First Week of Jack in Photos...

Here are just a few pictures from Jackman's first week of life.

Mommy and Jackman, one day old

This is what he mostly does...sleep and look adorable

Coming home from the hospital

Cutie petutie

A little angel

Welcome to the world little one!
Weight: 5lbs 7.5oz
Length: 19in
Head: 33cm
Little, but that is how I like them :)
We are head-over-heels in love with this sweet baby.

Happy {Birth}day to my Boys!!

James Robert 7-21-09 and Jackman Kyle 7-21-11
How did we plan that?
Happy Birthday Boys!!

James' Birthday Party!

I can't believe that my baby James is almost 2 years old!! We decided to have his birthday party a little early last Saturday. Aubreigh, Matt, and Quinn came up on Friday night, and Aubreigh and I had a girls night for my "baby shower". It was nice to have a night without the kiddos.
We went shopping and then out to eat at Texas Roadhouse.

I had a lot of fun fo sure:)

***
The next day we played at the house, and had a BBQ with the Parks and Kutterers.

James and Quinn, these two are friends having fun


Boys and their Mommies


Present from Mommy and Daddy!
When we brought it out his look was just "ohhh", and of course I missed it on camera.
He now asks to go for a "ride" all the time


"Cheese"
Loving the corn on the cob

Food!!
Check out those cow cupcakes...MOOOO!!

Cake!!

Tractor!! One of the best gifts of the night from the Parks!

Cars!!! He picks these cars up from the Kutterers with the big yellow tractor.

Sisters Kendra and Ann

Happy Birthday Jamers!! We love you more than anything!

Evolution of a Belly

I guess this time around I felt like I was getting bigger, faster, (well, I was) and didn't really want to document that in pictures. However, I've leveled out, and I'm about the same as I was with James. I'm also now past 37 weeks, so this baby can now make an appearance whenever, I'm hopping sooner rather than later though.

Jan 22, 2011
12.3 weeks
Running a half marathon!

April 1,2011
22.2 weeks
Nathan's mission reunion

April 12, 2011
23.5 weeks
At the Littleton Historical Farm

April 19, 2011
24.6 weeks
At home


May 8th, 2011
27.3 weeks
Mother's Day!


May 13th, 2011
28.1 weeks
Manwaring reunion in Las Vegas


May 23rd, 2011
29.4 weeks
At home

June 6th, 2011
31.4 weeks
At home


June 16th, 2011
33.0 weeks
Hiking Y Mountain

July 1st, 2011
35.1 weeks
South Ogden Splash Pad

July 11th, 2011
36.4 weeks
At home


July 16th, 2011
37.2 weeks
James' Birthday Party

Any guesses as to when he'll come? Hurry and leave a guess! Could be tomorrow!

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July Fun on the Farm

We haven't stayed with Mike and Misty Porter in what feels like forever, and we always have a great time when we do, so we decided to visit while we had a free-er weekend. What is great about living only 1.5 hours from the farm is that we can still visit the whole day on Saturday and go home to be able to go to church on Sunday.

So what did we do? We helped them do some yard work in the day. It was lots of fun getting to visit while our hands were busy helping. And just look at these two on the riding lawn mower:

Daddy and James were both so happy to help mow because they got to use the awesome mower!

Tate, Taylee, and James decided the pond in the fountain needed a few more rocks in it while the adults weeded the garden and flower beds.
***
After the {work} comes playtime, and with the yard work done, we all could play!
We were getting ready to take a four-wheeler ride when it started to rain, so all of us clambered into their Jeep and took that instead.
We took their Jeep Wrangler up places that you only see in commercials.
It was so awesome.
We took it up a mountain right under where there is an eagle's nest on the side of a mountain on the farm, through the river bottoms, up some crazy hills.
I'm glad that we all rode together.
That is the next kind of car that Nathan wants to get when he is done with the U.
James, Mommy, and Daddy at the top, it was pretty windy, and the view was incredible

Then James got to do something that I knew he'd love:
James got to pet the baby cows at the farm!!
I knew he'd love it, so on the Jeep ride Mike pulled over and took James out to see these adorable little guys.
***
Thank you Mike and Misty for such a great time, one of our best visits ever!!

