Randomness

Posted on May 7, 2014 by Mdfrisco

Two days after Easter, Jacob started coughing and sneezing and ended up with a full blown head cold. Other than a mild fever and a day or two of a runny nose (which I’m sure was teething related) Jacob has not been sick. So now he has had his first real cold. Of course a couple of days later when he started feeling better I got it and then I think I either gave it back to him or he relapsed. But man, I remember the days when I could call in sick to work and rest in bed when I was not feeling well. Not anymore! Thankfully, Jacob still had a pretty good temperament when he was sick so I was not dealing with any major mood swings. He was actually very cuddly and wanted to be held all the time, which I loved, except when I was trying to get something done. Being sick didn’t really disrupt Jacob’s nighttime sleep, except it was heartbreaking hearing him cough through the night. It was hard to try and play with him or keep him entertained while all I wanted to do was close my eyes or stand in the hot steaming shower to relieve my congestion. I did get a small break over the weekend when Justin took Jacob to meet his parents for lunch in Temecula. I spent the entire time they were gone dozing on the couch. Anyway, for people who don’t get sick often, it was a doozy! Now, other than the lingering dry cough, we are both much better. Not looking forward to Jacob bringing home all those germs when he starts school, ugh!

On a more exciting note, Jacob has been walking now for about a week and a half. Of course the first couple of days he was a clumsy klutz falling over after ever few steps. But now he is more and more sure footed and is picking up speed. I’ll get some pictures of him walking up here soon to share.

Also, sometime in the middle of being sick and learning how to walk, one of Jacob’s molars popped through. He won’t let me look in his mouth anymore so I’ve had a hard time looking for new teeth. But I have noticed him chewing on some of his hard plastic toys and a couple of days ago I had my finger in his mouth getting something out that he put in and surprised myself when I almost sliced my finger open on his molar. Sheesh, those teeth are sharp! I think he is working on the other side now because he is back to chewing and is really biting down hard on things.

Generally Jacob has always been such a fantastic eater. He recently went through a picky phase where all he wanted to eat was bananas, yogurt and cheese. He would eat a little bit of other things here and there, but not much. Looking back I think it was leading up to his cold and cutting his molar so he was probably just not feeling well. But now his appetite is back in full force and I feel like he is eating more than before. And he will eat pretty much anything I give him, or at least try a few bites before deciding he doesn’t want something. He eats more than I do and I sometimes wonder how I am going to keep him full when he is a teenager!

We have a really, really busy week next week, so I probably won’t post anything next week. But I’ll be back soon with more stories and pictures.

To end this post here are some pictures of our recent visit with Oma, to celebrate her 91st birthday!

Jacob loves to play with her wooden blocks

Or more specifically, he loves to knock them down!

Happy Easter

Posted on April 25, 2014 by Mdfrisco

This year my birthday fell on Easter Sunday. And my mom arrived for her visit 2 days before. We really didn’t have anything big planned for the weekend, but we ended up being pretty busy. On Saturday afternoon, we went to an Easter festival that our church was participating in at a local park. By the time we got there everyone we knew had already left and the playground was pretty crowded so we decided not to stick around. But we stopped in front of the DJ so Jake could wiggle his booty, he loves music! And to pose with the blow up Easter bunny, which he was not too sure about.

Later that afternoon we went to a birthday party for Jacob’s friend Micah who turned 1! Then that evening, Grandma babysat while Justin took me out to dinner in La Jolla for to celebrate my birthday.

Sunday morning after church we played at the park and went out to lunch. That afternoon I wanted to get a family picture so we went to the park to play around for a bit.

Jacob loves to smell flowers. Whenever I have flowers on the counter in the kitchen he always stands under them, reaching up and calling out to someone to pick him up so he can smell them. And he has to smell each flower, not just one. In fact, he has been really interested in all plants and flowers in general. When we are on our walks in the stroller he is always reaching out to touch the plants as we pass by. Once his fingers touch the plant he pulls his hand in the stroller and giggles. So Jacob and my mom were smelling the little white flowers in the grass.

