christmas at the museum

this is what jesse and the other museum artists have been busy working on: a statue of Mary & Joseph and baby Jesus, along with the starry ceiling, decorating the main hall of the Creation Museum

teething, crawling, christmas....what's next?

just a little update on the progress of this boy who is growing up faster than we can believe... jacob is officially crawling. not Indy 500 crawling, but he gets around, nonetheless. he can do them all: army crawl, bear crawl, and regular crawl, but not all at once, and not all in the same day. he likes to mix it up a bit. :)

and after 4 or 5 nights of jacob waking up at 1 in the morning, crying like no other, and waking up way too early from every single nap, i finally figured out why...we have a tooth! well... it's trying to come up, but not all the way there yet. i love it when i can figure out the reason for his unusual behavior. thank you Lord for giving me wisdom...most of the time!

and we finally got a good shot for his Christmas picture. we decided not to include jackson...it was just too much to ask of them both!

and some of the runners-up:

a new look

i was just wandering around blogspot and found a couple new features for our blog...complete with a new look. same old boring stuff...and lots of pictures of our son. :) please take time to participate in my new "poll". (my attempt to make myself feel better about only having bought 3 out of 10 christmas gifts so far.)


now, try not to laugh...yesterday, jesse made attempt #1 at a christmas photo of jacob and jackson. between jacob's drunken face and jackson's inability to look at the camera on command, it made it difficult to get a good shot. i wasn't there- so what WAS jackson looking at??? we will be making attempt #2 very soon.

happy birthday to me...

it was a weekend full of fun as i celebrated my 27th birthday. it all began on friday with a surprise at work. my friend candace had made cupcakes and invited a group of my friends to sing happy birthday to me....a surprise to me. and lets just say, i think all 150 people in the office heard them singing- what a nice embarrassing moment. :)

it continued onto friday evening, jesse took me out to my favorite mexican restaurant, abuelo's, while jacob attended a night of free babysitting called "Time Out" (courtesy of a group of Creation Museum staff).

and still it continued onto saturday morning, as my friends jessie and mandy were to take me shopping...only to find a SURPRISE birthday brunch waiting for me when we went to pick mandy up at her place. so i got to enjoy my favorite meal (yes, breakfast) with a group of 6 girls. we ate pumpkin chocolate chip muffins, delicious scrambled eggs, biscuits and chocolate gravy, danish pastry from Panera, fresh fruit and dip, hash browns, and i am sure i am forgetting the other things. it was a wonderful surprise and a nice time together.




saturday evening jesse and i decorated the tree. we went with simple this year- just snowflakes and white lights. it is all we needed and all we cared to spend time on.



brithday morning i woke up (at 8 am- yes that is a huge sleep-in!) to the smell of baking cake and pancakes. jesse had my cake in the oven and he was fixing me pancakes for breakfast.
we spent a nice day together as a family...even though jesse and i are still getting over colds and we were slightly feeling miserable....it was a good day. :)




and i can't end without mentioning the tragic ending of my birthday day....all i need to say is Bengals-10, Steelers-24.....sniffle........

thanksgiving: part 2

here are some pictures from our weekend in pittsburgh

the hanna family grandkids [from left: Lexi and Eva (held by their grandma Stotler) Connor, Philomena, and Trevor in front (held by their grandma Hanna) Jacob (held by his gammie Pié)]

the spring babies: philomena was born 3 weeks before jacob,

and connor was born 2 weeks after jacob.

jacob in the highchair his mommy used when she was a baby

grandma and grandpa mclane

thanksgiving

we're getting ready to head to pittsburgh for thanksgiving to see lots and lots of family. as we prepare for this holiday, we can't help but think of how much we have been blessed and how we have so much to be thankful for.
every day we love jacob more and more; and the more we love him, we often ponder of the GREATEST sacrifice the Lord made of HIS OWN SON, to pay the punishment for OUR sins, so that we might have eternal life. we are truly thankful for that great gift of love. it has taken on a whole new meaning for us now that we have a son of our own. we are so thankful that God has given us this special gift and the privilege of being "mom" and "dad" to jacob.
we are also so thankful for the friends that God has surrounded us with in Kentucky. it is such a blessing to us, even though we are away from family, we have our friends who have done so much for us to fill that family "void". MANY THANKS to the Nordines, Brysons, and Ashleys who have been a huge help to our family during the past year.
we are thankful for our health, our home, and our work, our family and our church family.

Praise God from whom ALL blessings flow~ we are so THANKFUL!

new specs

since my husband doesn't read this blog, i feel at liberty to post pictures that he would consider unnecessary. so this one's for you, hun. (in case you DO read this) :)

jesse decided to go for a newer look following his recent eye appointment at the optometrist. jesse's new specs:

6 months of spit-up: our survival story

wow! can't believe jacob is already 6 months! he saw the Dr for his 6 month check-up on tuesday. Dr said he's looking good- 18 pounds 10 oz (75th percentile for his age) and 28 inches long (95th percentile). he was still not concerned with jacob's vast and never-ending quantities of spit-up, but wrote jacob an Rx for infant Zantac. we just started the doses last night....keeping our fingers crossed! while we know this won't completely diminish the spit-up, we are hoping and praying for it to reduce the amount and frequency.

jacob's aunt rachael and aunt joanna came to visit this weekend (and cousin Bo for a short while). the girls adored jacob and had a blast making him smile.

aunt joanna was inducted into the spit-up hall of fame.

they got to visit the museum and see jesse's handiwork.

aunt rachael bought jacob his first pair of chuck taylors- which we finally got the right size to fit his fat feet. jacob seems to really like his new kicks...he couldnt keep his eyes off of them.

dear santa...

i know it's early, but some of you are starting to ask. so to all you "Santas" out there, here is jacob's Christmas wish list:

Robeez Dinosaur shoes or Robeez Puppy shoes, size 12-18 months
(he can't decide which ones he likes better because he likes dinosaurs and puppies both SO MUCH)

Backpack, Light Blue, size small

Laugh & Learn Learning Puppy

Laugh & Learn Toolbench

Discover Sounds Guitar

Camo pants (because he out-grew his favorite camo pants) size 12-18 months

long-sleeve onesie shirts (he likes all the colors) size 12-18 months

BOOKS!! especially cardboard or plastic pages!

