Abby's Birthday

I think I say with all the kids birthdays, but I really cant believe she is 4 already. She is growing up so fast.

This year we decided on a Teddy Bear Tea birthday party. It was centered around the fact that we got her a gift certificate for Build a Bear Workshop and her and Daddy went on a date a few days before her birthday. She had a blast with daddy on their date.

They went to Red Robin for lunch. She was so excited when they sang to her and had a blast with her chocolate sundae and balloons.

This is actually when they are signing to her. She is just too cute.

And of course, loving the chocolate sundae. Daddy had to give her a straw so she could suck up all of the chocolate.

After lunch, they headed off to the mall to the workshop. Grammy was given a Build a Bear a few days before this, so she had been asking us if she could go to the "workshop" too. She kept saying things like, "Mommy, I need to go to the workshop. Where is my workshop." Perfect timing. All the fun with Grammy's bear was build up to getting her own.

She had a blast picking out her bear and stuffing it. She picked the Hannah Montana bear of course with a cute little outfit. She was very tempted to go with the guitar as well, but decided on a pink purse at the last minute.

Her party was on her birthday. It just happened that Daddy was off that day, so we planned it around the big kids being at school and out of the way. We invited all of her friends over for a "tea party." They all brought their bears/dolls with them. When they arrived, they got dressed up for a picture with their teddy bear. We then set our teddy bears on a picnic blanket and served them tea. After our bears were satisfied, we went to the table for our tea and lunch. Then it was story time. After story time was back to the table for bear cupcakes and ice cream. Then we opened presents and sat around talking and playing. It was a really fun time. The kids all had a blast.

Abigail has grown up a lot this year. I see her getting more into the "big girl" things like barbies and dress up and even make up. It is crazy to think about. In this last year she has

• Concurred potty training.
• Learned some of her ABC's.
• Started to perform for us.
• Learned to talk CONSTANTLY. lol.
• Become a wonderful big sister to her little brothers.

It is sad and awesome to watch all these little people grow. I wish I could keep them at the little baby cuteness ages forever. but then it is also so wonderful to watch them grow and make good choices and continue to learn. It is fun to see them become bigger little people.

And in case all of that was not enough, at the end of the day we got to open family presents and have a family party. We purposely had her party with her friends during school so that the big boys would not be there (3 less kids to worry about, right). That meant that after dinner, we had the chance to open the presents from the boys and Jim and I. Grammy and Poppy came over and had some cake and Ice cream with us. For her "family cake" she wanted a barbie cake, so this is my attempt at the barbie cake. It was my first attempt. Pretty good for a first try. Now I know what not to do. LOL. It was a good cake for her though. She loved it.

And here she is opening the present from Jim and I. The boys got her some magnet dolls. You know, big wooden dolls with magnets in them with a ton of interchangeable clothes, shoes, and accessories. it has proven to be a favorite with all of the kids. Jim and I got her a V-tech motion game system. We have a ton of V-smile games and so this plays those as well as the new v-motion games. She was very excited. She also got some doll stuff with a stroller, carseat, and bassinet. She loves that as well. Overall, not very hard to please her. LOL.

Happy Birthday Abigail, we love you tons.

FEED ME!!!!

This little man of ours is just way to active. I had just gotten home from the store and was putting groceries away, thus the fridge door was open. I turned around to get something and when I turned back, I found this....

9 Months old. I just cant believe him sometimes. My mom and I were laughing so hard. It was just too cute. Apparently he was hungry and I was just not fast enough for him, so he had to take matters into his own hands.

Jameson Firsts

Jameson is growing way to fast. It always happens doesn't it. We just go through each day and they get bigger and bigger and progress so fast.

I just thought I would document a few of his firsts for memory sake. He is now officially 9 months old (as of a few days ago) and is just getting into everything and keeping us on our toes. He climbs the stairs, gets into the bathroom, loves to pull drawers open and empty them of their contents, and has officially taken his first steps. WOW! He is an amazing little man. I am so proud of him.

Here are some pictures of some of the fun times with Jameson.

This is actually one of the first times he was able to pull himself up on the hearth. It was about at 6 months or so. He has now moved on to climbing onto it and cruising along the fireplace. He will also lean over the edge to get something off the floor and kind of belly slide (like a seal) to get off. It is very comical to watch.

This is actually the very first time he stood up on his own. It was just a bit before Christmas so he was about 8-1/2 months old. I just thought I would snap a shot and text to Jim at work to say hi. I stood him up thinking he would fall down and he didnt. I quickly took the shot. Now, he is all over the place. LOL. What was I thinking teaching him a new trick. He has enough in his arsenal. LOL.

And here is his lovely drawer emptying abilities. He loves to pull open these drawers and pull out all the towels and rags. The drawer below has all the "kids" cups and he loves to play around with those as well. Fun times.

Here he is with his first sucker. Boy it really pays to have older siblings!!!!! He loved this one. I couldnt help it, I had to take a picture before I took the sucker away from him. LOL. Look at those chubby little cheeks. He was really sucking hard on that one.

I love this one as well. Notice the binky upside down. He loves to put it in this way. He is just TOO COOL FOR THE BINKY!!!!

Don't Eat Pete!!!

I just had to blog this mostly so that I would not forget the moment. We played Don't Eat Pete for FHE last night and Daniel was just hilarious. If you are not aware how to play... We divided a piece of paper into 8 slots. Each family member got to draw a face. We then sent one person out of the room and decided which face was "Pete". I put 2 pieces of M&M's on each face and when the family member came back to the room, they started eating candy off the faces. When they got to the face we chose as Pete, everyone screams "Don't Eat Pete."

It was a lot of fun. The kids had a blast. Daniel was the 5th person to go out of the room, so he had watched all the brothers eat the candy and was sooooo excited to get his chance to eat candy. When he came back in the room, he just started shoving the M&M's in his mouth as fast as he could. He was laughing so hard and as he was putting candy into his mouth, it was falling out. He actually did very well and did not pick "Pete" until last, so he got to have all of the candy. He was a slobbery, laughing, cocholate mess, but he was so very cute. It was adorable. At 2, I am not sure he understood the idea of the game, but boy did he understand that you get to eat the candy. LOL. What a fun night. FHE can really be entertaining at times.

Roses

Jim likes to surprise me with roses sometimes when he goes to the store in the evening (usually for milk LOL). The other day he had to run to the store and came home with 2 roses, one for his wife and one for his little princess. How totally sweet.

Abby was thrilled to get a rose of her own. She was not so thrilled to get her picture taken, but she did enjoy daddy's attention and rose.

Thank you Daddy, your girls love you so much.

The boys sledding

We decided to make a backyard sledding run for the kids to enjoy. It is small, but they had a blast going down the little hill we made.

There is just a bit of a slope to our backyard, so after piling snow up we were able to make a nice little run for the boys. Tyler and Jacob really had some fun. Here is some video of them going down.

Towards the end, Tyler added a few bumps and was trying to catch some air while sledding. He had a great time.

Christmas Carols from Abby and Daniel

Jim won a digital video camera at his work Holiday party last night. I have had a bit of fun playing with it today, so I thought I would try my hand at uploading videos to blogger.

This is a video of Abigail and Daniel serenading us with Christmas songs. She loves to sing and he loves to do anything she is doing...

I love how she has started to bow when she is done performing. I am not sure where she picked this up at, but it is just too cute. And in typical Daniel fashion, we get a little push at the end. I hope you enjoyed the video and look forward to more fun videos of the kids.