Ivan had to work evenings during the first week of July so he missed out on fireworks. Jax and Nora went to the fireworks display on base on the 3rd, where Jax did really well with his first experience with fireworks, he was a little scared at first but ended up enjoying them. Our friend Logan came to visit at the last minute, which ended up being a lot of fun. We went for a picnic on the beach at Ilse of Palms, walked all over downtown after hitting the farmers market, and went to the angel oak tree. Not too long after her visit, Nora's mom flew in and treated us to our first ghost tour downtown. It was a fun way to learn about some of the history of this old city and it's residents.

August:
Jax started taking his first unassisted steps, and finally on the 29th he got his first tooth, followed shortly by his second on the 31st. He also finished his first set of swimming lessons. Next summer we'll do it all over again so that he is comfortable in water. Nora started going to a quilting class on base.

September:
September was a big month for us, Jax took his first plane ride! He and Nora were needed in Odessa for a friends wedding in which Nora was in the bridal party. This was Jax's first trip to Texas and he got to meet so many family members and many "aunts" who were ready to spoil him. He did amazing on the flights and the travel (there was a roadtrip to Dallas) . And he got to have his first of his 2 birthday parties.

October:
Jax turned 1!!! He had a great birthday party with a few of his friends. Not too long after Ivan graduated prototype school, where he received an award for personal excellence. We celebrated by heading to Virginia right after the ceremony to go to Busch Gardens where Jax rode his first rides. Jax was walking pretty regularly by the end of the month and going days at a time without crawling.Ivan got selected for staff pick-up which means that we're staying put for the next 2 years. Jax got to do a little trick or treating this year, but he mostly just hung out with daddy while he passed out candy to the trick or treaters.

November:
another slow month, I'll save you the details, but this was Jax's first time to get ahold of a dirty diaper, we found out that we can sterilize a baby and his room in record time. Also we moved Jax into a bigger room and switched his old one with the office. It's a little further from our room, but he has so much more space for his limitless supply of toys. By the way, if you are thinking of getting Jax something, please no more toys or stuffed animals, board books are great and so are clothes. Ivan had to work nights for Thanksgiving (boo!) so we were lucky enough to dine with some other friends who have boys close in age to Jax.

December:
We decided at the last minute to take advantage of Ivan's military discount to Disney World and went the weekend before Christmas, for both our second family vacation and our little Christmas gift to ourselves. Jax finally got 2 more teeth, bringing the total up to 4! We were able to ride most of the classic family rides and enjoyed nice weather, we left on a Thursday after Ivan got home and stayed until Monday evening so that Ivan could be back at work Tuesday afternoon, so we were able to devote 1 day to each park. This was every one's first trip to Disney World and it was really successful, we have already started making a list of all the things we want to do the next time we go! Ivan had to work Christmas, but ended up getting Christmas eve off so we went to the festival of lights on John's Island (about 10 mins on the other side of downtown Charleston), where there is a 3 mile drive through Christmas lights. A few days after Christmas, Nora packed up the car with Jax and drove off to Texas for a late Christmas with some of her family because Jax's cousin Gus was flying in as well.

January:
January was filled with roadtrips and relatives for Nora and Jax and work for Ivan. Jax managed to get 2 more teeth in Odessa followed by both of his top molars cutting through in the same evening, luckily it was a few days before they were scheduled to head home so he was doing much better with the teething pain by the time they hopped back in the car to leave. The trip home was more eventful than we would have liked plagued with bad weather and a fire alarm going off in the middle of the night, but we made it back in one piece. The end of January was just spent enjoying being home and spending time with each other.

February:
So far this month has been pretty awesome, Ivan made E-5 so he is now a second class petty officer!!! Also he turned 25, way to go! We got a new bedroom seeing as how our old set was falling apart and missing drawers and we upgraded to a queen size bed, that's right, we'd been sleeping on a full size bed for over 4 years!So that may not be very exciting to anyone else, but it was super exciting to us. Tonight we are experiencing the first measurable snowfall in 10 years, we took Jax out but he really didn't care for it, it was (and still is) snowing and he didn't want it in his face or anything. (it's where our picture came from) He better get over it by the morning because we are going out and making him his first snowman whether he likes it or not! We switched Jax over to a big boy bed and he has been doing incredibly well with it, his first night he went down for the first time and didn't get out until 7 and a half hours later! It has only improved since then. We are still using the crib at naptime, but he is getting better at knowing that his bed is where he needs to be sleeping now.

I realize that I need to update pictures soon, until then go to youtube and look up nordorr for a few videos of Jax!

Hi there!

Ivan graduated top ET of his class from power school. Nora's grandmother was able to come down that weekend to visit and see the ceremony. He got his own special little plaque and when he went to get it all of the other graduates has to stand at attention. The weather cooperated and Jax even slept peacefully through almost all of the ceremony.

After power school Ivan went on hold for 2 months and worked in a lab at the training school. He was happy to have a bit of a break from the studying and Nora and Jax were happy that he was home a little more.

In April we had Nora's mom, sister Rose, her husband William and their son Gus visit. It was really exciting to see the little cousins interact. For those of you that don't know, Gus is exactly 6 weeks older than Jax. At the time Gus was crawling and Jax was still rolling around. We took them all over the area and went to a few gardens that were in bloom for spring.

