Life after cable

Before I married my husband, I had never had cable TV. My parents weren't that into TV; we didn't even have a television until I was almost a teen, and even then we used it mostly for watching movies. So when I lived on my own I didn't feel any need to fork over the fees for cable shows.

My husband has never not had cable, and so when we married he just kept his subscription and I enjoyed the luxury of watching TLC shows, NCIS reruns, and movies on demand.

Being parents had made us rethink some things—and I'm sure it will change our lives much more dramatically in the future. We opted to cancel cable TV. It's saving us a little bit, but mostly we cared about the character development of our little guy.

I'm not by any means saying you can't have hundreds of channels and raise kind, godly children. But for us, it was the best choice. We found ourselves watching shows with language and action that could be a detriment to Jack's little life—while he was in the room—and probably did nothing for us, either. Even commercials are pretty tasteless sometimes.

Anyway, this cutting off of cable came as a bit of a shock to the system when we were used to watching TV at night when we felt like doing nothing else, or in the morning to catch the news. The other day I came to the realization that the living room is pretty underutilized these days. It was an eye-opener to recognize that most of the time we spent there was consumed with TV.

In the past few days, we've rediscovered another item in the living room—our piano—and enjoyed making music as Jack pounds away at a few keys he's figured out how to reach. We didn't spend excessive time in front of the tube before, but we've been doing more reading, playing games, and talking. (Admittedly, we still watch a few favorite shows online—but that's also time we spend together since we make a point to do so rather than aimlessly channel surfing.)

We may head back to the land of cable someday. But for now, we like it here.

Nine months already?

It's hard sometimes to believe that little Jack has been growing, changing, and making us smile for nine months. On the move (crawling and pulling himself up to stand), he likes to get into everything. Despite the fact that we bought more toys for him, he still loves to grab onto the hot water heater, rip paper, pull CDs of the shelf, and get into other little bits of mischief. But he charms his way through it all (most of it, anyway) with a seven-toothed grin.

I love this little guy and am so blessed to be his mom.

Yes, I still scrapbook

I have to admit that my scrapbooking goal (get caught up on my albums) did not so much get accomplished before Jack was born. My intentions were glorious, but all the moms who warned me that it was highly unlikely to happen were absolutely spot on. (Feel free to say, "Told you so!")

After Jack popped his little head into the world, I spent entirely too long making baby announcements (they weren't super fancy, but it just took a while); in fact, the last ones were sent when he was three months old. Then I made two mini albums for each set of Jack's grandparents that feature pictures of his grandparents holding him when he was fresh and new, and his one-month portraits.

Currently I'm working on one more project (a surprise for someone so I can't say). I hope to finish it this weekend.

And then, at long last, I will try to get caught up (currently, I'm on December of 2007) so I can get on top of Jack's baby book. My goal is to at least start on it by the time he is a year old—and I hope sooner (even if I'm not totally caught up on my other albums). I'll try again to use this blog as a form of accountability for myself so I won't sidestep my goal this time.

We shall see...

Eight great months!

We celebrated Jack's eight months by going to a local park and seeing the animals there: deer, bighorn sheep, and bison. It was great fun and the park (a big tourist attraction) was very quiet since most of the attractions had closed down for the day. Even though it was rides-shutting-down time, the older man running the carousel said there was one more ride of the day and let Jack ride on it with Mommy.

Jack's big accomplishments this month were crawling (and he gets a little braver about exploring the house every day), standing (while holding onto something), and the pincer grasp (picking up finger food and getting it into his mouth). It's so much fun to see him grow and grow and grow...

Seven sweet months

Jack is enjoying all the holiday festivities during his seventh month. He's got five feisty little teeth (and one on the way), is steady sitting up, and pushing himself up on his hands and knees (but so far has only mastered going backward).

During an every-five-year photo shoot with my side of the family, the photographer took a few of him so we have even more precious pictures to treasure.