Determined

Jacob is determined to prove me wrong.

Last week I said that although he was good at moving around I didn't see him crawling anytime soon. He isn't up on hands and knees crawling, but he has been working super hard all week at his army crawl.

That kid is motivated.

Jacob's room

We got Jacob's room all set up months ago. And I kept meaning to take pictures of his room, but never did (things like that happen a lot around here). So today I finally took the video camera in there and took a little footage of his room. But to really appreciate it, I think you have to see what his room looked like before Jacob ever was. It really was quite sad.
We have to give BIG HUGE thanks to Justin's aunt and uncle who did the labor and painted Jacob's room for us. They did such a great job! They also came back a few weeks later and put the wall border up for us. Justin's uncle also helped to get the wall shelf up and level. We really owe them for all their help.



We had planned to get the room all ready over Christmas and a month before Jacob was born, but Jacob was too eager. The painting was done the weekend before my water broke and the wall border put up the weekend after Jacob was born. The wall shelf didn't make it up until Jacob was a couple months old (and we didn't know what we were naming him for sure until he made his appearance, so I didn't get the name painted and ready until about then anyways).

We couldn't possibly list everyone that gave us stuff that is in his room, but his room wouldn't be what it is without the generosity of others. Thanks so much - we love his room and we know that he does too!

8 months old

Today Jacob is 8 months old!


I took a few different pictures and these are the ones that turned out the best. Above he is smiling (I think sometimes he looks like he inherited slight dimples from me - I definitely see a dimple in the picture above).

Above he is staring at the camera, seeming confused.

Here he is playing with his elephant.

And now he seems ready to make his escape.

Jacob is getting lots more mobile these days, but he is still not crawling. We knew when Jacob was born 6 weeks early that he probably wouldn't hit any developmental milestones early; and since they say that most babies start crawling around 8 or 9 months, we had no expectation that he would start crawling any time before that. I wouldn't be surprised at all if next month we are still reporting that he is not crawling, and that's perfectly fine.

Jacob has really started picking up a schedule, which is nice for me - much better than when I had no idea when he would be tired, or hungry, etc. We go to the gym every morning Monday through Friday pretty much as soon as we can get there after the Kids Klub opens. When we get home (usually around 10am) Jacob eats and goes down for nap #1 of the day. Sometimes he naps for only an hour, but a few times he has napped 2.5 to 3 hours for this first nap. He wakes up, eats, plays (or we run errands), eats again and goes down for nap #2. Nap #2 is typically shorter than nap #1, but it is long enough to get him through until bedtime which is usually between 7 and 7:30.

Jacob loves to blow spit bubbles. Sometimes he wakes up in the morning and just starts spitting. Which is much better than waking up crying. He also loves to stick out his tongue, not that we have been able to get a picture of it.

Jacob loves Colby. He loves to watch Colby and reach for him. He loves it when Colby gives him kisses, although I don't love it all that much. He also loves Colby's toys. Colby has hardly any toys (because he chews them to pieces and we throw them away) and Jacob has plenty of toys, but when Jacob sees one of Colby's toys he makes great effort to get it. It wouldn't be that big of deal if it didn't automatically go into Jacob's mouth once he gets it.

Jacob has really found his voice this past month and it turns out that he can be quite the talker. He especially likes to make high pitched sounds when he is happy and talking to himself.

Most of all, Jacob loves it when Daddy comes home and plays with him. Justin is able to get the best laughs out him.

2 months later than I planned

This post should have been done back in June. Better late than never.

On June 11th, Justin and I celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary.

In some ways it is hard to believe it has already been 5 years, but when you look at all we have been through you would think we had been married quite a bit longer.

Since we have been married we have:

• Dealt with being unemployed and unable to find a job (luckily only for me and not both of us)
• Lived in an apartment that we were busting out of the seams in
• Bought a car together
• Taken some nice little vacations while childless with 2 incomes
• Were greeted with the first 2 tropical storms of the season for both our first (in Destin, FL) and our second (in Orlando, FL) anniversary
• Moved half-way across the country
• Bought our first house
• Suffered through infertility
• Justin was diagnosed with an incurable chronic illness
• Went through in vitro
• Gone through 4 hurricanes together
• Lived without electricity for 2 days (which was 2 days too long)
• Justin has had 3 major surgeries
• I had to be hospitalized and put on bedrest the last 10 days of pregnancy
• Had a 6 week premature baby

We have gone from right out of school, completely broke and in overwhelming debt; to two nice incomes and living comfortably as we paid off debt and saved money; to one nice income and one small income from a part-time job back down to one income again (and feeling broke due to the cost of diapers and formula).

We are glad that some of the things that drive some couples apart have only brought us closer to one another. It has been an amazing 5 years and we know that things will only get better.

Justin and the case of the Disappearing Punch Bowl

No, it is not the first book in the next series by J.K. Rowling (if there ever will be a next series). It's just a funny situation that I encountered today. In an effort to clear up some more counter space, Julie asked me to put the punch bowl somewhere. I immediately thought of the place I like to put all of the not-often-used kitchen items (since we don't have enough cabinet/closet space for it all)...on top of the cabinets. There are already a couple cake pans up there, so I got a chair, climbed on it to get on the counter, and placed the punch bowl and ladle in the next available space...the corner.

Little did I know that, unlike the bottom of the cabinets, the top of the cabinets are NOT boarded over in the corners. This means the punch bowl and ladle took a quick and noisy journey out of sight, and into the hole. Luckily, the punch bowl was big enough that it did not go all the way down to the bottom of the 48" tall cabinet chasm. I was able to extricate it, but there was no hope for the ladle. Even through the use of some extra-long cooking tongs, I was not able to retrieve the still-stranded ladle.

Julie said that it is probably a good thing, because we don't know what all might be down there besides the dust accumulation of a 6-year-old house's cabinet chasm. It is a good thing the ladle is not too expensive. At least I know now, and here is warning to all of you, that it is NOT a good idea to store things in the corner above your cabinets.