Tricking and Treating

Happy Halloween all! Look at me! I'm an Old Time Golfer! Did you see my hat? I can't wait to get out there and get me some CANDY! I'm not really sure what this is all about, but Mom is pretty sure it'll only take a house or two to get me going. Do you think I look like Payne Stewart? Have a great day everyone, and I hope you all gain at least 5lbs in sugary sweetness.

Be the first with the most all of the time,

HAJ

Halloween Treats, That Look a Bit Trickey

We made Halloween cookies for me to take to school. As I said when Daddy told me that I was bringing these treats for the kids, "They're gonna love it!" We made witches, pumpkins, cats, and a haunted house from these cut outs that Brookie got for me. First we made the dough and cut out the shapes. Then popped them in the oven. We frosted them with all kinds of different colors. After that, and here's the cool part, these are special 3-D cookies that stand up when they're assembled. Some stood up perfectly, while others...not so much. They were a big hit and a lot of work. Good thing Halloween only comes once a year...but here comes Thanksgiving. I gotta go ask Mom if we can do turkey cookies next!

Home is where the heart is,

HAJ

Christmas Comes Early

Don't you just hate it when I leave for the weekend and don't tell you? I just pack up my garbage truck, my baseball bat, and my farm animals and hit the road. I spent the weekend visiting G&G E in South Dakota. It was an amazing weekend, and possibly a preview of what's to come. I sat down and watched Polar Express with Gma and I think a bit of the holiday spirit started rubbing off on Gpa.

For example, see that yellow dump truck behind me? He took me to the toy store (see new jacket) and I got to pick out anything I wanted. Then when we got home, Gpa brought out this tractor. AND before I could get bored of that, he brought out this train set. Although, I know Gpa, and he loves trains, so I think he loves this as much as me! Mom told Gpa he should have saved those things for Christmas, and he said, "What are you talking about? Its not Christmas!" Gotta love Gpa.

Saturday-night special,

HAJ

2nd Boggy-versary

Happy 2nd Bloggy-versary to me! Can you believe I've been telling you about my life almost everyday for two years now? I thought I'd celebrate by revisiting a few of my favorite photos from the past year.

Remember when my cousins came to visit this summer? And when Patrick and I went riding on a train. How about the mini-JUGGS reunion? I loved the day when my gammy and grandpa Jack took me to the track. Or when my grandma and grandpa took me to the golf course for lunch. There was also the week up nort', and the bocce ball tournament. I better throw one in there with Mommy, or she'll be mad.

Thanks for hangin' with me, and I'm looking forward to see what this year will bring!

Stand on your own two feet,

HAJ

Secret Messes

I made my first secret mess the other day. You know one of those messes that kids make when the parents aren't looking, and they come upon a scene like this. And then, as their brains are trying to compute what happened they see this. They're finally putting things together when they look in here. And then soon after notice this. Which leads to a little investigation and they found it here. They should be thankful it was relatively easy to clean up. Now, where did I see that chocolate syrup?

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,

HAJ

Fall Classic

Month 28 Archives

Dear Henry,

Happy 28th months! To be honest and true, I never thought we'd make it this far. I don't know why, I just didn't. I got all wrapped up in you being a baby, and never considered that you might grow up, feed yourself, and have a conversation with me.

There's so much to tell you about this month, so the list might be all over the place as many of these don't relate to each other. You know what? I'm just going to go with bullet points. They're easy to read and easy to change the subject.

• I can't believe it, but you told Daddy about our dirty little secret. You know, how I give you a sucker when I pick you up from Nini's house? One day Daddy picked you up, and you asked for a sucker and told him that Mommy has suckers. Honey, these are things you gotta keep to yourself or we could all be up a creek one day.
• Which brings me to your brutal honesty. I just love how you don't know about lying yet. You come and get me every time you make a mess or spill or break something. "Mommy, come wook what I did. Mommy, I bwoke dat." If you tell me about it, I don't get mad. Maybe that will cut down on the lying for the future.
• Lately, and this is mostly my fault, you don't want to come eat dinner with us at the table like a proper family. We, as an improper family, enjoy eating in front of the TV, mostly on Sundays. So when Monday's roll around, you want to eat in front of the TV. But we don't allow it, so you end up in time out. After 2 minutes, you're thrilled about eating dinner at the table. Its a crazy ritual that I hope ends soon.
• You love babies. You hug, kiss, feed, and want to carry and hold the new baby at Nini's house. She said she's not ever seen a boy your age be so loving to a baby. If you're trying to hint at something.....get over it.
• When you first meet someone who you aren't familiar with, you get shy. Which is fine. But if they try to talk to you, you holler at them. This is not cool. For example, auntie Jodi was trying to make friendly conversation with you about your truck, and you yelled "YOU DON'T HAVE IT!" and then you made the stink face. Its going to be really hard to make friends if you keep that one up. So stop it.
• And probably your new favorite thing in the universe is watching the movie Racing Stripes. "I wanna watch horsie racing!" You'll watch it 100 times in a row if we'd allow it. Which we don't. We're heading to TX in the next few weeks....just you wait to see what we have planned for you.

Another great month Baby Bear. We've got a lot of exciting things coming up with travel and the holidays. Its going to be so interesting to see you on an airplane now that you kind of know what's going on, and to see you with Santa. You're already starting to talk about him and you like to go look at the Christmas decorations at Target (already). Watching you awaken and become aware of your surroundings is such a blast, I don't want to miss a thing.

Loves, Mama

Child Labor

Over the weekend Mom violated child labor laws and hired Andrew and Ethan from next door to rake the yard. They were raking their own yard, so she offered them a pretty penny to come and work on ours. Works out pretty good for me...so far.

