Birthdays Continued..

On Tuesday, Jan 29th Jacob got to have a 'part 2' of his birthday. Whenever a child in preschool has a birthday they get to bring a special "Birthday Poster" with pictures and a paper telling about themselves. They also get to take birthday treats for all the other kids, and get their very own birthday crown to wear and take home. Jacob was excited for his special day. He helped me pick out the star cupcake holders and pictures to put on his poster. He had fun wearing his crown and sharing treats with his friends. He even got a special birthday book from his teacher.

Tuesday night, Jacob had a friend who also turned 4 and he was able to go to his birthday party. From what I saw and what Jacob told me, it was about the coolest birthday party ever. It was a Ninja Turtles themed party complete with costumes, games, a pinata , food and fun! They took some fun pictures from the party. I think it's obvious to say that all the boys had a great time!

Jacob's 4th Birthday

Today was Jacob’s 4^th birthday. I think I was as happy as he was (and not just because he would ask me EVERY day how many days until his birthday and EVERY day if he could open his presents yet). It was really a fun day to celebrate.

To start the day off, Jacob had decided a week earlier that he wanted rice pudding for breakfast so we topped it off with some candles and sang happy birthday to him. I also let him pick one present to open that morning, he picked a song book from Grandma & Grandpa Stevens.

We pretty much did things at home, letting Jacob choose different games/activities that he wanted to do- playing with dinosaurs, reading books, and watching a movie. Nothing too exciting, but we had a lot of fun. I especially love playing dinosaurs with Jacob & Caleb- they get all of them out; we line them up and can play for hours.

For dinner Jacob wanted pizza so I made some yummy homemade pizza and finished up his birthday cake- a delicious 4 layer ice cream cake. (And don't you just love the food on his face? I still don't know how I missed that before all the pictures!)

Finally when Jeff got home we had dinner and opened presents- the time Jacob had been waiting for all day! He had a great time and really got some fun things from Mom & Dad, and the Grandparents including: a piggy bank, books, clothes, lots of cars, a semi loader truck, the Mac truck from the movie Cars, a big carpet that looks like a road to drive the cars on, a soccer ball, football, some games & a puzzle. He also loved the birthday cards that were sent and the fun phone calls from family members.

It was sure fun to celebrate Jacob’s birthday; we had a fun day and I still can’t believe he’s already four. Seems like yesterday…

Happy Birthday Jacob!

4 Years Ago Today..

Happy Birthday Jacob!

4 Years Ago


3 Years Ago
2 Years Ago
1 Year Ago

Now..
It's amazing how quickly they grow. Happy Birthday Jacob, we love you!

Ward "Paper Bowl" Party

Our ward held it’s 2^nd annual “Paper Bowl” It ended up being a lot of fun for everyone! There was a dinner with lots of food, and we enjoyed socializing with everyone. Then they started the main event- The Paper Bowl Championship. There was a bracket set up with everyone who wanted to play including kids. When they first started off the game they put on some music, the kids loved that. It was funny because all the kids immediately ran up to the front and started to dance to the beat. Caleb especially was showing off his dance moves. It’s so funny watching them because they get a little crazy; as you can see from the pictures! They really had a fun time though, and luckily there were no casualties.

Anyway, the paper bowl game was lots of fun. Everyone was able to play that wanted to. They matched people up and went from there. Jeff, Jacob and I played too; unfortunately none of us made it past the first round. Jeff actually did well, scoring 5 touchdowns, and would have continued through the game if he had not had such an outstanding 1^st opponent who scored eight touchdowns; it’s a little hard to compete with that! We had a great time anyways! Jacob did really well and had fun. Caleb just loved running around like a wild man with all the other little kids, but he did stop to try his hand at making touchdowns with the little paper football and did pretty well even if he didn’t have an opponent! Matthew was a super sweet baby and was so good the entire night. By the end of the night he had fallen asleep in Jeff’s arm even with all the noise and confusion. It was a fun evening and great to spend it with friends and ward members.

