The Deckers

A Much Needed Family Visit!

2012-01-27T11:33:00.001-07:00

I have been so anxious to visit my family for a long time! I booked a trip awhile back to visit my family in Maryland in January, and the plan was for me to take Blake by himself so I could get a little vacation from Jacob and he could spend the weekend with his dad at home. In the end though I felt bad about not bringing Jacob since I knew my family would love to see him again since he's at a fun age, and I knew he'd love to see all them, especially all my sisters. Sooo, even though it ruined my idea of actually getting a nice break, I knew my family would gladly volunteer to help with the kids, so I worked it out to get standby flights instead and brought both the boys with me. So really, everybody wins! Except Luke, who got left at home alone. Sorry! But I'm so glad I brought them both! It was well worth it and we all had a great visit!

We flew in on a Thursday afternoon, and the boys did fairly well on the flight, sleeping majority of the time- minus the 10 minutes towards the end where Blake loudly fussed before eating for the third time and falling asleep a second time. But from the moment we got to the house, these boys were suffocated by their aunts- in a good way :)

Here's Blake with Andrea. And Jacob associated Andrea with dancing since she always had her itouch with her and so he had a good time dancing with her a lot, and using her itouch to watch Tangled.
And conveniently Andrea got this awesome playhouse for Christmas so Jacob had a blast playing in it with everyone. I'll even admit, that house was pretty cool. I can see why a 14 year old would specifically ask for that for Christmas haha.

Erika especially loved to be with her nephews spending every waking second playing with them and taking off two days of work so that she could spend the whole long weekend with us. Jacob adored Erika as well and they had so much fun playing together! Their favorite game was to play 'bedtime' and Erika would be the baby and Jacob would play the mom, and put her to sleep in his bed, haha it was too cute. I loved how they could spend hours playing together and I was able to hand over the kids and get a small break!
Friday I decided I wanted to go to Fuddruckers for lunch since all the ones in Denver already shut down. Tyler, Erika, and Julia came along, and while they weren't as impressed with their food, I love the burgers there and miss having one near us! And Jacob had himself a good time running around the restaurant looking at the arcade games, he would hardly sit and eat. As everyone often tells me, I guess I obviously have my hands full... Needless to say, after our lunch excursion, all three of them shook their heads and said they didn't know how I do it every day with both those kids. Haha, me neither.
Anyway, Friday night we all stayed home, ate pizza, played games and sat by the fire. Love it. Saturday for lunch I had my best girl friends from home over for lunch- Amy and Katie! I literally can't make a visit home without seeing them, it's great to always catch up and see them!
After my friends left, I put my tired boys to bed and went shopping for a bit with Erika and Andrea. That night we sat around watching a movie and then had a thorough discussion of it afterwards, haha. Then Sunday we went to church and snapped a couple pictures real quick beforehand.

After church, I took the boys straight down to Luke's grandma's house in McLean, VA since all Luke's family out there was getting together for dinner. I was really happy that I could see a lot of extended family that I hadn't seen in awhile, meet a new cousin just married in, and visit with everyone else all together. Jacob even had some new cousins to play with and were great in sharing all their fun toys with him. It's funny to see other kids with the exact same obsessions as Jacob: Buzz Lightyear, Lightening McQueen, and Thomas the Tank Engine. That pretty much sums it up.
Monday was Martin Luther King Day so I was lucky that everyone either already had the day off or were able to easily take the holiday off so that we could spend the day all together and go down to DC.
We decided to drive down instead of taking the metro so we could limit walking around in the cold, and it was actually a fun drive. Erika taught us a Martin Luther King song that she heard the kids singing at one of her elementary schools in Baltimore. It wasn't even really a song since the only line she knew was, "Martin Luther King was a great, great man!" But the way Erika sang it so reverently was hilarious and we ended up singing it all weekend since we couldn't get the tune out of our heads! Then we tried to think of any other patriotic song we knew that we could sing for the holiday and as we were driving slowly along the sights downtown, my mom tried to be sneaky and roll down the window of our 12-seater van so everyone could hear us obnoxiously singing "50 Nifty United States" while we bumbled down the street. It was actually pretty fun, haha.

We walked around the river for a little bit and then let Jacob play on the playground there for a few minutes, until he tripped and split his lip open for the second time in two days. Ah, poor guy.

Then we went over to the Jefferson Memorial, and I'm embarrassed to say I don't think I've ever been over to it before, at least not that I remember. It's pretty right there on the water though, and has lots of nice views.

From the Jefferson Memorial we could see the new Martin Luther King Memorial and it was packed for the holiday, so we didn't head over but it was good enough seeing it across the river and as we drove by.
Then we all went over the Musuem of Natural History, which I thought would be a lot of fun for Jacob.

I was glad Jacob did like seeing all the dinosaur bones and animals. Here I think he was saying the dinosaur was sad and tired and was taking a nap, haha.

And little Blake got a view of everything too since he insisted on being carried instead of staying in the stroller.
Here we took a "family" picture since it said that we all descended from this original animal that looked like a rat... haha, whatever.

Yup, it was a fun little day trip, but after checking out nearly the whole musuem we were ready to go home. That night we picked up some Jerry's pizza (another place Luke and I desperately miss in Denver!) and then I stayed up with my sisters to watch an eventful episode of the Bachelor! By Tuesday I decided we should probably get home, so after spending the whole morning packing, it quickly came time to say goodbye to everyone...

Goodbye Grandpa!

Goodbye Erika and Julia! We had such a fun time seeing everyone and can't wait to come back and see the whole family in August!

Blake at 7 months

2012-01-20T15:44:00.001-07:00

So I totally missed blogging about Blake turning 6 months and now he's just turned 7 months old! It's going so fast and little Blakey is really growing up quick!
At 6 months we took him to the doctor and on 12/23 his stats were: Weight- 16 lbs 5.5 oz (28%); Height- 26 1/2 inches (52%) and head circumference is 53%. To be honest though, I'm not sure pediatricians are all on the same scale because at this age Jacob weighed a pound less than Blake but was in the 45% for weight and was only a half inch taller but was way up in the 75% for height. Maybe I'm just not good about math, but I'm starting to think these percentages are all nonsense numbers!
Somewhere in the 5th month he learned to sit up on his own and my life is suddenly easier, seriously. Now that he can sit up I don't feel I need to carry his carseat into the stores when we're running errands and Blake loves sitting in the shopping carts. And now that he can sit up he can see his toys and will sit and play for extended periods of time completely satisfied. He also likes being around Jacob and watching him play or just sitting on the floor sucking on all his toys.
The boys still play really well together and I love how they make each other laugh. I love when Jacob tells Blake that he is his best friend, and both these boys love getting time together with their dad too!

And this poor little guy has been teething for some time, but other than losing a little sleep he's handled it pretty well. So at 6 months, in the first week of January he got teeth number 3 and 4! He loves to suck on his fingers or bite down on anything, and we all think it's funny when he bites into a sweater or blanket and gets his teeth stuck! He's kind of crazy when it comes to biting...Blake also makes lots of funny high pitched squeals and low growls, and a couple times he's even babbled ma-ma-ma. He's been eating babyfood for awhile but I just need to remember to be more consistent in feeding him every night- (I don't know why this is so hard for me to remember!)
He doesn't take very long naps at all, especially when sometimes it feels it takes me more time just to put him down then he'll actually sleep, but he will usually go down 2 times a day if he sleeps in a little. Now that his teeth have cut through, his sleeping at night has gotten better again (for awhile there he reverted back to waking up every 2 hours), but he usually still wakes up once in the middle of the night to eat, and then again when Luke's leaving for work around 6:30 and then he'll sleep in for a couple more hours.
A weird fact about Blake- he loves to scratch things? Even in this picture he's turning around to scratch the wall, but all while smiling. I guess all babies like to scratch or rake with their fingers, I just think it's funny how he scratches everything, all the time. I'm not sure if he just likes the sound it makes or the way it feels, but his nails are very sharp and the sound of him scratching the walls or our leather couches makes me cringe!

And although Blake learned to roll over both ways months ago, now that he sits up so much it seems he's forgotten how to roll off his belly, which is weird because he learned to roll that way first. But if he's ever on his belly now he'll just keep kicking and wiggling in circles but seems to forget that he can roll over. And he's not crawling yet (thank goodness) but he's pushing himself up more and just wiggles a lot. Even when people hold him he is so jumpy it's exhausting.
Blake does have a great smile though and seems to have mastered fluttering his eyelashes to make a perfect flirty smile to everyone he sees. He still loves to be held by anyone, and I am glad that stranger anxiety hasn't seem to set yet. He has a cute little laugh, even though we sometimes can't tell the difference between his laughs and cries. I would like to say that he's typically pretty happy, but he does like to get his way so he's given us some good whines lately too.

And almost everyone I talk to says that Blake looks just like me, and yea, it's true. I came across this picture of me when I was one years old, and I was amazed how much Blake really does get from me!

I couldn't get a very good side by side picture of Blake with my picture, but I think it's still pretty funny. But I just adore my blue eyed, chubby cheeked, swirly dark haired baby boy!

A New Start

2012-01-09T14:00:00.003-07:00

So not only is it a new year but we are starting fresh this year as Luke starts a new job! I know some of you are thinking he just got a new job at Quiznos, and yes he was only there for just over a year, and so he was not planning on looking for a new job for a couple more years. However, this opportunity practically fell in Luke's lap as they came to him and asked him to apply. We even were friend's with the guy who previously held the position, but it became available when he got promoted and they moved to New York this summer. The company did not realize that he and Luke were even friends from church, but had his resume from over a year ago and were referred to Luke through a random recruiter.
So despite the fact that Luke was not interested in leaving his job, let alone thinking he'd even receive an offer, he went through several interview processes around Thanksgiving and after almost a month of waiting, he received the offer days before his birthday!
So even though he felt awful leaving his position where they desperately needed him at Quiznos, he knew it was best for him to leave now, not to mention they gave him a great offer that he just couldn't turn down.
So he will now be a senior internal auditor at Ball Corp. and he is really looking forward to the opportunities that this will present for him. We know that this is a stable company that he will be able to stay with for a long time and be able to move up and within the company. And today is his first day, so hopefully he likes it because this is it now- no more job hopping!
We are so proud of Luke and how hard he works for us, and we can't believe how blessed we are that Luke was able to be offered such a great job, especially when there are so many others around who struggle to find jobs for such a long time. We realize that our family is definitely being watched over and we hope this job becomes a good fit for him.
I got to admit though that are some perks from Luke working at Quiznos that we will miss- the free drinks and Quiznos gift cards for one. Luke will also miss getting to ride the bus downtown and meeting with all his other downtown friends for lunches. His new job is in Broomfield and so it will be a 25-30 minute drive west so that won't be as fun for him. One better thing about his new job though is that there will be no more "month-end" and so he won't be as busy and have to work late as often- which is what started happening much more frequently at his last job.
Luke working at Quiznos also marked when his interest in running and eating healthy began- ironically because Quiznos is a fast food company. But thanks to their gym downstairs Luke lost over 40 pounds while he was with them, but luckily Ball will have a nice gym there too so Luke plans to continue running after work. Now if only I could find myself a little set-up so that I could get in some work-out time...
Either way, we're a little sad to say goodbye to Quiznos since it was a good job for Luke at the time, but we are both excited about the possibilies that this new job will provide for our family, and looking forward to a new and even better year!

Christmas 2011

2011-12-29T13:44:00.013-07:00

We had a great Christmas this year! We just spent it together at home with the four of us and it was really nice. It was especially fun now that Jacob had a better idea of what was going on and was very excited to get his presents. He probably got a little spoiled this year, we even decided to hold back a few gifts until his birthday in March. But the whole Christmas break with Luke being off work was a lot of fun! A few days before Christmas I continued one of my family's traditions of making gingerbread houses. So Jacob and I worked on one together and Jacob did such a good job helping!

Our roof kept falling flat so our little gingerbread house ended up like this, and it had clumps of marshmallow snow covering it, just like our house still had tons of snow outside. Not the prettiest little gingerbread house but Jacob enjoyed eating it :)
So it snowed on Thursday, a few days before Christmas and we still had snow in our yard from the beginning of December, so even though it didn't snow on Christmas day we had a white Christmas!
Jacob loves the snow so much on Christmas Eve morning we decided to take him sledding! It was so fun I'm sure this will become a new tradition for us. Jacob took a few rides down the hill with Luke, and then me, but then just wanted to walk around and explore for a little while.

Finally when we were about ready to go, Jacob decided he wanted to go sledding again, but wanted to do it himself! So we sent him down on the little sled, and as he got to the bottom of the hill he went flying off a little snow ramp, and then almost hit another guy! But he held on tight to his sled and managed to stay on- it was so cute! He loved it and then just wanted to go over and over again! I can't wait to take him sledding again!

Later that night for Christmas Eve dinner, we had some smoked beef brisket along with many other yummy things, and then we let the boys open one present early...
new Christmas pajamas! This is one of Luke's traditions and I think it's kind of fun. And look how excited Jacob was for his new Christmas pj's!
We then read some Christmas stories, had our Christmas Eve pudding (and Jacob won since he found the almond in his pudding), and then put the kids to bed so Santa could make his visit!
This is probably the only year we'll ever be able to get away with favoring one child- practically every present was for Jacob! And if it wasn't for their grandparents providing gifts, Blake might not have gotten any, but luckily he's too young to notice the difference. Either way, we had lots of gifts to go around and it was a really great Christmas!
Here is Blake on his first Christmas morning! And Jacob's eyes got real wide when he came downstairs Christmas morning and saw all the gifts- he ran towards the tree and said "Santa gave me all my presents!" It was fun to see him so excited, he wanted to open everything right away! But I steered him towards his stocking first and he went to town on all the chocolate and candy- he ate nearly all his candy that day!
We had a real nice brunch that morning, opened more presents, went to church at 1, put the kids down for naps, I got to talk with my family to my brother out on his mission, and then when the kids woke up we were finally able to open the last of the presents!
Jacob's two most favorite gifts were his Buzz Lightyear toy and his Thomas the Tank Engine lego set, and we were pretty excited to give them to him. It was fun to see how his eyes would light up when he opened every present and we're glad that he can enjoy and appreciate all his new toys!
We all got some nice gifts this year and thanks to our family who sent gifts to us too! It was a very nice Christmas and I loved spending so much fun time with my three boys! :)

Luke's Birthday= It's Almost Christmas

2011-12-21T11:07:00.006-07:00

December is such a busy month, as soon as Thanksgiving was over we suddenly had tons to do. We've been getting ready for Christmas with lots of decorating, shopping, and activities. And this is our first year using an artificial tree and I have to say, I'm pretty happy with it!
So not only have we been building up for Christmas, but Luke's birthday is also 8 days before Christmas, so we celebrated this past weekend with his parents who flew into town. On the morning of Luke's birthday we had our Ward Christmas breakfast and Santa came to visit. Jacob was initially excited but once we finally got through the line to sit in his lap he wasn't too happy anymore. Blake loved checking out his cool beard though.

That night for Luke's birthday dinner we went to Hacienda Colorado, a nice mexican restaurant and we all really liked it.
After dinner, we had a quick little party for Luke with a few presents and an ice cream cake.
The next day at church was another busy one since I had to give a talk in sacrament meeting and Luke and I both had lessons to teach in our classes. I am going to miss the girls in my class that are moving on to young womens next year, but love teaching my primary class and looking forward to a new year. And my boys were dressed so cute in their Christmas clothes, I wanted to share a week early.

It's hard getting these boys to sit still but even the ones that didn't turn out so well are still so cute to me, haha

Later Sunday night, we drove and walked around downtown to see some of the lights and then finished up at Luke's office to grab some hot chocolate. Here is Jacob checking out the lights and saying, "Merry Christmas!" We are very excited for Christmas in a few days, looking forward to Luke having a week off, and spending the time together with just our family!

