Christmas

We had a very nice Christmas. We just bummed around most of the morning and then around 10:30 we headed over to my parents' so they could play with Jacob before his nap. He was begging to go outdoors and Grandpa couldn't say no, so we bundled Jacob up and Grandpa pushed him the swing for a while. :) After he had his lunch he took a nice long nap. While he napped we all had a delicious brunch and waited for him to get up so we could open our gifts.

Before we opened our gifts, my dad read Jacob a children's book with the Christmas story. Jacob sat and listened to a couple pages before dashing off to play. Gotta love that short toddler attention span!

That's a pump for a yoga ball that he is holding. It is one of his favorite 'toys' at Grandpa and Grandma's


Jacob got a rake and a lawn mower. He is very attached to the rake. He has been carrying it around all day! It was in his room when I was trying to put him to bed tonight and I finally had to chuck it out of the room because he was whining for it.







This was taken on Christmas Eve



It is a well-known fact that I am a bit freaked out by nutcrackers. Something about those teeth just looks evil to me. Of course people just can't resist torturing me and that includes giving me nutcracker gifts. Jacob liked it!



Now my poor little boy is a bit under the weather. He woke up with a bit of a runny nose and fever. The fever went up and down all day, the worst at dinner of a 102 degrees. Jacob has never had a fever that high. He is in pretty good spirits and was even laughing at dinner even though he wouldn't eat anything. I did give him some homemade turkey broth in his sippy and he drank quite a bit of that, so he got some fluids with substance. I took his temp before bedtime and it is down to 99 degrees, so hopefully in the morning he will be feeling better.

Some Christmas Pictures

Last week I bought a little Christmas tree and today we finally decorated it and put up our stockings. That is the extent of our Christmas decor this year. Better than nothing, right?



Jacob loves his tree. When I brought it in the house and showed it to him, he became obsessed. He would go over to it, point and whine to be picked up so he could touch it. He caught on quickly to the word 'tree' and now when we say 'tree' he runs over to it.



Today we received our Christmas package from Alan's brother's family. They sent a singing card and Jacob LOVES it! Alan said he may put a knife through it by tomorrow. Ha Ha



Our tradition is to open the gifts on Christmas Eve, but Alan couldn't wait and had Jacob open one of his tonight after dinner. Jacob enjoyed opening it and got mad when I took the wrapping paper away. He loves his new sock monkey! Thanks Randall, Hilary, Lila and Sam. :) We'll be opening the rest of the gifts tomorrow (if Alan can hold out :P), probably before the Christmas Eve service since it will be Jacob's bedtime when we get home.





Tomorrow for dinner we are having tamales. Can't wait! Then for Christmas we are spending the day with my parents and brothers. We are having brunch, our tradition as of the past few years. Yummy!

House Update

We had our walk-through yesterday and it went well. We took some pictures (nothing special, just for our reference) and some measurements. Its funny how you remember things. Some of the rooms seemed bigger than we remembered and others smaller or just different dimensions. The termite damage repairs weren't done due to the rain, but they are hoping to do that today.

Now our to-do list is even bigger, but it still isn't huge and we have lots of decisions to make as for what styles to use in the rooms we are re-doing. We are re-doing a lot in the upstairs bathroom and have a few changes to make in the downstairs one. We are also trying to decide whether we want to put in new tile in the kitchen along the backsplash. What they put in isn't our favorite, but it isn't as bad as we remembered. So, I don't know. Maybe we'll just get an estimate and go from there.

We met the sellers and they are super nice people. They are even giving us their living room rug! Its a big wool one from Pottery Barn, so I think that was very generous. Hopefully it will look nice with our furniture because our rug is pretty old.

The lady was telling us about all the different trees in the yard and they have a persimmon and a Gordon apple, just like we do. Kinda weird since most people haven't even heard of Gordon apples. There are also Valencia and navel orange trees and of course the giant walnut in the back. I think there is a black berry bush too.

Yesterday afternoon we went to sign papers at the escrow company. We took Jacob with us and he was very entertaining! He had a book and wanted the escrow officer to read to him. Fortunately she likes kids and even has 2 (grown) sons very close in age.

If everything goes as planned, we are set to close on the 30th. Can't wait!

I know. I know.

My mom said that if she opens my blog and sees the Face Plant picture one more time, she is going to scream. So, I guess it is time to post something! It has been busy around here. The days just slip by so quickly! I had every intention of posting this past week, but Jacob had a difficult time with sleep and it made for an exhausting week. He was completely refusing his nap and his nighttime sleep wasn't that great either. His sleepiness made him very clingy and I got squat done. Fortunately things seem to be back on track. Today he took a 3 hour nap!

Jacob's new favorite thing is to have books read to him or to read books to us. Dozens of times during the day he will bring me a book and make little grunt noises meaning 'read to me!'. Last night he was in the kitchen with Homer. He had a book open, pointing at the pictures and just babbling away. I wish I had gotten a video of him reading to the dog! It was absolutely adorable!

For Christmas we got Jacob a kid-sized couch. He loves it! This is one of his favorite ways to sit on it.



These were taken a couple Sundays ago. He looked so cute in his sweater vest and my mom wanted me to take a picture of him in the outfit. It wasn't easy!!

This is mostly what we got. He thought it was SO funny to roll around on the couch.





Last Sunday evening was the church Christmas program. They didn't offer childcare, but I thought we would give it a try. Jacob did so well! During the kid parts he just sat mesmerized! He even 'sang' along a couple times. :) During the rest of the program he just sat quietly reading his books or looking around. He must have been kinda sleepy or something to sit so long!

This past week I scheduled a bunch of appointments while Alan is on break. I got a haircut, my eyes checked and Homer had his yearly check-up. Homer gained 5 pounds this year thanks to all the food Jacob throws him!
I also got all my Christmas shopping done and my cards mailed out. YAY! Can you believe Christmas is in like 4 days?!?

