A conversation with Jacob

Jacob is such a sweet little boy. He has always seemed older than he really is and cracks me up on a regular basis. He loves to make people laugh and seems to find joy in anything. He has always been super snuggly just like his dad. Actually, he is pretty much a mini Manny. He loves to watch UFC fights with his dad and has picked up on the moves very very quickly. He does better wrestling with older boys because he's a little too much for kids his own age. He is such a joy in our family.

I had to share a really cute conversation that Jacob and I had the other day in the car. We were in line at the school waiting to pick up the girls and he turned to me and said, "ya know Mom, I was just thinking that we have 4 boys at our house and 4 girls." I turned to him and asked who were all of the 4 boys. "You know, me, Daddy, David, and my other brother." Your other brother huh... tell me more about him. I'm thinking o.k. does he know something that I don't know?!?!?!? "Ya, my other brother. Except he's not actually in our house, he's in heaven." At that point in time I had many thoughts rushing through my head. Sara knew about Jacob way before I was ever pregnant with him. I believe that little kids have such a sweet spirit and tend to know more than we give them credit for. At this point in time I'm getting pretty nervous, so I ask him to tell me more about his other brother. He gets really excited and says, "well, Jesus is my other brother and he's in heaven. But, he's still my brother so we have 4 boys in our family." "And I have 2 dads. Because Heavenly Father is my daddy in heaven and I have another daddy here. Mom, isn't that so cool that I have 2 dads?" Jacob was on cloud 9 telling me about all of this. I love the conversations that I have with my kids and I get to see a little bit of what they are thinking about.

Jacob with his "Buffalo Cake" that he made for his treat for family home evening a few weeks ago. He knew exactly what he wanted to do and it turned out great. It was so yummy! If you look closely you can see the eyes, nose, mouth, horns, feet, hair, and it has a beautiful tail that you can't see in this picture.

Deon and the kids

We had our family pictures taken by a very talented friend of mine, Amanda. I will be posting our actual family pictures later, but I'm running out of time right now before I have to go get the kiddos from school. I am having a very difficult time choosing which ones to develop and hang on the wall. Beware of the picture overload that is to follow, but I need your help.

Me and my girls!

I think this picture is hilarious. It shows the personalities of the boys so much. Jacob is watching the other kids running around playing. He's probably thinking, "why do I have to be stuck here when I could be over there playing and will he ever stop crying so we can take this picture already!" David is just like the rest of our kids and would live outside if he could. He finally gets to play outside and explore this very interesting new place and you are going to make me sit why?!?!?

Manny and the kids

I love how David is holding Jacob's hand in this one.

They are truly "daddy's girls"

This is the last picture that we did and David was done with this picture taking stuff. I really wanted a picture with Manny and all 5 of the kids. I have a frame with a quote on it that this picture is going in. The quote is from General Douglas MacArthur and reads, "By profession, I am a soldier and take pride in that fact, but I am prouder, infinitely prouder, to be a father."

Manny and Deon's pictures

Our "Twilight" pose

Sara's pictures

Emily's pictures

Erica's pictures

Jacob and David's pictures

Jacob was wanting to play with all of the sticks. If you know Jacob you know that if he's outside he has a stick in his hand. He has a pile of sticks off to the side waiting for him.

David was not interested in getting his picture taken. There was too much to explore. Poor Amanda just had to run around after him snapping pictures.

We were trying to get his attention and we were playing peek-a-boo with him. This is his peek-a-boo back at us.

Yay!!! This is fun! We had a lot of fun taking these pictures and Amanda did a fantastic job! Thank you again!

Snow Day

I am really behind again, sorry. This is how the month of January started off, with my flowers in full bloom. November and December were so warm that my flowers actually bloomed in January. Emily took this picture of the flowers for me. A couple of weeks later we got a wonderful snow storm. We got about 4-5 inches of snow, which is very rare for where we live. School was cancelled for 2 days, so the kids had so much fun playing in the snow for those two days. We also had a "Harry Potter" movie marathon. I'm not sure who was more excited, Manny or the kids.