A few days after Nora's family left, some of our friends from Texas came to visit and we did the garden and tourist circuit again. during this time Jax got sick so we took him to the doctor to find out that he has horrible seasonal allergies! He was given a prescription for baby allergy meds and we continued our garden tours without any further problems.

At the end of April Ivan started his last leg of training; prototype school, he'll be done with that in just a few short months but we probably will not know for certain when and where we are moving to until after his graduation, please don't ask, we don't know, but we will let everyone know as soon as we find out. Just as in the other 2 schools Ivan is excelling and running away with the curve, we know he is getting excited to be finishing up with all this school. As soon as he is done he will be a certified nuclear reactor operator and no one can take that away from him, go Ivan! Right now he has started his 12 hour rotating shifts that will last until his graduation. He hasn't had to work overnight yet, I'm sure that it will be a shock to him when it happens.

As far as Jax news goes, he is crawling, crawling a lot, he will crawl on his hands and knees if he feels like it, but generally prefers to army crawl. He is also pulling up to standing. He just started that a few days ago and is already ready for the next step! Hopefully we can adjust to pulling up before he decides to stand up and walk off. We took him to the beach last weekend for Ivan's class family picnic. Jax had such a good time, I think he is part dolphin, but what did you expect when both of his parents were swimmers?

Sadly our other computer died and we have yet to get most of the pictures off of it, but here are a few from the past months and more recently. Us at Ivan's power school graduation, Jax and Gus at cypress gardens, Jax at wannamecker county park, and Jax at the beach (our friend Cassie was holding him while he was getting his picture taken).

Quick post

I love baby sunglasses. I especially love the way his eyes are, you can see them through the glasses. This picture is so priceless, it's the new background on the computer.
There are new pictures up on the flicker album. I like to just put it on slide show and watch all of them from start to finish.
Ivan is doing really well, he has one of the top gpa's in a class of about 300, and he is overall the top E.T. (his class is made up of E.T.'s, M.M.'s, and E.M.'s) by a pretty wide margin. He just has three tests left before his comprehensive final. He is gearing up to graduate power school on Friday Feb. 13th. He went ahead and volunteered to be on hold for 2 months before beginning prototype school since there were not enough spaces for all the students graduating. He will still be doing something during this time, (its still up in the air which job assignment he got), but his days and hours will be much shorter so he will get to be at home more and spend some more time with Jax and mommy.
Jax is consistently rolling from his tummy to his back and he will roll in the direction of either mom or dad if they are sitting beside him instead of in front of him. He is trying to roll from his back to his tummy, but can't quite get it yet, he can roll up on his side but just can't make it all the way over. He is starting to uncurl from birth, but he still keeps those little legs tucked most of the time. His legs are starting to straighten out from being bowlegged and his feet are starting to get arches and turn out. This past week he started laughing, he has been giving little chuckles for a few weeks and he squeals in delight, but now he does the full blown big hearty laughs. Great news, he has gotten to the point where he doesn't completely hate his car seat, in fact, he usually smiles when he gets in it (he knows he's either going for a ride or walk) and has stopped having huge breakdowns if the car seat isn't in motion, well, the breakdowns are fewer and far between at least.

Well Finally!

We finally have a crib for Jax! Just in time for him to turn 3 months old. The plan was to have one before he was born, but things just didn't work out that way. After finding and researching cribs that we wanted we would go to order or buy them and they would be either discontinued or out of stock indefinitely, this happened 3 times!!! The last time it happened was in August when we found yet another crib that was the style that we wanted, was one we could agree upon and was in our price range with good safety ratings. We went to order it and oh, no longer available in stores, no longer available to order online. That was the final straw for me. I had a mini nervous breakdown fueled by pregnancy hormones and just decided that we were going to use the bassinet in the pack and play for a little while because crib shopping officially sucks. We slowly gathered everything but the crib and went out and found the one we wanted about a month after Jax was born. As soon as all of Christmas was over we ordered that bad-boy so that Jax could start off the new year in a new bed.

After all the heartache that went into finding a 4th crib that matched everything that we both wanted, and then ordering it we thought we were going to be happy and done with it. I was so excited that I went and got all the bedding and ironed everything, including the little fabric flaps on the mobile. We went to babys-r-us the other day and saw it in person in white and it was so ugly, both Ivan and I hated it, it was just so tacky and that's what was coming to our house. When we got home we were both so upset and disappointed. Today when the crib got here I was just going to put it together and be done with it. But much to my surprise, ours didn't look so tacky, it actually looked really nice. I guess just a different finish makes a big difference. I got most of it done and then Ivan finished it off. We put in all of the dinosaur bedding and it looks so cute. Most important of all, Jax is sound asleep in it right now he had absolutely no trouble in the transition from pack and play to crib.

It's Santa!

We took Jax to see Santa today. Of course Santa was at the complete other end of the mall from where we parked. Not usually a big deal, but Ivan is on crutches with a really bad sprained ankle. Jax was really good with Santa and didn't cry until after his visit was over and the picture was bought and paid for. I need to hook-up our scanner and stick that baby on here. Until then this cute picture of Jax in his Christmas outfit will have to do.