Happy Birthday Gran

Today is my dad's (Jake's Gran) birthday.

Happy Birthday Dad/Gran!!

We love you very much & can't wait to celebrate with you soon!!

 

Dad - click here to see your video. I have struggled all day trying to get it to post!

This Week

#330

Enjoying the beautiful weather!

Riding our bike to the park

At the park

 

Climbing the "mountain"

Showing his muscles

February 5

#329

Our household is growing by 2 (temporarily). No, not with babies, but with in-laws! Robbie's parents are moving in with us for a few months. When their house was built a few years ago, it had Chinese drywall. So the builder is having to remove everything & take the house down to the studs. Replace the drywall and then put everything back. Crazy! It will take approximately 3-4 months. So while that is being done, the Bush's will be staying in our guest bedroom. With them comes their cat (which if you know my love for animals, that should be interesting!) but also comes their sewing stuff & monogramming machine! Right now everything is just kind of crammed where we could find a bare spot, but I can't wait to dive in & organize it all! Robbie asked if I was just going to start sleeping upstairs:).

February 6

 #328

We worked on our thank you notes from Jake's birthday. This is the first time I've made him help. All he had to do was sign his name. I tried making it a learning tool and we talked about the gifts, who gave them to him, why we liked the gift, what sweet friends we have, etc... And he complained the whole time. Really?!?! 

February 7

 

Camera Dump

Random pictures from the week...

 

#337

Playing with his "computer" in the car.
He looks like such a big boy in this picture!

January 29

 

#336

We put a toy chest in the bonus room. Jake loves to dump all of the toys out of the toy chest & "hide" in it. He has a pillow & blanket in there. He'll go in there & lay down. Crazy kid!

He insists on closing the lid

Just resting comfortably

January 30

#335

When Jake's tent is upright, he is camping. But he also loves to tip it over, on its side. When he does that, he is in a submarine. He told me to take his picture of him looking out his submarine window.

January 31

 

#334

Playing with shaving cream & bubbles that he got for his birthday.
You can't tell in the picture, but he has shaving cream all over his body.

February 1

#333 

Okay, I goofed & forgot to take a picture on Saturday. But, I did go to dinner with 2 of my favorite friends from college (Amy & Julie). We all went to Troy together & were Phi Mu's. We've all lived in Birmingham as single girls (when we would have supper club & see each other every week!). We're all married now with kids. Both Julie & I moved off, but are back in Birmingham now. I love being back in Birmingham with these girls. I just wish it wasn't so hard to get together for dinner! Busy families, schedules, etc.. make it hard, but when we do get together, it is so worth it! I love these girls and love getting to catch up with them. I thought they were going to have to kick us out of the restaurant to get us to leave!

February 2

 

#332

This is only half of the picture I was trying to take & only of Jake's backside. So another fail. I realized that when we were walking into church that Jake was wearing a navy polo & khakis and Robbie was wearing a navy pullover & khakis. TWINS! They looked so cute walking in together holding hands. So sweet! I tried snapping a picture as we were leaving lunch.

February 3

 #331

In case you've noticed, while at home, someone is not a fan of clothes. It starts when we get home from school. He takes off his socks & shoes. Then he'll tell you that his pants are hurting him and he needs to take them off. Later he'll tell you that his shirt is hurting him and he needs to take it off. We made the rule that he at least had to keep on his underwear. Silly kid!

February 4

 Funny things that Jake says....

 

He loves the word "cozy" right now. When he is in the toy chest, he says that he is getting nice & cozy. He loves to get under the blank on the sofa & "get cozy". He also says that wearing socks makes his feet cozy.

 

He loves to say "are you kidding me?".

 

Whenever he is using #2 in the bathroom, he enjoys company. He'll call for me & ask me to sit in the floor "and just talk to me". '

 

I made the mistake of one day getting frustrated with Jake. I was trying to finish up work & he kept trying to sit in my chair behind me, whining & just being kind of pesky. Accidentally in frustration, I said "you are getting on my nerves". Oops. Now Jake asks me all the time if he is on my nerves? Ha! I know it should not be funny, but I die laughing every time he says it. Then Jake told me one day that I was on his nerves. Again I die laughing. Then we both got in trouble by Dad.  

