This and That

The Winn family has been a little bit sick lately, so there have been a lot of sniffly noses and coughing, and today poor little Jenna has been throwing up about every half hour since 6 am. But that hasn’t kept them from enjoying the Halloween season. Lix thought long and hard about this year’s costumes and finally decided on a pair of M&Ms. Jenna is green and Bo is blue. I will go ahead and point out that the costumes are hand-made by Lix, from the dying of the clothes to the application of the Ms to the construction of Jenna’s tutu. So hats off to her. (Halloween pics to come!)

Just a shot from Jenna's photo shoot.

The other October staple is the trip to the pumpkin patch. The patch they visited was about 40 minutes away from home and was actually two patches that border one another. They realized it was two distinct operations after parking in the one that had free parking and charged for rides. Then they had to jump the fence over to the one that charged for parking and had free rides. Earlier in his life Jarom would have thought that this was a great plan. But with Jenna and Lix and Bo in his stroller, he would have rather just paid the few dollars for parking. Jenna had a pretty good time at the patch, even though it felt more like August than October. There were bounce houses to jump on, lots of pumpkins and scarecrows to look at, a tractor pulled train to go on, and a pony that wanted to be ridden. They stuck around for a few hours, Lix tried her hardest to get a picture of her children that she was satisfied with, and on the way home they stopped at the grand opening of the Costco next door to get some pizza and a hot dog.

Jenna and her pony, Poco.

We also experienced a pretty fierce Texas thunderstorm last week. The rain and hail pounding on the tin roof over the back porch woke Lix up in the middle of the night, and the frequent lightning and loud thunder kept her up for a little while. In the morning as everyone was getting ready for church Jarom noticed that one section of the backyard fence had been blown over, so he had to get Nate to stop by and help him get it back up.

Jenna posing on the steps

Jenna has continued to do pretty well with the potty training, mostly thanks to the strong encouragement she gets from her mother. On day 3 or so of the training, Alixa decided that Jenna knew what she was doing and that there needed to be some negative consequences to going to the bathroom in her panties. So the cold bath rule was instituted. Whenever Jenna fails to use the toilet, she has to take a cold bath. Lix figured that she was going to have to wash her off anyway, so she might as well make it an unpleasant experience. Depending on the face you are making right now as you read this, you may or may not believe the faces that people have made at her as she tells them about her method, but you can’t argue with the results. She has only had to take 3 cold baths, and she definitely tries her hardest to avoid them. For his part, Jarom says that cold water never hurt anyone, except those guys who had to carry people across the frozen Mississippi river. He had to take cold showers for two years in Peru and it turned out okay for him. Feel free to tell Alixa what a bad mother she is, but know that she isn’t going to change for you.

Jenna doin' her business. Like father, like daughter.

Speaking of Lix, she has started going to the gym again with the kids. We originally got a membership at 24 hour fitness, but the daycare there was pretty shabby, so we switched to the Frisco Athletic Club and are very pleased with the decision. Lix has also been pretty active on our new grill, the one that came with the house. She is excited to expand her cooking repertoire and Jarom enjoys the addition of grilled things into his menu. She also spends a lot of her time complaining about how bad her fantasy football team is this year. This is mostly because after week one Jarom tried to give her Fred Jackson and Calvin Johnson in exchange for Chris Johnson, and she declined. I apologize for that last sentence, because I know that none of you care about the Winn’s fantasy teams, but years from now when Jarom reads this he will snicker.

Jenna loves to bake things for her daddy. I think its because she likes to take licks from the bowl. We made him coffee cake. She loved the brown sugar topping!

Now that things are starting to get settled in and in a routine Lix has started asking about home improvement projects. There are several rooms that she wants to paint, and some landscaping that she wants to change. Also there is one addition to the family that Jenna keeps asking about. When we were all still in Richmond Lix told Jenna that when we moved to Texas she could get a kitty and a purple room. Well she has latched onto those ideas so strongly that I’m not sure she really believes that she is in Texas yet. She has decided that she would like a blue kitty, but that a yellow one would also be acceptable. It will be named Beartoy, and it will be sooo nice. So one of these days I guess there will be another pet in the house. I’m not thrilled about cats, but I hear they keep to themselves, so I suppose I can handle it.

For some reason, Jenna loves to lounge on our stairs. On this day, her baby needed to lounge too.

And now a story from Lix:
A couple times a week, I take the kids on a jog to the park that is close to our house. Jenna often wants to run with me, and usually ends up running about a mile. She runs the whole time, never getting tired. It is actually quite amazing. Today on our run, she fell down and skinned both of her knees. They were bleeding and she was a little sad, and so she rode in the stroller for about four seconds until she wanted to run again. When we got home, I asked if she wanted a band aid to put on her booboos. I didn’t want her bleeding on the couches. She said yes, so I brought over two band aids and started to put them on her cuts. She started crying because she thinks that band aids on her booboos will hurt them. Instead, she asked if I could put them on her arms. So, for the cuts on her knees, she has band aids on her arms, and she insists that now they feel better. Silly girl.

Quotes

Alixa falls down.
Jenna: Are you okay mommy? It’s okay that you fell. Don’t cry. Don’t cry about it mommy. Just be a big girl, and don’t cry.
(Note from Alixa – I wasn’t actually crying)

Alixa: Jenna you need to listen, you are driving me crazy!
Jenna: (crying) No! I just want to drive you crazy!

Jenna loves to try on Lix's shoes. On this day she came out and said, "Look mommy, ice cream cone shoes!"

Most of Bo's recent pics are in the last post, but here is one more just to prove that it isn't all about Jenna.