The Blue Park

One thing that I really do miss about our old neighborhood is all the parks. We lived within walking distance of several playgrounds and lots of big grassy fields/soccer fields/baseball fields, etc…Our walks to the park and letting Jacob run around with a ball on the fields, was such a big part of our daily life. There was one playground that was Jacob’s favorite, I actually did a post on it. We called it the Blue Park since the ground was a blue padded/squishy rubber, and most of the equipment was blue. We spent a lot of time there. On our last day when we moved out of our condo, we stopped at the Blue Park to let Jacob play one last time, before heading to the new house. Every once in a while when I say we are going to the park, Jacob asks if we are going to the Blue Park, and still talks about it often.

In March, Jacob had a dentist appointment, and his dentist office is in our old neighborhood. When we were finished with the appointment, I told Jacob I had a surprise for him, and I started driving towards the Blue Park. When we got closer and closer, I could see on Jacob’s face that he recognized the neighborhood and from his excitement I knew that he knew where we were going.

It tugs on my heartstrings to see how much he has grown since we were here last (almost a year ago).

He can tackle things with ease now that were a little too difficult for him before.

And it was fun seeing him show Dylan around his favorite park.

And it is fun to see Dylan doing the things that Jacob did when he was a baby.

Dylan really liked the swings at this park

Jacob did swing for a little bit

But he would much rather climb

Such a big boy now!

It is these moments, that I am SO thankful for this blog, these pictures and memories. When I start to feel overwhelmed with how far behind I am, or the pictures and stories that never made it on here, I remember the trips down memory lane when I look back on an old post and the happiness/sense of accomplishment I feel when I get a new post done. It also shows me how much I have grown as a mother. When I read back on the first post I did about this park and I came to this sentence, “This particular day was a Saturday morning, there is no way I could take pictures and chase Jacob around the park by myself, so we had daddy with us.” I had to laugh. Now that I am used to the juggling act that two kids entails, bringing my camera along at the park (by myself) didn’t seem like a big deal. At times, it was a bit challenging and I always had to make sure Dylan was in a safe place when I was focusing on Jacob, but it is possible. To me, remembering old memories and creating new ones is more precious than anything, and I am so blessed to have my little family to do that with.

Springtime

It is amazing how fast the days turn into weeks and the weeks into months and the months into years! Some days drag on forever, but time in general is just speeding by. Here we are enjoying another beautiful San Diego Springtime! With St. Patrick’s Day and Easter just a couple weeks apart, March was a fun filled month.

I love how Jacob really learns about all the different holidays not just with what we do at home but at school. They have so many fun activities, themed lunch parties, and all the holiday crafts. After his St. Patrick’s Day party at school, I tried to get a picture of both boys. Neither one would sit still, so I gave them some of the shamrocks that Jacob made at school and asked Jacob to tell Dylan about them. That lasted for about 5 seconds, when I was able to snap this picture.

Then Jacob took off and I was left with this handsome dude.

He was eyeing the artwork and trying to figure out what to do with it.

After looking at it and waving it around, he decided to rip it to shreds and see how it tasted

It must not have been very tasty, because then he took off after Jacob.

After St Patrick’s Day came Easter. Our original plans for Easter weekend were pretty relaxed. Jacob and I had a birthday party to go to on Saturday, then we were going to church on Sunday. However, thanks to March Madness, a group of us had an impromptu get together on Saturday evening to watch the game, which also turned into an Easter egg hunt for the kids, and a fun evening with friends. Here they are lined up waiting for the GO! to start the hunt.

And I will admit…I didn’t do the whole Easter basket thing this year. And since this was a last minute thing, we didn’t have a basket for Jacob to use for the hunt. So Justin ran out to the car and grabbed a wine carrier bag for him to use. Parents of the year, I know…

To make things fun for the dads we also hid cans of Coors Light for them to find. Somehow it turned into the dads giving the kids a dollar for every can they found and brought to them.

Sunday morning we celebrated the real reason for Easter at church. After the service we did another Easter egg hunt. Instead of quickly gathering as many eggs as he could, Jacob would pick one up, and crack it open to see what was inside before putting it in his bag. He is very selective…

And then he and Dylan got into a groove where Dylan would pick up an egg and Jacob would take it and put it in his bag.

After the service we went to our friends house with a group of our church family and spent the rest of the day there.

We feel so blessed to have all these wonderful friends who are like family to get together and do life with.

He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ – Luke 24:6-7

SpiderMan

One day Jacob found his SpiderMan costume in a pile of things that I was getting ready to put away in the attic. He asked me to help him put it on and despite the fact that it was too small for him, he wore it all day long. Then the next day when it came time to get dressed, he requested his SpiderMan costume again, and the next day and the next…and so it began.

