A few pictures of Jacob

Just a few pictures of Jacob this morning while Kevin and Tyler watch a Phineas and Ferb (Tyler's favorite cartoon right now).

Kevin thought that Jacob might like a hat. So we put a Moose hat on him. He LOVED chewing on the strings. :)






Kevin thought that we needed to measure Jacob and laid one of his Inchimals blocks next to Jacob. :)

Four Months

Jacob is four months old today! Talk about time flying by! We actually didn't even realize this until tonight and then Adam and I were both shocked that he is already this old. What can I tell you about Jacob now that he is a big four month old. . .

• Mobility. He recently started rolling over from back to tummy. And as such has caught me off guard when I have left him playing on his play mat only to walk back into the room and he is two feet or so away from it and turned 180 degrees. This is also happening at night when I go and get him for a feeding and discover he's at the opposite end of the crib.

• Sleeping. He prefers to sleep on his side now and will protest if we lay him down on his back. But it doesn't take him long to flip over and go to sleep. This new sleeping habit also results in the silliest, contorted napping position when he does sleep in his swing because he wants his head to be completely sideways. I will try and take a picture of it. He's also now sleeping in five to six hour stretches at night for the "longer stretch" and it has been great for me!

• Schedule. Slowly we have worked into a schedule for our day. It doesn't stick to the clock but a pretty strong pattern has developed. He wakes up around 6:30AM and is then up for an hour or two. Then an hour or two nap, and then he is up for a long time. This is probably his most content, happy awake period. He loves to roll around on the floor or play in the exersaucer. And you can get a lot of giggles out of him. He enjoys watching his brothers play around him, and loves tours of the house. We never know how long this awake time might last. It might be two hours or it might be five. He likes to keep me on my toes here. After this period we enter a fussy state. He fights a nap, doesn't want to be held, and usually doesn't want to eat. I have learned to just set him in his swing (before learning this, this was incredibly stressful as it usually coincided with Kevin's post-nap fussy period as well) and that quickly settles down for a short one before waking up in a better mood. I say fussy, but Jacob's fussiness really is pretty tame. It's just balancing it with his brothers and the time of day that it happens as I want to get dinner going. After this brief nap he tends to play happily again and we wait for daddy to get home. He will then play until seven or eight before falling asleep for his "long stretch" of sleep. After that he tends to wake up every hour and a half until he eventually is just up (or rather I am up).

• Talking. If I had to guess, I would say that Jacob is going to like to talk. But whether he gets the opportunity to talk a lot is going to be another thing. When he gets someone to play attention to him, he loves to stare at your eyes and just smiles. He will either laugh or babble after you talk to him and is getting good and a back and forth session. Tyler and Kevin are pretty excited too because they think that he has mastered the "O" sound by always saying "oooooo" and Tyler will run around yelling "Jacob knows his letters!". ;) He also started talking to his toys and it is pretty cute listening to him grunt and "oooo" at them.

• Hands. Jacob has definitely discovered his hands. His coordination is getting better with each day and know he can be known to grab at things and try to put them in his mouth. And as Tyler recently learned, you have to be careful if you hold hands with Jacob because he will be quick to your finger in his mouth and chomp down. We even watched him grab his foot this week and start sucking on his toe!

We have his well check appointment next week and we will find out how big he has gotten in the last two months! Until then, a few pictures I took tonight while daddy was playing with him. Tyler and Kevin were already in bed and so Jacob was getting some special playtime with dad and was in such a good mood that I had to get some pictures.

This first picture is a result of no flash. The picture has a lot of noise, but I just love it. Just a pure smile from Jacob while grabbing daddy's finger. I just wish it would have turned out better! :)

And now lots of giggling and smiling pictures. :)

Mud

I want to first comment on how proud I was of Kevin this morning at the gym. Today marks the first time where he not only ran into the gym willingly, but quickly jumped on a bouncy toy and waved bye to me! I was so excited for him that there were no tears or worry, and just pure excitement.

And when I returned, I was told that Kevin did amazingly well and so great that they actually let him out of the toddler area (designed for ages 1 to 3). Apparently, he got to playing with his new friend (we met this little 3 1/2 year old boy last week...and both Tyler and Kevin have a blast playing with him) so well that when Tyler and the boy asked to be let out they just let them all three go. And so, I think he had a blast. Especially when I walked in to get him and when he saw me he told me "no Kevin stay" and crossed his arms. Thankfully, once he saw me grab Jacob and Tyler, Kevin willingly followed, but I can't tell you how excited I am to see him transitioning so well! And since the little boy is there almost every day, the boys have a new friend to look forward to seeing.

Okay...so once home we mowed the lawn. As I was working on the backyard I looked over at the slide/climber to see no Tyler or Kevin. I scanned the yard and found them standing at the wheelbarrow that once had left over dirt from some planting earlier this spring, and now is filled with mud after last week's rain. Of course they looked to be having fun, so I took a few pictures and then told them that they could play this one time only. I really am not a fan of playing in the mud, but they had sticks and looked to be having a blast. And really, the only harm was having to strip them down and bath them up....so today they played in the mud for the first time and to their credit did not make as big of a mess as I thought that they would. :)

My Three Sons

Even though it was Father's Day and daddy probably shouldn't have had to cook his own dinner, he was nice enough to spend his afternoon smoking ribs for us. So while he worked on that and Kevin napped, Tyler and I hung out with Jacob. After awhile we decided to take some pictures of him.





