Boys Will Be Boys

Here is a little sign of our future...they're both laughing, so I guess it's okay!

Birthday Boy

We recently celebrated Jacob's first birthday. It's amazing that it has already been a year. I have all kinds of little sentimental thoughts about his first year, but I'm just not the kind of person to write them down :) He's turning into such a fun little guy. He likes to laugh. He loves adventure and to be crazy. He has little fear. Some of his recent accomplishments are learning how to climb down the stairs safely by himself (and off of furniture), he loves to point to where he wants to go, LOVES to be outside (and throws rediculous tantrums when told no), and he has started taking several steps by himself!! He can do about 4. Something that worries me a little about him is that he'll laugh at me when I tell him no, not to do something. And then he does it again....oh brother. Here are a couple pictures from his birthday. We had a "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" party.

Honey Bunches of Oats

While I was preparing for Jacob's birthday party, we had a little mini disaster. In the time it took me to pull the cake out of the oven, this is what Jacob managed to accomplish.


And here is his famous "concentration tongue".

The Gopher

One day last week we were driving to Matthew's school. I saw a groundhog (I call them gophers, thanks to Winnie-the-pooh). There were no other cars around, so I slowed down so Matthew could see it. I kind of thought to myself "I hope I don't see that groundhog dead on the road later." Well two days later, sure enough, in that exact same spot, was a dead gopher right on the yellow line. In my own sad reaction, I said something about it and told Matthew what I had seen, not really thinking about what he reaction might be. The poor kid started balling (tears, snot, red face and all), so upset. He was saying things like, "I hope the gopher is okay. Will it be okay, Mommy? I think it will be okay." I felt SO horrible!! I almost had to pull over and give him a hug. Then he got very worried that it was THE gopher on Winnie-the-Pooh...luckily I convinced him that it wasn't THE gopher! Bad mommy!! I forget how sensitive he can be!

First Day of School

Matthew's first day of school was several weeks ago...and I'm just now getting around to putting pictures on the blog! Oops...again. This year the first day of school was so different than last year. Last year I was worried about leaving him. He was worried about me leaving him. He cried the first day. But this year, so different. He walked right in, and got down to business playing play-dough. It didn't even phase him that I was leaving. As we walked up to the door of the building, I asked him to go up to the door to take the obligatory "first day of school" picture. I said "go stand by the door and smile so I can take your picture." This is what I got:

Smart Elic....
Here are some other memories of the day:




And two pictures that capture the true chaos of the morning - it wasn't so picture perfect! :) FYI - the living room was actually clean before everyone woke up. This was accomplished in probably less than an hour. And Jacob, well, he just doesn't like to do anything very quickly in the morning, other than eat breakfast.

More Writing

Matthew is really excited about learning to write. He can write M, O, A, T and D. So he's on his way to writing his name. We're still working on H, E and W.

Family Time

On a recent Saturday, our day kind of got off to a "blah" start. We were just hanging out at home, kind of bored. So we put our brains to work to come up with a good idea for something to do. It was the last weekend before school, so we needed some excitement. So we threw everyone in the car and went to Iron's Fruit Farm. It's where we've gone the last several years to pick pumpkins. But they sell stuff year round. On the day we went, we could pick raspberries and apples. We all had such a good time!





It wasn't very crowded, so Jacob got a turn to drive too. Matthew actually got to drive the tractor all the way back from the orchard. It was only us and one other family out there picking (and that family had girls who weren't interested in the tractor!). Aparently, it's a big deal to be allowed to drive the tractor. Usually people aren't allowed to do it.

And we also took some time to play around a little.

Dinosaurs!!!

Matthew has developed quite an interest in dinosaurs. He likes to learn their names, read about them, and watch movies. On Monday, I took the boys to the Children's museum. We snuck a peak at the end of the big Dinosaurs exhibit (you can see the last room from the gift shop). Matthew was so excited about them. So, the next day we went back to see the entire exhibit. Matthew told me he wouldn't be scared of the big dinosaurs and their noises...so we went in. The first room just had a stegosaurus that you could move by pushing buttons. That was fun and exciting. But then you go into a big room with LOTS of VERY BIG dinosaurs. They are moving and making loud roars. It was a little intimidating to him (but not at all to Jacob. He thought it was funny!) At first he admitted he was scared and he wanted to leave. But he slowly warmed up to them. He enjoyed pushing the buttons and watching them move. The entire time he wanted to be close to me or my mom. There were not many people there at all, which was nice. We could go at our own pace. At one point I had Jacob standing up, holding onto my fingers. He wasn't walking, but just standing at my feet. One of the workers came up to me and said that if he didn't have shoes, he couldn't be down on the carpet...are you kidding me? He's a baby!! I don't know why it bothered me so much, but it did. So as I carried Jacob, and he got mad because I wouldn't put him down, I made sure to walk past her as he screamed. After we left the exhibit, Matthew asked to go back and see the scary dinosaurs. So we went back in and spent some more time watching and pushing buttons. Here are some pictures from our visit!

Baby Play

Jacob and his cousin Ollie are just two weeks apart. They are both finally getting old enough to start kind of playing together (as much as babies do...). It's so cute to watch them interact!

He Just Wants to Be a Big Boy!

Last night at dinner, Jacob had plenty of food on his tray, including corn I had cut off of my cob. But he just wasn't content....he wanted his own cob, because that's what everybody else had. So I gave him mine and he was happy!