Pajamas: Old Navy size 12-18 months or Carters size 18 months

Praise Baby music DVDs or CDs

did someone say FREE??

so it's halloween and Chipotle is giving away FREE burritos if you dress up as one. so what does one do? why, you dress your husband and baby up, of course!! and that's exactly what we did last night, with our good friends the Nordine's. thanks goes out to Jacob and Isabel, Lee and Jesse for getting us dinner!

squash and pumpkin

i tried to be creative- carved my pumpkin this weekend with polka dots all over. it ended up looking like a swiss cheese pumpkin. but i like it anyway- so go ahead and laugh.

jacob had his first real food this weekend. he ate squash on sunday evening and seemed to love it. i have attached a video.

sick and growing

jacob is almost 6 months...and showing signs of wanting to crawl. he was sick this past week with a fever for 3 days, followed by a rash on his belly and face. we think it was roseola. whatever it was, it's gone, and we're glad!

when you are married to an artist

this is what happens when you are married to an artist...and he has friends who are artists... and they just might happen to have too much time on their hands. yes, this is a doctored picture.... no, we did not put a real cigar in jacob's hand. and no, we did not buy jacob a mini leather chair. so, enjoy-compliments of Travis Wilson

studio pics

jacob had pictures taken by lauren at the studio 2 weeks ago. here they are: http://www.laurenbryson.com/jacob

please let me know if you want to order any. i would be happy to give lauren the business! :)

still here

wow- i am realizing i havent written in over a week, and havent posted pictures in about 2. we've been a busy family, keeping up with everyday life. we had visitors last weekend- grandma & grandpa pié and uncle josh & aunt heidi (pié). jacob charmed everyone with his big smiles a little giggles, aunt heidi and unlce josh got to see the creation museum, and we all enjoyed a sermon by Ken Ham on sunday morning.

jacob is 5 months now! time is fllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllying! so here are some pictures: (jacob in his froggy costume, jacob in his big boy high-chair, aunt heidi feeding jacob cereal, and jacob with his aunt & uncle)

their eyes meet

so, my friend candace is getting ready to head back to work in another week. we plan to have a "child swap" and watch each other's baby as the other goes to work. so in preparation for that, we have been doing practice rounds. here are some cutie pictures that candace took while she had the kids (both awake at the same time, might i add!): http://leeandcandacenordine.blogspot.com/2007/10/soap-opera.html

cereal

i almost forgot to mention this, but we started jacob on cereal this past weekend. he impressed us and ate every last drop. he didnt reject it like we thought he would. he even smacks his lips before he asks for more.

spit up monster

jackson loves spit-up. good thing we have a spit-up baby!

here are some pictures from the weekend (grandma mclane came to visit)

here's daddy thinking he's funny again...no, jacob is not pregnant. :)

haircut #2

jesse cutting candace's hair. final product will soon follow. (have to wait for when the mommy's can find time to get their picture taken together)

4 months (and a few days)

jacob had his 4 month dr appt last week. he weighed in at 16 pounds 13 oz. measured 27 inches. and the dr said he's a healthy boy and we can start him on cereal at any time.... he's growing so fast!!! he got his 2nd round of shots and recovered within 3 minutes! i was patting myself on the back after that. :)

ok, so jesse has taken the whole haircutting thing to the next level...his wife's good friend. yes, candace was brave enough to ask jesse to cut her hair. so saturday afternoon we were at the nordine's house...an hour later jesse had given candace the "new mom" do. pictures will be posted soon.

trust redefined

jacob's been busy these days...we went hiking this past weekend at the Boone County Cliffs. can't decide who liked it more, jackson or jacob. jackson enjoyed being out of the apartment and in is own element. jacob enjoyed looking at the trees and everything around him.

jacob started smiling and laughing at himself in the mirror...i've included a picture of that too.

so i must really love my husband. i put complete trust in him...a pair of scissors in hand...my long wavy locks at his disposal....and this is the result. he did pretty good, i must say. and anyone interested in haircuts at "salon pie" just get in line and bring lots of cash!

ken ham's blog

just wanted to let you guys know that jesse and i were mentioned on ken's blog today, along with a few other couples who recently became parents at AiG. you can also listen to dr. david menton's AWESOME talk on the miracle of birth (fearfully & wonderfully made).

click here: http://blogs.answersingenesis.org/aroundtheworld/2007/08/31/baby-boom-continues-at-aig/

colorado

we were in colorado this past weekend. jacob's first plane trip went fine, except for the 10 minutes of screaming (that seemed like an hour!). he met lots of family and went to yet another wedding. my cousin Andrea married Brady, and this was the first time in over 10 years that all the Vollbracht cousins were together. here are some pictures from the weekend. (jacob and pike's peak, jacob with great-grandma vollbracht, the newlyweds, the vollbracht cousins)