Spring School Pictures

Below are Jake's school spring pictures. He looks like he has a mullet! Thankfully he has his first hair cut appointment on Friday.

Weekend in Auburn

We were in Auburn over the weekend. We visited with friends, took in a baseball game & got to meet sweet new baby Owen. Such a wonderful weekend! We stayed the weekend at our friends Melanie & Chad's house. Thanks for the hospitality guys! The have 2 dogs and a doggie door which Jake was fascinated with. Jake was also fascinated with Chad. That is his new buddy! On Saturday we took Jake to an Auburn baseball game. We sat on the hill so we could eat lunch & let Jake play around. Then Saturday night, Summer & Gary had everyone over for a cookout. It was so great to see everyone!

Jake loved the doggie door

Saturday at the baseball game

Of course Jake was more concerned with tackling mommy

Watching the game

I promise, we really were at a baseball game!

Smiling with Mr. Chad Saturday night

Fun in the wagon! Henry & Jake

The boys playing in their pj's

Jake tackling Henry (I don't know why Jake is so into tackling lately)

I'm pretty sure Owen was laughing at Jake & Henry

Happy 15 Months Jake!

Jake on St. Patrick's Day. He is impossible to take a picture of!

Jake at his school's spring program

Since his class can't sing yet, they just stroll across the stage. Jake is in the front row closest to the audience. He liked everyone clapping for them.

Thursday through Sunday of last week, Jake went on a road trip with Mimi & Granddad (Robbie's parents). They went down to Niceville to visit Great Granddad Jake & GG Kathy. Jake is still going through his "shy" stage around people, but he quickly warmed up. He had a great time. He loved playing outside & especially loved riding in the golf cart! Thanks so much guys for giving mommy & daddy a break!

Jake liked when Granddad would roll down the windows. He would try his hands in the air.

Great Granddad Jake & GG Kathy's house has more interesting books than mommy & daddy's house

Playing at the park

Jake had too much fun! Great Granddad Jake & GG Kathy live on a golf course & close by water!

Lots more pictures from their long weekend, but these are all I have for now. Thank you again so much!

Sickness+Guilt+Wreak+More Sickness=Bad Week

There are just some weeks you want to pretend never happened. Last week was one of those weeks for me. Now, I will say, that for every bad thing that happened, it could have been so much worse. So I am grateful that the badness was kept at a minimum, but it STILL was a crappy week. It started with Monday evening when Robbie picked Jake up from daycare. He had a 100 degree fever, so that meant he couldn't come back to daycare for at least 24 hours. Argh! He wasn't even acting sick. It's been a frustrating year with missing school. It seems like once a week every other week either school is closed because of the weather or Jake has a minor sickness that he has to stay out. It makes it hard, because it is just Robbie & I juggling that schedule. Today's job economy is not exactly great for telling your company every other week, that you are going to be out. But what can you do? Well, I guess the daycare knew what they were talking about, because sure enough, Tuesday morning, Jake wakes up sick. So I took the morning shift & Robbie took the afternoon shift. Poor little guy. He had a cough & was stopped up. Robbie & I just kept our fingers crossed that he would be well enough in the morning to go back to school. I could tell that Wednesday morning, that he didn't feel great, but he wasn't running a fever. When I got him up, he wanted to drink his milk while sitting in my lap rocking him (usually he wants to run around). I felt so horrible. I knew that he just wanted to stay home & mom rock him. But things have been over-whelmingly (is that even a word?) busy at work. We are dealing with 1/2 less of our staff, but the same amount of work load. We had to at least try daycare. I felt so guilty dropping him off. I'm so torn between trying to be a good employee & a good mom. It is those mornings that being a mom working outside the home weighs so heavy on my heart. So I drop Jake off & tell them to just call us if he starts feeling bad. Then, after I leave daycare & am on my way to work, I get in a wreck! ARGH! I am just so thankful that Jake wasn't with me. I hit a truck with a front steel bumper, so the lady driving the truck was okay & her damage was minimum (again, thankful). But my poor altima didn't make it. They whole front end is crushed and both air bags deployed. I am okay. I had a seat belt burn on my chest & unfortunately, I was wearing a multi-strand wooded beaded necklace. When the airbag came out it punched my chest (thankfully not my face!!). All of the beads dug into & cut my skin, so it looked like 100 cats clawed my chest. But by today, they are all pretty much gone. For those of you who know me, know that I hate driving & am terrified of it. So now I am even more terrified. I've driven a few times since the wreck, but I swear I feel like I am having a panic attack when I do. Can you go to therapy for this? And I absolutely do not want to drive with Jake in the car. My heart races even thinking about it. So... the bad week couldn't end there. By Thursday, I had whatever Jake had. My head felt like it was going to explode. I was stopped up & my throat was killing me. It was Robbie's mom's spring break, so Mimi & Granddad were going to keep Jake Thursday through Sunday. Robbie & I had been looking forward to this for weeks. We planned on meeting up after work on Friday. We were going to dinner & then meet up with friends afterwards. I made it to dinner, but felt horrible. All I felt like doing was going home & going to bed. I'm so disappointed. After dinner we headed home. So much for enjoying a night on the town without the munchkin. The final nail in the coffin, is that I have lost a note pad. I (in a stupid pregnant decision) decided to make Jake's baby book. Needless to say, I'm over a year behind in completing it. But I've been working hard on it the last few weeks & it is close to being completed. I'd written down all of the pages layout, content, etc... in this note pad. And now I can't find it. I've torn the house apart looking for it. I can't find it anywhere. So there you have it. My no good very bad week. I write this to get it off my chest. It's time to stop worrying it, whining about it, crying about it. It's time to just give it to God. Nothing I can do now can change anything that happened last week. And there are so many people going through things so much worse. I did have a devotion this week on tough times though. (Isn't it funny how God works?!?) The verse was Even when I go through the darkest valley, I fear no danger, for You are with me. Psalm 23:4. The prayer for that day was "Father, thank You that no matter where I am, You are there with me. When I go through difficult times, remind me of Your constant presence." While the past week was bad, I know that there will be worse. But thankfully we have a Lord who will be by our side through it all.

