March 11, 2009

• More Cuteness

  I have some new Jack media (a video and some pictures) to share with you all. Johnny took these on Sunday.

  Here's Jack showing off some of his favorite words: hi, uh-oh, bao-bao (hug in Mandarin) -- you'll also see that he goes to hug Johnny after saying that, and bye.

  And here are the pictures:

  Jack with Wally, a polar bear from Johnny's childhood ... there's a story about this picture underneath the pic!

  

  Lately, Jack's discovered Wally in one of his toy baskets and has adopted him as a best friend. He puts Wally in his high chair and feeds him imaginary food with an empty bowl and spoon, he plays cars with Wally, and he even insists that Wally sit next to him while he's watching TV. Occasionally he'll "share" his milk or snacks with Wally. On Sunday, right before we took the picture above, Jack ran to his room, opened his dresser drawer, removed a polo shirt, closed the drawer, then ran back to the living room and asked me to put the shirt on Wally. At night, he wants to put Wally to bed in the big boy bed, and in the morning, he'll sometimes remember to get a new shirt for Wally. However, I should say that Jack's affections are very fickle: Often, after "bao-bao"ing Wally, he'll say the Chinese word for "throw" and violently throw Wally to the ground, then giggle uproariously. Also, I once asked Jack if he wanted Wally to join us for an outing to the park. Jack responded by shaking his head, saying "no" and hastily tossing Wally away.

  And a couple of pictures of Jack just goofing around:

  

  I've decided that I love it when Jack's hair is off of his forehead!
  

  I really missed my cutie today. It was one of those rare days (in fact, the first since I started this part-time from-home gig) that I had to travel for work. I thought hard about whether I even wanted to go, but it's a one-time thing, and it was an opportunity to be paid for a lot of hours. It was just to Phoenix and back, so I didn't have to stay overnight. Since we're (hopefully) going to be buying a home in the very near future, the more I can make right now, the better -- especially since I'll be taking at least a few weeks off after the baby comes this summer. The clincher was that my mom's back in the States now, so she could drive over and watch Jack for the day. If it weren't for her being around, I couldn't have done it in the first place. So my mom came over late last night. My flight departed at 7:20 a.m., so I left the house before Jack was awake. At first I thought I would really enjoy a quiet flight sans toddler, since all of my flights in the last 20 months or so have involved a child in my lap. I also was secretly looking forward to a tantrum-free day where the only whining for snacks would come from me. But, as soon as I lined up at the security checkpoint, I began missing Jack. It felt odd, to say the least, not to have him close to me. I found myself having little panics about where he was, or thinking of what he should do next, or how to distract him, before realizing that he wasn't with me! It was definitely a relief to see him again, a little after 5 p.m. today. I did get a very glamorous welcome home: When I opened the door to the apartment, he ran up to me, grabbed his crotch and announced me that he had very recently pooped by saying "Ew." Jack had a really great time with my mom, and I'm really grateful to have had the chance to earn the extra bucks! She had even brought over dinner for us, so that was one less thing for me to do after getting home ... yay! I'm glad to be home. It's strange how out of place I felt today, doing something that would have been so routine back in my full-time working days.

  Well, I am exhausted from my super-long day, so I'm going to turn in. As Jack is fond of saying, "nigh-nigh"!

  • 1:26 am
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