Follow Up

Just to follow up on my last post, Jack doesn't actually run into traffic. No one needs to buy me a leash to keep him from getting flattened by a semi. I'm prone to exaggeration occasionally and I was feeling a little snarky when I wrote that last post. Or maybe I was just tired and run down from all of the packing. Anyway, Jack is fine. I never let him loose near streets or cars. I guess I just needed to vent a little about how challenging this stage is. I think that this post by Linda at All and Sundry really puts into words a lot of the frustration I am feeling about this stage: http://www.sundrymourning.com/2009/04/08/monster-babies/.

In other news, the movers come tomorrow. After tomorrow, we will be homeless. Luckily, my parents are kind enough to let us stay with them for the ten days that we are between homes. I think that moving in with Grandpa may be Jack's idea of the perfect living situation. He cries (CRIES, people!) every time my dad leaves. So the next ten days will be a little slice of heaven for the boy.

The Trouble with Learning to Walk--What People Don't Tell You

I've found the past six months with Jack to be more difficult than his first year. It mostly has to do with the whole walking thing. First, it was the learning to walk phase, where he was constantly teetering to what I feared would be certain death. Toddle, toddle, toddle, fall, cement, BAM! And repeat. I felt like I was living second to second, trying to predict the angle at which his body would most likely land and trying to place myself ahead of the fall.

I thought that it would get better when he was sturdier on his feet. What I didn't predict was that he would get faster. I know you are probably thinking to yourself--duh! But dude, I had NO IDEA! So, even though he's not falling every few seconds, he is darting out in front of traffic or running away from me in stores or generally being a pain in the a$$ to keep up with. It doesn't help that he never listens to me scream "Stop!" I'm just the lame-o mom who's trying to dampen his fun. The ingratitude for saving his life over and over again can get to me sometimes.

And I blame the walking for his growing sense of independence. No longer is he happy sitting in a stroller, roaming around the mall or letting me shop. In fact, I rarely pull out the stroller any more because it involves too much screaming and crying to get him in it. And that's just me, you should see him.

I know that these are all natural progressions, the milestones he is supposed to be hitting, but I'm finding it very challenging. This isn't to say that all of the progress he has made over the past six months is all unfun. I mean, the three month old Jack couldn't give me slobbery, wet kisses (atleast not intentionally). Nor could the three month old Jack try to sing "Ring of Fire" while dancing in the backseat of the car (which mostly just sounds like "Down, Down, Down, heahkc disi ciso").

I'm just looking forward to the day when I don't have to save his life every few minutes. Please tell me it gets easier.

Edited to Add: I just re-read what I wrote and I felt like I had to add that I love Jack completely. Each day, I look at him and I am in awe that he is mine--that this little ham-ball is mine. I just didn't want to leave anyone with the impression that I didn't love my little bear, even if he can be giant pain in the tushy.

Updates

Things have been pretty hectic here at Chez Jack. About three weeks ago we decided that we would put our house on the market to see if it would sell. With the market being what it is, we thought we might be able to get a good buy on a new home, but knew that we would probably have to be patient in the selling of our current home. Turns out we were completely wrong about how long it would take to sell our house. I don't know if it is a testiment to the popularity of our neighborhood, how we priced the home or how much time and effort my parents put into fixing up our house to sell, but we got an offer the first day that it was on the market. And now we have to be out of here by April 17th. Things are moving fast around here.

The same weekend we got an offer for our house, we put an offer in on a home near my parents. It's a brand new home, built as a spec home by the builder. We will double the amount of space that we have, not even counting the fact that the new house has a two car garage and about 1200 sqft of unfinished space in the basement. The downside will be that Terry will be adding probably a half hour on to his commute each way. We'll probably be getting a hybrid in the next few months in order for Terry to take advantage of the HOV lanes on 66 (although we know that will be temporary solution). Here's a pic of the new place:

As for updates with the little bear, he is becoming ever more opinionated. His new thing is controlling what we listen to in the car. For the past week, he has been obsessed with Johnny Cash. He'll listen to one sing ten times in a row, then will get sick of that song and will want to move onto another Johnny Cash song (which he has to listen to ten or twenty times in a row). I don't mind Ring of Fire or Walk the Line, but I do question whether I should let him put Folsom Prison Blues or the Cocaine Song on repeat. I'm sure that this is leading him to some future delinquency.

Well, I guess that's about all for now.