Baby Jake turns 1!!!

(So technically his birthday was yesterday, but my blogger photo-upload has been really finicky lately...probably has something to do with my pathetic computer. I finally got it to work today.)

I have survived the first year of having 4 kids! Is it wrong that I think I deserve some sort of medal or something? I mean, I know my mom had 9 kids (more than twice as many as me), but she was/is Superwoman, so clearly that doesn't count. :) As hard as it has been, I don't regret choosing to bring Jake Walker into our family one little bit. He is the cutest thing ever and I love him to death! I can't wait to see what to future holds for this sweet little guy.

P.S. I'm pretty sure I'll still be calling him "Baby Jake" decades from now...it just fits him. :)

Can you even believe the smile on this kid's face? (Not to mention those cheeks.) Love him!!!

I love that his fork is upside-down in this one. Obviously, I don't really let this kid feed himself very often. The clean-up just isn't worth it. But we made the exception for his birthday. :)

At least now the fork is the right way. I have to say, though, that he wasn't nearly as interested in his birthday cake as some of the other kids were...that's right, I'm talking about you, Sydney...

That girl wasted no time demolishing her cake. Jake, on the other hand, seemed to take his time and savor it a little more. He must just be extra-mature for his age...tell me something I don't know!

This is what the cake looked like after he had a little time to get more into it. Notice I moved it onto a paper plate and got rid of the glass one. :)

Present time!!! If only he knew what presents were...

Good thing he has 3 older siblings who were MORE than willing to help him open them!

This is his little dump truck that has cool lights and sounds. He liked it at the store, so we got it. It's so nice not to have to hide the gifts or be sneaky when they're little like this...too bad it doesn't last very long...

What was I thinking??? TWO presents with lights and sounds!!! I must be crazy! But he loved them, and isn't that what matters most?!?

He was pretty mesmerized by the songs playing on the shape cookie jar. I wish still pictures could capture the slow little swaying/dance move he was doing, but not so...it was pretty cute!

Fake Hair

So I can finally pull my hair up into a pony tail again, but it's so tiny and pathetic, I needed something to help it out. The solution: FAKE HAIR!!!

I love it~~especially on a day like today where I was doing housework all day and really didn't have time to do my hair (it's still wet from my shower this morning.). :)

I still need to fiddle with it and pin it up in certain spots when I'm going to wear it "out," but I'm so happy with the results and how well the color matches my own fake color...and that I now have a lazy hair-do for those lazy days! This is the side view...thanks to Brandon for being my photographer :)

Jake wanted some pictures of himself, too.

Here's his super-cheesy grin!

Just Because

So I don't really have anything exciting to blog about, but I realized I never posted these bathtub pictures of Jake, so here you go. Seriously, he is so cute! He really loves the bath now, after an initial distaste of it earlier in his short life. :) I was getting a bath ready for myself the other day, and he was pretty mad that I didn't let him in. Just thought these pics might bring a smile to someone's face...you're welcome!

P.S. This last one is my fav!!!!

The Fair

Yesterday after Brandon's football jamboree in Boise, I took the kids to the fair (yes, all 4 by myself!). Brandon had won 2 free tickets from the library's summer reading program, so I just had to buy a junior ticket for Ryan since Sydney and Jake were free. We first went and got lunch--Pronto Pups and fresh lemonade!!

Their favorite thing was probably the petting zoo. There was a HUGE Texas Longhorn, which you can't really see in the picture--it is behind them in the center pic--they're imitating it. There were also pigs (Sydney's favorite because they reminded her of Wilbur), goats (Ryan's favorite, because they tried to eat his shirt), hatching chicks, and cows, one of which was huge!
After the petting zoo, I let them each choose a couple of rides to go on. Sydney's first choice--no big surprise--was the carousel. Her other choice was the itty-bitty kiddie roller coaster. She thought she was so brave to go on it by herself!! Brandon chose the roller coaster, which he thought was pretty lame after Disneyland...then he and Ryan both drove the bumper cars. Sydney was very disappointed she couldn't drive one herself. Ryan's other choice was the swings, which he loved, but also made him really dizzy. Poor Jake spent almost the whole day in the stroller and was out by the time the other kids started their rides.

After the rides, we were pretty hot, so we went into the expo building to see the entries. The kids really loved imitating the scarecrow they found and the huge pumpkins. Ryan's scarecrow imitation is my favorite!

Once we were faired-out, I told them we could either get a treat at the fair the share or go to Dairy Queen and get blizzards. It was a no-brainer! Brandon and I chose Thin Mint, and Ryan and Sydney had Oreo. And Jake had a little of every one's! It was a great way to end a really fun day. We all missed Tim, though, who left yesterday morning for his bighorn sheep hunt. :(

Football season is here again!