HaPpY 4tH oF JuLy!!!!

I think that Independence Day is one of my favorites, and now that James understands fireworks a bit more, it is getting even better. Saturday we walked over to Jeremy and Nicole's and enjoyed a big BBQ that they hosted. They invited co-workers, neighbors, and some of their family too. A nice mix of people came.
James really took to Nathan's co-worker from India, Ankit. He wanted Ankit to hold him through all the fireworks.
Then that night we set off fireworks. We had some we had just gotten while driving through Wyoming. The laws have changed in Utah, and now aerial fireworks up to 150' are allowed. Even the fire marshal drove by, and we had our neighbor who's a fireman here. We had some great fireworks!

Some of our fireworks, James with Ankit, and some of the spectators

On the July 4th we went to the Morgan parade and fair. The parade was like Halloween, so much candy was thrown. James enjoyed all the games for kids at the fair. And for only $3 you got a punch pass and could do all the little games.
$3 for a fair, can't beat that!

After naps that afternoon, which James slept for four hours, and I still had to wake him up (obviously we are bad parents and had been keeping him up late a few nights in a row to either see or do fireworks), we went to the Clearfield fireworks show (where we again kept James up late, but we got smarter and brought his pj's and had him ready for bed as soon as we started to drive back home). The Kutterer's had saved great seats so we were pretty close I thought.
I thought of the 4th of July in 1776, and the months after, and how scary it must have been to be on the home front during a war, especially against a professional army.
I thought of my own grandparents who fought in wars, and how brave their actions were.
Then I thought of our military forces today who still fight for our freedoms.
I am grateful for those long ago, and for those who are still fighting.

Fun Cousin Times

Kira and Tanner came up again (together this time), and had stayed overnight. James loves his cousins. Now when I say we'll be seeing them that day, if the door opens for anything, he thinks they are here and runs and yells their names. It melts my heart.
Anyway, we decided to sleep in a tent that night because they've never been camping with their family! And Kira had never set up a tent! We had to remedy that. Nathan ended up having to work a lot that night, so I helped them set it up in our neighbors yard since our sod is still in the don't-walk-on phase, and then slept with them until about 3:00 am, when I had slept wrong on my arm and I needed to go to the bathroom. It didn't help that our other neighbor's sprinklers woke us up, and I was so thankful that I had put on the rain guard. At least none of us got wet! Nathan took the second shift sleeping in the tent until morning. We opted to get some sleep so James slept in his own bed that night.

Tanner, James and Kira in the morning with the tent.
And James was not liking having his picture taken, he just wanted to play with his truck and tractor. Poor kid needed to catch up on some sleep!
****

The next day was hot (at least for Utah), so I decided to take all the kids to a FREE splash pad that I just found out about in South Ogden. It happens to be right next to our gym, and it's awesome! We took a picnic lunch and enjoyed the water and the playground. James was a little apprehensive going into the water, but we got him to like it. His favorite was the slide though on the playground.

Splash Pad fun.

Thanks Kira and Tanner for staying the night with us! We love you guys :)

Last trip to CO before baby #2...

The day after we laid sod we took a last trip out to Colorado to visit family before the new baby. Our GAC (Great-Aunt Carol) came from Texas, and we decided a few months ago that since we couldn't go to Vail this year (I'll probably be in labor during that time), that we'd meet in CO then for a visit in June. We had such a great time. We had good times playing at the retirement community Lincoln Meadows where my Grams lives now. James also came up with a new nickname for my dad, and he is now known as Boompa to James. He really loves grandpas!

Clockwise from Top Left: James and GAC enjoying pudding, playing with the pool balls with Boompa and learning colors, icecream from Grammies, lifting weights with Daddy, GAC and Grams, James in a train, new Four Generation Picture

We were able to see my parents horse, Cinnamon. James loves horses right now too, so when he got to sit up on her, his face just beamed.