I’ve had a little luck with Jacob wearing a hat when we are outside since he is distracted by everything that is going on. This is one of my favorites of his hats, we bought it for him to wear last Thanksgiving, but he wouldn’t keep it on. But on this day we got just a few minutes of hat wearing

Before it came off

We ended the day with our friends on bay enjoying the beautiful weather. Hope you all had a wonderful Easter!

The Haircut

Posted on April 23, 2014 by Mdfrisco

When Justin was a baby he had blonde curly hair. Since Jacob has his daddy’s dark eyes I was hoping he would inherit his curly hair too. And I love the look of casual, long(ish) hair on little boys, especially if there are curls. But I think Jacob has inherited my straight hair. And other than a simple trim in the front to keep the hair out of his face we have not yet given Jacob a haircut. Which has resulted in long wispy hair and it was getting to the point where I could make a ponytail in the back.

One day when we were coming out of the grocery store, there were some girl scouts selling cookies and they were cooing over Jacob saying how cute he was (of course he had flashed a smile and was waving at them) one of the girl scouts said to us as we were leaving “What’s her name?” and Justin casually said “Jacob“, the look of confusion and then shock on her face was pretty funny.

One evening, Jacob and I were having dinner out at a restaurant and an older couple sat down at the table across from us. They were enamored with Jacob and kept saying how cute “she” was and the man kept saying how they had all grandsons and no granddaughters and he just loved little girls, etc, etc, etc…They were so adorable how they were drooling over him (of course he was smiling and waving away to them as well) that I didn’t have the heart to correct them and just played along thinking we would end our conversation soon. They ended up chatting away and playing with Jacob throughout the entire meal and I eventually called him by name several times and when they asked me questions about him I started with the word “he…” and I briefly saw it register with the man when he realized his mistake.

So many people that I meet always say it is obvious he is a boy, and he is usually wearing obviously boy clothes. Although some colors such as, grey/yellow/red/white could go either way. And looking back on both of those incidences he was wearing yellow one time and red the other. Then one day we were at the grocery store, where they all know us since we are there all the time, and the produce guy asked if Jacob would like a balloon to play with while we shopped. I said “Sure that would be great!” and he came back with a pink balloon…Now maybe there is a perfectly good explanation, like they had an excess of pink balloons they were trying to get rid of, or maybe before it was inflated it looked red, or maybe he was color blind??? Anyway, after that I decided it was time for a haircut. Luckily, Justin’s parents were already planning to come for a visit a few days later and Papa J knows his way around a hairstyle, so he brought his scissors and Jacob got his first haircut!

Jacob sat on his daddy’s lap and we gave him a toy to play with

The first few minutes were no big deal to Jacob, but Justin was getting used to the scissors flying in front of his face 🙂

Then he realized that his Papa J was doing something to him

And tried to put a stop to it

But Papa J quickly distracted him with his playful antics

Then Jacob kept reaching for Papa J’s spray bottle

Which of course he got, along with a cookie in his mouth

And that kept him entertained for a while

Especially after daddy showed him how to press down to make it spray

And then he spied his Nonnie with the cookies

And the spray bottle lost it’s magic

After getting a cookie, Papa J was able to quickly finish his work

The result is a happy little guy

new things to play with

and a haircut that turned my baby into a little boy

Thanks Papa J!

Just some favorites

Posted on March 9, 2014 by Mdfrisco

With the craziness of the holidays, travels, Jacob’s birthday and the fact that he is only napping once a day now, my time to sort through pictures and blog them is even more limited than before. I am still taking lots of pictures but it takes a while before they are downloaded from my camera, let alone posted here. So I am playing a little bit of catch up…The few months before the holidays I was pretty busy in my little photography world since it was the season to get pictures done for Christmas Cards, there were also babies being born and birthdays to celebrate. Rather than doing a post for each photo shoot I did, I am just going to share a few of my favorites.

