Wake Forest July 4th Children's Parade

Every year in the town of Wake Forest, NC, they hold a children's fourth of July parade for the kids.  They ride bikes, wagons, little tikes tricycles, scooters, roller blades, literally ANYTHING through the one mile course.  The older kids come first with their dads on bicycles, followed by little ones with one or both parents in tow.  Tons of moms and dads decorate strollers and walk in the parade as well.  We thought it sounded like lots of fun, but weren't sure if we were up for being in the actual parade.  So, we staked out a shady spot and prepared to watch.

Here the kiddos are getting ready to come around the bend.  We waited awhile for them to start and then were amazed at the magnitude of kids that we saw coming!  There were HUNDREDS of kids and their parents in the parade.  They kept coming and coming. . . for like 30 minutes!  Jacob was getting really hot, but there wasn't a way for us to get back to our car because of the people watching the parade.

So. . . we just joined it!  It was so hilarious that I got Brett to march in the children's parade!

We really had a great time for the 3 minutes that we walked in the parade to get to our car.

Jacob must have been really hot b/c he emptied his entire sippy cup of water on himself!  At this age he liked to press down the top and make it leak on himself.  Thankfully, he has now started drinking it instead of playing with it.

Happy that he is soaking wet!

Here is a great shot of J looking out the window.  He loves to watch the world go by.  He really became interested about the world outside the window this spring and summer.

First Swim and Visit at Mimi & Papa Stan's

After visiting at the Sanders, Jacob and I packed up and headed to Mimi & Papa Stan's house for a little visit.  Jacob got to spend some extra time with Emily and Hannah, so he really enjoyed that as well!  Here Jacob is trying to take the phone away from Mom.  We had gotten in the habit of letting Jacob hold the home phone while one of us was talking to him on speaker phone.  He loved it!  However, the plan backfired as he then began to think that he owned every phone in the universe.  He is making Mimi laugh with his insistence!

Jacob had never been swimming so we took him to take his first swim at Karen and Charles Poole's pool (tongue twister, I know).  He LOVED it!  I knew he would since he was enjoying the bath so much at this age.  Jacob just splashed and splashed!  Everyone was laughing at how much he was splashing.  It was like non-stop hitting the water for my little man.

Emily and Courtney's daughter Olivia got in on the fun too!

Hannah had to sit it out b/c Steph and Bert had never taken her swimming yet.  They didn't want to miss out on the first time.  Also, Hannah was REFUSING to eat at this point.  She loved to breast feed from Steph and could really put up a fight about her bottle.  It was really stressing Mimi out, so Papa Stan took over.  As you can see, he is not worried about her starving!

Mimi with her grandkiddos.

Papa Stan was pressure washing the patio so he wrote a little message to Jacob while he did it.

Reading "Dear Zoo" with Mimi.  He LOVED this book so much and could open the little flaps from the time Michael & Allie gave it to him.

He loves their swing b/c it goes so high!  He just gasps and laughs when we push him.

Happy to be playing with Papa Stan and Uncle Stan!  It was a great visit!

Daddy goes to camp, Mommy & Jacob go to GA

The third week of June, Brett took our youth group to Ridgecrest for a youth camp.  Originally, Jacob and I were going to go.  However, then we found out that the rooms were sold out (people reserve them like a year in advance!).  Also, the camp is located on a mtn. so I would have had to push Jacob all over the hills of NC.  Brett said there were lots of spots that I wouldn't have been able to get to in the stroller.  So. . . the grandparents were very happy to hear that I would be making a visit to GA instead.  Brett's mom had just retired so she decided to come ride back to GA with me so I would have company and help with little man.   You can see that Jacob was very excited about this!

Showing Nana how he can do the push toy:

Jacob had such a great time at their house and especially loved seeing his cousins.

Grady was determined to have Jacob "sit with him" and play with the train.  Jacob wasn't much for sitting still, but he humored Grady for a second.  Grady was super sweet to Jacob and wanted to make a great train set for him. 

Then Clarkie decided he wanted to have Jacob sit with him as well.  Jacob was done!

 Here are some pics of Jacob in the car.  Once he was able to pull up and crawl around, we started letting him out of his car seat when had to wait for one of us to get something from the store.  Also, we would let him play around in the car during our breaks on the way home to GA so he could stretch those little legs.  He loved getting to play in the car :)

Here's Papa snuggling with his boys.  Nana put on a video for them and they were just mesmerized by it.  It was a sweet time with them!  My back was still definitely sore at that time, so it was such a blessing to have Sylvia there to help me get him in and out of the car so often. 

6 Month Photo Shoot

So this post is a little out of order, but I really wanted to 
have these pictures included in my blog book!  The pics below are Jacob's 6 month shots at Portrait Innovations.  If you are on a budget, it is a great place to go and get lots of pics for a small amount of money.  Steph, Bert, Keri, & Patrick had all taken there kiddos there.  So, we loaded up little man and drove to Cary for pictures.  We planned out the schedule exactly and fed him a bottle right before pictures.  He was happy for the photo shoot and then fell apart right as we were going to go eat dinner.  I am definitely happy he held it together for the photos.  We were overall happy with the pics and couldn't complain for the price!

This is his thinking face!

He's like. . . hold on there. . . I'm not ready  :)

Flash the red light, and I will smile!!!!

Right  around 10 months, Jacob started LOVING the camera.  Actually, he just loved the little red light that came on before the flash.  It cracked us up so much!  It we pointed the camera at him and let the red light shine on his face, he would bust into the biggest grin!  Sadly, that phase has passed and now we have to work really hard to even get him to look at the camera :)

This is sweet boy standing up at his play table.  The church had one just like it and some of the ladies in nursery were noticing how much Jacob loved it.  I said out loud that he probably liked it so much b/c we didn't have one like it at home.  That very night, Sarah & Brad Smith dropped one by for Jacob to play with at home!  We so appreciated Andy sharing some of his toys that he was done playing with.

So happy mommy is shining the red light on my face!

We truly have such a happy boy!  He definitely lets you know when he does not like something, but for the most part, he has a happy little temperment all the time. 

Jacob loves playing with his dada.  Brett will throw him up in the air and Jacob will laugh and laugh!

One of the tricks that Brett taught Jacob was how to make the toy rings spin in a circle.  Jacob loved the sound that they made on the hardwood floors.  Very early on, Jacob started throwing the rings down on the floor trying to make the same sound that his daddy did.  As Jacob grew, he would sometimes do this for 15 mins at a time.  Brett could sometimes get annoyed when Jacob and I were both throwing the rings on the floor while he was watching a good TV show :)  Ha!

Happy to be standing by himself for a second!

Sweet boy posing for mommy!  Things got much busier at our house during this month as he was able to get to anything he wanted.  We started having to say "no" to touching the TV and the DVDs that were beside it.  It broke his little heart (at first), but then he began to look right at us before he touched it.  We were trying to not laugh, but we just couldn't believe out sweet innocent one would knowingly disobey!  It definitely takes you by surprise when they do that at first.  Brett had to reassure me that Jacob had not "forgotten" the rules that we had set.  If I wasn't sure then, I am now, that sometimes that boy just wants to test his limits!