How to explain my children...

I've been thinking lately, actually for a couple months now,  about how I would explain my children to someone else.  How do you truly capture the personality of your children and then describe it to someone else in a way that does those little beings justice?  It's impossible, is the conclusion that I've come to, because unless you spend every waking second of every day with my children, you'll never understand them, but for posterity's sake I'm going to try.  I want to remember all their little foibles so that down the road, when they've grown and changed, I can remember who they were when they were 7 days short of turning 4 and 1 month short of turning two.

Madison:

- She's a little princess. She walks everywhere on her toes because "that's how princesses walk."  She's beautiful, not cute, because princesses are beautiful.  She wears dresses every day and she prefers pink ones.  Sleeping beauty is her favorite princess because Sleeping Beauty wears pink.  Everything she owns and everything she does must be beautiful.

- She NEVER, EVER, EVER stops asking questions.  I do not exaggerate when I say this.  She asks questions until I can't even listen anymore I'm so tired from trying to focus on explaining the world to her.  Then she says "mom, can you hear my voice?", which means, "mom, why aren't you paying attention to my every word."  It's exhausting and it tests the limits of my intellectual capacity, but it just shows that she's paying attention to the world around her and that's going to benefit her in the long run.

- She loves writing letters.  We send cards to people almost everyday.  She also loves to receive mail.  We have to check the mail everyday right around noon, just in case someone sent her a card or a "surprise".

- She's social.  She always wants someone to be in the room with her: me, Jaxon, Chris, or a friend.  She would have a friend to play every day if she could.   She always gets upset if I'm not around because she doesn't want to be "lonely".

- She's very helpful.  If she's in the right mood, she does a great job of being my little helper.  She likes to help get stuff for Jaxon and she's very capable of helping with chores around the house.  She gets excited when she gets to clean her bathroom (if only that would last :).  She even asks me "mom, what else can I do to help?" which of course makes me happy because I sure do need her help!

- She's very obedient.  I rarely have to put her in time out for disobedience.  She does sit in time out for whining and arguing, but she is very good at following the rules, which I appreciate because it means that I can trust her.  I'm completely comfortable letting her be downstairs watching a movie while I go upstairs and take a shower or lay down for a while.  I know she won't do something she's not supposed to do.

- She has a testimony.  I'm amazed on a regular basis how much Madison knows and understands the gospel, especially the Plan of Salvation.  We went through a couple of months where she was asking constant questions about death.  Today I was writing a letter to my grandma and Madison said "I want to write a letter to your grandpa."  I told her that my grandpa died a long time ago.  Madison said," That's okay, I'll just write him a letter and he can read it when he wakes up again."  Upon further questioning Madison informed me that when you die and wake up again it's called, "resurrective."  So at least she's got that part down, just maybe not the time frame.

Jaxon:

- Jaxon is my little comedian.  He knows when he's being funny and he will purposely put on a show to make others laugh.  Then he puts his hand over his mouth and says "I funny."

- He's a momma's boy.  Oh goodness, this kid is attached to me at the hip right now.  He wants to be with me no matter what I'm doing, and by be with me I mean he wants to be clinging to my person at all times.  He will sit on my feet while I make dinner and he always wants me to pick him up and carry him.

- He's a boy.  As much as Madison is a princess Jaxon is all boy.  He loves trucks, motorcycles (bikes), dinosaurs (dragons), balls, and sports.  He also loves to go under the overpasses on the freeway.  Whenever he sees an overpass coming he yells, "Mom, look, tunnel mom!"  Then he gets so excited that a "tunnel" is coming.

- He's a talker.  I thought that since he was my second child, and a boy, that Jaxon would talk later and would talk less than Madison.  I was actually hoping that this would be the case.  No such luck.  He talks just as much as Madison, and he has now started demanding attention and trying to speak over her.  This makes our home a very loud place sometimes!

- Jaxon is a fun little buddy.  I've really enjoyed the time I've been able to spend with him while Madison is at school.  Jaxon is just a good little guy to have around.  He likes to just be with me and do my thing. As long as we take our time and I can focus on him between errands he's pretty content to be my little friend.

Baby boy:

- The only thing I know about this next baby is that there is definitely a reason that he is coming to our family right now.  I've known since Jaxon was born that we were going to have another baby within the next two years.  I put it off as long as I could because I just never felt ready, but I think it's significant that the baby is due August 30, which means that Jaxon and he will only be 2 years apart in school.  I've always felt like that was important.  I've also always had a feeling that Jaxon had a brother coming.  So I don't know who needs who, but I do know that there is a definite reason that this little boy is coming to our family right at this time.  I look forward to meeting him.