First up was my one of my favorite families, The White family.

We went to the Los Peñasquitos Ranch House. I really like this location for the old buildings and nature setting. If you go at the right time of day the sun coming through the trees is magical. Little girls playing in the background of the photo is pretty magical too!

I also did the Wisbach family at the same location.

These kids were so much fun to work with

I was impressed with how willing they were to have their pictures taken and how well they listened to their parents

Good job mom and dad!

Then it was on to the Ford Family to capture their sweet Kennedy’s first birthday.

They live on the bay so we walked down to their backyard onto the sand for pictures

Kennedy was one of those early walkers, so she was a pro at the walking thing at the time of this photo shoot and that was all she wanted to do. I remember being sore the next day from chasing her around!

And my cousin added a second sweet little girl to her family

I love the time I get to spend with friends, family and even people I don’t know that well during these photo shoots. I know I still have a lot to learn, especially in the editing process, but the more practice I get the more I learn about my hobby. I am thankful for all my friends and family who let me practice on them and refer me to people who are looking for a someone to take pictures for them. Sometimes after looking at the pictures I took, I am disappointed that they didn’t come out as good as I hoped, sometimes I am surprised at a shot that I got and other times, I am so excited to share them with my client because I know they will love them as much as I do. Truly what it comes down to for why I love taking pictures is capturing memories.

“Time will never stand still and those moments that bring us such joy become memories in an instant. To capture such a moment and record it forever is truly monumental.”

– Joshua Atticks

The Children’s Museum

Posted on February 27, 2014 by Mdfrisco

I’ve wanted to go check out the Children’s Museum for a long time, so while Grandma was here last week, we did!

There are lots of different play areas and rooms with a theme and everything is hands on and kid friendly.

We played with stacking blocks made from mushrooms, we blew bubbles with homemade pipe cleaner rings (which Jacob loved). There was a play area specifically designed for younger kids where we spent most of our time.

There were lots of balls in this room and that is one of Jacob’s favorite things to play with

Then there was a “sliced orange” that was a never ending cycle of pick up the balls, put them through the holes and pick them up again…we could have stayed there for hours!

We also made our way through the bounce house twice before the older, rowdy kids took over and bounced Jacob out!

If you are ever downtown and need a fun place to entertain your kid, check it out!

Another fun thing about Grandma coming to visit is she gets those cute (and someday will be embarrassing) bath time photos 🙂

Jacob LOVES his bath, even during the day if the door is open, he will crawl up to the bathtub and turn around and look at me (like he is in the picture below) as if he is saying, can we take a bath now??

bath 1ed

Thanks for a fun few days Grandma!

San Diego gems

Posted on February 25, 2014 by Mdfrisco

Grandma was in town for a few days last week and we didn’t waste a single minute while she was here. Aside from our usual stroller walks, errands and park playdates, we spent time enjoying some of the perks of living in San Diego. First up, the beach!

It was a little bit cooler than the last few times we were at the beach, but there was still sand to play with, waves to chase, rocks to pick up and lots of ground to cover and burn energy before nap time!

Another San Diego gem we took advantage of is the Zoo!

We were entertained by rolling & swinging monkeys, swimming hippos, sleeping bears

and sleeping Koala bears

Jacob’s favorite exhibit is the zebra and donkey, every time he is mesmerized by them!

We saw lots of birds and ducks and we learned that male flamingos walk around with their neck stretched out to attract the females attention.

It is fun to do these things with Jacob now that he is a little older and he takes an interest in what he is seeing. Before going anywhere was just an excuse for me to get out of the house and rejoin society, but now it is such a fun learning experience for Jacob and I love watching him take in the new sights and sounds.

More coming soon!