On Monday we have our walk-through at the new house. I can't wait to see the house again. It has been a while and my memory is fading on some of the details. :P We are scheduled to close on the 30th. Not too much longer!

Face Plant

Jacob took a big face plant this morning and got a nice bloody nose. Poor baby! Its still bloody because his nose is a little runny and the blood won't dry. It happened while I was taking a shower and Alan said that Jacob was looking at himself in the mirror and laughing at his bloody face. Such a boy!

You can see the blood spatter on his right sleeve. I'm not changing his clothes until I am certain its over. Cleaning all the crusted blood off is going to be a joy for sure. He is getting sick of me coming at him with a tissue. :P
I may have to just stick him in the bath.





Edited to add:

All better! The blood seems to be gone so I gave Jacob a bath and got him all cleaned up. :D
Doesn't he look handsome? And yes, I chose the red shirt on purpose, just in case.

Random Stuff

Yesterday was a busy day! Jacob and I rushed to the grocery store real quick to pick up a few things before going to decorate gingerbread cookies at 10:00. I really wish Trader Joe's opened at 8:00 instead of 9:00. That would make my life easier some days. So, anyway, we went to West Coast Whoopies to decorate gingerbread cookies with the moms' group. Jacob enjoyed the cookies so much that he ate pieces off the floor. Lovely, huh? They were very yummy, I'll give him that, but I don't think I would eat floor cookies. Before we left I bought this humungous brownie. I swear this thing weighed like 2 pounds! Alan and I ate half last night and it was SO good, better than the whoopie pies, I think. Can't wait to eat the rest of it tonight!

I know you are super impressed by my decorating abilities. Not sure what I was going for there. I was just trying to decorate it quick while keeping an eye on Jacob.


Cookie!


Yesterday afternoon we had Jacob's 15 month well check-up. He is finally over 20 pounds! Barely. He was 20 pounds, 4 ounces and 30 1/4" inches tall. He is still below 5th percentile for weight and in the 10-25th percentile for height. The doctor said he is doing fine and was pleased with everything I told her about his development. He had to get 3 shots, which were no fun, but he did pretty well. He only cried for 30 seconds or so and then was done.

While I was getting lunch ready yesterday, Jacob discovered that getting in this box was super fun! It didn't look too comfortable to me since there are pans in it, but he enjoyed it, so we just went with it.





Finally a belly shot! This was taken at 26 weeks. I think I forgot to mention that at my last OB appointment I was told that all looked fine on the ultrasound. Good news!



Here are just some random pictures that were taken last week.

Jacob recently figured out how to get on the couch. Not good! As you can see, he tries to get up on the arm. He also likes to walk on the couch. Danger Baby!


We thought maybe if we put couch pillows on the floor he would play on those instead. Ha HA!



The boys hanging out on the couch together



Jacob's newest obsession is pulling things around. He loves this frog! Don't you love how he pulls it with the string between his legs?



Jacob loves to help me wash the greens. He thinks the Salad Spinner is so cool!

Thanksgiving Weekend

We had such a nice Thanksgiving weekend! Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. It is just low-key and a time to reflect on all we are thankful for. Plus, the food is SO good! :D

Alan had Wednesday off so we just spent the day cooking and doing stuff around the house. I made cranberry sauce, an apple caramel pie and did some prep for the stuffing. Jacob and I were in our sweats all day. ;P I love days like that!

Thursday we headed over to my parents' to spend the day with my family. Jacob had a ton of fun playing with his uncles. Jeff pushed him in the swing for such a long time that Jacob got sea legs. He couldn't walk straight after getting out! He also enjoyed his first Thanksgiving feast. He especially loved the sweet potato casserole that grandma made! It was a nice, relaxing day and of course we ate way too much! I used the turkey bones to make some stock and plan to use some later this week to make turkey soup. I stuck some of the leftover meat in the freezer so we wouldn't get too turkey-ed out!

Friday my mom and I went to the baby boutique here in town to get some good deals. I got a few cloth diapers for the new baby at a really good price and my mom bought some new shoes for Jacob for Christmas. They are so cute! We tried them on in the store and had Jacob try to walk in them. He sort of clomped around like he had clown feet. It was hilarious! He is used to his soft-soled Robees and the new ones have hard soles. It will take some getting used to, I guess. He did the same thing with his Robees and quickly got used to wearing those, so I am sure he'll get used to these too.

On Saturday we went for a long walk with Homer and then after Jacob's snack went up to Oak Glen. The Apple Butter Festival was going on up there that day so it was interesting. They had demonstrations on making apple butter, candles and cider. Jacob had a lot of fun watching all the people and checking out all the stuff like a giant saw. We saw a couple horses and he wasn't so sure about getting too close to them. He would touch one and then turn away quickly. We tried to go to the petting zoo, but it wasn't open in time. We needed to get home and get Jacob down for a nap. Ah well. Maybe next time. While we were up there we bought some pumpkin butter and honeycrisp apples. Those are my favorite!





On Sunday we celebrated our friend Maddie's first birthday. Jacob had a blast playing with all his friends! Between that and playing in the nursery during the morning and evening services, he did a lot of playing that day! He was wiped out by bedtime. I think he was asleep before I even left the room.

Now it is back to the ole grind. Alan is finishing up his semester this week, so things are pretty hectic. This is the last full week of classes and then next week he just teaches one class on Monday and gives his exam on Thursday. Crazy how this semester just flew by! Next semester he has a reduced load due to the baby coming, so things will be a little more low key. This semester was a busy one with Alan teaching labs 4 afternoons a week. I am looking forward to him having a more flexible schedule. It will really be nice with us trying to get things settled with the new house. :)