And while I would like to forget that last week existed, 2 really great things happened to other people! My best friend Amanda's little boy, Gabe, celebrated his 2nd birthday on Wednesday. Happy Birthday Gabe! I promise you & your mom will get your birthday gifts at least by next year!! Also, our friends Travis & Paulette had their son on Wednesday too! Welcome to the world Jonathan Henry!!

Not a lot of pictures from last week, but I had a few of Jake from St. Patrick's Day morning. I can't find our camera bag though, so I'll have to post them later. Sorry for all of the reading & no pictures!!

Trying out the Camera - Take 22

Okay, so this past weekend was my turn to try out the camera. Jake was not exactly cooperative. It was especially hard trying to entertain him while taking his picture. How do photographers make it look so flawless and easy? I have so much respect for them! Unfortunately, I only got about 15 minutes of camera time before some work stuff came up that I needed to take care of. I'm definitely learning though! I have no idea about editing though. I just have to figure out how to use the camera first!

Really mom?!?

Reaching for his favorite sleeping pal

Mr. Nosey

I LOVE this video of Jake. We have been working for months trying to teach him different body parts. He has poking your eye out, picking your nose & gagging your mouth, but he never points to the right body part when you ask. The other night I was messing with Jake because he loves to pull his shirt up and rub his belly. I started asking where his belly button was & he actually pointed to it. I asked him to point to eyes & he just looked blankly at me, but I asked for him to point to his belly button & he did again. YEA! He has finally learned 1 body part! I'm not sure if you can hear it in the video (over my annoying voice), but it sounds like he is saying "but but". Maybe he is trying to say belly button??

Projects: My new obsession (behind the other 900) is painting frames. The frames are only $1 at Michael's so who cares if I mess it up?! My friend Margaret asked me to make a frame for her son's room. The other is one that I copied from the web.

Over the Weekend

Our furlough from traveling is continuing for a few more weeks. We are becoming a little stir crazy, but sure are enjoying the low-key weekends! And we are really enjoying our play dates!

Jake's bud Connor came over to play (and the parents enjoyed a beautiful day to hang out outside)!

They kept passing the ball back & forth over the wagon

Having an in-depth discussion
I have to keep reminding myself that little boys like to play in the dirt & will get dirty. But did he HAVE to play in the black mulch?! I'm still trying to get the black out from under his fingernails.

My sweet little man

Talking on the phone (even though he always holds them up to his ear backwards). He LOVES phones.

Monkey Bumped His Head (but not by jumping on the bed!)

So, I get a call Thursday morning at work. The daycare was calling to tell me that Jake had fallen (over his own 2 feet) and hit his head on the snack table in their classroom. At first I wasn't worried, but his teacher said that he hit his head pretty hard & at first just laid there. His face was red & swollen, but there wasn't a bump (so they were worried that the pressure could be on the inside). They also felt he was acting funny, so they just asked me to come by & check on him. I still wasn't really worried. But when I called the doctor, they told me to bring him in immediately. Then I panicked. I started thinking about the actress that fell skiing and hit her head. She thought that she was fine, but then passed away later. I was such a horrible feeling. All of sudden I was worried & panicked to be with my baby. I would have thought that I would have been fine. In Jake's short year of life, we have already faced doctors, hospitals & surgeries. But this was different. My child was hurt, but I wasn't there & I didn't know how serious it was. It felt like a kick in the stomach. It was the worse feeling of worry as a mother. When I got to the daycare, Jake looked so pitiful. His little bottom lip kept quivering. Robbie met me at the daycare so that he could take Jake to the doctor. (I had to go back to the office for a meeting.) They did some x-rays and everything was fine. Yea! By that afternoon, the huge knot finally showed up. Poor little guy! The doctor said he has a really hard head though (is it good or bad that he is hard-headed?!?!). He was back at daycare on Friday. It was sweet, his teachers said that after Jake fell, the teacher was rocking him. All of the kids in the class kept coming up and checking on him. They got upset when Jake was so upset. Such sweet classmates!

The pictures don't do it justice!

For the Love of Reading & Dancing

Jake LOVES anything to do with books & anything to do with music. I tried posting this video of him dancing a week or so ago. For some reason, blogger would sometimes say that the video was unavailable. So I'm trying it again. I've got to get some updated video though because he has already advanced his moves. He now also dances in the car. He'll bob his head to the music. It's so funny & cute! I've got to get it on video!

Jake also loves books. He really likes to sit in your lap & you read to him. But in case someone is not available, he is also fine just sitting in the floor "reading" a book. I finally caught it on video.

His other new thing that he loves to do is pout. He'll stick his bottom lip out and tilt his head to his shoulder. He knows he looks cute doing it and it is so hard not to laugh. He'll pull out the pout anytime you won't let him play with the laptop or phone.

Pictures from the Ridge

Robbie & I took Jake to Missionary Ridge to try to get some pictures & test out some things on our camera. It was hard to get a close up of Jake, but still get the views in the background. We're practicing & learning though! It's also a little nerve racking having a nosey one-year-old on the side of a ridge with no fence. He did good though, so afterwards we took him to the park by the river. I guess we've never really ever tried out a swing. He loved it!

Little guy, big monument

Mommy & Jake

Jake & Daddy

View from the site where Robbie proposed

His new favorite face - the fish face

Hair flying in the wind from going down the slide

He loved the swing!