The Party

Posted on February 10, 2014 by Mdfrisco

When trying to decide what to do for Jacob’s first birthday party, we kept going back and forth on where to have it. There are so many great parks in our neighborhood but it being January we didn’t want to take our chances just in case the San Diego winter weather decided to drop below 65 and actually produce some rain. And our house just is not big enough to host all the people we invited. So I asked my Aunt and Uncle who live in Oceanside if we could have the party at their house. They said yes, with the location secured, the party planning mode was in full force.

We decided to go with an Olympic theme since the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia were starting just a few weeks later (actually I am watching the Olympics as I work on this post). We ordered gold medals and temporary tattoos of the Olympic rings. I went on Pinterest to get ideas for decor and made some Olympic torches out of candle sticks and tissue paper. I have some friends who are creating a business of putting together packages of paper decorative items for parties, they made us some Team USA signs and Olympic themed cupcake toppers.We got cupcakes in the colors of the Olympic rings and I had every intention of arranging them in circles like the actual Olympic rings to be served. But the moment was kind of crazy and that didn’t happen, but hey at least they tasted good!

Another idea that I found on Pinterest was a chalkboard that lists things about your child that you could purchase from a company who would personalize it for you. We have a few chalkboards in our house that we write sayings, verses, draw pictures, etc… on so we already had some colorful chalkboard paint markers and I found a big chalkboard at Marshalls all we had to do was get our creative juices flowing and make our own. It was two nights before the party and it took Justin, me and my mom 2.5 hours to do this with three differences in opinions (and all 3 of us are perfectionists) and two bottles of wine! It was definitely one of those nights that I will never forget. We were excited, frustrated and laughing the entire time. In the end I am pretty impressed with how it came out!

It says JACOB at the top and My First Birthday underneath.
19.12 lbs and 30.25 inches.
4 teeth.
I LOVE: The Dog (tag, tail, toys), Bath Time, Climbing Stiars, Touchdown, Oh No, Dancing, Hide and Seek, Walks, Peek-a-booFAVORITE:
Books: Tickle Me and Little Blue Truck
Song: Jesus loves me
Foods: Pancakes, Cheese, Zuchinni, Avocado, Peaches
First Word: Doggie

A little over 60 people filled my Aunt and Uncle’s yard. Of course it was a gorgeous San Diego day and we are so blessed to have have so many wonderful friends and family to celebrate Jacob with us. I am thankful that my mom took on the task of taking pictures, I was so busy visiting and if she hadn’t done that then I would have maybe 3 pictures of the whole day.

Then it was time for Jacob to have his birthday cake!

After we got Jacob cleaned up from the chocolate and blue frosting the party continued…

Then my cousin’s girlfriend surprised the little girls with some face painting

They were so captivated watching her work

Even little Riley got in on the fun!

Thank you to all those who celebrated with us! We missed those who could not come and Jacob is so lucky to have such wonderful people in his life. Happy Birthday to my sweet boy!

Christmas (part two)

Posted on February 1, 2014 by Mdfrisco

We spent the second part of our Christmas at Justin’s parents house. After unloading the car, Jacob was ready to open more gifts.

One thing that I love to capture in photography is creating some good bokeh (the intentional use of creating blur or haze in the background). You know those beautiful pictures you see where the round refection from the light, there is an art to it and it takes practice (and the right lens) to capture some good bokeh. One fantastic way to play around with bokeh is using the light from a Christmas tree.

Their tree was beautifully decorated and low to the ground so it made a great backdrop.

I just love that little reindeer butt!

Again daddy came to the rescue to put together the toys

Later, it was time for Jacob’s dinner. Justin’s parents found this great wooden highchair that we use when we go to their house.

When he finished dinner and was munching on a teething cookie, I couldn’t resist getting my camera and capturing Jacob in the highchair with the Christmas tree in the background. The bokeh was just perfect.

With a full tummy, Jacob went back to opening gifts. Papa J and Nonnie got him this great Nativity scene.

