Jacob's face vs. Baseball bat

This was day one....it swelled up the day after this was taken and turned black and blue. Now it is yellowing and healing but it looked pretty ugly for awhile. He survived....

Jacob's music program...

I realized today that I have done a blog post on all of the kids in the last couple of weeks except for Jacob. So I decided to fix that. As I was looking back at some pictures from last year I found these from December when Jacob has his 3rd grade music program. All of the 3rd grade kids performed for family and friends. Some even got to play instruments....including Jacob!! I think he was most excited to wear his tie :)

Here he is getting ready to play the bar instrument. He did a fantastic job!!

At the end of the night he wanted to take a picture with his teacher. He is having a great year so far and this program was right up his ally....he loves to perform!

Three in school!!

Today I have thought a lot about how I am going to be jumping back into the blog world and I'm afraid that I have had no bright ideas. One of my good friends said that I shouldn't try to "get caught up" but just start from here. That's what I will probably be doing and I'm sure there will be a lot of jumping around. For tonight though I am going back several months to a day that my life got way quieter for a good part of the day. This was taken on the boys' first day of school. Jacob is in 3rd grade this year, Luke in 1st and Zachary in Kindergarten. Jacob is having a very good year so far. He loves his teacher and I am so happy about that. Luke LOVES being in school all day. He adjusted to full time so well and loves all the recess. Zac is going 1/2 days, in the afternoons and is always so happy to get on the bus and see all of his friends.

I also figured that I should add a picture of Sarah to this post as well. This was taken over the 4th of July so it's a few months old. She's changed a lot since then and grown up quite a bit. I think that she is enjoying her time alone in the afternoon. Sometimes we go shopping, sometimes we go to lunch with Daddy, sometimes we go work in the boys' classrooms but most of the time we just come home and she has the whole house and ALL of the toys to herself, not to mention she can watch Princesses or Tinkerbell instead of Starwars or Transformers.

Some of my up and coming blogs will be Christmas, Luke's 7th birthday, our new found (or returning) love of skiing/snowboarding and many more.....stick with me friends.

Last wrestling weekend….

Well I know that I promised some pictures and videos for our last weekend of wrestling and I am finally getting around to it. They aren’t really very great pictures but I did get some more videos. Luke’s little buddy Aiden from school came to watch. Luke was so excited and a bit distracted. It was pretty awesome to have him there though.

I wanted to show you this picture because this boy was really a tough one for Jacob to wrestle. He faced him the very first weekend and the kid just totally shocked Jacob (and us) with how fast and aggressive he was. The first weekend Jacob ended up doing alright against him but when he saw that he was facing the same “really tough” kid the last weekend, he got a little intimidated. The other boy ended up scoring a bunch of points on Jacob but he sure gave it a good fight and never ended up getting pinned. We were so proud of him for standing up to him and facing him. One of the other boys in the group of 4 didn’t really even try because he was so scared.

Wrestling was a very busy sport for us to be involved in but it was so much fun. The kids loved it and learned a ton. We are very glad that it’s over and that we have our Saturdays back but we will be doing it again next season with at least 2 kids and maybe even 3!! Jacob is on the fence on whether he will do it again but Luke for sure is going again and we are pretty sure that Zac will be out there next year. I will end this post with a couple of videos. You will have to excuse the yelling that comes from me and Ben....we are not the quiet spectators! Keep your eyes open for some more posts soon…I am way behind and have lots to share!

Our wrestling boys

I guess this is about 3 weeks late but I am finally blogging about the Jacob and Luke and their wrestling experience. This has been a crazy month and we have one more weekend but it has been so worth it. To be honest, Ben and I didn’t really know how fun this sport would be for us. We have been so surprised and are LOVING it. It has been so fun to watch both of the boys find their competitive side. We took so many pictures and these are just a few. It’s a bit hard to take pictures and video at the same time that you are losing your voice for yelling so much!

Here's a couple of videos. This was the very first weekend and it was just a take-down tournament. They would take their opponent down, get up and then do it again. My hope is to take some video this up coming weekend so we can see the improvement. They really have learned a ton in just a few short weeks.

Jake joined in

Well he did it…Jacob decided to try wrestling. When we first signed Luke up we gave Jacob the option but he didn’t think he would want to until he went to the first practice. I think he’s enjoying it and will have fun but I don’t know if it’s really going to be his sport. I guess you never know though. Here’s a few picture of his first practice….

We are going to have a super busy March with this sport. The tournaments are every Saturday in March and for some reason they schedule the younger kids first thing in the morning. So Luke has to weigh in by 7:30 and his matches are from 8-10 then Jacob weighs in by 9:30 with his matches from 10-12. Can you say “full Saturday morning!!” It’ll be fun and I’m sure it’s just the beginning of our sports journey as a family. I will get some pictures posted after the weekend and hopefully a couple of videos too.

Finally, another tooth gone!

So Jacob is almost 8 years old and he just lost his second, yes his SECOND, tooth. He lost his first tooth about a year ago and we have been waiting very patiently for another one to come out. This second tooth has been a bit loose for a long time but about a week ago he came home and said "mom, I think I'm ready to pull this tooth". He work at it for probably 2 hours and finally, with some help from mom and dad, it came out. I should have taken some video because it was so funny that way it all happened. He went from a cry, to a shocked intake of breath, to a laugh and then finally to an excited, laughing, crying something. You will just have to picture it in your head and laugh with us.