Our Big Boy

2011-12-20T17:13:00.002-07:00

We have been slowly progressing towards potty training Jacob ever since we bought him a little potty on his 2nd birthday. We mostly let him just sit on it when he wanted, usually right after we changed his diaper, but nothing ever happened. Around September we bought him some underwear and he loved it so much we let him start wearing it over his diapers for a few months. Towards the beginning of November we started using a sticker chart and giving him a sticker every time he sat on the potty, even though to this point he had never been successful. A week and half later he started doing underwear "sessions" and just practiced wearing underwear for a few hours at a time, usually only about once, maybe twice a day. Naturally he'd have accidents, but would always jump right up and announce he was wet. After doing this for about a week, and then taking a break when we had family in for Thanksgiving, a few days after my family left, Jacob finally went to the potty all by himself! We gave him a ton of praise and special stickers and treats, and ever since then he's gone several times a day!
After getting two special stickers on his chart, Jacob got a special Christmas tree cake for using the potty all by himself for the first time. He was very proud of himself!
By now, Jacob's sticker chart is all filled out, it didn't take him that long at all since he loves to go potty now! He still got smaller stickers for trying, and would get special shape stickers when he actually went. In the beginning, he would literally want to go potty every 10-30 minutes, so it took up a lot of time! But now that he goes so well and we've finished our sticker chart, he suddenly doesn't need to go so often, but he still goes, just doesn't need all the motivation. We still let him know that we are very proud of him though!

And after using his little potty for a week, we moved the little seat to fit on the big toilet and he uses a stool to get up by himself. And though he could go #2 in his little potty, he has yet to go in the big toilet, he seems a little too scared to do it yet, but I know he'll get there soon enough. Jacob has also exceeded my expectations with nap and nighttime as about half the time when he wakes up from a nap or in the morning he's dry! So he's great at holding it for awhile and is good about getting up out of bed to go potty, even when he's in a diaper. So we are really proud of him and how quickly he picked it all up once we finally got going.

So we've also let him wear underwear when we go out if it's not for very long or we're running easy errands, but diapers still on longer trips. But he has used public restrooms and has done great, no public accidents yet. So he's not fully trained, but very close! We're just about ready to let him wear underwear out all the time, and have trusted him with underwear about half the time for naps, and he's done great!

As a special treat for Jacob learning to use the potty, last weekend we surprised him and took him to see Toy Story on Ice! He loved it and it was a really fun show! Unfortunately I lost my camera right before the show but I took some on Luke's phone, maybe I'll add some later. Either way, we are super proud of Jacob and how quickly he's growing up!

Thanksgiving

2011-12-07T14:42:00.014-07:00

So I'm a little behind on blogging, but let me back up to Thanksgiving!

My sister Julia and my brother James and his wife Tammy drove from Rexburg to come visit us on their Thanksgiving break. It was great to see family and hopefully it was worth the long drive for them! It was fun for them to see the kids and meet Blake for the first time!
Both of my boys loved all the attention! We had such beautiful weather on Thanksgiving and the day before that Julia went with me to take the boys to the park. And I can not get over my little blue eyed baby!
We had just got him this new hat and it just looks so cute I had to share a few pics of him too!

And after several tries I was also able to get a few cute pictures of Jacob in our backyard. These are basically the only ones where he was looking and not running away!

The boys together on Thanksgiving

Our family on Thanksgiving

and Julia with the boys

Oh and we had a nice Thanksgiving dinner and all too. Luke smoked our turkey this year and we all helped to make everything else for dinner. At dinner we went around to say what we were thankful for and had Jacob go first. I didn't think he would really understand what we were talking about but I just wanted to see what he would say and he was so cute. First he said church and since he got a big reaction out of that, he went on and said he was grateful for nursery, friends, trains, cars, Blake, Daddy, and Mom. It was really sweet. Later that night we continued our tradition of playing Rook for several hours, it was fun! The next day we checked out Boulder Falls, and it was freezing so we didn't stay too long but it was nice to get out of the house for a bit.

James and Tammy at the falls

me and Julia

cute boysSo we also got a little Black Friday shopping that day, found a couple good deals for the kids, and then Julia, James, and Tammy took off the next day. We had a nice visit with them and were happy they made the trip to come visit with us!

Lately...

2011-11-14T00:46:00.000-07:00

we've had lots of cute smiles...
we've looked super cute together all ready for church...

we've been very loud...
we've had warm enough days to play in the leaves...

Jacob has been helpful in getting Blake up from his naps...
Jacob has been nice enough (or bored enough) to play with Blake and his toys...
I cooked pumpkin and made it into puree... which then made me several loaves of pumpkin bread (and raisin nut pumpkin bread)...
and had plenty puree left for Blake's first baby food- he loves pumpkin!
We had a visit from great Grandma Martha for a weekend...

Blake mastered sucking his thumb...
and got his first two teeth!
We had a beautiful day at the zoo with some friends...
we've played with all our cars...
we've gotten clean from our baths...
and all while looking super cute!
Which brings us back to lots of smiles!

Happy Halloween

2011-11-03T13:23:00.000-06:00

This year I had the hardest time trying to decide what to have the boys do for Halloween and I put it off until the last week to try and decide.
Blake ended up being easy though because he could fit into the costume I made for Jacob's first Halloween- a little turtle! Who do you think wore it best?

Jacob at 6 1/2 months in the first two above, and Blake at 4 1/2 months below

Oh and Jacob wearing the shell again- getting jealous he wanted to try it on too and try crawling around like a turtle, haha.
But since I didn't have a lot of time to get a costume together for Jacob I decided it would be easier to just buy him one this year- so we picked a Buzz Lightyear costume! He was pretty excited about it, although it's not the most original for boys his age. At the ward Halloween party I think I saw about 4 Buzz Lightyears...
I'm not sure what Jacob thought of that, but all I kept noticing were how much cooler the other Buzz Lightyear costumes were! And to go along with Jacob's costume, Luke and I casually dressed as Woody and Jessie, which Jacob thought was a lot of fun even though we really didn't look like them at all.

All week I had been preparing Jacob for trick or treating and trying to explain how if he says trick or treat when we knock on someones door, they'll put candy in his bucket. And since he saw me buy our Halloween candy, all week at home Jacob kept stealing my candy, putting it in his Halloween bucket, and then running to show me and would squeal "Trick or treat! I did it!" So he was a little confused, but it was pretty cute. So he got his first taste of trick or treating at the ward party and that was fun, just real congested with all the other kids in the church.
So Halloween night Jacob went trick or treating with his friends Collin and Natalie. I think he had a lot of fun going with some friends, and so did I!

I was so proud of Jacob walking to each house and it was so cute when they'd all say trick or treat! He got the hang of it quick and had a lot of fun! And he got a lot of good candy too!
And this was only the first half! On the drive home Jacob still wanted to go trick or treating but I needed to get Blake home, so I dropped him off at our neighbors the Loughes, and they were sooo nice to take him trick or treating around our neighborhood and back to my house. So Jacob ended up with a lot of candy! I'm not sure which part is his favorite though, the candy or getting to wear his Buzz Lightyear costume- he's worn it these past three days after Halloween too!

And even Blake got to see his little friend Beckett too, so cute! Anyway, Halloween was a lot of fun this year, especially now that Jacob is old enough to understand how it all works and participate in all the fun stuff, but he's still young enough that he doesn't realize I've kept half of his candy for myself! Muhahaha! Happy Halloween! :)

Pumpkin Pickin' and Carvin'

2011-10-31T14:57:00.009-06:00

The Saturday before Halloween we went to the same pumpkin patch that we went to last year with some friends.
Jacob picked his own pumpkin off the vine

After we picked our pumpkins we let Jacob run around the hay maze and check out the farm animals.

He was a little too scared to pet the horse.
And he screamed when he saw the turkey walking slowly towards him- it was pretty creepy actually.
But he did finally pet the goats, even though you can't tell on my picture
He liked seeing all the animals and wanted to go back and do it again.

We had a good time at the pumpkin patch!

After the snow we had, our pumpkins froze outside, so once they thawed enough we started our carving. We decided to make them into Angry Bird pumpkins since Jacob likes them so much, and Blake's pumpkin was a little green pig.
And since Jacob wanted to help I let him paint the pumpkins first. And he did a great job helping, but I don't think we'll do paint again. I didn't really have good paint, or quite the right colors. Like Jacob's was the red bird but it turned out more pink. But that's fine, Jacob had fun helping.
Jacob really got into it, scooping out the seeds, and pulling the rest out with his hands..
I love his face here because you can tell it's really gooey but he insisted on doing it all by himself. Oh and ever since we picked out his Buzz Lightyear costume he's practically worn it nonstop haha.

And these are how our two angry birds turned out! Jacob loves them!

First Snow

2011-10-28T17:33:00.000-06:00

We already got our first snow of the season on Wednesday! We got about 8 inches total and Jacob had a great time running through the snow... and eating it. This is the first snow that Jacob remembers since he was so young last year, so he was pretty excited. And every day he's been singing Once There Was a Snowman.

getting ready to go outside, he was excited to get all his warm gear on

And he's off!

Blake had to stay inside with me but he got to watch Jacob play

I really don't mind snow days as long as I don't have anywhere to go, I have a good book to read, and the snow doesn't stay forever. Since it snowed it's been sunny and warming back up again. So at least it's quickly melting and we should have a nice Fall Halloween weekend!

Updates on Everyone

2011-10-24T17:11:00.002-06:00

So I like to keep updated on my boys as they grow, especially with Blake since things change so quickly. But I know that's boring for everyone else, so this is really more for me to remember what's going on with everyone I guess. Even now, I love looking back on the posts that I've made about Jacob and comparing them to Blake. So I know this may not be all that exciting to anyone else, but either way, this is our lives right now:

Blake- 4 months old

*Blake's 4 month stats: 14 lbs 1.5 oz (35% weight), 24 3/4 in (46% height)

*Blake is doing really well, he is becoming a lot easier and a happier, content, easy-going baby. He smiles all the time and at everyone- he has such a great smile! Even when I took him to the doctor he smiled the whole time at the doctor and didn't even cry when he got his two shots, I was pretty impressed. He has gotten much easier when we've been out running errands too. While he used to cry and want to be held all the time when I was shopping, now he never makes a peep! It's made my life much easier!*Blake's newest trick is that he has started rolling over from tummy to back! The first time I noticed was actually the last time I blogged on October 6. I remember because I set him down for tummy time so I could work on the computer and the next time I looked at him he was lying there on his back in a completely different spot on the floor. It's funny how babies can kick and wiggle themselves around so much. Since last week Blake has been rolling around a lot more and he's been very close to rolling the other way too (from back to belly), but he often hangs out in-between on his side. He enjoys laying on the floor rolling around, and playing in his exersaucer but has started to resent being in his swing- usually reaches back up for me and cries as soon as I put him down. He likes to be able to see us and be a part of the action.
*Blake has also found his voice and has starting cooing a lot more and a lot louder, very cute.

*Blake has also started eating some rice cereal. He hasn't eaten very much and is getting used to the idea of being fed with a spoon, but we'll keep trying!

*Blake will not take a bottle anymore. It was very short lived, and he was never great at it and I wasn't very consistent, so it seems we've missed our window. I would still hope that he would take a bottle in an emergency but I really can't be too sure, so that does worry me that I'll hardly be able to leave him for long. And he won't take a pacifier either, not sure how I let that happen, but I'm not very happy about this- especially since he needs to start learning how to soothe himself to sleep.

*Blake has done much better at sleeping through the night though, some nights even from 9pm-7am- which were awesome! He's been a little sick lately so that seems to keep him up just a bit more now since he can hardly breathe through his nose, but he usually gives me good long stretches- so I'm glad that's going better now! I still just need to be better at putting him back in his crib even though I'm exhausted, and we've started letting him "cry it out" sometimes too.
*Blake has been drooling like crazy. He goes through like 3 burpcloths a day just from wiping drool and spit-up, but his bibs and clothes are constantly soaked. I'm wondering if he's going to start early teething at 4 months like Jacob. He's always sucking on a couple fingers or his whole fist too- seems his right hand is the tasty one. Along with the drooling, Blake still spits up a lot after he eats too. Somehow I'm still always surprised with the amounts that he spits up and how he always manages to spit on me right after I've showered, or all over me during church- repeatedly.

*My favorite thing about this stage with Blake is that he is still relatively calm and happy and is always smiling, especially at Jacob. I love how much they seem to adore each other, and Blake is just patient and smiles at Jacob even when he's being loud and going nuts. I often have Blake get in Jacob's bed when we're tucking him in for nap, and he loves to lay there and listen to the books I read Jacob too. And even if Blake is flapping his arms in Jacob's face and kicking his sheets, Jacob just laughs and says "I love you too Blake"- haha ohh I love that so much! I love that they're already little buddies and can't wait until they can start playing together more!
My cute little guys watching TV from the top of the couch together

Jacob- 2 1/2 years old

Jacob has grown up a bit in the past couple months as well. Since the last time I've updated on Jacob, most things are pretty much the same, just doing everything a little bit more and better. He is still my sweet boy and I'm glad he's calmed down a bit lately too-overall.

After Blake was born, Jacob was being a little rebellious about bedtime and would never stay down, but that's finally stopped and he usually never gets up anymore and knows it's time for bed. Although, for the past couple months he's been waking up in the middle of the night, just screaming and crying, we're never really sure why, but he always goes right back to sleep after we put him down. Poor guy has also been sick for almost a month too with a cold, but hopefully it will go away soon.

*Jacob has been interested in potty training for awhile now but I've been taking tiny baby steps with him. A couple months ago we bought him some underwear- the first pack had a mix of Cars, Toy Story, Finding Nemo, Incredibles, and Wall-E. Those are all his favorites, and so when I gave it to him he shouted, "I love it!" So since then he's been wearing his underwear over his diapers just so that he can practice. He still asks to sit on the potty before or after I change him, but he's usually already just gone in his diaper, so it's still mostly just for practice. But many times he takes off all his clothes and diaper on his own and runs around naked until I tell him to hurry and sit on the potty. Luckily there have been no accidents, but then again there haven't been any successful runs either.

But one night last week while I was out Luke says he thinks Jacob might have gone in his potty because it was wet and had some toilet paper wet in the bowl, but not soaked like when he plays with the water and Jacob got all excited saying "pee pee". But we can't confirm that he did, and besides he hasn't done it since. But he's getting closer to being ready, so I keep telling myself that since Jacob seems interested and ready that soon we'll go cold turkey and take the potty training seriously- I think I'm just a little scared to try, so I keep stalling!

*Jacob's talking has improved lately too. His sentences keep getting longer and more 'correct' and we always are laughing at the funny things he tells us. We also love that he is very good at saying he's sorry when he's done something wrong and he always tells his mommy, daddy, and Blake that he loves them. He can also quote several parts of movies and books really well too. And while his talking has gotten better, his listening hasn't, so this is something we're working on.

*Jacob's imagination has seemed to grow more too and I love watching him play and entertain himself. Recently I bought a toy kitchen for him at a kids sale (only $8!) and Jacob loves to pretend to cook. Actually he prefers playing with real food- his newest thing he loves to do is steal my eggs out of the fridge and run around the house with one in each hand! Thank goodness they haven't cracked on my carpet!

*Aside from watching movies, Jacob is probably most addicted to playing Angry Birds on his dad's phone. When he stayed with his cousins a few months ago, they were always playing that game and had Angry Bird toys, so they kind of got him started on it, and he's been hooked ever since. He's actually gotten pretty good- I don't even hardly understand how to play the game. But every day when Luke comes home, Jacob always instantly asks for a piece of candy, and to play Angry Birds. It's nuts.

*Jacob enjoys counting things and can count perfectly to 12. And he's getting better with his colors but still working on them. It's weird though because sometimes I thought he's learned something and then he forgets it all the next day, so it's a slow progression with everything but I'm glad he asks questions about things and is trying to learn. I guess I just need to be better about sitting down and spending time to help teach him the basics.

