Halloween

Our little stinker was an actual lil' stinker for Halloween this year. He loved loved loved his skunk costume and hated when we made him take off his hood or take off his costume. He looked so sweet in it. On the back where the heart is it says : Lil' Stinker . Perfectly fitting for our cute boy... who is now SOOOO addicted to chocolate or like he calls it: kawk kawk... he got lots of candy trick or treating just around our neighborhood.


We went with Clint and Kara's family to Boo at the Zoo again this year and the kids got to do a little trick or treating there. Here's Jake, Max, Maddie and Ella together at the zoo.

We decided to paint pumpkins rather than carve them this year. Jake loved painting - and wanted to give the paint a taste - Yuck! He was quite creative with his painting and sadly, I didn't take any pictures of my pumpkin. Wesley never got to his since he was helping with Jake's.

We met up with our friends Becky and Mike to a corn maze/pumpkin patch. We had already bought our pumpkins (at a store) so it was nice to let Jake walk through the pumpkin patch. he really thinks he's so strong b/c he kept trying to pick up the biggest ones there.

They also had some kids rides and Jake went on the inflatable slide. Wesley had to help him get up there but I don't think he minded since he got to ride down as well.

Jake and I on some haystacks. And of course there's Jake and Wesley (with Mike to the side) in the kid's corn maze

Birthday Fun

My birthday was fabulous this year! Wesley and Jake made me breakfast... since I was still feeling sick a lot, he was limited to what he could fix me but he gave me an english muffin and sliced apples shaped in a smiley face - so cute! I was only able to eat 1/2 of the english muffin and that's it but it was nice to have him make me breakfast. The next wonderful thing was that since Wesley works from home, he left his office door open most of the day so Jake could wander back and forth and give me a break - it was GREAT! My friend Becky called and took me to lunch at Olive Garden - unlimited salad and breadsticks! It was so fun! My friend Tracy invited me over to her house and Jake and I hung out for a while. Oh, the day before as part of my present, we had a professional come and clean the house!!!! The best present EVER!
That night we got a sitter and went to a really yummy restaurant called Del Frisco's. Yummy yummy steak! It was a fabulous dinner! Then we headed to the mall and Wesley took me a jewelry store and told me to pick out a necklace or earrings. After looking around, I realized that it might be more practical if I got jewelry at JCPenney or Kohls rather than an expensive piece of jewelry that I might lose. I tend to lose jewelry, or at least earrings fairly easily. So I ended up getting a few necklaces and earrings at the cheaper stores. It was so sweet of him to take me to the other jewelry store though... I would have just felt bad if I got a pretty thing and lost it later. So then we thought about seeing a movie but my poor pregnant self was too tired to keep going so we were home by 9:30! My goodness, that's early! But it was a fabulous, wonderful birthday! So here's birthday cake at Clint and Kara's: Jake enjoyed the birthday cake the most I think:



Jake and Maya (Becky's daughter) at Olive Garden. They've become good friends, always holding hands, it's cute!

Stuff

I just have to post a few pictures for my own memories - So Wesley was out of town a few weeks ago and along with morning sickness, Jake and I both got the flu, or something close to it. Jake had the world's worst diarrhea (sorry - journaling for myself - skip ahead if you don't care for this part). I was changing his diaper every hour or so... and his poor bum - SO sore, poor thing. But with my sensitivity to smell, those were the longest 3 days of my life without Wes here. So, there were lots of times in the day where I couldn't muster the strength to feed him anything wonderful so here's an example of some food he enjoyed. Yeah, I gave him the entire bowl to munch on - he did more dumping over of the bowl than eating, but it made for a cute picture, I think.

Just yesterday I heard Jake playing in what I thought was the living room but as I went to check on him, I found him here (above), working his way into the hamper in the laundry room. He thought it was the funniest thing! Cracked me up.

I thought this was very cute. Wes started reading to Ella and Jake was not having that, so he worked his way onto Wesley's lap to join in the fun. He was bothered that he had to share Wesley with Ella. (He's so protective of his daddy.) It was cute watching him read to the two of them. It's so cute, Ella just lights up when Jake comes around!