4 Year Checkup

Jake had his 4 year checkup on last Monday (January 28). He weighed 49 pounds & was 43 1/3 inches tall. They've been checking his BMI and they confirmed at this appointment that due to his height & bone structure, he was just a big kid. Not obese. Yeah to being big boned & not obese! Ha! He did great on all of this tests & is progressing perfectly. He did have to get a few shots at the end. He cried when he realized what they were going to do, but by the time they were done, he had stopped.

 

They had him wear a paper robe. He didn't want to put it on because he said it was a dress & only girls wear dresses.  

He said he was pretending to be sick

He loves the swivel chairs in doctor's offices

#338

 

Some 4 year-old updates...

 

We are done with sippy cups. He now drinks solely out of regular cups. (I have no idea if I'm early or late doing this, but I was just SO TIRED of washing all of the pieces of those sippy cups.)

 

We also no longer take a nap. (I've been quite sad about that one.) I would have loved for Jake to keep taking one until he went to kindergarten! He was already just taking a nap only about half the days. The other days, he would just lay down & rest, but not actually go to sleep. He spent a week with my parents & since my niece no longer naps, there was no way Jake was going to sleep if Marrell wasn't. So he went a whole week with no naps. I knew I was already loosing that battle before, this was just the final nail in the coffin. Now we just have to get his bed time back on a schedule. He either falls asleep at 5, then wakes up at 10 or is just wired and doesn't fall asleep until late. Then he wants to sleep late in the morning. So we've got some work to do. 

Jake's 4th Birthday Party!

There is the cutest fire station in our neighborhood at the end of our street. We stole a page out of the Vaughan's birthday party playbook, and thought that would be a great

activity for the kids to do. The firefighters at the fire station were WONDERFUL! They were awesome. They showed the kids the fire truck, let them sit in it, let them explore it. They were great & the kids seemed to have a great time! After the fire truck investigation, we headed down to our house for some food, playtime & presents. 

The Decorations...

I love doing decorations, but Jake is a typical boy, so I figured he could care less. Didn't stop me from doing them though! His only request was to have balloons. When Jake walked in & saw the room decorated, he said, "Is this for me? This is wonderful!". (Granted, he was looking at the balloons when he said it, but in my heart, I know he was talking about all of the paper I'd spent hours cutting out.:). I went with a black & white dot, yellow & white stripe and solid red theme. And of course a few fire trucks thrown in.  

The envelopes
(Some we mailed out & to his school friends, we handed them out)

The invite

Goody Bags

The empty space is where the fireman hat favors went
I forgot to take a picture with them set up

 

Now for the important thing

The Guests!...

We had 13 kids & 2 babies attend. This was our first year to invite Jake's classmates. I'm so glad we did. Jake had so much fun with his friends. We appreciate so much everyone taking time out of a busy (& beautiful!) Saturday to come celebrate with us Jake's birthday.

Birthday Boy

 

I told him he could not have a cupcake yet

Jake & Addie
Addie came all the way from Chattanooga to help celebrate!

Before the party
The first few kids to arrive

Exploring at the fire truck

I wish I would have gotten a group picture of all of the kids in front of the fire truck. They were running all around though, so I knew it would be near impossible.

 

Everyone headed to our house afterwards for cupcakes & some snacks. It was such a beautiful day. We just opened the back door and let all of the kids run wild.

Singing Happy Birthday to Jake

Opening gifts

I hate that most of the pictures I got were of kid's backs. It is so hard to try to take 4-year-old's pictures.



Jake had such a fun time celebrating with all of his friends & family.  We hope that everyone that attended had as much fun as he did!

 

Happy 4th Birthday Party Jake!

1st Birthday Party: Here
2nd Birthday Party: Here
3rd Birthday Party: Here