*At home he is always talking about his cousins, friends, Grandma and Grandpa, Shannon (his favorite babysitter) and every day he always asks "Where did Daddy go?" even though he knows the answer is always "work". Jacob sometimes acts really shy around older people in close settings but usually loves to interact with any kids he meets. He always looks forward to getting out and being social with other people and he'll play with his friends, or new kids he meets at the park, library, etc, but he's also just as content playing by himself. He's gotten a tad better about sharing, but he often thinks that every toy he likes is his it seems, and is still very protective of the toys that are his, especially his cars.

*I got Jacob one of those old school cars that he can sit in and push himself around in with his feet through the bottom- you know the red ones with a yellow top. We had one growing up and I saw one at this kids sale I went to. Jacob loves to ride in it and every time we get in and out of our car he has to jump in his little toy car and take it for a spin too. He usually says something about how he has to go to work. He looks so cute riding around in it and the first few times he would just laugh like a maniac as he drove down the sidewalk- he loves it!

At the grocery store they also have carts that have these cars attached to the fronts and Jacob loves to ride in those too. And when he's good at the grocery store I let him hop out and ride the mechanical horses for a penny. He loves to do that and check out the toys in the claw machine because they have a picture of Angry Birds on the front.

*Recently we were finally able to make it back to the zoo since Blake had been born and I was happy that Jacob finally seemed more interested in the animals this time around. His favorites were the fish- he even found Nemo and Dory which was very exciting for him!*And Jacob has always loved to sing songs but he's gotten even better at knowing all the words to songs and we love singing to Blake together since it always makes Blake smile.

*Jacob is very sweet with Blake and watches out for him. He always lets me know when he spits up. And every time Blake starts crying, Jacob tells me, "Blake's crying. Go feed him now, ok?" And whenever other kids try to take a peek at the baby Jacob tells them, "That's my Blake" and he gets all protective as if they're going to take him away. Jacob is patient with him though even if Blake is screaming in the car, and Jacob is really great at getting Blake to laugh. It's not too hard since Blake could watch him all day and seems to find Jacob fascinating. Jacob is good at trying to share his toys with Blake even if he can't play with them yet and he laughs at all the cute little things that Blake does. He still thinks it's hilarious every time Blake burps too and he always comments "Good burp Blake!" I think it's great that they already are little buddies!
Kara

So I realize that I hardly ever post about me- the updates on me are essentially on what's going on with my boys. But for awhile I've been real bummed about the fact that my family is so far away, especially with Blake being born and I had no idea when my family would even get to meet him. And my family is getting bigger and more spread apart so it's hard to get together and see everyone, plus it's so expensive to fly all the way home to Maryland.

So for the longest time I've been trying to figure out a way to see my family and find a way home and I finally have a plan! I wanted to be able to fly home with the kids, and figured it'd be cheaper to just come in January after the holidays. And luckily Southwest had a lovely sale going on for a few days that made the weeks after the holidays cheaper so I decided I needed to take advantage of it. And then I realized I'd save even more money if I didn't need to buy Jacob a ticket! So I decided I'd leave Jacob home with Luke over the long Martin Luther King weekend in January since Luke already had the day off, and I could get a break! And of course my family would finally be able to meet Blake. Anyway, I'm so excited now that I finally have something to look forward to!

And although Luke and I have no Christmas plans, hopefully it will be nice to have a break here at home while Luke has a few days off. And hopefully my brother James, his wife Tammy, and my sister Julia will be able to drive here from Rexburg during their Thanksgiving break- definitely looking forward to that too, but trying to not get my hopes up in case it doesn't work out. I realize I must be pretty pathetic and this is probably why I never really talk much about me, because my life is kind of boring and all I have is just to look forward to the fun times with family!

Other than that, I've been on a huge reading kick lately, ever since I've been pregnant really. But I love when I get to sit down and feed Blake, because then I have an excuse to just read! I've read lots of really good books lately- my favorites being The Hunger Games series(even though I read those last year), The Help, One Summer, I've blown through tons of Nicholas Sparks books, and I just finished Handle With Care. All so good! And of course I'm really excited to go see Breaking Dawn-Part 1 when it comes to theaters in November!

Besides that, the only other thing that really keeps me busy are my church callings. I've been in Activity Days for well over a year now, so I'm the leader of the 10-11 year old girls and it's been a lot of fun! I feel like I'm at the end of an era though because all the girls I started with are now moved on, the last two turned 12 last week. So my little group always seems to be changing but I know the new girls that have moved up into my group are excited to be there because they know I try to make things fun! I also teach the 10-11 year old girls in Primary every Sunday, so I really do enjoy my calling, but it all does keep me busy!

Luke

Luke never likes much of a spotlight on himself, but one thing I think he does like for me to blog about is the good food he's always smoking. This summer he has smoked tons of pork shoulders, ribs, wings, chicken, and has made tons of french fries in his new turkey fryer too.
Around here he is basically known for smoking barbeque. And although I'm not the biggest barbeque fan, he has a lot of fun doing it and everyone seems to like what he makes.

Now that it's getting a little cooler he's been making more breads and pies too. We made lots of zucchini bread, regular and chocolate zucchini bread, and they were so good it was basically cake. And we've had pumpkin and strawberry rhubarb pies- the rhubarb being from our own "garden". (We don't really have a garden, all we have is rhubarb!)
And I am hoping to make pumpkin bread and pie from real pumpkin this year too. Luke's also been real good about having us try some new dinner recipes too, probably because the dinners I've been making for the last while have been nothing special, so it's been nice to have him help try some new recipes out and they've all turned out good!

Anyway, so things are just the same old around here, but it's good for me to notice and remember the little things that we're all doing and going through at this point.

Afternoon in the Mountains

2011-10-06T11:27:00.002-06:00

This past weekend we mostly stayed home and watched the Conference broadcast from Salt Lake. I really enjoyed watching, and hearing from our church leaders, and it inspired me to try and be better. For those of my friends who are not LDS, you can check out the website http://mormon.org/. And by the way, I'm loving being able to see all the new mormon commercials on TV now- I think it's pretty neat!
Anyway, after the final session of Conference on Sunday, we took a little drive through the mountains since we figured it'd be our last chance to see the trees changing colors. We pulled over in Idaho Springs, and found a great picnic spot along the river. Jacob had a great time just standing by the river, throwing in rocks and also playing at the nearby park.

We had a small little picnic of hotdogs, strawberries, homemade zucchini bread, and s'mores for dessert. Jacob's first s'mores and he loved them!

And with the beautiful fall colors and perfect cool weather, I couldn't help but try to get some cute fall pictures of my boys.

Blake is 3 months!

2011-09-20T23:20:00.000-06:00

My sweet boy is 3 months old! I never know if it's better to follow by weeks old or by the date they were born each month- but he's now 13 weeks and officially 3 months by the calendar too. Anyway, here's a long update on what things are like with him lately:

*Blake's newest thing is that he is now laughing! His first laugh was this past Friday the 16th and I was just playing with him while he was on the floor and then I realized he was giggling and he's done it several times since then. I love first laughs!

*Blake smiles all the time and I love it-they are just pure sunshine! I love how he opens his mouth real wide to smile and gets a chubby double chin. He often gives us big smiles just for nothing, and he seems to be a pretty happy baby these days.

*Blake is also cooing and making lots of razzes and spitty sounds, which is also so cute! Also drooling a ton, making spit bubbles, and loves to suck his fist.

*Doing well holding up his head during tummy-time and I love the look of concentration on his face while he does this.

*Has recently started playing in his exersaucer, and also likes being held in my front carrier, often falling asleep in it.

*Loves his swing, he still spends a lot of the day in it, we've already had to change the batteries.

*He seems to still sleep better in his swing than his crib. He'll take some naps in his crib but they usually don't last too long. So sometimes he sleeps in his swing for the first part of the night too.

*Blake still wakes up several times in the night and I have a hard time getting him to stay asleep when I need to move him to his crib since he'd rather just sleep cradled in my arms. And since he'll sleep longer if I just hold him, that's ultimately what ends up happening, but this is something that's going to need to start changing soon...

*Still likes to be swaddled to sleep or else he'll wiggle and fuss all night.

*Blake had his first formula bottle on 9/7, right before bedtime. He drank about 3 oz and then slept for 7 hours- so that was really good! This was a big deal for us because I have never used formula, even with Jacob. I planned on switching to formula just at night to help him sleep better but we've only tried a few random times since, but it usually seems to help him sleep longer so I'd like to do it as often as I can, but I know he doesn't like his bottle as much.

*Blake has a hard time falling asleep in his carseat and isn't a big fan of staying in his carseat while we're running errands but he is getting better. The last several times we went to the grocery store there was no crying- from Blake at least!

*Loves to take baths, always very calm and happy.

*Seems to enjoy walks in the stroller, and being outside.

*Has a good grip on his toys now and likes laying on his floor mat where he can reach up and grab the toys too.

*Always seems to be kicking and flapping his arms like crazy!

*Is very patient with his brother who still likes to poke him, climb on him when he's in his swing, lay on him when he's on the floor, and jumps in his crib to turn on his mobile when he wakes up. Blake usually is smiling when Jacob is around and likes to watch Jacob talk and play.

*Loves being held by anyone, but especially me.

*Blake is filling out quickly and getting big fast!

*At 2 months Blake weighed 10 lbs 10 oz and now he's roughly 13.6 lbs at 3 months!
We love our little Blake!

Football Season is Here

2011-09-12T10:20:00.003-06:00

I'm not particularly excited for football starting again, but they sure are!

We broke in the first game of the season by going to our friends- the Kims. We had a good time visiting while watching the game. And although Jacob does love the Redskins like his dad, he likes playing "Angry Birds" on his dad's phone more.

Labor Day Weekend

2011-09-07T14:46:00.002-06:00

For Labor Day weekend we did a little trip to the mountains. On Saturday, we left, got stuck in traffic and finally made it to Rifle, CO late afternoon. We first went to Rifle Falls which were actually really neat!

We could walk up behind the falls to see the view and the whole place was covered in really neat caves too.

Everything there was so pretty, someone was even holding a wedding there off to the side!
We hiked along a small trail behind the falls too and when we got to the top of the hill we had these beautiful views!

A few miles from Rifle Falls is the Rifle Gap which is this really pretty manmade lake in the middle of the hills there. You can't quite tell from the pictures, but the water was such a pretty blue!
Everything was so pretty up there, I really loved the scenery and the weather was just perfect. Things finally started to cool a bit just in time for Labor Day weekend, so it was a really nice afternoon. That night we found a restaurant in Rifle and then we headed to our hotel back in New Castle and took Jacob swimming for the rest of the evening.

Sunday we headed back to Rifle and went to one hour of church. Luke had served in that ward as a missionary so that was a little neat to go back, but he only recognized one person. Afterwards, we checked out of our hotel and headed to a park across the street that sat along the Colorado River.
Afterwards, we headed to Glenwood Springs which is where we intended to spend most of the weekend. But we just drove through town, got a quick lunch, then decided that since both the boys were ready for a nap it would be easiest to just drive on home, which was about a 2.5 hour drive from there. So even though it made for a quick weeknd trip, the boys slept all the way home and Luke and I enjoyed the beautiful drive as the trees were just barely starting to change colors.
Monday was Labor Day and so I got to dress my boys as twins again. It's funny how much bigger Blake has gotten since the last time I put them in these shirts on the 4th of July.

Jacob helped me make brownies, and Luke smoked some ribs and made homemade fries for dinner. We ended up eating a lot earlier than expected so we headed to Sloan's Lake just west of downtown and walked around. Again, it was such a perfect weather day!

We had a fun relaxing weekend together as a family!

5 Years Later

2011-09-05T21:05:00.002-06:00

Luke and I celebrated our 5 year anniversary on August 26. Well, actually we celebrated early on our trip to Vegas, and so we kept it fairly simple on our actual anniversary. But Luke did get me these beautiful roses and a sweet card.

We went out to dinner that night without the kids- for the first time! It was nice to get away real quick from both kids, but that's all it was- real quick. I didn't want to leave Blake for very long yet. So we decided that since we got philly cheesesteaks at the beach on our honeymoon, we would go for some quick philly cheesesteaks again that night. So that was fun :)

And the boys celebrated that day by Blake wearing his "I love mommy" shirt and Jacob was wearing his daddy shirt. They're our biggest fans :)

And I've caught a lot of smiles from our little Blake lately so I had to share. His smiles just make my day! :)
And Jacob has been so sweet with Blake lately too. He likes spending time next to him, and tries to help and always laughs like crazy every time Blake burps. He even tries to pick him up now and will say "I'll feed him"- haha, it's sweet and I love seeing the two of them smile and have fun together, even already.

Here Jacob was trying to show Blake how to ride a horse, haha.

I was also excited to have my friend Shandra practice her photography skills and take some pictures of us. Jacob and Blake didn't quite cooperate and smile as much as I would have liked, but we did get a couple cute ones and here are just a few of my favorites:

And I still like this last one even though Jacob is making his "mean" face and Blake is crying- I guess it's just a "reality" picture. As I think back on the last 5 years that Luke and I have been married, not everything has been smooth and perfect but I do feel like things keep getting better every year. And at times I do get stressed and annoyed and overwhelmed with my boys, but I still wouldn't trade it for anything. I adore my sons (and my husband!) to pieces and I am quite happy with the life I live now. When Luke and I were married, if we projected what our life would be like in 5 years, I'm pretty sure I'm living it now- it's just what I want and where I want to be. And although we have our non-picture perfect moments, I'm so grateful for my sweet little family!

Millions of Peaches

2011-09-01T12:16:00.000-06:00

On our way home from our trip to Utah we made sure to stop at Palisade. Luke has been wanting to go for over a year so that we could pick up a couple of bushels of peaches, since supposedly they have the best!

You could see the peach orchards everywhere and they had a little store right on the road at the edge of the orchard. Anyway, we went ahead and got 3 boxes, which were each a half bushel. And since we mostly just wanted to cut the peaches up into dehydrated slices and make jam we bought the #2 boxes since they were cheaper. So they don't look as pretty but still tasted great on the inside.

Well we got right to work and ever since we've been home it has seriously been a peach factory over here. Luke has made racks and racks of dehydrated peach slices- he wanted enough to last a lifetime! And I've made several batches of jam. This is just a sample of jars I got from just one batch.

And here's how the peaches look when they're done drying- yum. We've had fun working on the peaches together, and needless to say, we'll be able to enjoy these peaches for a long time!

Vegas!

2011-08-31T13:57:00.001-06:00

Since Luke and I were celebrating our 5th anniversary this year we wanted to do something big and fun! However, having a young baby, living in the middle of the country where there's not much to do, and not having close family to watch our kids made this a little more challenging. In the end, we decided we would drive to Utah and drop Jacob off at Luke's sister's so that Jacob could spend a few days playing with his three cousins. Then Luke and I took Blake and continued our long drive the next day to Las Vegas, where we spent 3 days and 2 nights.
I was a little worried about the drive there since it's about 8 hours to Utah, and then another 6 hours to Vegas and it was our first roadtrip with both boys. Overall though, they did really well. Jacob kept himself entertained and still slept a lot, and even though Blake is not in love with his carseat he did sleep a lot too and we did stop about every 2 hours so I could feed him.

So we made it into Vegas on a Wednesday late afternoon, and checked into the Monte Carlo. Here was our view from our room.
We also had a view of the pool, and despite what the picture shows, it did get sun in the day and was always full with people. We were going to hit the pool immediately since it was soo hot driving down, but it got a little cloudy and so we decided to check out the strip that first evening.

