Thoughts from Papa...

I've been meaning to put into words some thoughts about our sweet Jakob. This may go kind of randomly but I hope you enjoy this...

Things Jakob Loves....

Jakob loves story time at night. Each night when we put him to bed he asks for a couple of things. First he needs his blanket. He doesn't ask for it now days, but it is just a given. Next he needs Rexy, his stuffed t-rex. This is becoming his best friend, like "Hobbes" from "Calvin and Hobbes" After Jakob tucks Rexy in bed, he then needs his water bottle. That is something he has had for years. Then lastly he asks for a story and rhyming time. If papa tells the story it is something I make up, if it is mama then she reads a story. These days it 50/50 if he gets a story. If Mama and Papa are too tired or he just got done doing some other type of family time we skip that part. Then we have Rhyming time. Simply we take turns telling the other a word and letting the other try to figure out a word that rhymes with it. Some of the most popular words we do are "red and bed" "toes and nose" "dinosaurs and ???" "triceratops and ???" "super fast jet plane with guns and ????" Jakob loves challenging me with hard words. :)

Jakob loves dinosaurs.

He especially likes them when it involves one devouring, killing, hunting, sneaking up, fighting, or growling at another dinosaur. He will set up a little "village" of dinosaurs. Sometimes several are just standing around. Other times there will be one standing around with several sneaking up on it. And lastly there will be huge battles between the dinosaurs. Some of his favorite shows are Jurassic Park (yes I gave in and watched it with him), Walking with dinosaurs, Chased by dinosaurs, dinotopia...you get the idea.

Jakob loves Jets.

The faster, the higher they fly, the more missiles they have the better they are... He will often ask, "what jet is faster?" "Who is going to win?" He will often fly jets all over the house. Yesterday a sr71 and a coast guard helicopter where racing. It was a close race... Oft times the jets will hunt dinosaurs. Sometimes they win and sometimes they get eaten...

Jakob loves competition.

"Who is going to win...?" This is a very common phrase. It will often be finished with "to the light switch, to the potty, to bed, to the door, to the car, to sleep, to the table..." Sometimes it is annoying. We will ask Jakob can you go turn off the light? He will ask Who is going to win. We will say he is because I'm resting my tired feet. He then will get sad no one will race him and therefore won't turn it off. But it also helps at bed time. He may say he doesn't get ready for bed, but then we say that we are going potty and he will race and win to the potty. Then we ask who is going to turn of the lights first, who is going to his room first, who is going to get in their pajamas first...and before he knows it he got ready for bed and thrilled because he won with all the races.

Jakob loves family time and family home evening.

Jakob can get bored at home. His little brother is too young to play much with and therefore must spend most the day at home with just mama and papa. He is constantly asking us to go play with him or at nights he says we need to have family home evening. He just loves spending time with us. We enjoy this, but the same time after working all day and needing to do school work it can be hard with him grabbing us saying "Come see, come play, come!!!" We love playing with him, but sometimes we just are tired and tell him to go play by himself.

Some of our routines.

On weekends or when I'm home when he wakes up normally before us I will take him back to his room turn on the light, give him some food and take him potty then let him play quietly for another hour or so as we rest. He normally does really good and I can get some more sleep. He will finally come out and ask if its morning time and will ask for a family hug. He knows if he gets a family hug we are walking up and we will be up soon.

Jakob's sleeping habits.

Night lights...right now he is up to 3 nights light that change colors. (I like the changing colors...) Then he has to has some music playing or some kind of quiet sounds playing. Then a fan. Right now his room has a ceiling fan running all night. Waking up...

As mentioned Jakob has night terrors. Sometimes he won't have one for several weeks and then he will get several a night for a while. When it happens Lena or I get up and try to talk with him and tuck him back in. It can make for long nights...we just get to sleep and he starts crying...we get up tuck him and lay back in bed...he starts crying before we've rolled over....tuck in...we make it to sleep....1/2 latter starts crying............

Jakob is very sweet right now....not always listening...but very sweet. I guess that is typical for a 4 year old.

Well I'm out of ideas at the moment but I will try more in the near future.

Papa