In Search of Myself

Busy weekend

Jake turned 6 on Friday the 12th.  Aunt Kathy sent him a card with stickers and money in it.  On Thursday Priscilla and I took the 4 kids to Chuck E. Cheese (and those pictures are in HER camera.)  On Friday we brought Elauna with us to Red Robin, where we had dinner with daddy, Nannie, and Pa.

Then we all went to Nannie and Pa's house for cake and presents.

This is what we do for breakfast the day after birthdays.  :)

Saturday we had lunch with Nana before her shift at the bakery.  Today (Sunday) we went to Aowyn's birthday party at a park down the street.

This is what Jake was doing while all the other kids were gathered for cake and presents.  He's not so much for the socializing.  :) 

Awww, it's a baby.

Finally getting around to posting pictures of baby Lucy, our new cousin.

Last Saturday

We went to M'boro and visited the baby (will post pics of that later), then went to Nannie and Pa's for a visit.  Here's a few pics.

Nannie has beautiful roses!

Jake LOVES Pa's chair

Jake also likes to help Pa pick tomatoes

New cousin!!!

Jake has a new baby cousin named Lucy Rose!!!  She was born TODAY at 11:34 a.m.  7 pounds, 2 ounces.  What a cutie pie!  She is Aunt Julie's second grand-baby, and has a big brother named Joel.

(If the new baby is Jake's daddy's first cousin's baby, what does that make her and Jake?  Anyone?)

Picture catch-up

These are a bunch of pictures from my mom's computer that I finally got.  :)

How cool is Jake's new pool?!  I haven't tried it yet, but even *I* will fit in there!!!

I call these my "don't mind me, I'm a giant" photos.

Good pic of the 3 of us at Jake's graduation.

Jake and Zoe eating lunch in the little picnic table part of the new swing set.

Jake and Zoe at the playset at our house.  Gotta love how happy they look!
   

More on how my generation . . .

. . . schedules stuff.

This time?  Dates.

Jen: there's seriously not much worth watching right now

Lou: nope

i thought you wanted to see a movie at the theater

Jen: nah . . . want to stay home and eat dip, remember?

Lou: oh yes. you want me to make that dip

Jen: theaters bug me. I don't like the potential of having to sit next to strangers.

plus I like being able to push pause and run to the potty

Lou: i can pour syrup on the floor and have someone keep calling my cell phone to simulate the experiece

Jen: heh

What time is it?

SUMMER TIME!

Last Thursday (or . . . the Thursday before that . . . ) Jake graduated from preschool!

Here's Jake and Elauna with their AWESOME teacher, Mrs. Darlene:

Jake with Daddy and Nannie and Pa:

and last but not least . . . Jake with Nana and Grand-dad.
 

Look what we built

. . . in my mom's back yard.

yes, we got creative with the perimeter.  You do what works.  :)

Christmas overview

My Christmas break started on the 18th, the day of Jake's school Christmas program.  He was a wise-man, and was so so cute!

On the 23rd, we had the first of two Christmases at Nannie and Pa's house because a lot of people couldn't make it on Christmas day.

Jake didn't want to get out of bed that morning, and when I told him we needed to go because there were presents there for him, he said "Can't we just pull in the driveway and make them bring the presents out?"  Also, on the way there we were talking about why we celebrate Christmas, and Jake said "Because it's Jesus' birthday.  And Jesus is God.  So it's GOD's birthday."

Lou was working that day, and as we were walking up the driveway, I was reminding Jake about being nice to people and talking to them, because they are our family and it's nice to spend time with family on Christmas.  Jake said "Is dad going to be here?"  I said no, because he's working, and he said "But DAD'S in our family!"

We went to the Christmas Eve service at the church where Jake goes to preschool, and it was an experience.  Jake just doesn't do well sitting still for church.  And it was crowded, so Jake and I sat in one row, and Lou and Priscilla sat together in another.  Good times.

Christmas day we had 3 sets of gifts.  At 7 a.m. Lou made pancakes, we let Jake open his stocking and look at the presents we didn't wrap, then after we ate we opened all the others.  Jake thought he had all his presents opened, then Lou surprised him with a new bike helmet, and this:

Pretty awesome, eh?

At 11 a.m. we headed over to my parents' house . . .

And at 1 p.m. we all headed over to Nannie and Pa's.  While lunch/dinner prep was being finished, we got a picture of Jake with the 4 grandparents (which we haven't done in I think 3 years!)


After dinner and presents, we had dessert -- including a Snickers Cheesecake!  It was pretty awesome.  (Jake keeps making that face.  It makes me crazy.  But whatever.)

We were home by 5 p.m. but it felt like 10.  And Jake stayed up until almost midnight (again!) and then I had to get up and be to work by 7 this morning.  (I had a full week off, and now I'm back.)  I'm thinking about taking the tree down tonight.  Is that horrible?  Christmas was a lot of fun, but I'm kind of glad it's over.

Some shouting this morning

I was upstairs getting dressed, and Lou was downstairs, puttering around.

"Lou, what's the weather like today?"

"Woman, how would I know?"

"GO STAND OUTSIDE!"

kidding, people.  I was kidding.