He spent a lot of time “rearranging” the placement of the characters in the scene.

Not wanting to be left out, Apollo creeped under the tree to get into the action

We had a great Christmas and enjoyed all our time with family. When we got home, we had a couple days to get settled back into our routine and we celebrated New Years Eve with some neighbors. Then we were in full planning mode for Jacob’s birthday party, those pictures are coming up next.

Christmas (part one)

Posted on January 25, 2014 by Mdfrisco

We started off the Christmas festivities at my parents cabin. When we arrived they had in the middle of the living room, the rocking tractor that my brother and his family got for Jacob last year at Christmastime. Happy to be out of his carseat and able to move around, Jacob immediately started inspecting this new toy and decided to go for a ride.

They even had our last name engraved on the back.

The next day for Christmas Eve, we had the cabin full of family (including 5 dogs!) for dinner, presents and a good time together. One thing I have noticed is, as good as I am about taking pictures of Jacob…I am really bad at taking pictures of everyone else! So I didn’t get a single picture of that time. But of course I did get a few cute ones of Jacob in his Christmas outfit. First up, back on the tractor.

Even the big boys took the tractor for a spin 🙂

Jacob was fascinated with the horses and loved watching those large animals. So we spent some time on the fence of the arena watching the horses have their dinner.

We did get a picture of the 4 generations. Oma, Grandma, Mom and Jacob.

On Christmas morning, Jacob spent all morning opening presents and playing with his new toys.

However, if there are dogs around, they trump any package, box, toy or bow in Jacob’s book. And my parents dog Jane was happy to provide some entertainment for Jacob, he couldn’t contain his excitement!

After some coffee (for us) and breakfast, Jacob kept on opening and playing with his toys. He got a musical ball, clothes, books, a cell phone

Thanks mom, but you know this is not going to keep me from going after your phone, right?

Then Jacob tackled the present that was possibly his favorite one yet.

Hmmmm, can’t do much with it while it is in this box….

Daddy to the rescue!

And I have my very own truck!! Lets check out the horn here.

I simply couldn’t narrow these next photos down to one…or even two.

Besides it shows what a ham he is when he has an audience. Every time he would raise his arm, he would get a collective cheer from everyone.

and that makes him more and more excited!

Yeah!!!

Before we left, Jacob made sure to snuggle with his Oma for a few minutes.

He’s a pretty lucky little dude!

I’ll be back soon with the second half of our Christmas.

Thankful

Posted on December 12, 2013 by Mdfrisco

We have a lot to be thankful for, our family, friends, health, home, job and so much more… Of course this year, I kept thinking about how thankful we are to have this happy, healthy and pretty stinkin’ cute little guy.

Every year we spend Thanksgiving at Justin’s parents house. The day before Thanksgiving we had a quiet evening entertaining Jacob (or rather he was entertaining us!)

He loved having new territory to cover and different things to get into

And of course his GiGi is always game to play with him

And sing him songs

After a good nights sleep, Jacob was ready to celebrate Thanksgiving

He was busy getting everyone’s drinks ready for them

We attempted to get a family photo for a Christmas card, but clearly Jacob was not into it, he was ready for his nap!

Apollo can always be found in the kitchen while you are cooking, looking for things that are accidentally (or purposely) dropped on the floor. It is like a game to him, to see how quickly he can snatch up the food, sometimes he gets it before it even hits the ground. So on these holiday occasions, it is like the Superbowl in Apollo’s book, especially when it comes to Papa J’s cooking! Turkey anyone??

And it wouldn’t be Thanksgiving without an attempt to get a picture of all the dogs

Compared to years in the past, we had a small gathering this year. I enjoy the more intimate gatherings since it gives you a chance to really talk with everyone. However, there were so many people that we missed getting to see. Regardless, we had a good time and Jacob enjoyed his first Thanksgiving!