Past Week of Parties & Fun

This week seemed like the week of parties! On Wednesday the 23^rd we had a playgroup party for all the kids who have a birthday in January. I had actually forgotten that it was on the 23^rd, for some reason I was thinking it was the 30^th. Luckily I checked my e-mail early that morning and whipped out some rice krispy treats, got everyone ready quickly and walked over to the playgroup. Another blessing- Jeff had the car that day, which also had the stroller & baby carrier inside. Luckily the party was held at the apartment complex down a ways, and across the street. I held Matthew and put the treats in a bag, then held Caleb’s hand and we all had a nice walk over. The party was fun. A big thanks to Jordan for letting everyone use her home. There were tons of kids, but everyone had a fun time and Jacob loved having people sing happy birthday to him. I forgot my camera but luckily someone else remembered.

On Wednesday night Jacob’s preschool had it’s ‘Dad & Donuts’ night. It was a fun night where Jeff got to go with Jacob to his preschool for an evening of fun, games & of course donuts! It was fun for Jeff to be able to see the preschool and some of the things they do there. Jacob was so excited and was talking about it all week. They even made these cute little frames and had their picture taken together. Jacob especially loves having an opportunity to do fun things with Daddy. They had a great time. Caleb, Matthew and I enjoyed an evening at home and even had a special treat ourselves.

Friday night was the ward “Paper Bowl Party.” However, I needed more room and had lots of pictures so this one needed its own post…see next post…

Saturday morning the Primary had its first Primary activity. Jacob was so excited the previous week at church when he got the invitation for a pajama party. The night before I was wondering what pajamas he should wear; he’s grown out of all his ‘real’ pajamas so he usually just wears boxers and a t-shirt to bed. Luckily I remembered that Grandma Stevens sent him a new pair of pajamas for his birthday, so Saturday morning we let Jacob open a present early to get his brand new pair of camo pajamas. He was very excited. The activity was great, it was a ‘plan of salvation’ based activity with lots of fun and games included. They played musical chairs, and had donuts and juice at the end. Jacob sure enjoyed it. It was fun for me to take him alone; and afterwards we stopped at the store to pick out a few more things for his birthday; we got some ice cream, wrapping paper, balloons, etc. It was a nice little outings just for Mom and Jacob. The rest of Saturday was spent doing chores, etc. Saturday night Jacob and Caleb got to have some friends over. We watched kids while our friends went out on a date. We’re looking forward to our date night next week, and Jacob & Caleb had a ton of fun with their friends Ben and Seth.

Farewell to a Prophet

We received the sad news this evening. President Gordon B. Hinckley has passed away. I don't know if anyone can truly express the feelings that come when a prophet dies; especially one such as President Gordon B. Hinckley. He has been the prophet ever since I was 10 years old; he is the only one that my children know as the president of the church. His accomplishments have been tremendous, the lives he's touched innumerable. His legacy will live on for generations. I know Heavenly Father works in wondrous ways and our new prophet will be the one who is meant to guide and direct our church for this time; he will have the authority to lead and guide the church, and will continue the work. At the same time, one can't help but miss our beloved President Hinckley, his loving personality, his deep spiritual character, and his charm and delightful sense of humor. I know that he is in a much better place, and feeling joy beyond measure being able to be reunited with his beloved Marjorie. Goodbye President Hinckley, you will be greatly missed and long remembered.

Food for Thought

Jacob has always had a love for food! From the time he was born he had to nurse every 2-3 hours for about 45 minutes. Needless to say I spent a lot of time on the couch his first couple of months. He immediately took to baby food when it was introduced right at 4 months (a week before he turned 4 months, he was already 16 pounds and 26 ½ inches long so he was definitely ready) and it was a good thing for my sake! Grandma Stevens still laughs about the time when she was watching him when at 11 months old, Jacob nearly finished off an entire box of macaroni & cheese by himself; and then had some more handouts from other family members.
Now, at 3 years and 362 days (Jacob will be 4 on Monday) Jacob will literally eat more than I do!

