Caleb's first words and Andrew's column

Esther and I had the great opportunity to go to CCD Women's Conference, a gathering of all sorts of women from Nazarene churches located throughout Central California. During my day and a half away, I received numerous text messages from my wonderful husband, documenting our younger son, Caleb's, progress learning the English language. These are a few of the short narratives I received:

"I asked Caleb 'do you have poo poo?' he patted his diaper and said 'pee pee'. Sure enough, only pee. He is learning."

"Caleb just patted his diaper and said poo poo. Guess what is what full of?"

Later on in the day, I received another text message regarding our older son, Andrew. Now, you've got to understand how Andrew sounds when he talks, the way he does things, and how he... is. Generally. Sometimes, he's just a regular kid. Other times, I swear he's got a 16 year old hidden away in that Ethiopian frame of his, one that lisps, skips and does combo spin-frog-jump-cartwheel maneuvers all of the carpet and sometimes even the walls. This is the texts message I got about our little Space Cadet:

"Asked Andrew if he and his friends talk about ben 10 (one of Andrew's new favoritest cartoons). He said yes. I asked if they talk about ben 10 ellien force (Jimmy spelled alien wrong on purpose, but that's another story). He said "that's part of the ben 10 column, dad."

I can just imagine his look of total disdain, entailing that we are supposed to know these kinds of things. I mean, gosh, we watch Ben 10 ALL the time. Duh. Sheesh.

Another video post!!

This is a video of the first time that Andrew held Caleb (in the hospital, the day after he was born).

WARNING: I didn't upload this to YouTube. I uploaded it to Dailymotion, because they have a better video format and better quality. You must have a browser that supports HTML5 in order to view. This includes: Firefox 3.5 (or higher), Google Chrome 3.0.182.2 (or higher), or Opera. You can use Internet Explorer or older versions of Firefox with the VLC plugin.

Andrew Holds Caleb First Time
Uploaded by hansonjrs. - Explore more family videos.

More Videos

Here are a couple more videos of the kids.

Videos of the Kids

Here are some older videos of the kids.

Stove-top admiration

While I'm cleaning the stove today, Andrew (busy as ever building Lego Star Wars characters and "doing his business" on LegoClub.com and LegoShop.com) peers up from his reverie and exclaims quietly: "You're good!" I thank him sheepishly and continue on my crusade against cooked on gunk. A few moments later, he peers up again and states: "You're fast!" I laugh and ruffle his hair. No matter how hard I am on him, Andrew retains a sweetness and easy-going manner that just can't be beat. He's what I like to call a-good-husband-in-the-making!

"If you're not inspired by your kids, you need to spend more time with them!"

- Jackie's Vietnamese proverb

After I get done cleaning my lovely food-maker, I retreat to the Bat Cave (i.e. my room). Minutes following, Andrew clunks over to my door holding a large Sterilite container with a few handfuls of Legos. "The computer's all for you, Ma." he alerts me, signalling that he is done with Legoshop/Legoclub.com for the day. Harkens me back to the days when he first moved in and he told Alex with much grown-upness, one fine day on the phone, "Just a minute" as he balanced the horn between his shoulder and ear in order to free up his hands.

VBS in the insane Central Valley heat

This week, Andrew and I participated in the annual Vacation Bible School, hosted by Nancy, the head of the children's department for Hanford Church of the Nazarene. Our theme was "Custom Garage", so last Sunday, Nancy and I got together at her house and previewed some of the videos and music that were part of the daily lessons for the week ahead, conjurred up some crafting and food ideas (piggy banks out of recycled plastic bottles, doodling a la Ed Emberly style, hot dogs, smores, etc.) and going over things in general, although we couldn't really figure out what to do with our theme. Sadly, I wasn't able to help much besides that Sunday, Monday and Friday as someone short and chubby cannot miss his nappy time, but Andrew had a blast being with other people his age and size and energy level (ha ha!).

All week long, the kids worked hard at memorizing songs such as "Custom Built Heart" and versese such as Luke 4:1-3 and Mark 12:28-34. Initally, Andrew was a little bit of a wallflower, but he eventually blossomed with the other girls and boys, trully singing and following along with all the motions on the video. That was all good and fun, but the real fun was to be had at the end of each day when all 10 of the kids (count 'em!) got to cool off in Nancy's pool; a veritable chlorine stew arms and legs cooking in the dry 100 degree heat. I was pleasantly surprised at how much Andrew seemed to enjoy doing the activities, thriving on the interaction with the other kids. When all was said and done, everybody left VBS with awesome tans and God in their hearts.

This Sunday rolled around and although I was in charge of the nursery for the day, Jimmy came to see our son perform with his contemporaries. I'm sure it was a heart felt performance that brought the house down, a fun, new dimension to add to our already lively Sunday service. Don't have any pictures, but will have some to upload soon, so keep checkin' us out!

Tiger Cub Graduation

Last week (Saturday, June 6), Andrew graduated from Tiger Cubs in Cub Scouts and moved on to Wolf Scouts. The graduation was at Adventure Park, and the boys raced their Raingutter Regattas before the graduation. Here are some pictures of the fun times they had.

Totoro

Last night, Andrew and Caleb were watching one of their favorite movies, "My Neighbor Totoro." I went into the room, and saw a picture-perfect moment to depict how "into" movies these boys get.

Something to Start With

In the past month, we have had some fun with Andrew's birthday, and Andrew's Cub Scout Night at Chukchansi Park, watching the Fresno Grizzlies play the Portland Beavers. Here are some pictures of the events.


We had Andrew's birthday party at the local park, and many of his friends came. He was happy to get a lot of Bakugan, Transformers, Lego, and Star Trek gifts.

The following week, Andrew's Cub Scout pack, as well as many others in the area, went to Chukchansi Park in Fresno to watch the Fresno Grizzlies beat the Portland Beavers 5-1.

Welcome

Hey everyone,

Welcome to Jimmy and Jackie's new blog page.

We will periodically be posting pictures and news of what is going on in our lives. and the lives of the kids, Andrew and Caleb.