These two...

When Austin is home she gets to be the queen, it just kind of works out that way.  Both Tyler and Jackson look up to her so much that they allow her to run the place.  So when Austin is at school it has become very interesting to watch these two develop their own relationship.

Here they are according to Jackson playing kind of the mountain and according to Tyler flying away on a rocket ship.

Look at the level of concentration on those faces while they put their Sea Monkeys in the water.  I have got to get better at pulling out special projects - these were a gift from Uncle Wells two Christmas' ago and we just now did them because Joe saw them in the storage closet.

Here is the beginning of Austin's tooth coming out.  As you can see it was definitely ready to come out an after waiting all day for it to magically fall out she eventually had to be restrained and have it yanked out before bed time.  All I could think is how hard it would be to be a nurse in a hospital, Joe and I could just over ride her and make a decision whereas those poor nurses must convince you that something is a good idea.   By the end of the day she could spin it around in her mouth and it still didn't come out, I still have no idea what was holding it in place.

The difference...

Everyone always tells us that Jackson just has a passion for life that they haven't seen in other kiddos.  I used to just smile and shrug it off thinking to myself that clearly they hadn't been around a toddler in a while and they are all this happy.  Then last time I was hanging out with my new little niece it hit me.  When we had Austin (much like Summer is now) she was an only child, her life was quiet and content and if she "played" anything it was due to us showing her a toy or something of the sort.  Then we had Tyler two years later and Austin while a great big sister was still pretty small herself and couldn't really do a lot with her.  Obviously then we took 3 and half years off from Tyler to Jackson.  Now both of his big sisters do a lot of things, they go to school, they dress themselves, they sing, chew gum, buckle themselves in...the list goes on.  Basically in a 1 year old's head these are two super heroes who also LOVE to be around him.  His zest for life comes from being completely smothered in attention by two parents and two super heroes.

If Jackson finds a blanket anywhere in the house he will lay it on the ground and then lay down on it and snuggle.  Which will prompt Tyler to then scratch his back because that's what big sisters do. :-)

Wow, that's a lot of snow.

We are just coming out of a huge snow storm, in fact the girls have been out of school for three days in a row due to it - which of course you will never hear me complain about.  You know what my favorite thing about having the girls home so much is...they turn into kids again.  The other kids in their classes all speak like teenagers and our girls inevitably pick up on it, but within a couple of days of just having each other they are back to the 4 and 6 year old girls they should be.

We knew we were going to get a big storm roll in, so we took the last nice day on Saturday and went to the zoo with Gram.  It turns out that the wind was already blowing so we didn't spend too much time there but it was still fun.

And there's the new little girl growing away.

Jackson's favorite part was lunch afterwards.

And here comes the snow...this is Monday afternoon notice the table in the background.

And by Monday night look at the table disappearing.  I think we probably got close to two feet of snow that we are still digging out from.

I wish I would have gotten a better picture of this, or maybe a video.  I heard this wonderful sound of three children laughing and no one crying so when I went into the playroom I found Austin and Tyler had put Jackson in their baby doll stroller and were giving him rides around while he squealed in delight.  See...magically five days at home and we are back to kiddos!