Jake's 1st Year Photos

I can't believe my baby is going to be ONE year old in two weeks from today! It feels just like yesterday we were all debating on when he was going to be born and trying to decide what we were going to name our little one. Many people thought he would be born on Valentines Day but I thought there was no way, he would have to be 5 days early and with my track record I didn't think it was possible! He sure did surprise us when he decided to come on Valentines Day!

My friend Carrie took some pictures of Jake for his 1year old pictures. There are a lot here because they were all my favorite! We didn't get that many with the balloons because they all popped very quickly! First one, then the second, and shortly after the last! So good thing we had other things in mind!












Thanks Carrie again for a fantastic shoot! :)

Potty Training

I was just looking at my blog and can't believe I haven't really posted since the first of the year! I guess we haven't been up to much since we started potty training James 3 weeks ago. Then the much needed rain last week kept us in and we are so glad it is over but now little Jake is sick. Poor baby doesn't have any symptoms but a fever. He woke up every two hours last night! I felt like a new Mom again, wow I am so glad we are out of that stage, let's just say I couldn't get coffee quick enough this morning and I had to take a little snooze today too.
Every month or so since James was about 2 1/2 I tried potty training. HE just was never ready and I knew I had to wait until HE was ready. So about 3 weeks ago I tried again, it was very different this time. He wasn't peeing all over the place, he was holding it. He was holding it a little too long. It was getting a little frustrating, ok majorly frustrating. I knew he had to go and he would sit there and not do anything. We would try this a handful of times before it actually came out. He did so well! The only thing was he wouldn't go #2 in the potty. I don't know what it is with kids and #2 but Brianna was the same way, it took her FOREVER! I bribed him with everything! Finally last week he went, I was SO happy! We went right to the toy store for him to pick out what he wanted! Well I should have waited on the toy because it was a one time deal! Just yesterday though we were out to brunch and he went at the restaurant. THANK GOODNESS!! That would have been a nightmare! I think potty training is the most frustrating thing I have had to do as a parent so far. I am so not looking forward to the next one!
Here is James in his big boy underware and his new train!

Wow the things we get excited about now! Pretty funny that I am posting about this!

Kids Christmas Picture

My Mom has a picture of all of us kids and grandkids over the fireplace. It is 7 1/2 years old. So we are missing a few people in it! This year for Christmas all the grandkids gave my Mom a new picture. She loved it of course and her first question was, "Does that mean you and Craig are done having kids??!!" I told her it doesn't mean that and if we have another we will get another one done! My good friend Carrie took it. Thanks Carrie again!

SNOW DAY!!

New Years Day we went up to Big Bear. James has never been to the snow and Craig and I were so excited to take him and see how he reacted. He was also very excited because he has seen snow and sledding on TV. Ever since we have seen the snow in the local mountains when we are out driving James always asks where his sled is. So he was excited to finally go sledding. My friend Lindsay's parents have a cabin up there and they were there for New Years so we went up to their cabin. It was so nice that we could sled right outside the cabin and go inside when we wanted to get warm or when Jake needed a nap! I don't know what it is lately but again we got off to a ruff start! We were almost all the way up the mountain, about 4 miles to go and James gets car sick! Luckily I had a blanket in the back seat and I knew it was coming so I covered him and caught most of it in the blanket! Poor guy:( Also luckily we had some extra clothes so we pulled over as soon as we could and we were able to change him and I cleaned up a bit. Thank goodness we could wash all of the stuff at the cabin! Once we got there he was back to normal, excited to be with his friend and go in the snow!
Ayden and James all ready to go out in the snow!

Jake ready for the snow!

Zoe didn't last that long out there, it was her nap time!

Mommy and Jake

Family Pic

James eating the snow, yum.

Daddy and James

James' first time going down on the sled. He watched Ayden do it and he just got right on, we didn't need to do any coaxing.

They were getting air off this little bump, we decided to even it out a bit more!
This picture is priceless!

Here is a video clip of James going down for the first time!

Daddy and James going on the sled

Ayden and James going down together, oh my, it made me a little nervous!


James throwing snow balls

At the end they built a snowman. Well really Craig and Jeremiah built it while the boys played with the trucks in the snow.


What a great day we had. When we tried to leave though we had a little problem. We were all in the car ready to go and we couldn't get out of the driveway! We had driven Craig's car and he parked at the neighbor's house. They had a driveway that went downhill, so when Craig tried to back out his wheels just spun. We tried for a half hour to get out and then Jeremiah ended up pulling us out with their car! What a mess! There was a lot of traffic on the way out of town, which was kind of good so that James could fall asleep before we headed down the hill. Both of the kids slept all the way down and woke up right when we were down the mountain, so no car sickness on the way home, thank goodness!
We had so much fun! Thanks Lindsay and Jeremiah for letting us come up and play! :)

New Years Eve!!

We had a quiet, nice, New Year's Eve at home. Like we have since we got married! Brianna went out to a party at her friend's house, I made dinner for us and the boys and my friend Kimmi came over for dinner because her husband was working that night. She stayed till about 9 and then the kids went to bed about 9 also. We did our New Years celebration with the kids before they went to bed.
James tooting his horn

Jake didn't like his hat, I could hardly get a picture with it on!

James and I in our masks

James in his whole get up!

Craig and I didn't even make it till midnight! We are getting old fast!
We hope everyone had a safe and happy New Year's and wish you well in 2010!!

Long Beach Aquarium

Craig took the week off so we decided to try to do something fun with our kids, well with James anyway. Brianna the teenager wanted nothing to do with it, so Craig and I decided to take the boys to Pretend City, the new children's museum in OC. I guess everyone else had the same idea because it was packed! You had to wait for people to leave just to get in. They said it would be about a 45 minutes wait! Well that wasn't going to happen! So we decided to go to the Aquarium. Craig had never been and I had been once with Brianna about 10 years ago! It was about to be one of those days again, since we drove to the museum and it didn't work out then literally 5 minutes after we got into the Aquarium the fire alarm goes off and everyone has to evacuate the building!!! We were starving and I thought Craig was going to be off with my head. So we figured let's eat lunch and by the time we are done we should be back in. It wasn't until the third restaurant were we able to sit down, it was so crowded! We had an excellent lunch at Outback Steakhouse! Who knew! When we were done we were able to go right in the aquarium, everyone full, happy, and ready to see fish!

James would not have anything to do with touching the sharks or the rays. He didn't even want to put his hand in the water. This is as close as he would get!

Jake loved looking at them swimming around

James loved looking at the sharks, he said they were his favorite.

They both loved the sea lions and sea otters

We were surprised at how much Jake liked it. He would stand against the glass and bounce and pat the window. It was so cute.

After of course James had to see the boats

It ended up being a great day!:)