I am wondering when the other kids will start losing their teeth since Jacob has been so late. It doesn't really bother me though because, like their dentist says, we just get more time to practice on the baby teeth and by the time the adult teeth come in they will be pros and taking care of them. It may save us money in the long run right?

P.S. How's this new look? I might like it better. I think the picture isn't as good but it fits better and I kind of like the red in the background.

A bit of Christmas excitment...

For today I am just going to show you a video that we took of the older two boys opening up their Christmas gifts from us. They had both been asking for a Nintendo DS for a long time and we finally decided to get them each one. You will be able to see for yourselves that they were totally shocked and super excited.

I have lots more pictures to share from Christmas but for now I thought you would enjoy a quick video.

First day of school....

Well this is a week late but here they are...the boys starting school!! Jacob in 2nd grade and Luke in KINDERGARTEN!!! I can't believe that I have 2 kids in school. So far it's going great. Jacob was so excited to get back at it. He is one of those kids that loves school and was totally ready to go back after summer. Luke was a little nervous but also very excited. Here they are all ready to head out the door.

Getting ready is always fun and a little crazy around our house. Oh sure, it looks all calm here but that's because you can't see me in the background rushing around like crazy :)

Here is Jacob walking down the familiar hall. Last year his room was one of the first ones down the hall, this year it's the very last room before you go out the door to.....RECESS. It's the perfect place really. And here he is, showing off his desk. See Grandma and Grandpa? They came for the big day and it was so awesome having them here. Now to Luke....showing of his desk! He thought it was pretty cool to be there. I know I've already said this but REALLY?!?! Luke in kindergarten?

The day is over and here he is getting off the bus.

Look at that smile, no tears for this kindergartner. If you are wondering how he is after his first week, he still loves it. The words out of his mouth on Friday were "Mom, school is AWESOME!! I love it!!" I'm so glad he's having fun. I have to say that I'm enjoying it a little too. It's amazing what taking 2 kids away can do for a noisy house.

Well, there they are. Sorry Mamaw and Grandma that it took so long to post these pics.

Another first for Jake!

Last week while I was super busy with my W.O.W. project (see before and after ) I didn't get the chance to blog about 2 HUGE events that happened in our house. I will start with Jacob's big first. He lost his first tooth!! We were so excited....well maybe I was so excited! The story about how it came out is really funny and I will try my best to tell you how it all went down. It had been loose for awhile and I knew it was coming out soon. I was shopping at WalMart with Kimberly when Ben called me and said "Did you want to be here when Jake loses his tooth?" My response..."Uh, Yeah I do!" He told me that I needed to hurry home because it was coming out soon. So, we finished our shopping and hurried home. As soon as I walked in the house I got my camera and took this first picture.....before the tooth came out.
The funny part comes between these two pictures. As I was switching my camera from still shots to video Jacob grabs a napkin and starts playing with his tooth. I tell him not to touch it because I don't want it to come out before I get the camera on. Well he says "I'm just going to wig....*pause with shocked look on face*....I didn't mean to mom!!" HAHA It came out without him even trying to pull it. At the end of this post is the video that I got after the tooth actually came out. He was pretty proud of himself for pulling it out on his own. Here's a couple pictures of out 1 missing tooth boy.

So here's the video. Please don't pay any attention to the funny sounding voice in the background. You will quickly hear that I thought it was all pretty funny and I so wish that I could mute out my voice.

I will get the other "event" up on the blog soon. Curious to see what it is? You will just have to check back soon.....

Jacob's first "friend" party

Saturday was a good day for Jacob! He got to have his first real FRIEND birthday party. We let him invite 8 little boys....5 from his class, 2 neighbor boys and 1 from kindergarten. On Saturday morning I was a little bummed out because we had only heard from 2 little boys that they were coming. I knew Jacob would have fun no matter how many were coming, plus Kyle (from kindergarten) was coming and that was very exciting!! I was still just a little bummed that not more were coming. The party started at 2:00 and at about 1:15 I got a call from one of the moms who had forgot to call me to RSVP and was still wondering if it was okay for her son to come. "OF COURSE" I said, "he can totally still come". Something about that one last boy made me feel way better. It was kinda of nice only having 4 kids 'cause they got to play the Wii and I didn't have be so planned and organized. Here's the group of them....are they so cute? From left to right we have Garret (our neighbor), Ryan (a classmate), Jacob and then Kyle (the friend from kindergarten).

If you can't tell from the pictures, Jacob wanted a Star Wars party. It was a hit and all the boys had really cool goody bags (first time I have done those), yummy cake, Capri Sun and they had lots of time to play. Looking back at it all I think I'm glad that there were only 3 boys that came. It let me ease into the party scene a little :)







So, that's the end of Jacob's birthday. He ended up having 3 parties total....what a spoiled kid! It was so fun though. Now I've got just a little over a month to plan the next one....Sarah turns 2 in June!