James was so happy to be on top of Cinnamon, with his Boompa close at hand of course.

Another day we visited the museum called Wildlife Experience, and it has a mix of automated and stuffed animals in a museum type setting. Really neat. Turns out too that James was super afraid of the automated alligator. We had to reassure him that it wasn't real, but he did NOT want to be put down to walk near that thing, though I can't blame him. They had a neat "dig" interactive display where you could dig up bones from the past.

James and Boompa digging for bones

Finally there was an area that kids could dress up costumes of different animals and then play and do puzzles and such. I loved this place, too bad we don't live closer or I'd get a season pass. It was a great place to take an active and curious little boy.

Look at all those fun things at the Wildlife Experience museum!

Thank you so much to GAC for coming all the way from Texas, to Grams for letting us stay at Lincoln Meadows, and to my parents for taking time out to play and visit. We love you all and had a great time!

Evolution of a Yard

We have been busy this month putting in our back and side yard! We hired a guy do the sprinklers, grating, and concrete curbing. Then we laid the sod. Wow. That was a lot harder than I thought, and I didn't even do much. I just cut pieces along the edging and rolled some out. I did try to lift one, and it was so heavy. I wish I could have done more to help.

Back and side yards before work began


Bringing in dirt and grading the yard. James LoVeS tractors, dump trucks, and such, so he was in heaven watching.


On one of the days the workers had gotten to a late start, so I told the guy Zach who was working on our yard that James had been waiting all day to watch the "tractor", or bobcat, move dirt. He said, "Well, if he's been waiting all day, why don't you take him for a ride in it?" It turns out I got drive the bobcat while James rode with me! It was lots of fun for both the mommy and the Jamers. We went around the block and picked up his buddy Cole, who is just a year older and they are the best of buds, and I took them both for a ride. Seriously heaven for these little boys.


After the yard has been graded, the concrete curbing has been added around the whole house, and now we are laying sod.

We were able to bribe a few of our neighbors with pizza and frozen treats to come and help us lay the sod. The yard ended up needing eight pallets of sod to lay! Holy cow! Our niece Kira also came up for a few days, and we put her to work. She was a great helper, and did a lot.

Mommy and James after helping to lay the sod, what a big job! Gotta love the dirt all over us too :)

Now the developers are putting in a side fence, so once that is done we'll be good to go.
And I'll add the complete "after" pictures.
Stay tuned!

It is now a tradition...

...to hike Y mountain while pregnant.
I had my nephew Tanner stay with us two weeks ago for a few days. He is such a great kid, love him to pieces. I had to go to Provo anyway for my monthly chiropractic appointment (I swear by those, it has helped me so much, I'll probably never stop, anyway), so I talked to Kirstin, and we decided to hike the Y. I did this when I was pregnant with James too. Now it is a tradition, every time I'm pregnant, our unborn child will hike the Y, instilling in them cougar pride, or something like that. Thanks to Kirstin and Tanner who carried James in the new hiking backpack up. At the Y we had a picnic lunch, James liked all the "white rocks", then we started down. James did NOT want to go back into the backpack, but instead wanted to hold Tanner's hand the WHOLE WAY DOWN. I am not kidding. Our 22 month old hiked the whole way down the Y. We even passed another mom who was carrying her child in a hiking backpack. When she saw James she was astounded and asked how old he was. When I told her he was 22 months she said "What?!? Mine is 3 1/2 years old!?! He is doing awesome!!"
I think so too :)

Going Hiking

During Memorial Day we found this great deal at a store in Logan called Al's Sporting Goods. It's a hiking backpack that James fits in. We were finally able to use it on a small two mile hike up the plateau by our house then down into the neighborhood. It is a winner, everyone loves it. We'll be using this thing a lot I think.
We also found a hawk feather up on top of the plateau, which James insisted on carrying back.

Nathan and James with his feather

Kendra and Lady

And those pictures are in our neighborhood, isn't it so gorgeous and green? Love it.