Happy 4th Birthday Jacob!

Jacob celebrated his 4th birthday last week. It is so hard to believe that our little guy is already 4! We had a really fun day. Jacob woke up to a Mickey Mouse happy birthday banner in the kitchen. Then Jacob and daddy went to get donuts for everyone - our family birthday tradition. Jacob savored every bite of this donut. It took him almost an hour to eat one sprinkled donut! The triplets loved the donut holes! Who wouldn't, right?!

Next we headed to the park down the street from our house and meet up with some new friends. One of the little boys was nice enough to bring Jacob a "Happy Birthday" balloon, but stubborn Jacob wouldn't let us tie it to his wrist and the balloon was soon on it's way to balloon heaven. It took quite awhile to recover from this tragic event! :o)

It was heating up pretty good at the park, so we decided to head home for lunch. I got all our swim stuff together and we all headed to Grandma and Grandpa's house for a few hours of swimming. We put the little kids down for a nap and Jacob got to swim with just Jon and I for a few hours. Jacob is such a good swimmer! He loves to jump off the side of the pool, go under water, come up by himself and then swim to the side. To say he loves swimming is an understatement!

After the babies (I know they are almost 2, but I can't help calling them babies!) woke up from their nap, we went home for snack and let the kids watch a movie. I made tacos for dinner and then we took all the kids to Cold Stone for dessert. We signed up for Cold Stone's birthday club, so you get a free ice cream on your birthday! The kids, of course, loved getting ice cream and then we headed home for a few presents.

This year, Jacob got a Light Saber, some Buzz swim trunks, Legos and a tool box. He really liked everything! By the end of the night, Jacob was worn out and fell asleep quick! We all had a great day. It was awesome that Jon was on vacation that entire week. It really gave us a great chance to spend some time with the kids and really enjoy some free time! Saturday we hosted a birthday party for all the kids. We did a Dora bounce house and had a hamburger and hotdog bbq. It was a lot of fun! I'll post some of those pictures too.

We hope you had a fun birthday, Jacob! We love you so very much buddy! Love, mom and dad

Ready for summer!

With the weather being so great lately, we've been spending a lot of time outside. The kids love being outside and it's great to have a new yard for them to explore. The only hazard in our new backyard is a waterfall/fountain feature that Jacob calls the "pool". It's a great feature in the yard, but not when you have 4 kids, ages 4 and under! Not only is it a safety concern, it has become home to every ball, bat, frisbee, toy, etc that we own! The kids love to throw everything in there and it drives Jon and I crazy. Last weekend Jon went ahead and filled the pond with large rocks, but we were able to keep a little water in it to run the waterfall.

Last night I took the kids down to see cousin Olivia's t-ball game. It was a ton of fun! The kids did great. Jacob enjoyed playing with his cousin's Matty and Nathan, while the little kids got to run around free - something they never get to do! It was a bit terrifying for me, but once they understood the boundaries, they did good. Here's a photo of Megan before we left the house for the game:

After the game, we (me, my 4 kids, Heather, David and their 4 kids and mom and dad!) all went out to pizza. Again, a rare treat for us... to actually take the kids out to eat. Unfortunately, Jon was working, but Jacob told him all about it this morning. It's fun to take the kids out for new experiences. I'm always worried about how they'll do, but they continue to surprise me all the time! They actually behave pretty good! :o)

This afternoon, I filled up the kiddie pool. Here are a few cute photos from the day:

Jacob filling up the pool

Ryan

Dylan - "Cheese"

Cutie Megan

Everyone in the pool!

Tonight after dinner, the kids and I had a Madagascar 2 movie night. We got our jammies on and ate white cheddar Cheetos (a huge favorite in our house!). This was the first movie night with the little kids and they did pretty good. Dylan is a fabulous movie watcher, but Megan and Ryan only last about 15 minutes before they start goofing around. Overall, it was a fun day!

Getting settled

We're in our new house now... it's almost been 2 weeks. The kids are loving all the extra space and not having any furniture in 2 rooms gives them more running room. I'm not sure I like all the extra area that needs cleaning, but I'm lucky to have a husband who helps out with the household chores! It turns out our next door neighbors grew up in Santa Rosa and know some of Jon's extended family. Such a small world! They have 3 younger kids too, which is great. Jacob has already played with their little boy a few times. The worst part of the move has been Jon's commute and the extra time he's been gone. He used to come home for his dinner break, but now it's too far. I must admit, I was secretly excited that I didn't have to have dinner on the table by 5:30, but I miss it already. Jacob asks every night at dinner if daddy is coming home. But, the trade-off of having more space and living closer to family has been wonderful. We're looking forward to many summer days swimming at mom's and Heather's. Most of our boxes are unpacked... just a few random boxes that I think were still packed from when we moved to Folsom over 3 years ago!

