Turkey Boy

I believe Jake was born on Thanksgiving, 31 years ago, so it is only fitting that his b-day post, combined with a Thanksgiving post, be titled "Turkey Boy." To celebrate Jake's continued run into "old-ness", I got our favorite babysitter, and we went out on a date. Dates are so fun, but they are few and far between around here. We just had a baby which has put a damper on dates, and it is really expensive. But when we do go out, I love it. Jake chose Rudy's BBQ for his birthday dinner which was delicious as always.
Cole-Cole joined us on our night out...

We then went shoe shopping. That was my gift to Jake- enduring shopping with him. He will be the first to admit that shopping with him is not always the most fun way to spend your time, but after hanging out at the shoe store for quite some time (and almost leaving with nothing), he did settle on a nice pair of work shoes. He is still yet to wear them (he doesn't like to wear his new things for awhile, and he has to check and make sure he doesn't want something different) but I was glad he got something since I didn't buy him anything else.

Cole seemed to be happy about the long shoe shopping adventure (at least for a little bit).

And because Jake was practically begging me (actually he was really just humoring me) we went to see "New Moon". It was pretty much his favorite movie of all time. Really, I believe his exact words were more like "That was every bit as horrible as the first." Don't lie Jake- you know you like it. I have gathered that he is definitely supporting his namesake, "Team Jacob", and I'm highly considering making us matching shirts for the premiere of the third movie. I found the movie a little cheesy, but I still enjoy seeing what I have read portrayed on the screen. Some of the lines definitely sounded better in the book than in the movie. Jake did his fair share of standing up with Cole in the walkway to keep him happy- maybe lovesick vampires and werewolves aren't Cole's thing. But overall a fun night together and fun to meet up with friends at the movies, also.

On Jake's actual birthday, I busied myself with blowing up balloons and writing fun messages on each one like "Is that a gray hair?" and "Way older than your wife" and stuff like that. Sometimes I find myself so humorous.

The girls made about a million pictures for him that we displayed in the hallway. Jada had to make sure that I put her pictures up really high.

They also made him a fun note on the "weasel" (as Jada calls it). They have had so much fun playing on the easel and in the "exercise room" during this break. It has been great!

We went to Red Robin to cash in on his free b-day burger...

After dinner and FHE, I surprised Jake by inviting some friends over for some birthday ice cream. Jake loves ice cream, and Blue Bell really is the best, so this is our ice cream cake! We had five flavors to choose from- like our very own ice cream shop. It was great!

The girls were adamant about him having a "31" candle to blow out...

Besides the birthday, the girls have had fun giving Cole "hair". Jake and I actually just shaved off Cole's mullet tonight, and I already have trimmed the few stragglers off the top so now he looks even more like a cue ball.

We had the whole week off of school for Thanksgiving, so we decided to put our zoo pass to good use. It was a great cool day with minimal crowd. Perfect for a mom trying not to lose any of her four children.

Let's pause for a little zoo photo shoot. Notice Elle's missing front tooth...

We celebrated Thanksgiving this year with our friends, the Laters. I had a little help in the kitchen...

And I made it my goal to dirty as many dishes as I could.

We made sweet potato boats, mashed potatoes, and rolls. The Laters filled in the gaps (including making the turkey- so glad they did that), and we had ordered desserts from a young man in our ward doing a fundraiser. It all turned out so yummy and was so fun to be a grown up and try to pull off Thanksgiving dinner!

Cole enjoyed having his friend Trent over for dinner and also looked great sporting his festive tee-pee shirt.

This next picture was taken to reference Jake's quote that went a little something like "Maybe you don't understand this holiday"- meaning men sit on the couch and watch football all day while the women-folk are confined to the kitchen. I told him that maybe he can get away with that when our kids are older. He actually was pretty helpful, and we've enjoyed having him around so much this break, as well as spending time with friends. It's sad it is over!

Jake braved the Wal-Mart crowd at 4:30 a.m. on Black Friday, as well as venturing to Target to get some fun Christmas stuff. He said it was crazy- so glad he went and not me. We pulled out the Christmas stuff and decorated once Turkey Day was over on Friday and Saturday. Now onto Christmas. I'm getting a little more motivated now which is good because I was not feeling too into the Christmas spirit around Thanksgiving. Maybe it's all the decor out now. Who knows. I'm just glad that the decorations are not bringing back flashbacks of how ill I felt last Christmastime. Anything Christmas just reminded me of being sick, so luckily that all passed with the birth of the boy. Mint M&M's taste way too good again. Maybe it's not such a good thing!