Sigh... I understand that messy eating comes with the age. But, I really have to think hard whether or not to give my boy peanut butter and jelly... here's why: I put it on ritz crackers and he would open the 2 crackers and smear each cracker all over his face... Needless to say that he doesn't eat peanut butter and jelly very often

Here we go again. Why can't he get more in his mouth that all over him and the table? I've stopped watching him while he eats because the mess drives me nuts. I just come to clean up - his new thing with yogurt is to squish his hands in it... yuckAt Clint and Kara's house: Jake and Ella getting quite a fun ride around the house in this bin

We watched our friend's kids a couple of weeks ago (Janna and Luke). They were a lot of fun! We gave them ice cream and they all sat there so cute at the table, I had to capture it! Jake has really grown to love these boys - he gets all excited to see their oldest, Stone.

I'm sitting here in my husband's office b/c he has to work late and he asked if I wanted to come down and hang out while he works. Here's the problem with that at 8:00 at night: He doesn't have very good seating so I've pulled a patio and lawn chair as the foot rest; and second, there's no tv, so what's a girl to do? His office is in the basement, and there's nothing else to do down here so I decided to check my typing. I understand if you don't have time to do a speed test like this, but if you ever find yourself bored in the basement trying to keep your hubby company, this may do the trick!

87 words

Speedtest

This has been on my fridge for over a year now and every time I read it, I still laugh b/c it describes me perfectly.

This and That

Jake had pb&j for lunch the other day and to keep things clean, I just take off his shirt. After his lunch, he started munching on some cheetos and sat there chillin' on the couch. Rough life, huh? I'll call this: Where's Waldo? OR Where's Jake? Goodness, who cleans this play room? OH, I guess that's me. After this picture, it got 10 times worse. The issue is keeping the toys in the bins. As soon as I've organized the bins, Jake dumps them all over the room...
I don't have any other pictures for this trip, but Wesley got off work early on Friday and we went to see the fall leaves. We went on some mountain road and drove and you could see the trees everywhere. They were gorgeous. I love fall, it's my favorite season. But it feels like it never lasts very long, why is that? I mean, summer and winter last a lifetime, why can't Fall? Anyway, we stopped at this place for some yummy BBQ. And this is the only picture for this trip.
Jake went in the play room, sat on Maddie's lap and they sat playing basketball. It was so cute.
So twice a year our church has it's General Conference where the prophet and apostles speak on Saturday and Sunday and it is broadcasted all over the world. We get it on the BYU channel and watch it from home. Clint and Kara's family came over Sunday afternoon for the last session and we ate pizza and watched conference. I got this picture of Kara and Ella. Ella looked so relaxed and peaceful, so sweet!