Photos from the week

We've been staying with mom and dad for over 2 weeks now, but we got the keys to our new house today!! We're moving in this weekend! It's been going good here at mom and dad's, but we are ready to get going on moving in to our new place. It's been a long journey for us! Here are a few photos of the week:

Megan enjoying Jamba Juice... I think this cup is bigger than she is!

These photos were taken at Nathan's 4th birthday party. We had dinner and then a trip to the park. The kids love the park, especially when we get to go with the Nelson and Duryee kids!

Jacob, Jon and I have been sharing a room the last 2 weeks. We snapped this photo last night when we went to bed. So sweet and innocent! He's been sleeping on a crib mattress on the floor. He loves it! He calls it his "little bed". I'm not sure he's going to like his full size regular bed anymore!

Jon's Birthday

Yesterday was Jon's 33rd birthday! We all drove up and dropped Jacob off at preschool. Then, Jon, myself and the trips went to run a few errands around Folsom. Jon bought a new driver at Sports Authority and when we got home, he went to play golf (even in 95 degree heat!). He had a fun time on the course and enjoyed his new driver. When he got back to mom and dad's, Jacob and Papa were swimming! The first swim of the year! The pool temp was 77, still too cold for mommy and Grandma, but Papa and Jacob had a good time. Jon jumped right in when he got home too. Jacob picked right back up with his swimming skills that he learned last summer, which is fantastic. We also realized that he can touch in the shallow end and the water comes up right under his chin! It's hard to believe he's that tall! We had a yummy steak dinner with homemade apple pie and ice cream for dessert. (It was my first homemade apple pie and it turned out pretty darn good!). We finished up the night by putting the kids to bed and watching American Idol. Overall, I think Jon had a fun day! It's funny how just the simple things in life are fun to us. I just asked Jon the other day - "remember when we used to be fun?" But, now that I think about it, "fun" is just different now. "Fun" to me is spending a great day with my family while we laugh and cry and play and be goofy. Here are a few "fun" photos...

Easter

We had a great Easter this year. We started the day with sleeping in, breakfast and church. Then it was naptime and off to Grandma and Grandpa's for an egg hunt and dinner. It turned out to be a beautiful Spring day! Jacob loved the egg hunt and got tons of eggs in his basket. He had a great time. The little ones, on the other hand, didn't get tons of eggs... as soon as the first plastic egg cracked open and candy fell out, they were done for. Each of them found one egg, dumped the candy on the grass and started eating! They had no interest in finding more eggs until the candy was gone! It was pretty funny! The photos below should explain how the egg hunt went...

4 out of the 6 of us are smiling and sort of looking at the camera... I consider that a success!

This photo was taken at home right after church... not too many smiling faces, but still cute!

Dylan grubbin' on some candy!

Megan has some too!

Cutie-pie Jacob

Free-for-all with the spilt candy!

Even Jacob got in on the candy!

Easter Sunday was our last night at our Folsom house. It was bitter-sweet knowing that the next day we'd be loading everything up to move. All of a sudden, it felt like we had just gotten there. We moved in to that house when Jacob was only 4 months old and now he's almost 4 years old... where did the time go? That house served us well, until the triplets starting walking. Then it just go to be too small. We were so on top of each other and nobody had anywhere to go for the tiniest bit of piece and quiet. Our new place is much bigger and closer to family, which will be wonderful. We have tons of memories in that house, all of which we get to keep with us for a lifetime. I guess that's the great thing about moving... the house stays, but the memories go with you. We are looking forward to all the wonderful stories and memories we'll have in our new place!

Fevers, packing and a bee sting...

Our house will close escrow one week from tomorrow... which means we are packin' up! We've slowly been packing for the last few weeks, but we are in high gear now. All those last-minute things to pack are now finding their way into boxes. We had a garage sale over the weekend and sold a ton of baby stuff and some household items. It was a fantastic sale! It was sad to let go of the baby things, but I held on to some of my favorites. I'll always have the memories, but the stuff had to go!

Jon has been sick for the last week and a half and now the kids and I are getting it again. My voice is about to be gone - for the 4th time in 3 months! Dylan started with a high fever a few days ago, then Jacob had a fever and tonight Megan is at 102.5. To top it off, Jacob got his first bee sting yesterday. He was finally feeling a little bit better and wanted to go outside and as he was running barefoot to the slide he stepped on a bee and got stung on the bottom of his foot. Luckily I now know he is not allergic to bees and he recovered pretty quickly.

It's going to be a busy week with packing, doing a few repairs on the new house and moving some stuff to mom and dad's. They are gracious enough to let the six of us (plus Bailey and Brandy!) stay with them for a little bit in between houses. Oh, and don't forget Easter this weekend!