Tyler's camera ran out of batteries and he was so sad. So I let him take pictures of Jacob with my camera. And he took this one. :) We really had a fun time together.


And then he let me take a picture of Jacob and him together.

While we were doing this, Kevin woke up and was quite unhappy. For those that don't know, it takes Kevin awhile to wake up after a nap or in the morning. And usually, the first person he sees is the only one he wants for the longest time. We jokingly call it imprinting as Kevin is quite serious about the person he chooses each time.

Tyler still wanted to take pictures and called daddy in so he could take a picture of all of us. And we did that for awhile (though usually only one person was actually in the shot), and right before daddy went back outside to check on the ribs, he took a quick picture of me with all of the boys. I'm not sure if I have ever taken a picture with all three of my sons. So of course, I just love these and can't thank Adam enough for taking them, even if it was Father's Day and we failed to take a picture of him with his boys. :)

Frog Rescue

In the words of Tyler:

Mommy found the frog in the hole next to the window in the bedroom downstairs. (Mommy translation = outside in the basement egress window). And I ran downstairs to the frog with daddy and Kevin. Then we rescued the frog. I told daddy I wanted to play with the frog. I want a pet frog. And me and daddy and Kevin went outside and rescued the frog. I told daddy to pet the frog and I did. He just jumped away. Me and Kevin laughed. Then I touched it. Me and Kevin hopped like frogs. Then we went to lunch. Then we got ice cream. I got some chocolate with some Oreos in it. My ice cream was good. I said thank you to daddy. Here is some pictures about me and Kevin with the frog. There is one picture of the frog.

Base Jumping

So this week has been a lot calmer and I finally feel like we are settling back into a routine. I am halfway through my mountain of ironing and hope to finish it up tonight (a big feat as I let it go way too long!). My big thing for the week was that I reactivated our gym membership. I paused it halfway through Jacob's pregnancy and decided it was time to get going again. This is big because obviously going to the gym will be good for my health. It is also a sanity saver as the child care is awesome, so hopefully a little time to myself throughout the week will reduce some stress.

It is great for the dogs because it means that they get a few hours without chaos...as I am learning that two active boys means lots of noise and activity. I can only imagine the house once Jacob is up and running. :) The gym is also great for the boys. Tyler loves going to play and run around. Kevin is learning to be more social with kids and how to cope being separated from me in small spurts. And Jacob gets a good nap in either the protected infant center (as no older kids are allowed in) or wrapped up in my Moby wrap as we walk the track.

So that is exciting for all of us. We also had some fun earlier in the week when we met up with our friends Grant and Josie at the Children's Museum. I didn't take my camera, but the kids all had a blast. We worked in a trip to the library for story time, and today Tyler started his new session of swim lessons. And finally we braved two trips to the grocery store this week and survived them both without too many meltdowns. :)

Some other things to note from the course of the week:

• Kevin successfully went to the children's center today without any hesitation and spent an hour and a half playing well without any tears.

• Tyler explained that I should no longer be afraid of snakes but that I should like them. And after a long talk about how silly it is to be afraid of them and how I should just be brave like him, I have accepted that new outlook and am no longer going to be scared of snakes (I sure hope it is that easy...).

• Jacob finally seems to be on a schedule...not down to the hour...but in a pattern that I am learning. Nights still involve a lot of waking up, but nothing we can't handle and hopefully work through soon.

• Kevin demonstrated to me that he understands that words are to be read and has started attempting to "read" along with me in books. It has been just awesome to witness!

• Tyler figured out how to subtract this week and is pretty pumped about it. He has us constantly quizzing him on addition (0-10's, and by 10's to 100) in both English (and tonight Spanish thanks to dad) and says that he hopes to be as good at subtraction soon so he can tell his teacher when he is an adult and goes to adult school that he wants to teach subtraction.

• Jacob has started rolling. He goes from his back to his stomach and then just loses it as being on your stomach is apparently very frustrating!

• Kevin now knows all of his numbers from 0 to 10 and most of his letters. He also has some of his colors down (as some are still tricky) and knows all of his basic shapes. But he is so proud to tell Tyler as Tyler has started randomly quizzing him throughout the day!

• Jacob loves to laugh and looks for any opportunity to talk to someone. He is quite the "talker" and I figure that is great since it will help him keep up with his big brothers someday as they talk nonstop too!

• At this very moment Tyler would like to be a paleontologist when he grows up. He wants to dig for dinosaur bones and then take them to a museum. He enjoyed going to Como Zoo last weekend and seeing a Polar Bear head, and hopes to find a T-Rex fossil for a museum. He is not sure what state he needs to go live in to find one and reminds me constantly that the Pteranodon is his favorite dinosaur, not the T-Rex.

And now to pictures from today. The boys figured out earlier in the week that they can base jump from their little slide. It is their new game and it drives me nuts because I am a worrier. But they have so much fun and haven't gotten close to getting hurt (just hurt feelings if they don't always take turns). And so our compromise is that I let them do it for a bit while I am there, and then they have to find something else. Today I took some pictures of them base jumping as they think that they are professionals and have so much fun showing off for me. And Jacob was having fun watching them...though I think he agrees that they are crazy. :)