We walked around checking out a few hotels. I thought the NY looked pretty cool- and we even had passes to ride the roller coaster but couldn't use them since we had the baby! :(
We saw the lion exhibit at the MGM which was really neat since you could walk under the bridge and see the lions above you too.
We also checked out the M&M and Coke stores. We also tried the "Around the World" where you sample different drinks from countries around the world. So that was pretty fun- and filling. It's amazing how much drinks can fill you up, we couldn't even finish them.

Here's us each with our favorite drinks- I liked the two juicy ones from South Africa the most.
After taking a quick break at the hotel we headed out again- it was easier to put Blake in the carrier at night since it wasn't so hot and it was much easier getting around without the stroller!
We checked out the strip a bit more but in the end, we decided to go back to our hotel to get dinner at one of the Italian restaurants downstairs- D Vino. It was a quiet, nice place to eat, and luckily Blake slept through dinner. Afterwords, we were already so tired from driving and walking around that we just headed upstairs and just relaxed at the room for the rest of the evening.
The next morning after getting a quick breakfast, and walking around the strip until we could find Luke a swimming suit- we went to the pool for the rest of the day! Somehow Blake slept most of the time too even though the music from the DJ was extremely loud. So we kept Blake in the shade while Luke and I laid out in the sun and tried soaking up a whole summer's tan in one day. And it was soo hot that we'd take turns taking a dip in the pool since one of us would have to stay back with Blake- that part did stink that we couldn't go in the pool just together.
After several hours though Blake finally woke up and seemed hot so we took him for a quick dip in the pool. I swear all eyes were on us when we brought Blake in- people don't see a lot of babies in Vegas, so he sure got a lot of attention!

Later that evening we walked around the strip again, checking out a few sites and interesting hotels.

I really liked this picture- I think it was in the Bellagio- made entirely of flowers!
After walking around a bit we finally decided to eat at Margaritaville. It was especially neat since we opted to eat on the patio on the third floor and so we had a great view of the strip at sundown, and it was just a beautiful night. And luckily Blake slept again through dinner, even though I still had to carry the weight of him in my carrier.

We walked down the strip for the last time that night seeing everything all lit, and my favorite was seeing the fountains at the Bellagio which was really neat with the music at night.

Friday was our last day, so after getting breakfast at a nice buffet at the hotel, we checked out and headed to Hoover Dam, which was surprisingly not that far.

We also did the tour of the plant and got to go underneath the dam and also saw the huge generators, so that was all neat. Luke especially enjoyed the video part of our tour and all the little details we learned, and he was excited to see the huge new bridge that was now finished.

Our last stop in Vegas was to check out the Las Vegas temple on our way out of the city. The last time we were in there we never found it, and so we were curious to see it this time. Also, even more than that, the temple is right outside the area that my brother Daniel is serving on his mission, so I was anxious to drive around his area. And although I was hopeful and kept my eyes out for him, we never did spot him. But after driving around the area awhile we were finally ready to just get back on the road and head back to Utah.

I actually missed Jacob a lot while we were gone and I often wondered how he was doing and hoped that he was having fun. It sounds like he did pretty well and had fun during the days, but had a hard time sleeping at night. But I admit, it was nice to be able to walk around and not have to worry about him for a few days. And although Luke and I really enjoyed our time, it's easy to say we probably could've had even more fun if we didn't have to have Blake with us too. One thing I was really sad about was that we were not able to go see a show since we would've had to buy Blake a ticket too, and we just weren't willing to have to do that. But we did have a fun trip, and we're already looking forward to next year when the boys are older, and we'll be able to get away on our own again!

Blake's Baby Blessing

2011-08-27T13:56:00.000-06:00

We had Blake blessed in church on Sunday, June 14. We were grateful to Luke's parents who were able to come in for the weekend and Luke's Aunt Julie who flew in that morning was able to be there as well. My dad was planning to come out for the weekend too but missed his standby flight- so we missed having him there with us but hopefully my family will get to meet little Blake soon!

Luke gave Blake a really nice blessing and it was nice for his dad to be a part of that circle as well. Blake was wide awake and did great throughout the blessing, and the whole day. I felt the same as when Jacob was blessed, just filled with love for my little boy, and I loved seeing him in his little white outfit, passed down from Luke. Blake was such a little angel all day and I couldn't help but take tons of pictures to treasure those moments!

loving seeing soo many smiles that day!

I love how much sweeter Jacob has gotten with his little brother lately too! We all love Blake and are so happy to have him in our family!

Crashing Cars

2011-08-23T13:56:00.006-06:00

No, we did not crash our cars- we just went and saw a demo derby! Luke and I used to go to them all the time when we lived in Idaho and always had so much fun and this was the first time we were able to go to one since we've lived in Colorado. One of Luke's closest friends was visiting from New Mexico so he came with us and we brought the boys too. And although Jacob was confused and concerned at first, he ended up really liking the "cars- crash!" and still talks about it, even though this was a few weeks ago now.
So not only did Jacob get to witness cars crashing into each other, but also an ambulance...
and the big trucks that were needed to lift all the cars off when it was over. (Everyone was ok by the way.)
We also saw motorcyclists doing races which was also a lot more fun than we expected, and I think Jacob had a good time!
By the time the derby was over it was late, but we had to walk back through the county fair to get back to our car so Jacob checked out some animals like the cows and sheep- which he really liked and was even petting too.
And we even got to see fireworks go off as we left. So it was a fun night and I'll need to make sure the next time they do the fair we make it more of a day event!

Montana

2011-08-09T13:58:00.003-06:00

Luke's extended family is real great- they get everyone together every two years and have really fun family reunions. This was my third Schow reunion- it's Luke's mom's side with her mom and siblings and everyone's kids/grandkids. So it's not a huge group but each reunion has gotten bigger and it seems the grandkids are just about outnumbered the adults now.
Anyway, so it's been a lot of fun in the past and a great way for me to get to know Luke's extended family and so this year they held the reunion at Lakeside, Montana for the second time. Unfortunately Luke was unable to attend since it was the first week in August and Luke is always busy with "month end" the first week of every month so he just couldn't take off those days. But I was lucky enough that Luke's mom was able to help me fly standby into Montana with the kids so that I could still go.
I was a little worried about being alone on the first vacation since Blake was born and having a crazy 2-year-old and 6 week old newborn to handle on my own, but everything worked out fine. They were both great on the plane (Blake slept the whole way in my front carrier, and Jacob slept the first half but then played quietly and kept entertained the second hour which was great) and people were surprisingly helpful and friendly at the airport, so that was a good start. Then Luke's dad picked me up at the airport and after we finally found each other, we left the airport to realize we had a flat tire- so that was fun.
But we finally made it to the lake houses Sunday afternoon. We had four houses between us, one house for each big family, and they sit on a tall hill right on the lake. We all share one dock that sits in a private cove and has this pretty view. So pretty much every single day, we'd wake up, have breakfast then start getting ready for the lake. Then we'd make the long walk down the hill- and I usually got some help with Jacob which was nice- and then we'd all sit out on the dock, and people would go boating, water-skiing, wake boarding, or just playing in the water. Luckily Jacob loved playing at the edge of the water and could keep himself entertained while I handled Blake.

The three little babies taking a nap together down at the lake- adorable! Finally I got Jacob a boat ride by Wednesday. He was a little nervous when we were going really fast but he seemed to enjoy it has has been talking about "riding on a boat" ever since.

So I would usually be down on the dock for about 2 hours or so until Jacob would beg to go back up and take a nap. I never really liked leaving so early and always had intentions to get back to the lake when Jacob woke up, but every day he took 3-4 hour naps! So at least it was still nice to relax at the house, read a book, and just hang out with Blake.
Every night we would do something fun all together. The first few nights all us girls watched the Bachelorette finales together, another night we played minute-to-win-it games, and one evening I took Jacob down to the dock with a few others to do a little fishing.

Jacob's cousin Christian caught his second fish!

And Grandpa helped Jacob fish too, so cute :)

Another night for dinner was a fiesta and so everyone got to wear mustache's and sombreros and later the kids hit a pinata and danced, everyone had fun!

Blake with his great grandma Betty

Blake even got in the spirit and sported a uni-brow for the night, haha

Jacob taking a swing at the pinata

mad dash for the candy One big reason I wanted to make it out to the reunion was so I could see the other babies too! Two of Luke's cousins had their babies the same week as Blake- they were often referred to as Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Blake was born Monday June 20, Emerson was Carrie's baby born the 22nd, and Jennica's baby Savannah born June 24. Although they're so close in age they still vary a lot in size but are all so sweet and adorable! On Thursday, we took a little side trip with Luke's family to Big Fork and poked around the downtown shops for a bit. Jacob spotted this little fountain and spent awhile playing in it and getting completely soaked!

Thursday ended up being our last day too since I needed to be able to catch a flight that night. So it was a day or two earlier than everyone else, but that was ok since we all had so much fun and did everything we wanted to. Jacob is still talking about seeing his cousins, riding on the boat, flying in the sky on the airplane, swimming in the lake, and seeing Grandma and Grandpa. Even though he got in a couple scraps with his younger cousins and was a handful at times, he obviously had a great time, and so did I.
I am just grateful that we were even able to make it out at all, even if Luke couldn't come. And even without Luke, I am so grateful to everyone who was sooo helpful with the kids. Everyone was so nice to help me keep an eye out for Jacob (who loved more than any other kid to run away!) and everyone was more than willing to offer a hand to hold Blake, which I loved just as much as he did.

Thursday night, after we left, Grandma Betty had put everyone's name into a drawing to win a quilt that she had made. Turns out Blake won the quilt! People had previously joked with me saying I deserved the quilt this year just for coming out to Luke's reunion without him, so I almost thought they had it rigged when they told us later we had actually won. So if we got a quilt out of it all, then I guess the trip really was worth it! Haha, either way, we had a lot of fun and are looking forward to going (together!) to the next reunion in two years!

One Month

2011-07-20T12:16:00.000-06:00

Blake is already one month old! And for comparison, I put together this picture of Jacob and Blake each at one month in the same outfit- I think it's amazing how much they actually look alike now! They have a few differences of course- Jacob has his distinct cleft chin, and you can tell Blake is slightly bigger, and perhaps has a bit darker hair. And although you probably can't tell, I think Blake's eyes are a brighter blue than Jacob's were, so I'm hoping his stay blue, unlike Jacob whose eyes turned brown after a few months, but we'll see. But since Blake was born he has reminded me more and more of Jacob.
All these other pictures were taken when Blake was 3 weeks old. And since everyone has been asking how things are going- they're going good and getting better/easier. Blake has started to fall more into a sleep schedule and it's nice that he usually falls asleep when we put Jacob to bed at night and also sleeps during at least a part of Jacob's naps during the day too. So it's nice to also have some breaks from both of them during the day and get alone time in the evening when Luke's home too. And although he does still sleep a lot, unfortunately it's usually not for very long at a time- or at least that's how it feels!
And the nights aren't too bad- I think I still end up feeding Blake every 3 hours or so but I feel like I'm usually getting enough sleep, so it's terrible. The only annoying part is when Blake decides he's not tired for about an hour usually around 4:30 am, and even worse when it's because his stomach is upset. But once he's been changed and burped enough, my solution is just to hold him in bed with me and once I fall asleep I'm sure he must fall asleep too. So it's still not perfect, but not bad, and I know it will get better soon.
So other than that, here's some other things about Blake:
*At 2 weeks Blake was 9 lbs 7 oz and 21 inches
*At 3 weeks Blake was 9 lbs 10.5 oz- growing great!
*He likes to be held and rocked- a lot. Especially by me.
*Swaddling calms him down when he's upset or tired and this is about the only time he'll take his pacifier too.
*Doesn't enjoy diaper changes.
*Loves taking baths.
*Usually cranky getting into his car seat but then is calm once we start driving.
*Currently experiencing a load of baby acne :(
*Gets fussy when he needs to burp, often has stomach pains, and spits up a lot too.
*Enjoys his swing and will sometimes fall asleep there- but only if he's swaddled and it's quiet.
*Happy being carried in my baby carrier- thank goodness, because my arms are permanently exhausted.
*Doesn't mind running errands (as long as he's not extremely tired, or else he'll scream...)
*Always waves his arms like he's punching something in the air.
*Seems to like music and being sung to.
*Beautiful bright blue eyes, dark hair and skin, and a perfect amount of chub.
*Even if he is a little bit more demanding at this stage, we still love this little guy!
And although Jacob has gone through a few phases since Blake has been born, he's doing a little better now. Jacob at first was showing a little aggression and developed his "angry face"- when he sees Blake he tends to ball his fists, show his teeth, and roar and scream. We can't really leave Blake to lie on the floor with Jacob around, and even when Blake is in the swing Jacob thinks it's hilarious to bang it back against the wall and laughs when Blake gets startled and his arms fly out. So we tend to be constantly reminding him to use his "happy face", not to be screaming, and to be nice and gentle with him. And so I would say half the time Jacob still is rambunctious around Blake, and the other half he's curious and tries to be gentle. He likes to lay down next to Blake and will smile and wait for him to do something funny- like spit out his pacifier, or sneeze 4 times in a row. Sometimes I just wish I could fast forward to when they'll be good friends :)
And Blake aside, Jacob has really grown up a bit in the past few months as well and I haven't really updated, so here's what Jacob's doing now:
*He's speaking in small sentences and is good at telling us what he needs- although he has become a bit more whiny lately too.
*He can say and identify most of the alphabet, can count to 10 but usually makes a mistake on at least one number still, and is practicing his shapes and colors but hasn't quite got them down yet- but he's constantly asking us what color things are.
*He's also gotten really good at singing songs with us and loves to sing fun songs with me, and helps sing songs at night when we put him to bed.
*He's good at playing by himself and keeping himself occupied, at least for a little while.
*He's learned to get water by himself at the fridge, climb up on the bathroom counter on his own to wash his hands or get things out of the cabinet(not good), and insists on sitting in a big chair now at dinner.
*He loves to play with his friends and always asks to play, or at least to go to the park or get out of the house.
*He still loves his Cars and Elmo movies, but now is also big into Toy Story, Ice Age and practically any movie that he can get his hands on.
*He likes to try and get dressed by himself and whenever we change his diaper he asks to sit on the potty too- but nothing yet.
*He's also backtracked on bedtime- he used to always stay in bed and go down really easily, but now he gets up a lot always saying he needs something, so that's been a bit more frustrating.
*He's gotten in a little bit more trouble lately as he's been testing us more, but then he laughs when he's in trouble, which is even more frustrating! But even though he can get on my nerves sometimes, overall he still really is a good kid and we try to make sure he knows he's a good boy and we still love him too!

Happy 4th of July!

2011-07-05T11:32:00.002-06:00

How cute are they?!

First thing that morning Luke had to take my mom to the airport at 4am, and then he decided to go into work for a few hours to get caught up even though he had the day off. But he was home by 11 and then that afternoon we hit up the pool together for the first time as a family this summer. Even better, it was free resident day! The pool was filled to capacity when we got there but only needed to wait about 15 minutes until we were let in. It was worth the small wait, Jacob had a great time. This pool has lots of splash zones and a little water slide that he just wanted to do over and over!

He loved floating around in the shallow parts too since he can do it all by himself. It was a really nice afternoon. We had a small cookout at home that night and we all crashed pretty early so we didn't make it out for fireworks. But I was up with Blake when the fireworks went off just outside our neighborhood so I was still able to hear the music and watch them all from the comfort of my bedroom window! Happy 4th of July!