St Louis Visit

I think most know that if Wesley is on business for more than 3 nights, I feel justified in taking a trip myself. He was going to be gone for an entire week and those who know me know that I HATE being home alone, especially that long. So I took a trip to my sister, Lea's house in St. Louis. We haven't traveled much in a while, mostly b/c traveling with an 18 month old, in my opinion, is insanity. I avoid it at all costs. But I felt that being home alone for 5 days would be more stressful than 2 plane rides with an 18 month old. I got super lucky with each flight, there was a middle seat open next to me both flights and the people sitting with us on the aisle seat were so so nice and actually helped entertain Jake the whole time. On the flight home, the guy came to our row and the flight attendant let him know that an exit row was open to him, but he looked at Jake and said that he'd rather hang out with Jake, and he was heaven sent! So nice and just helped entertain Jake the whole time. I was extremely grateful. On the down side of the trip, Jake went mad crazy with hitting so there was a lot of disciplining and time outs... yet to no avail, nothing changed. One time he hit Lea's 11 month old, Taylor and I told him, no we don't hit and without a pause, he pushed her forehead and she fell to the ground. WHAT? Seriously... that was rough. But other than that, we had a blast and here are some things we did: THe first thing I need to mention b/c I don't have a picture of it but Leslie, our very very close family friend is actually in the same area as Lea and she came to visit. We sure love Leslie! Lea's lucky to have her so close! Jake loved playing in the front yard with the sidewalk chalk, but even more, he couldn't get enough of Mason's helmet. He wore it the entire time we'd be outside and would get mad when it was time to take it off. I guess you can never be too safe... We went to Jump 4 Fun, an inflatable slide/play place. It was so so fun! I don't know who enoyed it more, myself or Jake. I mean, I was exhausted after it was over from chasing him from place to place. He did so well, climbing the slides by himself and sliding down on his own, it was too cute. I didn't think it would be fair if I just watched, so I forced him to ride with me a few times.
Lea, Mason and Jake in the Toddler area
Cute Taylor- oh my gosh, she's adorable!
This is what I want to get Jake for Christmas, it was he favorite to play in a pit full of balls
The zoo in St. Louis is free - yeah, free, and a great one, too. So we took the kids one day. I watched Lea, Mason, Abby and Jake go on the carousel ( yeah, the spinning on the carousel makes me sick, sad, huh?) while I watched Taylor. Jake was so cute to watch, each time it went around, he'd search for me and wave, it actually made me teary-eyed the first couple rounds b/c he's gotten so grown up and big! He loved the carousel
They had a cool dinasour exhibit. This is the ONLY picture I have of Lea, and she's looking down. Oh well, here's proof that it was actually Lea that I went to visit

Mason and Jake digging for fossils
Mason and Abby on a giant beetle
Fine, here's a picture with me in it... I prefer to show the cute ones and keep myself out of the pictures.
Jacob's 3rd haircut. This was Lea's second time cutting it and he did NOT like it this time. It got to the point where he was screaming and crying while I had to hold his arms down to keep him still so Lea could finish up his cut. Hopefully it won't grow as fast anymore. But she cuts it so cute and he looks like such a little man! It was a great trip and we had great time.

Baby Shower

My friend Tracy just had her baby. It's her second, she has a little girl and just had a boy. It took a lot of persuading to get her to agree to a shower, but finally she gave in. Someone offered to help with the shower so she did the food and I did the decorations. I kept it pretty simple, just did a diaper cake and then a few vases with Gerber daisies all around the room. I loved how this diaper cake turned out:

I putting some block letters on ribbon on the staircase and loved how that turned out. She got so many cute boys clothes and gifts, I can't wait for mine to come! Unfortunately I was dealing with bad morning sickness during the shower that I never got any more pictures of the guests and the yummy food. But these are the 2 I did get before it started. It was so much fun!

Mom & Dad Edwards Visit

We recently had Wesley's parents come to visit and we had such a great time! Jake definitely remembered them this time and loved their company. He loves being able to go outside with grandpa and this time he loved coloring with grandma. This is grandma and Jake in coloring action. They sat there for about 10-15 minutes, which is AMAZINGLY long for Jake. His attention span is usually 30 seconds, if that long. It was so cute to see him playing with grandma and grandpa.

Kara came over one morning and the girls (minus Maddie who was at school) went for a walk... oops, that's right, Jake's in this picture. Well, then I will say the moms went on a walk one morning. Ella's all bundled up in the stroller, so cute!
We went to lunch at Mt. Fuji - a hibachi restaurant. They have great food and Jake loves watching the fire and cooking.
We went to the park one day - here's Maddie on top of the play thing
Jake has been really into sports lately. Here he is playing catch with Daddy, his favorite person!
Maddie pushing the 2 little ones on the swings.
Kara and I on the swings. Funny how much the swings still make me giggle

We went to the aquarium, one of Jake's favorite places. HEre's Jake with David, Max and Maddie
Daddy and Jake in the tunnel
Jake with his 2 favorite boys, David and Max. You should see how much he lights up when he sees them. He is their biggest fan.
So we ate at the restaurant and after ordering, the salads came out, but then we waited a long time for the entrees, not even the kids ones came out early. I believe Jake got his meal the very last. In the mean time, after the salads were gone, Jake was still starved and started having at it with the ranch dressing. So he'd dip his fork in the dressing and eat it. You can see how much I enjoyed him doing that.