Here is an example of a typical day:

Jacob wakes up and is hungry for breakfast at 7:00. This morning he had two slices of French toast (with the big thick Italian bread), then he wants a bowl of oatmeal-and it’s not just eat the little ‘packets’ oatmeal, it’s a full sized serving. After the oatmeal, he would also like a bowl of cereal.

At 10:00 he comes and tells me that he’s hungry for lunch. I tell him that he just finished eating at 8, and lunch isn’t for another couple hours. So I get him a whole bagel, and a few pretzels to tie him over.

Lunchtime at noon, I’ll ask him what he wants. He nonchalantly replies, “A pickle, some pretzels, an apple, a sandwich & a hotdog.” We start with one whole sandwich, a pickle, some pretzels and carrots. Then he has a hotdog afterwards. A couple days ago he wanted a peanut butter sandwich & a tuna fish sandwich along with his side dishes and ate everything.

He’s generally hungry again around 2 and wants an apple or a piece of bread, or something like that. He is then usually asking for food again at about 4 and I’ll usually give him something like an apple or orange, etc.

Dinner time I usually give him portions just slightly smaller than mine, and he usually finishes off everything and sometimes wants seconds. And of course he’s always game for dessert afterwards. (or a couple desserts!)

He’s usually good from there, but fairly often when he’s getting ready for bed he’ll tell me that he’s hungry again and wants a piece of bread.

(Side note: I think Jacob gets his love of food from Jeff. It was so funny when we were reading through Jeff's old journals; especially those from junior high and high school. In almost every entry, no fail, he talks about the food he had that day in some form or other.)

Caleb can also be a good eater if he’s in the mood. This morning he also had a piece of French toast, a small bowl of oatmeal & some cereal. But with him, it completely depends on his mood. He still loves to drink milk and sometimes prefers that to food, which can cause some interesting battle of the wills! Mainly because it’s not healthy, but also because milk is almost $4 a gallon!

I feel like I spend most of my day in the kitchen preparing something or getting food for both Jacob and Caleb! Really though, it would be interesting to see a break down of the minutes of my day into each room of the house; I bet I spend a great deal of it in the kitchen!

In all actuality I am grateful that the boys eat well, especially since they’re pretty fond of fruits and vegetables and healthy food. It’ll be fun to see how Matthew does when we introduce solid foods in a month or so.
Anyway, I’m a little nervous at this point. Nervous about how high our grocery bill will be when we have three teenage boys! It’s already a little tricky to really keep the grocery budget. Good thing Jeff will be a practicing doctor at that point because we’re going to need that salary just to keep food in the fridge!

I Spy...

I took these pictures back in November, and thought they had been deleted off the camera. I was so happy when I found they had just been put in a different folder! These pictures are some of those that just make you happy when you look at them.

Jacob and Caleb love to play on our bed...especially with all the pillows...especially right after Mom has just made the bed!

Anyway, one morning Caleb climbed up into the pillows. It was funny, at first I could hear him, but I couldn't figure out where it was coming from. Didn't take me too long. The best part about it though was that Caleb thought he was hidden pretty well, like I wasn't going to notice him hiding in all the pillows. Reminded me of the Seasame street song, "One of these ones is not like the other." It didnt' take too long smiling at him before he couldn't help but smile back. I love Caleb!

Washington DC Trip

This weekend we had a fabulous trip down to Washington DC. We took off at about 6:45 in the morning and drove down. It was our ward temple day so first of all we were able to do a session at the temple. It was so great to be there. It was especially fun because Kimberly & Mike met us there. They were even sweet enough to watch the boys after doing their sealing session while Jeff and I did an endowment session together. What a great time to be in the temple together, we really appreciated it. Afterwards we headed downtown to do some sight-seeing. Although it was chilly we were fortunate the weather wasn’t too cold. We lucked out and found two parking spaces just a couple cars apart (which isn’t easy to do in downtown DC on a Saturday!). Then we got out the stroller & baby carrier, loaded up the boys and headed off to the museums. Don’t you just love the picture of Jeff with all three boys? Kimber and I switched off pushing Jacob and Caleb in the stoller (after all 70 pounds of children can get a little tiring!:) But we thought it would be funny to get a picture of Jeff pushing them with Matthew in his carrier, talk about “Mr. Mom!”