Adjusting at Home

2011-07-04T23:19:00.003-06:00

These first two weeks have flown by- it's hard to find time to sit down and blog! Being home has been quite an adjustment and so I've just been trying to get used to taking care of two kids at home and managing both when we're out running errands too. It's been great to have my mom here to help though for these first two weeks, it's really helped ease the transition. For some reason I thought things might still be easy in the beginning since babies sleep so much, but they also need to eat and be held a lot too! And then I feel I need to compensate all my time that I'm away with Jacob by giving him lots of attention when Blake doesn't need me for the moment. But things are getting better and I'm getting more used to it.
The first several days were a little rough. I wasn't getting much sleep at night, not only because Blake would wake up at least every 2 hours to eat, but Luke was also up sick coughing all night the first week too. Jacob had also already been sick and then Luke got sick the night I had Blake. A week later Luke was still feeling awful and coughing like crazy so we finally took Luke to the doctor and found out he had bronchitis and a sinus infection. So Luke wasn't able to really help with the kids and even though my mom was here to help, I had been feeling like I still had 3 boys to take care of. So the beginning was a bit exhausting and having a baby feels overwhelming enough. I found myself often wondering how I'm ever going to manage it all on my own once my mom leaves, but now that everyone has been feeling better lately it's made things a little bit easier.

Jacob was going through the adjustment as well and it was obvious at first that he still wanted his attention. He hasn't necessarily been acting out but every time we hold Blake he wants to be held too sort of thing- as you can see...
But he's still very sweet with Blake and is always very gentle. He likes to hold his hands and name all his body parts. When Blake cries Jacob will jump up and say "I'll get it" and will try to beat us to him. Jacob always likes to follow me around with him whenever I go to feed Blake or change his diaper, or give him a bath- he likes to be in on the action and comment on everything I'm doing with Blake. And I love how Jacob always whispers and calls him "cute baby" or will just say "aww", but it's cute to hear him say Blake's name too. 'Blake' was actually the only baby name that Jacob would say before he was born and officially named too. Jacob has been big into "doctors" since all my visits, so here he is playing Doctor with Blake and checking his heartbeat, haha.
Giving his brother hugs, so sweet. Jacob's been a great big brother so far.

Blake 4 days old

Here is Blake after his first bath at home. Check out his crazy hurricane cow-lick in the front!
Doing some posing on the blanket his Grandma Cheri crocheted for him. Blake is 5 days old here.

Luke's parents were also able to fly in that first Friday to come see the baby and stayed until Saturday evening. We had a good time mostly just visiting around the house, but also went out to lunch and did a few other little errands. They also went with Luke on Saturday and took Jacob to go see the movie Cars 2 at the theater. It was Jacob's first time at a movie, and he did ok but lost interest by the end and ended up hanging out more at the arcade. Apparently it wasn't nearly as interesting for young kids like the first movie. So we were probably more bummed by this than Jacob since he's soo into Cars, but it seems he still had a fun time.
Here's Grandpa John and Grandma Brenda with Jacob and Blake

our first attempt at a family picture

and a picture of us with my mom

Besides running a few basic errands to the grocery store, library, and Target, we didn't do too much with my mom outside of the house. But towards the end of the second week, we took Jacob to the park one day- and even though he has a sour face in the picture he had a great time and loved hanging out with Grandma. And then on one of the last days that my mom was here, we took the boys to the pool. Blake was great and slept the whole time (I do love that about young babies) and Jacob had a blast swimming around in the pool. It felt good to get out for a bit and finally do something a little more fun!

On Saturday we went down to the outlets to shop for a bit, and then stopped by the Denver Temple to show my mom on the way home- and attempted another family picture...

A random close up of Blake one day shy of 2 weeks old, just blowing bubbles- or spitting up. This kid spits up soo much!

my sweet boys ready for church- Blake's first day

All of us ready for church on Blake's first day- July 3. These are my two favorite family pictures so far :)
And one last picture of Grandma Cheri with her 2 grandsons. My mom had to leave early on July 4 but we were so grateful to have her help for these first 2 weeks. I'm going to miss having dinner made for us every night, the dishes always done and the house kept tidy, the extra arms to help with the boys, and of course her company too. Jacob misses having her around too. Now I'm kind of on my own again so I'm hoping I can start to get more sleep soon and get in a routine so that I can handle these two! As much as I worry though, I'm doing pretty well, and so far so good!

The Birth of Baby Blake

2011-06-27T18:09:00.001-06:00

June 20, 2011. This has been the day that I had been looking forward to for the last 9 months. Yet I was still surprised that my due date actually became my delivery date as well, and our precious Blake David Decker was born! Here is his story:

It was last Monday and I had just a few things left to do around the house before my mom was to fly in late that night. I was just busy doing laundry and things when I noticed contractions starting around 9:45 that morning. I was on and off the phone with my mom and mentioned my contractions were getting a little closer but I was still talking through them fine and really wasn't in much pain. I was even able to capture these last minute belly pictures in between contractions too.

Finally though, around 11 am I called Luke at work and told him that he should probably come home just in case and that he should take me to my midwives first and they could tell me if I was ready enough to go to the hospital. By the time he got home and we were ready to leave it was 12:15 but then I realized that my midwives were closed from 12-1 for lunch, so we would need to wait. However, my contractions were starting to take my breath away and looking back we probably should have just tried going straight to the hospital, but I figured we still had time.
It did work out though because it gave our babysitter a little more time and then they were able to meet us at our house to watch Jacob just in time so that Luke and I could leave to go to my doctor at 1. I was just grateful that this part all worked out well since I had stressed about what to do if my mom wasn't there, but thank you to the Loughes!
Anyway, we get to my midwives right at 1, which is also connected to the hospital, and they get me in right away. Finally, the midwife who I had spoken to on the phone earlier, who didn't sound convinced that I was ready, she checked me and was shocked! "Holy cow, you're already between 7-8 cm! We need to get you up to the hospital right away before you have this baby in the elevator!"
Luke and I were actually pretty surprised too. He thought I'd only be a 3 since I had been handling the pain ok and I thought I'd be at a 4 since that is what I was when we got to the hospital when Jacob was born. Regardless, she got me a wheelchair and took me straight up to Labor and Delivery- thank goodness we still didn't need to drive to a hospital!
By the time I got robed down it was 1:30pm. I had told my midwife right away that I still wanted an epidural and was getting nervous about there still being enough time. She told me that since my water still hadn't broke that we could still do it. I did my best breathing through the contractions as they started to get more painful, but started to realize that time was slipping for my epidural, and even if they came soon I wasn't sure I'd be able to hold still enough for them to put the needle in. I still don't understand why anesthesiologists always take so long to get to women in labor!
So I started to panic. My midwife was nice enough to tell me that there was still time and she'd do her best to get the epidural quickly. Well, soon after that my water broke and so then I really started to panic. I knew it was going to be too late to get the epidural and that I'd have to go naturally and I was beyond scared. I never prepared to do a birth like this and I just knew I couldn't do it. And even then my midwife still said there could be time to get the epidural, as long as I didn't feel the need to push. And about five minutes later, I felt the need to push.
It pretty much went downhill from there. I went psycho-crazy and was pretty mean to all the nurses that suddenly rushed in and grabbed me from every side. Somewhere along the lines I even bit Luke's cheek. It was pretty traumatic.
I guess I was lucky in the sense though that it went very quickly and only needed to push for about 10 very long minutes and then he was born at 2:19pm, only 50 minutes after getting to the hospital. The hard part was over- and I was still alive! I could not believe I actually did it. The whole experience was unreal.
They weighed him in at 8 pounds, 9 ounces and 20.5 inches long. Definitely bigger than Jacob who was 7 pounds, 15 ounces. When they were cleaning him up, they asked me if he had a name and I realized that we still hadn't decided. Since Luke had a better look at him, I asked Luke what he thought the baby looked like and he surprised me by saying the name that had been my favorite so far- Blake. So before I knew it Luke was calling people with the news and so the name quickly became official before I had even realized that we had decided. But we each liked the name Blake enough that it was about the only name we'd compromise on, and we had already previously decided the middle name would be David after my dad.
So that's the story! Luke was really great through everything and I was just so glad that he was there and that everything worked out ok in the end, even if it was not the way that I had planned.

Luke got to feed him a bottle after his first feeding since his blood sugar was extremely low, but after the formula he was boosted back up to normal, so that was good.
Luke brought Jacob over later that night so that he could meet his new brother. Jacob had previously been really excited but was a little quiet when he came to the hospital. Jacob had been sick over the weekend before and his fever came back that day so unfortunately he was a little sick so we didn't want him around Blake too long. Jacob and Luke actually ended up being sick the rest of the week, so that was kind of a bummer, and we just had to be a little careful with them around Blake. Luckily though my mom came in that first night though so she was at least able to stay with me at the hospital until I was discharged Wednesday morning.
This picture is a little blurry, but I still thought it was sweet, and we did let Jacob try to hold him for a bit.

Blake in his outfit ready to go home!

Blake has been a great baby so far and it's taken time for it to even sink in that I now have another son to take care of! I've already accidentally called him Jacob several times. So it's all an adjustment and I'm still trying to get into the swing of things but I'm just happy that everything went well and that Blake is healthy. I really do feel blessed. I'll post more soon about how things are going at home, it's amazing how fast time is already flying and how busy I've been now that I have 2 kids! But we are thrilled to have this new baby in our lives and looking forward to the crazy adventure ahead!

Big Baby To-Be

2011-06-03T09:55:00.004-06:00

So the day seems like it's getting closer and closer for this baby to come. I'm technically 37.5 weeks right now, so I'm at least officially full term and that makes me feel better if this baby does decide to come early.
Yesterday though I went to the doctor for my normal weekly checkup. First they took my weight and told me that by their records I had officially gained 30 pounds-yay? Actually I thought I had already gained more than that so I wasn't too surprised. But it is weird for me to think that I only gained 20 pounds with Jacob and he was still 7 lbs 15 oz when he was born! Anyway, so then later she measured my belly and throughout my whole pregnancy I've always been measuring right on for the week I was in. So last week I was measuring 36 inches, right where I should be, then yesterday they said I jumped up to 39 inches. Ohh my!
So in one week this baby grew a loooot, which looking back makes sense. This past Sunday evening I was having so many contractions I started packing a bag thinking we might just need to go to the hospital that night. Luckily the contractions stopped when I fell asleep though, but the false labor has already started. And since then, this week I've felt extremely tired again and have been having a lot of pain high in my stomach. My doctor said the baby's pushing his butt up on me though so that explains the sharp pain I've been feeling every time I move, but she said the baby should be moving lower this week.
But since the baby is suddenly measuring at 39 I asked if that meant I could be having my baby next week and she wouldn't say, but she said all it means is I'm going to have a BIG baby and he'll probably be rivialing Jacob in size! So that kind of freaked me out a little haha. Big healthy babies are great, but realizing I could be ready to possibly have this baby next week made me think how soon that was and how I'm not really prepared! But at the same time it would be so great to be done with this pregnancy early.
For some reason though I just feel so much more nervous about everything the second time around, I always feel like I'm forgetting something. And the part that worries me the most about coming early is that my mom won't be here yet and I really don't know what my back up plan is for Jacob until it will be time. So even though several people now have offered to help watch Jacob when the time comes, it's still just a little stressful knowing that I'll need to quickly decide what to do when the time comes and it really does depend on what week, day, or time of day this baby decides to come.
Anyway, I guess I just needed to get this all out and sorted out in my mind, haha. Either way, this baby could be coming very soon, and he should be big and healthy! So for now, I'm just trying to relax and keep this baby in for at least another week, but for all I know he could be right on time, or even a little late like Jacob. I guess I'll just have to wait and see! In the meantime, I'll be thinking about a name...

Weekend with Erika and Tyler

2011-05-26T14:42:00.000-06:00

So as much as I love living out in Denver, one thing that I wish the most was that I had family- any family!- that lived close. Sometimes it's really hard living away from my family, especially now that we're having more kids. So I was so excited that my sister Erika and her husband Tyler were going to be driving through Denver for the weekend. Of course it would have been more fun if they were actually moving here but they're actually moving to Maryland for awhile so that Tyler can go to school and Erika can look for a job now that she just graduated from ISU with her masters in psychology. It was so fun having them here even if it was just for a few days and I couldn't help but think how fun it would be if I could see them all the time! But I'll take what I can get and I enjoyed the time that they were here!

Tyler and Erika drove from Pocatello, ID and got into Denver late last Thursday night. So on Friday Luke still had to work, but the rest of us decided to go downtown too and just walk around 16th Street Mall. It actually turned out to be a beautiful day! So we did a little shopping and walked over to Luke's office. He was too busy to come down but they had a hotdog stand outside so we ate those outside, and it was a lot of fun!
That night we got some pizza and then went bowling. And yea, it's not easy to go bowling when you feel like you have a bowling ball in your belly!
Erika loves her little nephew and it was so nice to have them both around to help with him, and Jacob really warmed up to Tyler and Erika too.
Even though he wasn't up for many pictures, Jacob was actually behaving really well while we all bowled- usually he's running around and just trying to play the arcade games. But he watched and clapped for all of us and liked being in charge of the balls as they rolled in haha.

I was bowling horribly so I finally decided I may as well let Jacob take over my game. So we got the ramp out for him and he loved it! On his second turn he even got a strike too!

He didn't really know what was going on but I was glad that he was able to play with us and we all had a good time :)
On Saturday I had an activity for Activity Days and so while I was out in the morning Luke worked on the yard and smoked some ribs for lunch. We filled up on those and were so full for the rest of the day none of us even wanted dinner! I even liked them, they were very good ribs!
That afternoon we stopped by our friends graduation party, ate more food, and then later we took Jacob to the park. He had a blast running around on his own for awhile, and then Tyler and Erika took him on the swings too.

We talked Erika and Tyler into staying one extra day through Sunday, and we mostly just went to church and hung around the house and played a few games but it was fun to have some extra time to visit with them before they left early Monday morning.
I'm also now 36 weeks, so finally starting my 9th month- even though it somehow feels like I'm farther along. I look like I'm ready to pop!

And even though we couldn't quite capture a picture, Jacob loves to rub my belly and talk about his baby brother and give him kisses.
This picture would be so much cuter if Jacob wasn't being grumpy about having to take a picture!

Jacob really misses Erika and Tyler and keeps talking about them and the fun weekend that we had. We're glad that they have now made it to Maryland safely and that they were able to dodge all the huge storms and tornadoes along the midwest, they got lucky they didn't have any car trouble this trip, unlike at Christmas.
Anyway, now we're looking forward to when my mom comes out in 3 1/2 weeks- I love having family around to visit and help out! I wish I could see more of my family sooner but I'm so happy to have my mom come out and help with this new baby that should be coming very soon!

Utah Weekend

2011-05-18T14:46:00.001-06:00

This past weekend we decided to go to Utah to visit Luke's family since we hadn't seen them in awhile and wanted Jacob to spend some time with his cousins. I was a little worried about the drive, not so much about keeping Jacob entertained for 8 hours, but for me too since I was 8.5 months pregnant. But luckily everything went very smoothly and we had a fun weekend.

Luke got off work a little earlier on Thursday and we took off around 3:30 and made it into Rifle by 7. Jacob did great on the drive and kept himself occupied with toys.

It was nice to split up the drive there in two days, it gave us some time to relax. After we got dinner, we went to our hotel and took Jacob swimming- he loved it! I'm pretty sure it was the highlight of his weekend and is still asking us when he can go swimming again.
The next morning Luke worked out at the gym, took Jacob swimming one last time, and then we had breakfast at the hotel. The hotel felt pretty empty too since we were the only ones at the pool and at breakfast, but that was actually kind of nice. While I finished packing our bags Luke took Jacob to the playground outside and then we were back on the road by 10.

We got to Luke's sister's house Friday afternoon and stayed until Sunday morning. Luke's parents flew in Friday night and we were able to visit with Luke's other sister who lives out there as well, so it was nice to see everyone even though it was a quick weekend. We mostly just hung around Luke's sister's house so I didn't take many pictures, but I got a couple of Jacob with his cousins.
Owen, Andrew, Christian, and Jacob
Jacob loved playing with their toys and cars, and watching Cars- even on vacation he couldn't miss a day of watching his favorite movie!
Jacob did really great on the drive back too - sleeping, watching his movie, and playing quietly- until the last 30 minutes, but that's practically to be expected. Actually, Jacob always does much better than I expect at things like this- sleeping away from home was another one of those things that I worried about since Jacob is in a bed now, but again he impressed me and did great. It's weird thinking that when we make the trip out again in a few months we'll have another baby with us- hopefully everything will go as smoothly then too!