I'm fine as frog's hair,
HAJ

I Heart Palmer

I love Palmer. He's my best pal. We always have so much fun when we're together. He likes to sit by me on the couch. And I don't mind it one bit. I just snuggle right on in, and try to enjoy his company. Because if there's anything I'm good it, its sharing.

Honest as the day is long,
HAJ

Has He Converted?

The final stop on our trip included a stop in the beautiful New Ulm, MN to see my great gpa and gma W. They just moved into new digs, and Gpa rides around in a SCOOTER. I know. So I really liked that, and then I started telling Gpa about how I like baseball, and how I like the Twins and all that. Well, what I'm about to show you is very rare and may be worth a serious amount of ching one day. My gpa...the HUGEST Yankee fan EVER....in a Twins hat. Shhh, don't tell him I showed you. He swore me to secrecy. I'm sure the Yankee gods are not happy.

Slicker than snot on a doorknob,
HAJ

Hugs All Around

When we were in SD, we stayed with my great auntie Jodi and uncle Butch. Although I like to refer to him as "auntie Butch", and he seems cool with that. My great gma and gpa J came over for a visit too, along with my cousin Jerid and his cute girlfriend Ashley. Here's a glimpse into how we spend out time during our visits. Exciting stuff huh? Whenever we go see them, (or anyone for that matter), my parents always make me go around the room and say good bye to everyone and give them a hug. I pretend I'm shy, but deep down I love this ritual. See.....here's Jodi, and here's Jerid, and my favorite is Ashley.

Thanks again to the SD clan for putting up with us for the weekend! We just love visiting you guys and get ready because we'll be back before ya know it!

Keeping on top of things,
HAJ

Dreams Do Come True

I kinda left ya hangin' didn't I? Sorry about that. We went on your bi-annual world tour of South Dakota, and well, maybe someday they'll come into the 2000's and get Internet access. Maybe.

Take a look at that picture up there people! HOG HEAVEN! Daddy took me out to my uncle Severt's farm and I not only got to ride the tractor, I DROVE the tractor too. Severt has a fancy GPS system on the tractor and it pretty much drives itself, so Daddy and Severt chit chatted, and I DROVE. And when I say tractor, I mean TRACTOR. Check this out! The tires are taller than my dad. (And we all know how my dad's nickname is Stretch.) It was so exciting, that I actually fell asleep on the way back to the city. Mark it in my top 3 best days ever.

Stay tuned for more updates from another great weekend in SD.

Cry uncle,

HAJ

Auntie Chris' Birthday

Happy Birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday auntie Chriiiiiiiissss! Happy birthday to you!

Love, HAJ (Was I ever that small?)

Gobble Gobble

Have you guys heard of those turkey fryers that you fill with something like 3 gallons of oil and then put it on your deck, and then in about an hour or so your house bursts into flames? But the kicker with those is, the turkey that comes out of them is so moist and yummy and deliciouso, that its almost worth burning your house down. Well, I think we found ourselves a happy medium. This weekend we bought what's called the Big Easy. Its an oil-less turkey fryer, and uses infrared technology to cook yer bird. Its way more healthy, and gives you super moist meat. Here's what she looks like. Here's the bird when you first put it in the pot. Then Mom lost track and forgot to take more pictures, but trust me, it looked like this when we pulled it out only about 90 minutes later. Then we shredded it, popped it in the crock pot with some spices, broth, and the drippings from cooking it. It was excellent! Let us know when you wanna stop by and we'll infrared one right up for ya!

Duck soup,

HAJ

Bump Watch 08-09 - Week 16

I will stop using the banana pictures after today, I just had one more to use up and now we're done. OK, jeez.

Here's auntie Chris at officially 16 weeks along. Not too much different than last week, but see that little bump right by the door knob? Yeah that one. That's usually not there, and from what they tell me, that's my cousin. It sure looks a lot different than my other cousins!?

A rose by any other name is still a rose,

HAJ

New Location

If you look very closely, that's me taking a little snoozer on the couch. Mom did a little experiment and let me take a nap on the couch. Not sure its a good idea or not, but she thinks maybe I should learn to sleep other places besides my bed. Well, it worked. I actually slept for 2.5 hours while Mom was right in the kitchen futzing around. And best of all, I don't throw that "I don't wanna take a nap" fit this way!

Que sera, sera,
HAJ

Getting My Ears Lowered

Today I went to see Miss Kelly and get my haircut. This is probably somewhere around the 5th or 6th haircut I've had. But today marks the first time I've gotten my hair cut and I DID NOT CRY. I was very excited about not crying, and I'm telling everyone how I didn't cry. Not during the trimmer. Not during the combing. Not during the Spiker. The best part is the end when I get a sucker and a sticker.

Knock the socks off,
HAJ

Only Bananas

Today is another exciting day with my mother. We'll run around doing errands like getting her a new battery for her cell phone, taking her new jeans to get hemmed, going to the grocery store to get food for only her to eat because she never feeds me anything but bananas. OK, that's not true, but I just thought try to make it like look its all about her, plus I'm holding a banana.

Like the pot calling the kettle black,
HAJ

Should We Play Baseball?

In case you don't know who my favorite team is, I thought I'd clear things up. I bid farewell to the Minnesota Twins, and tip my hat to a fine season. It was sad to watch the last game of the year last night. Mom and Dad even let me stay up to watch the whole game. They thought maybe I was a little good luck charm. Its too bad its ending now, I was just getting into it. I ask to watch baseball every night and I love to hit balls with my bat (Dad just ordered me a baseball tee...supposed to get it tomorrow...I'm DYING). After I hit the ball, I toss my bat and run around the bases yelling GO TWINS! GO TEAM! I hope I don't forget everything by the time spring training rolls around.

Up to scratch,
HAJ