Zachary turns TWO!

For those of you expecting monster truck party details, sorry...this is not the post about Zachary's party. Also, for anyone who reads my posts through email this one has a lot of videos so you may want to just go to the site: www.mtmzjones.blogspot.com

July 1st, 2009 Happy 2nd Birthday, Zachary Frederick!

Our birthday tradition is to hang streamers from the birthday child's doorway the night before so that when he wakes up he knows it is a special day! Plus, they are just fun to run through.
Here's the first of many videos:


This next video is only 2 seconds long, but I promise you it's worth watching. At first you may be shocked, but the more you watch the funnier it becomes.

So, I've appropriately titled that video "Streamer Smack Down" (Zachary recovered quickly. It really did sound worse than it actually was.)

Before Mikie woke up, Zachary and I enjoyed some one on one time. He was being so silly with this stick horse. When you ask him what a horse says, he replies "NEIGH, (and then makes a raspberry sound by spitting).

He grabbed the counting bears off the shelf and I was so surprised to watch him start sorting them all on his own as you'll see in this video:

In this video: He can count to 13 before the record hits a scratch:



Poor little Zachary woke up with watery eyes and a stuffy nose (which later turned into a sinus and ear infetion) Here he is with his birthday pancakes while I sang Happy Birthday in this video:


Mikie had 4 hours of camp every morning this week, so after dropping him off, Zachary and I went to Toys R Us. He picked out a set of 3 new monster trucks that he just had to have opened before we left the store. Here he is playing with them in the Toys R Us checkout line.


Video: Once Daddy came home, we let him open one of his gifts: A remote control Grave Digger


Video: Daddy also bought him more monster trucks.


Imagine this song when you see the next picture: "It's my birthday and you can cry if you want to"

Yeah, Mikie woke up from his nap a little grouchy, but the clouds were rolling in so we had to make the big reveal of the ride on Grave Digger happen quickly. The initial reaction wasn't what we expected: Zachary didn't want to sit in it and Mikie had to be bribed with a popsicle to drive. Once they were both in, it didn't take long for them to enjoy it.

What's under the cover?

GRAVE DIGGER

Video: OFF WE GO!

Video: more Grave Digger fun

Once we parked it in the garage, Zachary decided he would like a turn to drive it. So, we pulled it back out and put him in the driver's seat. He loved pushing the pedal but wouldn't touch the steering wheel, so Michael cranked it all the way to the right which allowed him to go around our cul-de-sac many times.

Before the rain hit, we made it to Chick-Fil-A...

for some birthday ice cream.

Health Status: Zachary is still very tiny only weighing 20 lbs exactly on his 2nd birthday. He is in the 10th percentile for height so he is growing, just not gaining weight. Our pediatrician thinks that he may have a casein sensitivity so he is on a non-dairy/casein free diet for at least one month (probably longer). She believes that the casein (milk protein) is causing him to have more ear and sinus infections and could be the reason he isn't gaining weight. Looking back over the past year, I can say that I am starting to agree with her. Before finding out that Zach was allergic to milk and eggs he had several ear infections and started to slip off of the charts for his weight. Once we discovered the allergy and restricted his diet for 6 months he started gaining weight again and the ear infections cleared up. After he was declared allergy free, I reintroduced milk and cheese in hopes to "beef him up" and we started our 3 months of traveling the world where Zachary once again fell prone to ear and sinus infections and showed no weight gain. Which leads us all to believe that even though he is no longer "allergic" to milk it is still affecting him in negative ways. He's been on the casein free diet for a little over a week now and I can say that he seems a lot happier and maybe even a little bit hungrier.

Abilities Update: What Zachary lacks in size, he definitely makes up for in personality. He is independent, strong willed, and easily frustrated (sound like anyone we know?). He is also very verbal, but not always understandable. He knows all his colors, some shapes, some letters, some numbers (amazingly one of them is the number 8....just like Mikie), and can tell you the names of every single monster truck we own...which is around 30 or more. He absolutely loves to sing and remembers how the melodies go even if we can't always understand his words. He is about 75% potty trained and is already refusing to wear the pull ups whenever we go out (which means I now carry a potty in my car).