Mother's Day

2011-05-10T09:35:00.001-06:00

The whole weekend was just beautiful! It was in the 80's each day, so on Friday I took Jacob to the zoo. I figured it would be the last time we'd go together before the baby was born.

Jacob did a really good job and we saw all his favorite spots and saw some new things too- this was the first time we wandered over to the little aquarium and Jacob loved seeing all the cool fish!

By the end though we were both worn out!
Also, just on a sidenote- Jacob's latest obsession is the movie Cars. I found him some Cars pajamas the other day and as soon as he put them on he insisted that he needed to watch the movie. So I set up his little DVD player, and look how excited he gets! It's probably bad though that he now literally watches this movie every day! Luke's looking forward to taking Jacob to his first movie in the theater in June- Cars 2!

Anyway, on Saturday Luke and I got a babysitter and went on a real date- movie and dinner! And Luke and I basically never go to the movies so it was a fun for us! It felt good to get a nice date in before the baby comes though. We went downtown and saw Water for Elephants and then went to Maggiano's for dinner, and again it was just a beautiful evening to be walking around outside.
Luke got me some pretty Mother's Day roses and on Sunday he made a pancake breakfast, dinner, and cleaned up too- thank you!
And here's Jacob waking up from his nap on Mother's Day- of course he woke up as soon as I was trying to take a picture of him sleeping, haha. One week after he started sleeping in his bed at night, he transitioned to taking naps in his bed too. He's done a great job and stays in bed the whole time, but he's back to only taking 1 1/2 hour naps, which is still good, but overall he's getting less sleep since he typically wakes up at 7:15am now. I'm getting used to that small change though and Jacob is completely transitioned and doing great- yay Jacob!
And here's my sweet boy on Mother's Day. And he made me a cute Mother's Day necklace in nursery too :)

Me and Jacob on Mother's Day And what says Mother's Day more than a big pregnany lady? Me at 34 weeks!

I'm getting more and more anxious for this baby to come, mostly just because I'm done being pregnant haha. At the same time though my biggest worry though is that this baby will come early, so I guess I still have mixed feelings. And I don't feel very mentally prepared yet to have another baby in the house, and we are still no closer to deciding on a name either. But I am very excited to meet this little boy and be the mommy of two! I feel very very lucky to be a stay at home mom and I recognize that I'm very blessed. So this Mother's Day was nice to feel even extra spoiled and appreciated, and I wouldn't trade being a mom for anything!

Brave Big Boy

2011-04-27T14:54:00.001-06:00

Two weekends ago on a whim, we went out and bought Jacob a new bunkbed that I found on craigslist. Since he's having a brother we knew that we'd want them to have a bunk bed in the future, but for now we wanted Jacob to be able to use the top bunk on it's own as a toddler bed since it has a rail. And with the arrival of this baby getting closer, everyone encouraged us to switch Jacob to the bed before the baby comes to make it easier.

And I was planning on making the transition easier by putting his bed in his room for now so he could ease his way out of the crib but still be in his room a little longer. But understandably, Luke didn't want to have to set up his bed and then have to move it to his new room in a few months from now, so we agreed to just start getting his new room ready and he could make the change all at once.

So all last week Jacob watched us set up his bed and buy things for his new room, and he's been so excited! He talks about his bunk bed all the time and loved jumping in it (and on it) and pretending to go night-night like a big boy. So the room isn't much, but we figured it was cozy enough that he could make the switch over.
So Easter night was the big night and Jacob was finally ready to sleep in his new bed. I think I had the hardest time with it- all the sudden I wasn't sure that I was ready to give up all the mornings he'd let me sleep in, and figured maybe we really did still have time to put it off a little longer. And most of all I worried that maybe we were trying to push him into too many transitions at once- new bed AND new room.

But we stuck with it and kept his same night routine. He was obviously pretty nervous the first night and was close to tears but kept repeating that he was going to be ok. It seemed that he was mostly just nervous being in this new room. But after a lot of stalling on my part, I left him alone and closed the door behind me. It was quiet for 2 minutes and then he started crying and came running to our room. I put him back to bed twice and was about ready to give up, I hated forcing him to sleep in a bed if he wasn't ready.

But then I decided to get him a soothing CD with just soft piano music, and then Luke layed down with him and just kept telling him to be brave, and after 20 minutes he left him alone. Surprisingly, Jacob stayed in bed after that and put himself to sleep soon after without crying again at all. I couldn't believe it. Although it was hard and heartbreaking at first, Jacob actually did a great job!

He slept through the night, finally falling asleep at about 9:45 and woke up at about 7 when Luke was leaving for work. So that was not as fun having to wake up 2 1/2 hours earlier than normal, but then yesterday he slept until 8:15, so maybe it wont be too bad soon enough! And since he is falling asleep just a little later and waking up earlier, he's at least taking nice 3+ hour naps again to make up for the sleep lost at night. So I guess I can live with that, haha.

So anyway, it's been 3 nights now that he's slept in his bed and he has completely impressed me. I had spent so much time worrying about how to set up his new bed situation and how he would handle it, and I'm so glad that, at least so far, he really has done amazing! And it's so sweet how every morning when Jacob wakes up he's so proud of himself for sleeping in his bed, and tells us how he was brave, and did a good job, and is a good boy. It's nice to hear him being so proud of himself because I think that's what's been helping him keep it up, because he knows how happy and proud of him we are each morning.

So I originally started this post thinking I was going to need to ask for advice, but as a few days have passed I'm pleased that things are going smoothly enough so far. I never really expected the transition to be easy and it still is taking us all some getting used to, and I know it will still take a little more time until Jacob's completely comfortable with the idea. But I'm just so proud of him- and sorry for all my details but I wanted to be able to remember how we did this, for future reference and because this really is a big deal for us! Jacob has been growing up so quick lately, but we are so proud of our big boy!

Easter

2011-04-25T17:00:00.000-06:00

Not too much going on for Easter this year, but at least gave me an excuse to finally pull out my camera again! I've been so bad at taking pictures of Jacob lately. Anyway, we went to a small little Easter Egg Hunt at the church on Saturday and Jacob loved looking for the eggs!

And it didn't take long for him to realize that there was candy inside- that got him pretty excited too!

He ate about half his candy before we even left, I tried to get a picture of his face stuffed with 3 chocolates, but he just stuck his toungue out :)
And here is my big boy on Easter, all dressed for church. Actually we had Stake Conference and were lucky enough to have the apostle L. Tom Perry there, and so that was a neat Easter Sunday. And we showed up over an hour early to get a seat for the 2 hour meeting, and Jacob did great- we were so proud of him sitting with Luke the whole time!

We also enjoyed a nice dinner of salmon(though I was really wishing we did pork chops!), potatoes, green beans, rolls, and deviled eggs. Then we had a yummy strawberry shortcake for dessert- Jacob had 3 helpings!

And luckily I took some time to take some Easter pictures too, I never really got around to taking nice ones of him at his birthday, but I managed to get a couple of cute Easter ones in our backyard- so enjoy!

Spotlight on Jacob

2011-03-29T14:01:00.004-06:00

So I got all caught up on what we did for Jacob's birthday but I didn't really mention much about what Jacob is doing now that he's two. And so I want to try and capture what Jacob is like so that we can remember how fun and cute he's been at this stage!

First off, here are Jacob's stats at 2 years. He's 23 pounds 4 ounces- I know, he's tiny! I was worried he'd be off the charts in weight but his pediatrician reminded me that they don't grow as much in the second year and from here on out like they do in the first year. So even though he's only gained 3 pounds in the last 6 months, he's still in the 3rd percentile for weight, right where he's always been. And he's 33 inches tall in the 25th percentile now. Poor kid hates going to the doctor, at least he doesn't really need to go back for another year! (But isn't this doctor gown so cute?!) At two, Jacob LOVES:

*Songs!- He loves to hear songs on the TV or radio, or makes Luke play music for him on his phone or when we're on the computer. But he especially loves when I sing him songs. His favorites are ones that have hand motions that he can do with me while I sing, especially: The Eensy Weensy Spider, Popcorn Popping, The Wheels on the Bus, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, and his latest favorite Happy Birthday! There's not really hand motions for Happy Birthday but ever since his birthday he'll try and sing the song to himself ("hap bersday.. you!")and he'll ask us if it's his birthday ("bersday?") or the other day he told his babysitter that it was his birthday and that he's two- haha.

*Walks!- Jacob begs to go on walks, especially if it's to the park- because he also loves to go down slides! He also now begs to go to the store! I think he just likes to get out of the house every day! *Books!- He loves to be read to and often likes to have a book in hand. Even when we go to his room to change his diaper he has to get a book first! His favorites are this little fairy tale series we have and he can tell me the title of every one and can read along with a lot of the words- which he has been doing for awhile but still a really fun stage.

*Baths!- What kid doesn't love laying in water and playing with toys and bubbles? But, he does hate when I wash his hair.

*Cars and Trucks!- Jacob loves to play with car toys and trucks and make little beep beep sounds or whatever. He also loves seeing and hearing real trucks outside, including firetrucks, ambulance, police cars, the garbage truck(which he calls the "dragon"- meaning trash can), construction trucks, and airplanes, trains, and bikes too. He also loves to ride his toy truck and bike at home.

*Bubbles!- He doesn't care so much about bubbles themselves but loves to just blow the bubbles. Even if I give him a small tube of bubbles that's empty he'll still carry it around and pretend. He got a bubble mower for his birthday but he was too worried about the bubbles coming out(or not coming out actually) that sometimes it's better to just keep bubbles away, or else he drives me nuts asking for bubbles!

*Sports!- He loves to play basketball, catch, and kick balls while running outside. He also likes to watch sports on TV and knows the difference between when Dad is watching basketball or football.

*Eggs!- Sometimes Jacob will go through phases of foods he likes, but he's been very consistent with loving to eat eggs- he could eat them any meal! Luke has even taught him how to dip his toast into his eggs and so this is his favorite way too eat it too.

*Taking Off His Clothes!- At first he started doing this just because he loved to be in charge of zipping, or unsnapping, and just seemed to think it was funny to constantly be slipping off his pants. Then I figured maybe his pants were getting in the way when he was trying to play. But more and more I'm starting to think he'll also slip off his clothes when he knows he needs a diaper change- which he'll also always tell me now by either saying "diaper" or "change". But I still think he finds it funny to run around in just a diaper :)

*Cameras!- Of course all kids are obsessed with holding the camera or seeing themselves on camera- which is why it's nearly impossible to take videos of him or pictures of him cooperating with me. But it's still funny when I scroll through my pictures and find about 7 in a row of his feet on top of my kitchen table!

*Elmo!- Yes, Jacob still loves Elmo! He sleeps with, not one, but two Elmo "dolls" at night- he either has to have them both together or none at all. He still likes watching Elmo's World, and he's much better at sitting still through episodes, which is great especially when I need him still for at least 15 minutes. But he also loves all the Sesame Street characters and can say all their names and likes to imitate Cookie Monster and laugh like the Count. He also laughs along when he watches TV, and tries to count and interact when he watches the show too. And as much as he enjoys shows like that, I am happy that he's not a TV junkie like I was worried he was getting to be earlier. He'll watch about 2 shows a day (he also likes Caillou), which I think is not too bad since I think he does gain some learning that way too.

*Candy!- As I've mentioned before, Jacob always begs for "can-dee", "nougett", "taffy", "gloc-let", "cookie", "cake", "ga-bar", and so on. We've tried to set the rule of 2 pieces of candy a day, and only when he's earned it but somehow he always earns one when Daddy comes home from work? Haha, soon enough we'll be taking him to the dentist, and hopefully he just hasn't ruined his teeth yet!

*to Laugh!- Jacob has such a fun personality and finds amusement in many things! He finds random things funny, will laugh at others, laugh when he thinks he's being cute, or he'll try to make others laugh. He loves attention from us and loves to be tickled and be silly. He has a great, contagious laugh and such a sweet smile!

*Mommy and Daddy!- This one I guess is the most important of all! Even though Jacob is growing older and becoming more independent I love that he still loves us! Just recently Jacob has almost started favoring me over his Dad, which can be frustrating for me sometimes when all I want is a break. And he's started trying to push buttons and do things he know he shouldn't too. But I love that he still likes to cuddle with me on the couch, and bring toys and books to me so that we can play together, and I love the time we spend together when I tuck him in at night, and I know that he loves all our time together too.

More things to know about Jacob:

*Jacob is a sensitive boy. Sometimes this means that he can get emotional or sad easily, but he also always notices when others are sad too. He always will point out to me how others are feeling- whether they are sad, crying, or happy. Even when he hears or sees a firetruck or ambulance go by he always asks what "happend?" He still likes to give hugs and kisses, and cuddle with us. He is just simply a good, loving, sweet boy.

*Jacob can be a very good helper. Naturally he may not always want to clean up, but all I usually need to do is just sing a clean-up song and then he's happy to help! And whenever he knows that he's done something good, he always calls himself a "good boy!" which I think is pretty cute.

*He is becoming much better at keeping himself entertained for longer periods of time by just playing with his toys, or watching a short Elmo DVD while I clean up the kitchen and make dinner.

*He plays well with friends and other kids, older and younger. I love picking him up and people telling me he was the best behaved kid, and doesn't get upset or cry when other kids take toys from him. I love that he is easy to get along with and just loves being around "fends".

*Jacob is good so far at sharing and using his manners. He is good at saying "please" and "sorry" and I love that he always says these words in a soft whisper. He's finally getting better at saying "thanks" and (your) "welcome" too.

*We've started using time-out a few times now, the only times I've had to go to that is when he hits me with toys. Usually I know he's just trying to be funny or play around, but I have to draw a line somewhere, and it seems to have worked so far, and hopefully I won't need to do it much more as he learns what's expected.

*I still think Jacob is a picky eater, but I think he's gotten much better and has started trying more foods that he used to always turn away- meat in particular. He does love to use his utensils and feed himself and is great at sitting at his little table until he's done.

*Jacob is talking and using so many words it's almost useless for me to make lists of words he knows now. All I need to do is say a word once and he's basically picked it up, if he hasn't already. We can communicate pretty well now, and it's nice to know that others can understand him too- enough anyway. I love this stage though and how he loves to talk about things, and I can start to see how he thinks and processes things by the words he tells me. Sometimes though he'll say a string of words that just sounds so random he doesn't seem to make any sense at all! And I'll admit, when he repeats a word over and over and over... it's not as cute, haha.

*He can be whiny, but not to the point of tantrums, luckily. He'll get frustrated if he can't do something- like a puzzle, or get his shoes on by himself, but I just remind him to ask for help. He'll get whiny and repeat himself when he wants something- like candy, or to go on a slide, and if it's not something I can give him I just have to try my best to distract him with something else until he stops. So far though, we haven't had too many problems with this, and I'm hoping this means he'll be an easy-tempered kid overrall.

*Jacob has not officially started potty training but he has definetly shown and interest and is showing a lot of signs that he's ready to at least start practicing. As I said earlier, he tells me immediately when he goes and tells me that he needs me to change his diaper, and he'll often take off his pants too. He got a new potty for his birthday and so every now and then he'll tell me that he wants to go sit on his potty. So for now I'm just letting him get used to the idea, but I want to wait until I know he's really ready and would also like to wait until after the baby is born too.

*Jacob is full of expressions! Especially lately he's been big on rolling his eyes, looking up when I'm trying to give him directions, making his eyes and mouth real wide, make puppy faces, and just being silly! He really makes us laugh! He'll often make silly faces or shy smiles to strangers too, so he still gets a lot of attention from others too.