We decided to go to the museum of natural history and the boys absolutely loved it! There were dinosaur bones, animals, insects, fish, rocks & gems, etc. I think they’re favorite was seeing all the huge dinosaur bones, but Jacob did tell me that he was disappointed that there weren’t any real dinosaurs. After explaining that if there WERE real dinosaurs, they would probably eat him, Jacob decided he was happy looking at their skeletons instead! Caleb was just enjoying taking everything in. They enjoyed looking at everything with the exception of the “Gems & Rocks” section where they started to get a little impatient. I would have liked to spend a little more time in that section, but they didn’t quite have the interest for all the beautiful stones & jewelry. (See how happy they are? :)Matthew was a great trooper! He was happy the whole time, took his bottle great, and even fell asleep by the end of the trip. Those museums are absolutely amazing! We spent a few hours there and didn’t even come close to covering the whole thing, and what we did see was pretty quick. We finally headed back around 6:15 or so, and were able to see the Washington Monument and White House all lit up. Then we said our goodbyes and headed back on the 2 ½ hour, $15 in toll fees, trip home.

The trip was so much fun, and although you get home tired, and still needing to prepare for Sunday, it was great. My favorite parts are definitely being at the temple, and also just having the time to spend with family. It was so fun to spend time with Kimberly & Mike again; even though we’re so far away from family, it doesn’t seem quite so lonely knowing they’re just a few hours away, we love getting together with them! And I love having the time with Jeff on the long drives. We haven’t done as many road trips lately, Jeff’s schedule is way too busy for that!, but we sure enjoy them. It’s a great time to be able to sit and talk together without distractions. I love it when they boys fall asleep and it’s just the two of us talking & laughing together. We enjoy the time when the boys are awake too, we have some fun conversations together!

Anyway, it was a fun trip and I’m so grateful we were able to go and spend the day together. Thanks again to Kimber & Mike, we had a blast!

Boys

You might be wondering what this picture is. These happen to be the nice assortment of random items that Caleb put inside our cd/dvd player; contacts, pennies, some random earring, etc. Funny…yes, but the incidence of items being put in the hole of the cd player is much too common. I’m surprised the poor thing is still partially working after what it’s been through! These are the types of things that are daily occurrences in our home with our little boys. It seems I’m constantly cleaning crayon from the walls, putting food(like eggs) back in the fridge, putting the computer stool up so they can’t climb up to get things off the top of the refrigerator, pulling apart wrestling boys on top of the newly folded laundry on my bed, and taking care of other wild & crazy “adventures.” These boys definitely keep my hands full; I don’t know how many times I’ve had people tell me, “Boy you must be busy!” (Many times I get that when Jacob is at preschool and I only have Caleb & Matthew with me) And yet I wouldn’t have it any other way. They make life busy, challenging, and yet so fun and worthwhile. They’re wild and crazy, and I can’t help but love them for it.

3 Months

Matthew is 3 months. I can't believe it's time to start putting away the 0-3 month clothes (well, some of them have been put away for a while now) and get out the box of bigger clothes already. It's kind of sad, I seem to associate the baby clothes with a newborn baby and it's already time to put them away.

Matthew is growing like crazy. He's getting more interactive every day and will watch the boys run around the room. He's already showing his opinions on what he likes- he would love it if I held him all day long! He tries hard to get my attention whenever he's in his swing or bouncer by making cute little noises, cooing, laughing, and by all means if that doesn't work he just goes to whining, fussing, and full out crying!

He's actually a really good, and super sweet baby. He loves his brothers and especially being right in the middle of the family. He's doing better with a schedule, and we're loving this little man!

Weekly Happenings

Just a few random things...