He did everything in his costume. He ate his meals as SpiderMan, ran around the house and outside as SpiderMan, played his drums as SpiderMan

He wore it on our evening walks on the golf course

SpiderMan practices good dental hygiene

Jacob basically was living his life as SpiderMan.

A really fun time was when we went to the grocery store. I wish I had someone to videotape that experience. EVERYONE was smiling and commenting on and high fiving Jacob, it made for a fun shopping experience.

This went on for quite some time and the costume was getting a bit beat up. I started telling him it was dirty and I had to wash it every time he asked to put it on (I know the experienced parents reading this know exactly what happened to it)…But the hat part was fine, so he continued to wear it.

Doesn’t matter where we were going, or what we were doing, there was always a little part of SpiderMan with us. From reading the news with daddy on Saturday morning

to going to the dentist to get his teeth cleaned (told you SpiderMan has good dental hygiene!)

And my absolute favorite thing was when I asked him what SpiderMan says, he would make the hand motions like SpiderMan does when he shoots the webs from his hands and say “I love you!” since it is also like the sign for I love you.

Makes my heart melt!

Month 11

I can’t believe how close we are to Dylan’s first birthday! This little guy is such a snuggler! After picking him up, he will often lay his head down on your shoulder or against your cheek. If you are sitting down he will come over and pull himself up and lay his head down in your lap. Or if he is just playing on the ground he will all of a sudden lay down and snuggle with the carpet.

Dylan loves playing with us, but is also very content on playing alone for a few minutes. One of his favorite things to do is push a car across the floor and around in circles. He loves pulling all the books out of his book bin and turning the pages and looking at them. That’s when I start feeling bad that I don’t read to him as much. So I’ve been trying to be better about that. His favorite book right now is “Where’s Spot?” Every time he lifts the flap to open the door, closet, clock, etc…he shakes his head to say nooooo. And a few times I’ve caught Jake reading the book to him, that alone makes all the difficult times in parenting so worth it.

He is tearing all over the house with his walker and getting braver about letting go and standing for a few seconds before sitting down. Between crawling, his walker and cruising around on furniture, this kid gets around, fast!

I often look at him in amazement. He is such a big boy, not only in size, but in maturity, the way he acts and the things he does. I know having an older sibling has a lot to do with that. It is fun to see Dylan try to keep up with Jake and see them play together, but a part of me misses my little baby. Jake has a workbench under the window in his bedroom and when he knows someone is coming over, or daddy’s on his way home, or when he wants to be nosy, he stands ontop of the workbench and watches the cars drive by and waits for whoever he’s looking for. I call him the Neighborhood Watch! Now whenever he gets up there Dylan starts fussing and reaching up to me so I will lift him up and stand him next to Jake. And they giggle and bang on the window and push cars along the windowstill together. As I stand back (spotting Dylan) I am shaking my head at the two boys and it is during those moments I have to keep reminding myself that he is not even a year old yet!

Here are his weekly photos

Week 44

Week 45 – showing us his serious side

Week 46

Week 47

Week 48 – It’s a good thing we are almost done with these weekly pictures, because it is getting more and more difficult to keep him still, he would much rather launch himself forward off the couch.

Ranch Style Photos

In February we were back at the Broken Branch Ranch. And every once in a while we do a little photo shoot to try and get some cute pictures of the boys around the ranch and with Grandma and Grandpa. The main focus this time was on Dylan, mainly because a certain 3 year old is not too keen on sitting still and smiling for the camera. We also were trying to recreate something similar to our favorite “cowboy” picture of Jacob when he was 8 months old. Since Dylan is a little older than Jacob was, it was harder to keep him still, but I think we got some good ones. There’s not a whole lot of story to tell here, just heavy on the picture side…

First we loaded up the props in the wagon.

Then while we were waiting for the guys to bring the bales of hay I started snapping away at Grandma and Dylan

Then Dylan was ready for his close up

When Grandma and Grandpa joined in, Dylan could not take his eyes off Grandpa. He loves Grandpa’s deep laugh and in every single picture I took he is smiling at him.

Then we tried to get one with both boys and we ended up with more outtakes. But they are still fun pictures to have, that show the general craziness of two boys.

This is what we get if we ask Jacob to smile or laugh for the camera (and again Dylan was focused on Grandpa laughing)

This would have been a good one if Dylan had been smiling, but I think he was over it at this point.

Dylan was tired of sitting and being held, so we let him stand up and play on the bales of hay

and he was sampling the goods

Then we went for a ride in the wagon

Which led us to the horses

And that is usually where you can find this guy hard at work

I love some of the facial expressions I get, he takes his jobs seriously! I can just hear his voice in his head saying “Don’t mess with me mama, I’m busy!”