*We've also seen the "spiritual" side of Jacob lately too. When we dress him on Sunday he knows where we're going because he tells us "urch...eezus" (church, Jesus). He always finds pictures of Jesus and points them out to us and I've caught him reading my scriptures where he then said Jesus again. Last Sunday Jacob and Luke didn't go to church because they were sick but Jacob got a hold of Luke's cell phone and somehow opened an app that had church music and he just went into the other room and laid on his belly with his chin in his hands listening to church music, and when Luke found him, Jacob simply told him "song, Jesus"- it was sweet. He's also good at doing prayers with us and doing surprisingly better at being still and reverent during church. *Has started saying "Jacob" and refering to himself and identifying himself in pictures, videos, and even in the mirror.

*Jacob has still been a great sleeper. He'll take a shorter nap during the day- typically an hour and a half, but then he usually sleeps about 13 hours on average each night. He goes to bed at 8 and typically wakes up at 9, but still sometimes sleeps in close to 10. I'm really trying to soak it all in before this baby comes!

*Jacob has been sporting long hair for a long time now and over the weekend we finally cut his hair short! Luke and I were really sad to see his long hair go, and so was Jacob- he haaates getting his hair cut! And he had so much that it took awhile too. But he got a lollipop so he made it through, and I think it looks so cute now! And I'm glad that it helps make me feel like he's older now too- he looks more like a toddler to me now! So I know this was a long post but writing it all down makes me realize how much I just love this little boy and everything about him! Jacob has always been so sweet and good, and I still just can't imagine how my next boy will be able to compare- he has a lot to live up to! At least I know Jacob will be a great older brother and I know he's getting excited to have a baby and be a brother too. I'm just trying to enjoy the time that I have left where it's just me and Jacob- we spend so much time together it's really like he's my little best friend! These two years have really been wonderful, and I'm excited to see how much more Jacob will learn and grow in this next year!

Jacob's Birthday Weekend

2011-03-24T21:28:00.000-06:00

Jacob's birthday was a busy day! I tried to make it as fun as possible for him so he could really feel special on his day! And lucky for him, his Grandma and Grandpa Decker were able to fly out that morning so they could enjoy his birthday weekend with us! So first thing Jacob and I did was go pick them up from the airport. Then we headed to Target so we could get our last minute birthday shopping done- and we got some great stuff for him! Then we went to McDonalds for lunch.

Luke went in to work at about 5 am that morning so that he could get off halfway through the day, and he was able to meet up with us there at McDonalds- we were glad he could come hang out with us! Jacob loves running around the play area- but he was a little scared about Ronald. This was as close as he would get to him for a picture!
Then we were able to go home for a bit and relax with everyone while Jacob took a nap. Then after he woke up we headed out to the park. Both last year and this year we've been lucky that it's been such amazing weather in March on and around his birthday. And Jacob is now absolutely obsessed with slides- so he had a lot of fun at the park!

Yea, he could have spent hours on all these slides!

He was also cute riding this saucer and little pig too

So as if that wasn't enough, afterwords we headed to Chuck-E-Cheese (or Chunky Cheese as someone kept calling it, haha)

he loved all the little rides and always got sad when they stopped moving

and he even got to play basketball after watching all the big kids do it, including Dad and Grandpa :) So after $5 of tokens, we put all our tickets together and Jacob was able to win a box of Nerds, SweetTarts, and a little toy frog. He seemed to have a lot of fun but I think it will be a long time before we take him back- that place can be a little crazy, and a little overrated honestly too.
So then we came home and picked up some Anthony's II pizza for Jacob's birthday dinner. And I wasn't sure since Jacob can be a picky eater, but I was happy to see he loved the pizza too!
Then it was time to open presents!

He loved all the attention he was getting from everyone!
This box was a new elmo potty, and Grandma picked out a fun bubble mower for him.

We also got him this new trike which he's been so excited about, and then some clothes, books and little things too. I am still on the search for some sunglasses too so if anyone knows where I can get some I've had the hardest time finding ones his size!
And if the bike wasn't his favorite new toy it's this car rug and all the little toy cars! I've been wanting to find a rug like this for awhile and Brenda found this perfect one at Target!And even better, all the little cars that match with it were all at the dollar section in Target too! And they all make little noises and light up so Jacob just loves them!
So after presents was time for cake. And with the busy day I ran short on time decorating his cake- it's not exactly what I had pictured- but Jacob still seemed to like it, so that's all that matters!
And he absolutely loved when we would sing Happy Birthday to him. We made sure to do it a couple times throughout the day and he always beamed. And he can tell us that he's 2 years old now too!

He only took a couple bites of his cake and then all he wanted to do was play with his cars on top. After that he was ready for bed, it had been a long day but I know he knew that it was a special day because it was his "bers-day". And the next day was just as jam-packed since we were trying to take advantage of the short time that his Grandma and Grandpa were in town.
So the next morning Luke set up Jacob's trike and Jacob was very happy to wake up to all his new toys again- he loved going from one toy to the next all morning! Then we ran some errands together, then headed south to Cherry Creek to this burger place they wanted to try out. I can't remember the name-Duffy's maybe- but it was real good, and it was at a cute little part downtown. So Luke's parents also checked out some shops too and Luke and I found a park for Jacob to play at for a bit- more slides!And it was another beautiful day so after lunch we headed over to Red Rocks to check out the stadium, which we had still never seen. I was a little worried about climbing to the top because it looked so far and steep, but it wasn't as bad as it seemed. And it was all so neat and pretty!
Once we got near the top, Jacob was such a good sport at climbing all the steps up too!
Here's the stadium at the top.
Grandpa and Grandma with Jacob- he really did like them but was just not in the best mood at this point because he ran into a pole and fell just a few minutes earlier, and was tired since he didn't get a chance to nap- poor kid A picture of Luke and I with Jacob
We didn't stay up there for too long since it was so windy, but the walk back was much easier. We were all proud of Brenda for making the long walk up too since she had just had hip surgery only 6 weeks or so ago. So we all felt good about getting out for the day to do something fun and different. That night we went out to dinner to Outback together, and by the end of the night Jacob was exhausted! But before putting him to bed we got one last nice picture of him with his grandparents since they had to catch a flight home early the next morning. It was a short weekend with them but I know Jacob really enjoyed their company for two days and all the attention that he got from them. He's still talking about "ga-pa" and "ga-ma" so hopefully he'll get to see them, and other family soon!
So it was a fun birthday weekend for Jacob! Now that he's two I think it's also time for a fresh hair cut! Luke and I love his "long luscious locks", but I'm ready for a change and hoping that maybe he'll look older to me too. So as soon as he gets that hair cut I'll take some new pictures of him, and hopefully he'll cooperate! This boy is always on the go and can be a handful at times, but overrall he is the best little boy I know and I could not have asked for a better son! Happy Birthday Jacob!!

Pre-Birthday

2011-03-23T22:28:00.001-06:00

First a random picture: You can't tell but we were at the car wash and Jacob thought it was so neat that Dad was giving the car a "bath"- this picture was just too cute so I had to throw it in :)

So we didn't have a birthday party for Jacob this year, but since his friend Jane's birthday is only a few days before his, I decided the two of them could at least get together to do something fun! So I invited my friend Natalie and her daughter Jane to join us at the zoo last Wednesday morning when it was just perfect weather- and I wanted to start making good use out of my zoo pass!

First stop and Jacob's favorite- "eh-fents"! Not the greatest view, but they still liked them

Trying to show them the monkeys. It was so hard to get Jacob's attention- all he wanted to do was run around again!

Jacob at least enjoyed the drums and made a little friend too

cute picture of the two of them checking out the camels And I just thought this picture was funny because Jacob kept trying to give this random boy hugs and afterwords kept trying to hold his hand- it was cute but very strange and random...

So that was our day at the zoo! I think Jane enjoyed it much more than Jacob- he's still not into the animals much but I'm glad this time we had some company and that at least Jane loved seeing the animals! I think we'll need to have them come with us again soon!

The next day was St. Patrick's Day and I'm pretty sure from now on I'm always going to feel like that holiday is just an extension of Jacob's birthday since two years ago I went into labor the night of St. Patrick's Day. So since it was practically his birthday I had my camera out more...

So we had made this cute little rainbow mobile for the holiday and he was just so cute dancing and waving it around! (sorry he's not dressed- all his green clothes were in the wash so he had to wait until the laundry was dry before getting dressed!)

And green sugar cookies isn't a normal tradition, but I wanted cookies so green iced cookies it is!

And the one tradition I always have to have now is pistachio pudding for dessert. I even had to go to two grocery stores before I could find any. But two years ago when my mom was here and we ate it with whip cream it was like the best thing I ever had. And then it was the last thing I ate before Jacob was born the next day. And so this year it was also the last thing Jacob ate before his birthday and he turned 2 the next day!

A Quick Peek at 25 Weeks

2011-03-08T14:34:00.003-07:00

So yesterday I had to go in for a second ultraound since they wanted to check my fluid level again. They weren't too worried about it so I tried not to think about it either but did make an effort to drink a lot more water the past month. Anyway, when I got there they said that since my last ultrasound was over a month ago they would need to do everything again- all the labeling parts and everything. But that was fine with me- just meant I got to see my little baby longer! I was just sad that I didn't have Luke with me this time because this ultrasound was much better than the first one. The lady actually took her time and talked me through everything and the baby looked much more like a baby rather than a skeleton. We even got this great shot of his face! This is probably my favorite ultrasound picture, between both my boys!
It's sideways since his face is showing sideways- and there's a hand or two in the shot too. I just loved seeing his face and how he's moving around. I saw him kicking me on the screen and would feel it in my belly at the same time- very weird! This baby has been moving around a lot and feels very different from last time around.
I realized part of that reason may be that this baby is also breech. I'm not too thrilled about that, and my doctors say there's plenty of time for him to turn around but it does make me a little nervous. But it at least explained all the stomach pains I've been having. Maybe it's just me but everything seems to hurt a lot more the second time around!
It hasn't been bad though, I really have been doing fine, just remembering the discomfort that comes that farther along I get. And the sleepless nights, eh. Also, it turns out a lot of my symptoms are from anemia and I've been really slacking on taking my iron pills, so if I'm better at that I'll apparently feel a lot better too- go figure!
So being in my 25th week now I still have a ways to go but I feel like it's going fast. I'm just about at the end of my second trimester and I still have not done or bought a thing for this baby! Not that he'll need much though- that's the nice thing about having a second boy. I just want the time to keep flying and hopefully I'll be ready when he comes!

Jacob in February

2011-03-03T21:16:00.001-07:00

So it's time for another update on what Jacob has been up to this past month...

Here was Jacob the first time I brought him to the doctor with me- actually back in January. I was a little worried he'd freak out but all we had to do was give him lollipops and he was set. I just need to remember to ask for them when I go in now though or else all he'll say is "a-pop!"- somehow kids never forget, especially when it comes to candy! This boy is addicted to candy, chocolate, snacks- anything sweet or bad for you... he gets it from his mommy :)
I took Jacob with me when I went to go visit my friend who just had a baby boy. I wanted to kind of get an idea of his reaction and what he'd be like- and he was so sweet. He was very gentle and just sat there smiling at him. It made me feel a lot more comfortable that he'll be a great older brother. And since then, he's become much more sensitive to babies- like anytime he hears a baby cry he'll stop and kind of frown and say "baby crying"- I think it's so sweet!

When getting ready for church one morning I found Jacob running around like this- naked except for his diaper and my pearl bracelet. He was very proud and kept smiling calling it a "nec-gless".
Jacob got to see his old buddy Jane and some of these pictures of the two of them were too cute to pass up! Jane was just so funny dressed in her tutu, a cowboy hat, and insisted on carrying around a calculator...

My cute cute boy!

And Jacob seemed to teach her his margarine tub dance. He literally does this every day- sticks an old margarine tub on his head, and runs around in circles dancing and making noises...
And he usually has to take off his pants to do this- this is a very common way to see Jacob at home!
He is so silly, but at least the simplest toys keep him happy :)

He also loves to play with his cars and trucks now, pushing them around or riding his own little toy truck. And when we're driving in the car he has to point out every car and truck he sees too, haha.
And I had to catch another classic shot of him trying on Daddy's shoes- without pants of course...
We've also had a warm week in the 60's and so Jacob and I have enjoyed several nice walks on the trail behind our neighborhood. He begs to go on walks everyday now- he loves to just run along the trail and always tries to sneak off to check out the prairie dogs.

Today was our last day of warm weather, at least for a bit, so I broke down and bought us a year zoo pass. We went for the first time today and unfortunately this was the only picture I was able to capture since I forgot my camera and my phone camera froze up after I got this shot with him checking out the elephants.
Jacob overall didn't seem to care about the animals, which kind of surprised/disappointed me- all he wanted to do was get out of his stroller, run around, and play with the other kids at the zoo. Finally when we saw the elephants again on our way out Jacob liked watching them pick up grass with their "nose" and put it in their mouth- they at least gave him a good laugh. So hopefully throughout the next year he'll still find interest in the zoo- we need to get our money's worth!

So that's all for now. Jacob is just the sweetest, cutest little boy ever with such a funny personality! I just can't believe in 2 weeks my baby will already be 2!

26th Birthday

2011-03-03T15:07:00.003-07:00

So not too much to say about my birthday this year, pretty low key, but nice. On Friday I started making cupcakes so that we could enjoy them over the weekend. Jacob was such a great help too!
And it was my first time making red velvet cake- it's crazy how red the batter is- it looked freaky! And yikes it was a mess too- that red dye really gets everywhere!

Mmm but so worth it! Here's Jacob enjoying his spoils after all his hard work too- yummy! Unfortunately at last minute Luke had to go into work on Saturday, but it was ok- I took Jacob and we went out shopping! I got myself some much needed maternity shirts and then went up to the Orchards to walk and shop around a bit more, until I found a new scarf too! And Jacob enjoyed running around and playing for a bit too- it was another beautiful day! That night Luke took us out to Macaroni Grill and we had an awesome meal! Seriously, my shrimp portofino might be my new favorite restaurant meal, and then they even brought me a slice of cake for my birthday :)

So then Sunday was my actual birthday. I had Luke get another belly shot of me- I'm 24 weeks now. I know it's not the greatest picture, but it'll have to do...

And I just had to laugh because later that evening I tried getting a picture with Jacob and he kept making "Luke" faces! In other words- looking as crazy and uninterested as possible every single shot! Haha so this was the best I could get- he is so silly :)
That night for dinner we had salmon, rolls, fries, and green beans, and then Luke made me a lovely apple pie for dessert too. He even carved- H B K D- which stands for Happy Birthday Kara Decker of course! So it was a nice easy birthday- now it's only less than 3 weeks until Jacob's birthday and my little guy turns 2!

Garden of the Gods

2011-03-03T14:40:00.007-07:00

Luke had President's Day off so we used that weekend to make a little daytrip just a little over an hour south to Colorado Springs and decided to go see the Garden of the Gods. It was warm and sunny when we left but right as we entered Colorado Springs it got all cloudy and rainy. So we weren't quite prepared for that but luckily it was just a sprinkle and it didn't last too long. So we headed out and took a look around.

The rocks were really quite amazing. They were huge and had a lot of really neat shapes just randomly around the park. This one above is called "Camels Kissing" and this one below was Balaning Rock or something. As we got closer we could see that it really was balancing on hardly anything- it was really neat!
We even got a good laugh about another rock that we saw because Luke said it looked just like our ultrasound picture, so we said the baby was here with us too. But out of decency, I won't show the picture of the rock... but it still made us laugh :)

Jacob and I also found a cool little cave to walk into...

And not the best picture of Luke and I but I said we needed to document that he was actually there! Afterwords we went to a barbeque restaurant that he really wanted to go to- it was packed! And that was it- we would have hit up the outlets on the way home but it started storming again and we were already tired. But it was nice to get out for a day and enjoy some time together!