Tuesday was preschool for Jacob which meant errands for mommy, Caleb and Matthew. When we got home, both boys wanted to do something fun so we made necklaces out of Fruit Loops. They enjoyed doing it, and it gave me a chance to do a few things as well!

Wednesday we had playgroup at the Smith Playhouse, it’s a great old mansion that has been turned into a fabulous playhouse for children. With three stories of toys, houses, trains, cars, blocks, etc. It’s a child’s dream come true playhouse. It’s always fun to be there with friends.

On Thursday we begrudgingly welcomed back the cold winter weather. It was actually fun to see the snow coming down, and we ended up getting a couple inches. Luckily it didn’t start snowing until after we were done with preschool and running errands It didn’t stay long, but the boys enjoyed it and I love the cozy feeling of being in your warm home while the snow is falling.

It's Official...for a couple months now!

Photos Coming...

I'm a little slow adding the exciting news, it actually occurred on October 27th, but I'm excited about it anyway.

Well it's official, Kristie is engaged to Thomas McConnon! He proposed to her on October 27th, 2007 on her 22nd birthday. We all couldn't be more excited. They've been dating for a while now and everyone just loves Tom. He is from Boston, Massachusetts and they met down at BYU. It's pretty cute actually. Kristie was a cheerleader and Tom was Cosmo BYU's mascot. (Hopefully it's okay to reveal that now that he's graduated & isn't the mascot anymore!) Anyway, they are so cute together and we're all so excited for them.
They'll be getting married on Friday, February 15th in the Salt Lake Temple. The best part of all is that we get to go! Yea!! We'll be flying to Boise on Tuesday night before the wedding and will get to stay until the following Tuesday. It's only a week and I wish it was longer, but Jeff can only take a week off of work; at least we'll enjoy the time while we're there.
I had played with the idea of staying longer and just flying back by myself, but really... flying by myself with OUR three boys ages 3 and under including a 4 month old baby? It might work if the flight was shorter, but Boise to Philadelphia has at least 1 layover and is about 10 hours at the shorter end of the spectrum with all the time at the airport, layovers, etc. It sounded about as fun as getting your teeth drilled without anesthesia (Which on a side note, I have experienced...the Dentist's words were "Oh, it shouldn't hurt too much...It's small and it'll be quick") Anyway, long story short. I decided this would be a fun week trip and maybe in the future when and if we fly out again, I'll make it a longer trip.
We are so happy for Tom and Kristie and also super excited to finally have a week vacation. It's been a while and work and life have been busy! I think the winter doldrums are a chronic problem for many people and a vacation is just what the doctor ordered. (literally... thank you Dr Stevens!) Anyway, I'm super excited and counting down the days until we get to fly out for Kristie & Tom's wedding. Only 29 days left!

Matthew's Stats and Weather Update

Today was Matthew's 2 month dr's visit. I know we're a little late, but somehow he wasn't added to the insurance until 2008 started, so we had to wait until after the new year. Anyway, the appointment went pretty well. He weighed in at 12 pounds 14 ounces and was 24 inches long, he's really starting to get big! I can sure feel it after carrying him around in his car seat for a while! And he's now in size 2 diapers. He had to get a couple immunizations today, which is never fun, but he was a brave boy and did pretty well. Side note: I don't think I've ever seen a 2 month old baby as determined to try and turn over as Matthew. He already, when laying on his back, is twisting and moving around trying to get to his tummy. He will even spin partial circles. He usually does it when he's trying to watch Jacob & Caleb. He's sure funny, and I don't imagine it will take him too long.
After the appointment & running a few errands with Caleb and Matthew, we picked up Jacob from preschool, had a quick lunch and went to the park. Would you believe that on January 8th in Philadelphia it is a fantastic 66 degree sunny day? It was absolutely beautiful and so nice to take the kids to the part without having to be all bundled up. Matthew especially seemed to love being outside.
I'm hoping the weather lasts for a while, I have to keep reminding myself though that after all it is January and chances are, the normal 'winter weather' will return sometime soon. Oh well, we'll enjoy the sun while we can!