Brandon started football practice last week. We now have football 5 days a week, with 6 this week. This is a picture of him at the Jamboree at BSU stadium last year. This year he is on a new team, since his coach from last year and a lot of the boys didn't come back. I was a little nervous about how he would do joining an existing team and being the "new guy." We talked with him a lot about proving himself and really pushing hard. AND HE HAS! It's been so fun to watch him practice this year! He has really tried hard and it's paying off. He's starting at middle linebacker, a coveted position. He was so excited when they called his name for that position--so cute to see his expression! Tim and I were talking about how cool it would be if he kept up with the sport and we could still be watching him in high school in a few years... More pictures from last year...I haven't taken any this year yet, but he's made some amazing tackles and sacs at practice and I can't wait to see what he'll do at this year's games! (He's number 33)

I can't wait for the games to start! Now you know what I'll be doing every Satuday for the next couple of months! Go Brandon and the Cowboys!!!

Disneyland recap--Finally

Make a Smilebox slideshow

So I'm finally getting around to blogging about Disneyland! I just had so many pictures to post, so I tried something new--a smilebox slide show. I still have a lot to learn about smilebox, apparently, but hopefully you can view the pics if you want to... Here's how our vaca went down:

We left our house on Fri, Aug. 24th. It took 16 hours for us to get to our hotel, but we made it safely there and the kids were actually pretty good in the car. (On a side note, Jake stayed home with my mom and dad, and Liz...thanks you guys!!)

On Saturday, we braved Disneyland. Our tickets got us into the park an hour early, so we got the really popular rides out of the way first, like Space Mountain (which most of us didn't like so much). It actually wasn't all that busy, considering it was a Saturday in July! We rode a ton of rides and were worn out by the end of the day, so on Sunday, we just hung out swimming a lot at our hotel and napping. :)

Monday, we hit Disney again. This time we figured out how to buy the right bus passes so we could have unlimited trips back and froth to Disney. On Saturday, we had walked back...sort-of a bus pass mix-up... On Monday, we again went full speed and tried to get all the rides we had missed on Saturday. We went home for a little while in the afternoon, then back for the parades and fireworks, which we almost missed. Again we were worn out, but had a ton of fun!

Tuesday, we tried to meet as many characters as we could. We got several in, including some princesses for Sydney while she and Cathy waited in line for an hour and a half--the longest line of our whole trip!!! Needless to say, we took our time with those princesses once we got in there. We went back again that night for the fireworks so we could be closer, and this time, they were amazing! It is by far the best fireworks show I've ever seen! It really was great!

Wednesday morning, we drove down to San Diego and hit Sea World. We mostly just went to the shows: Shamu, the dolphins, and Cirque de la Mer (amazing). We were pretty tired from our time at Disney, so we left a little early to go swimming at our hotel, which we hadn't seen yet...

It was awful! The Garmin said we were at the right spot, but we just couldn't believe this could be our "hotel and suites." Tim went to see if it was the right place, and sadly, it was. Our room was o.k., but the place itself was scary. The pool that the kids wanted to swim in butted up to the hotel bar and there were scary people in it (I'm pretty sure they were some sort of gang...). So we told them they couldn't swim, which made them really sad, but seriously, we were afraid for their safety. Needless to say, the next morning we checked out of that place before we left for the zoo...

Thursday was zoo day. We had a good time there, and the kids' favorite thing was feeding the giraffes. Again we were SOO tired, so we left in the afternoon and drove back to Anaheim to stay the last night in our "safe" hotel. That way we had a head-start for our drive back on Friday. We took a different route home and shaved off about an hour and a half, which was great. It was good to get home to Jake and to relieve my family from watching him.

All in all, it was a really great trip--a little too long, perhaps, but still great. I hope the kids can remember it for a long time cause we won't be doing it again for a while!!!

The Settles' Visit!!!

Christine, Megan, Alyssa, and Madi (missed you, Brittany!) were able to come visit last weekend after Megan graduated from BYU (Go, Meg!!!). We only had them for about 48 hours total, but we sure fit a lot of fun into that small amount of time. Megan made Sydney say "Hey, Chow-da" about 100 times...all the girls had fun meeting Jake, we played Nerf dart tag and Guitar Hero, made more chocolate lava cakes, and fit in a lunch date and a little shopping. It was super-fun to have them all here and made me even more excited for our Woodman reunion in December.
Say cheese!!!

Madi, Ryan, and Sydney took turns showing off their amazing trampoline stunts. Madi did an unbelievable split jump, Ryan did his signature back flip, and Sydney a top-notch front flip. Sydney SOOO enjoyed having Madi (and the other girls, for that matter) here! She was finally in the majority as a girl, something she never gets to experience. :)

Of course, Ryan had to show everyone his stellar Guitar Hero abilities. Everyone wanted a turn to try and keep up with him, but really, no one stood a chance. That boy is freakin' amazing when it comes to that game! I love the picture of little Jake already trying his hand at the guitar.

Megan, Brandon, and Sydney played Nerf dart tag for forever...I think Megan mostly just got a kick out of Sydney wearing those safety glasses. It was pretty funny! She seemed to go instantly cross-eyed when she put them on.

I'm so glad they could all come...we don't get visitors from Florida very often (ever)! Thanks to all you guys for a super-fun weekend!!!