Halfway

2011-02-08T13:53:00.003-07:00

Here is a picture of me halfway! This was taken just over a week ago since I officially started my 21st week yesterday. To most people it must seem small and many have not even been able to tell yet, but for me I already feel huge! I guess wearing black doesn't exactly do my belly justice, I swear it seems a lot bigger to me...
And my doctors say I'm gaining weight just fine and everything has been normal. I was supposed to go in today actually but cancelled since there's a lot of snow and Jacob and I are sick. The only thing I know right now that's not quite normal is that the water fluid level in the sac is really low, and I'm not sure if I did something that might have caused that but I'm really trying to drink more water now. They will have to do another ultrasound in 3 weeks to make sure the water level goes up. I don't know what will happen or what that means if it doesn't and they told me not to worry, but naturally that makes me a little worried. Has anyone else ever had that issue?
Other than that everything has been just great! Now we're just trying to decide on boy names... :)

It's a...

2011-01-29T10:40:00.002-07:00

BOY! If you look closely at the ultrasound pic you can see that this baby is clearly a boy! I kind of couldn't believe it- I was somehow convinced it was a girl, or maybe that small part of me was just hoping for a girl. But Luke was thrilled and I really am happy too- this is really just what we originally wanted. Now Jacob will have a brother close in age and we hope that they'll always be great friends!

We kept telling him that now he's going to have a brother, and so he kept saying "brutter" yesterday, which was cute. But then this morning, I kept asking him, "Jacob, are you excited to have a brother?" And everytime he would ask me, "sitter?" Haha- maybe he wanted a sister afterall! Maybe next time kid... :)

So...

2011-01-15T13:45:00.001-07:00

You would think by now I would have come up with a more creative way to say this, especially since I've kept it in this long... but I'm not very creative.
So yea- we're having another baby! I'm due around June 20, which puts me at just about 18 weeks. We are all very happy and excited (Jacob included), but I'm a little more anxious right now to just find out what we are having!
Luckily I don't have to wait too much longer- we should hopefully find out if it's a boy or girl at our next ultrasound January 28! That's less than two weeks, so if you would like to go ahead and make any predictions now is your time!

As for Luke and I, we would be very happy to give Jacob a brother who is close in age. But after my second ultrasound which I just had this week, I'm starting to wonder if it's a girl because I saw it's ankles crossed (not that it means anything, but that's just my theory that girls cross their legs more?!) So I have absolutely no idea, but we will be happy with either of course.

Dec 2, my first ultrasound at 11.5 weeks- tiny little legs and arms :)

Jan 13- Now the baby's head is on the left side, you can see a hand next to it too.
The baby is really low for this stage and is having fun laying sideways across me, so it definitely feels different to me than the last time I was pregnant.

And they're not the greatest pictures, obviously, but they are the only ones I got for now! I haven't even taken a picture of myself yet, but trust me, I'm already showing. Started showing a little too early in my opinion ;) But that's all besides the point! What matters is the baby is very healthy and growing normally, and I've been feeling fine- much better lately at least. We are just excited and hope everything continues smoothly until this baby arrives in June!

Winter Time with Jacob

2011-01-12T09:41:00.007-07:00

So I almost forgot that we had a little mini-Christmas once we got home from California. Jacob had a couple gifts from Luke's parents that we were anxious to open, and it was fun since this year Jacob could open his own gifts!

He got a couple Elmo toys, including this fun Elmo driver.

And his favorite and biggest toy was this new basketball hoop- he loves it!

They also got him this cute Redskins jacket and pants, but he's going to need to grow into the pants :)

Here's him trying out his new hoop! Look at the way he shoots!

He practiced a lot that first night and just got used to dropping it in, but he's gotten a lot better at shooting it in now too- it's really impressive! Luke is very proud!

Here's Jacob on New Years Eve- we went to a friends house and Jacob stayed up all the way until midnight!

And ever since we got home from our trip it's been cold and snowy- finally! So Jacob loves to look out the window and say "snow".

And he loves any excuse to try on his boots, but has enjoyed going outside and playing in the snow even more! This is the first year he could really run around and enjoy it, and I have fun just watching him explore :)

And when he's not playing outside, he'll find the most random things to keep him entertained inside. These butter tubs are his favorite hats and you'll see him wearing them a lot around here! Haha I love spending the day with Little J.

California Christmas

2011-01-01T20:32:00.001-07:00

Well it's been a big year for the Meiners family! Once again this year we were able to get together with my family, for another wedding! My brother James married a sweet girl named Tammy who he met at school this summer, and they got married Dec 23 in San Diego where she is from, so we all got to stick around and stay together through Christmas too. We've never had Christmas in California, so it was a little different and non-traditional than what we are all used to, but we still had a lot of fun! So get ready- there's waaay too many pictures on this post, so good luck making it through them all! Luke and I flew in to San Diego late Tuesday, the 21st, and got to rent a cute little car. Wednesday, Andrea was the only other kid around so we took her out shopping and got our last minute christmas/wedding shopping done. Then we ate lunch at In-n-Out for the second time on our trip and we hadn't even been there 24 hours yet, haha. Oh and Jacob loved this little Ernie doll my mom gave him, it used to be my brother's, but those kind of toys are classic I guess. Tyler, Erika, and Julia drove in from Idaho but got stuck in a snow storm and crashed driving through Utah. They had to stay in Nephi, Utah for two nights and we were afraid they wouldn't make it at all, but they finally rented a car since theirs was stuck in the shop, and they made it in Wednesday night at the end of our wedding dinner for James and Tammy.

Here were the cute drinks at the wedding dinner Wednesday night.

After dinner, all us family sat down and they just told us their story of how they met, got together, engaged, all that fun stuff. I was actually a little surprised how much James referred to me as part of their story, I guess I made a lot impressions on him and advice along the way that sort of moved James forward. But it was fun hearing both sides of their story and how everything all worked out, they really are great together!
So the big wedding day came, they were sealed in the San Diego Temple at 2:00 on Thursday, December 23. Isn't this temple beautiful?!

The happy couple, just married!

They had a reception that night in Vista in probably the most beautiful church building I had ever seen! They did all the main stuff, we had yummy desserts to snack on, they did the cake, then lots of dancing.

My camera was being horrible so I didn't get any good dancing shots, but they did a lot of dancing, this one was where my Grandpa Craig was singing a song for them, it was sweet.

After that, other people were able to dance too, and Jacob was anxious to get up and steal some of the show for awhile!

And that was pretty much it, then they were gone with a a trail of bubbles and streamers!

Off they go! Congratulations James and Tammy!

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So the next day was Christmas Eve, so of course we went to the beach! Actually- that felt really weird to us, but we had nothing else to do, so me, Luke, and Jacob went to Oceanside with my sisters. It was too cold to swim but we just hung out on the sand and checked it out for awhile.

It was also Jacob's first time to a beach, so he had a lot of fun checking out the sand, touching all the foam bubbles, and running around! He loved it!

Christmas Eve night was at least a little more traditional, and it almost seems our family has stronger traditions for Christmas Eve than Christmas day itself. This year, we had a rental house for the week in Fallbrook, and my grandparents lived just down the street, so they came over for Christmas Eve dinner, and James and Tammy took a quick break from their honeymoon at the beach to come back and spend time with us too. We had a nice roast dinner, read the christmas story from the Bible, had our traditional Christmas Eve rice pudding dessert/game, and then watched It's a Wonderful Life.

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Christmas morning! It felt weird being in sunny California, but at least our grandma let us borrow this small tree so we at least had a place to put the few presents we all brought. Just a nice, small, easy Christmas!

Jacob opening his stocking first thing in the morning
he got a little stuffed snowman in his stocking and he gave it a big hug :)
checking out and biting through half his candy
Christmas was also special again this year since we were able to talk to Daniel for the first time since he's been out on his mission in Las Vegas. It was nice since we were all together, that we were able to talk to him together too. Just like when we had talked to James, it's always fun to hear their spanish accents and what life is like out there for him, it was neat.
Finally we were able to open presents! We all did a secret santa exchange, and great Grandpa Craig had Jacob and got him this cool train station set!
And he got these cute gloves that he loved trying on!

Christmas night we went over to my Mom's cousin's house and they had a lot of my mom's distant relatives over. So that was fun to kind of meet up with them again. And later that night I learned that I am probably the worst Guitar Hero player in the world!Luke had to leave Sunday night, but we were able to catch a family picture while we were all still there- yay! I was really sad Luke had to leave earlier, but he needed to get back to work Monday, and I wanted to stay just two extra days so that I could feel like it was a real vacation. We spent a lot of time with wedding and Christmas things, so the next two days we were able to play in San Diego a bit more!

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So on Monday we went to Coronado Island and ended up spending pretty much the whole afternoon there. You catch some real pretty views of San Diego as you head over the bridge.

They had a little playground and park area so it was great to let Jacob run around and all my sisters were so good about playing with him and watching him when he'd run off. And he ran off a lot! There were so many huge green fields, Jacob just took off chasing any sort of dog, bird, or flower he could find! :)

My family also rented a tandem bike for an hour and we all took turns trying it out. I tried sitting in the front with my sister but it was a lot harder than it looked! So I rode with my dad along a sidewalk that follows along the edge of the island and it was so fun!

Then we walked around the shops there, went to Taco Bell for lunch, and then walked along the piers. Jacob loved looking at the water so much, all he wanted to do was jump off and get in!

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Tuesday was our last day there but I didn't fly out until late that night, so we went to San Diego for the day again, this time to Balboa Park. They had some musuems free that day but I think we only wandered through one, but there was a lot of open pretty scenery so we just kind of walked around checking it all out for awhile.

Jacob especially loved checking out these fish for awhile!

After that, it was already time for me to say goodbye and head home! My parents were nice enough to help me drop off my rental and get me over to the airport since I was on my own with Jacob and all our luggage. And since I've been home in Denver it's been well below freezing and snowing! So I do miss that part of California, but mostly miss being with my family- we all had a great trip and I feel lucky we were able to get together so much this year! It's been a great year and we're looking forward to what this new year will bring!

Jacob Lately

2010-12-11T09:18:00.003-07:00

So I just realized that I have a ton of random pictures of Jacob from the past few months that I've never posted, and I might as well do an update on what he's been up to since it seems he's dramatically changed and grown in the past few months as well. The pictures are all really random but seeing them together is kind of amusing to me since you kind of get a feel of what he's like through the day- or at least these past few months- some of these pics are a little older.

Out of laziness I never moved this swing out of our family room (well I have moved it to the basement by now) but Jacob still liked to play in it and rock like he was a baby. Just playing with a stick outside- always will find something to play with. Likes to wander to our fence to check out the nature I guess... Now sitting at the fence AND playing with sticks trying to walk in daddy's shoes

playing peek-a-boo with his blanket
giving his bear a big hug and pretending to go "ni-ni"

playing at some girls' house and found ALL their necklaces and he just kept adding them on! He loved them so much they let him take a couple home and he still wears them all the time!
it's not girly, its gansta :)

This was a few days before Halloween, and was the first time that I realized Jacob knew how to say prayers. I had never "taught" him how but after seeing us always pray before eating dinner, and seeing everyone pray at church he somehow caught on! After we said our prayer for dinner that night I looked over to see that he was praying with us :) And not only does he fold his arms, but he will bow his head and mutter nonsense words quietly while we pray so that he's praying too, haha. We're trying to at least teach him "amen" but he hasn't quite caught onto that yet, but we're happy to see he's trying!

can't go up the stairs when you're stuck in a chair :)

We got Luke this cowboy hat for Halloween and ever since, Jacob loves to pull it out of our closet and try it on! He thinks it's so funny! Oh and notice he's also wearing one of his necklaces too, haha.
smiling, looking at how cute he is in the mirror

I love this smile of his here- he was having so much fun just letting the hat bounce on his legs while he walked around- such a funny boy :)

After bath time I was trying to get him dressed but all he wanted was to put on his shoes and get "going!" And he picked out the shoes himself :)

Playing out with the leaves and rocks- we've had so many nice fall days.

Not the best picture- but Jacob alwaaaays finds these hairbands someone made for me and he loves to pull them out and wear them. This is how he puts it on by himself.

helping me rake the leaves :)

This is the first time I noticed he started taking care of Elmo- he was feeding him some olives for snack! And if you know how much Jacob loves olives this was actually very sweet of him to share with his little friend :) (Now his new thing is trying to brush Elmo's teeth before we need to brush his own, haha)
trying to stuff them in Elmo's mouth, haha

good job Elmo! mmm

So overall, yes Jacob likes accessories, to try things on, and to try and do things by himself- that seems to cover it all! Also, ever since Thanksgiving when we had family in I feel like his vocabulary has exploded again. I have a hard time even keeping track of all his new words, especially since he's gotten better at imitating and repeating words that we say to him. But it's kind of fun since I feel like we communicate quite well now that we can understand each other.

And Jacob is very good about following commands and helping out when we ask him to clean up, or put something in the trash, or to go play in the other room, or sit down at the table, or turn down the radio, etc. Oh, and I even can get him to empty the clean clothes out of the dryer for me and put them in the basket, haha.

It's also cute how he knows his routines so well, like for bedtime, he tells me what to do- he'll ask for his milk, go up to the bathroom and make his noise signal for brushing teeth (he makes like a swishing sound with his mouth), and when we get to his room he'll get his books and show me which ones he wants me to read. And I love that while we read he'll say several words with me, or make hand motions or noises to go along with the story, it's one of my favorite things! Some of these things he's done for a long time but it still makes me happy that he understands our routines and it makes me hope he'll continue to be a good boy as he gets older.

We just love our little Jacob! :)

Thanksgiving Weekend

2010-11-30T11:12:00.001-07:00

Well I don't have too many pictures to show of our Thanksgiving, but I might as well share since we all really did enjoy our long weekend! Luke's parents came in Tuesday and so we took care of all of our grocery shopping then.

On Wednesday Luke still had to work so his parents, Jacob and I went for a drive down south. We first visited their old friends who now live in Colorado Springs, then we hit the outlets on the way back in Castle Rock. We were all able to find a couple christmas gifts down there so that was fun. Later that night we ran a couple errands, went out to dinner at Smashburger, and came home and played several rounds of Dominoes and Rook.

Thanksgiving was nice and relaxing. Even though we had a lot of cooking it made it a lot easier since Luke decided to cook the turkey in his smoker, so that really helped free up the oven. Luke and his dad were very proud of the progress of the turkey throughout the day, and it only took about 7 hours to smoke.

they moved the smoker to the shed to keep the coals warm

all ready! it was very moist and tasty all around

Our dinner feast! We had turkey, a small ham, gravy, stuffing, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, homemade rolls, mixed vegetables, and a fruit jello.
Jacob just starting off, excited to eat! And I guess I didn't get a picture of him eating the turkey, but he did and we were so proud since he usually hates meat!
turtle pumpkin pie and traditional pumpkin pie for dessert

We ate dinner by 3:30 since we didn't have lunch that day so we were able to relax and enjoy the rest of the day. I spent most of the week reading in my spare time (I just finished the second book of the Hunger Game series and I can't wait to read the third- they're really good books!)

So on Friday we didn't have many plans, but we did do a little bit of shopping and did actually end up buying a new desktop computer- which we were planning on getting for ourselves for christmas. So we got that all set up and we were excited about that, didn't take a picture though. We also meant to go bowling together but went a little too late so we missed out. But we went out to eat at this mexican place Luke likes and took it over to McDonalds so Jacob could get some fries. And our burritos were all so spicy we got sundaes after so we could cool our mouths off. And this picture was just too funny of Luke's dad feeding Jacob the ice cream- he was opening his mouth so wide in anticipation, haha! Yum! Anyway, so it was a good weekend to relax and eat good food and enjoy our company. His parents took off Saturday morning back to Virginia, but it was nice to have them for a few days this trip- we all had a good long weekend!