Getting our Saturdays back

(This first pic belongs later in the post, but silly me deleted and had to upload again, so here it is out of order. Just pretend like you don't see it...)
Soccer season has come and gone again. A good and bad thing- good because we can finally hopefully start accomplishing things again on Saturdays instead of running back and forth to the soccer field. Bad because we really do enjoy watching the girls play and they seem to really enjoy it. Up first, a little about the Fireballs...

Elle's team ended the season with an 8-1-1 record. This is the first year of non-co-ed and the first year that they actually keep score. It is amazing how much more competitive it felt this year. It was so fun and we met some really great people on the team. They won their last game for the year and Elle scored a goal. After the game, we met up at a BBQ place for lunch, trophies, and cupcakes.

Elle had fun with her friends Sydney and Brooklyn, and also made some new friends this season. Jada continues with her creative picture poses...

My friend Nicole took some awesome pictures of the girls, and another mom used those pics as well as some others to put together a slide show and a memory book for the coach. It turned out so great!

Elle's coach was a nice guy who is passionate in a very loud way about the game. He really had a lot of energy and did a good job directing the girls who are still learning about the game.

Now for the Tigers...

After Elle's party it was back to the soccer field to catch the rest of Mya's game (after a stop to pick up some flowers for the coach- Jake took Mya over ealier). They still don't keep score in Mya's division and the feeling is a lot less intense. Mya was the only girl on her team this year (and there really were hardly any girls on the teams that we played- where were all the girls this year???) and really started to put some effort into playing during the second half of the season. The first half of the season Jake and I questioned whether or not she ever would really pick up on the game, seeing as how she would sort of just run around, not really do much with the ball, preferring doing handstands to actually paying attention to what was going on. We had to say things like "let's see how many times you can touch the ball" or "stop doing handstands- you're going to kick someone in the face!" But something clicked towards the second half of the season and she really started to play. She ended the season scoring 5 goals in her last game!

I took on the unofficial team mom job towards the end of the season to pull off trophies and coach's gift. I seem to take that role on just about every year.

Mya's party was a little less organized, consisting of cupcakes, balloons, trophies, and juice. Below is Mya with her buddy Spencer...

And now onto someone we affectionately call "Cole-Cole"...

The little bald scraggly hair man continues to take a lot of my free time, but makes me happy in the process. He is getting well acquainted with his arranged best friend Trent, and they will be spending their first Thanksgivings together this year.

I have perfected the "power snuggle" with the little guy. He loves to be swaddled when he sleeps. During the day, if he gets tired and cranky, I wrap him tight in the "power snuggle" (I love the knit blankets), put him on my shoulder, and he usually knocks out shortly thereafter.

He also has taken a liking to sucking on his hands, often preferring his left one although he doesn't discriminate. He's got a nice dry patch in between his middle fingers on one hand and was sporting quite the damp sleeve the other day.

The residing 2-year old in the house continues to leave her mark...

We went to "Muffins with Mom" before school one morning and feasted on a very tiny muffin (actually I brought Pop-tarts for Mya and Jada and gave Elle my muffin- no way she would have been full after her tiny bite!) Luckily they let us come a day late because we were still in recovery mode from our fun bout with the barfs on our day to come.

There have also been some fun bedroom campouts going on. Even Jada is old enough now to participate and would probably sleep in the tent every night if we let her.

The girls also have found a new way to entertain themselves- by using the garage as an "exercise room" as they call it. Funny how things like this can entertain for hours. We came home last Saturday and had to move the van out of the garage to fix the light. The girls started to play and literally played in there for hours. I went to the temple for a bit, came back and they were still playing. We even let them eat a garage picnic dinner in there one night. They did a remake of the "exercise room" after school one day this week also. I had to capture Mya's awesome outfit she wore- yes that is a pink thermal under her red uniform and polka-dot PJ pants under her soccer uniform shorts, along with yellow socks I believe. A definite fashion statement. (This is where you refer yourselves back to the top pic and then continue on...)

And because two pictures on this post have featured my children with food hanging out of their mouths, I had to bring back a picture from about a year ago when Jake found it humorous to do the same...

Have a great Thanksgiving!!!