Pumpkin Muffins

The other morning, the boys and I decided to make pumpkin muffins. They always love helping and have become quite the little chefs! Peter and I try to encourage their participation in the kitchen and what kid doesn't love cracking eggs!

They each took turns with the mixer...except for Parker. It is still a little too loud for him!

*disclaimer: not every baking moment goes so smoothly. Jacob and Parker were arguing over who would dump the flour in the bowl and as I was pouring it into the measuring cup, Jacob grabbed it and flour ended up all over the counter. Also, Jacob was determined to put eggshells in the batter until I finally had to grab it from him. He can be such a booger sometimes!

Sleepy Boys

Just some of the crazy places we find Parker sleeping. For whatever reason, he loves going into Jacob's room. Last night he was in there reading books while Jacob was passed out cold!

Even at 3, he still sleeps like a baby!
This cracked me up! Peter and I were downstairs and we heard someone fall out of the bed (our guess was either Jacob or Parker). When we came up for the night, we got our answer. He must have been pretty tired!

Another pic of Parker in Jacob's room. This was the second time he fell asleep under his bed. We are not sure what he was doing under there!

Random Shots

Daddies boys (minus one, of course). Jacob is such a nut.

Both Jacob and Parker like to walk around with their blankies on their heads. Not really sure why, but it is pretty amusing.

Crazy (typical) Jakey

Parker is eating mini M&M's...look at how Dakota is making sure none drop!

The glowing eyes are a little freaky.

Happy Birthday, Parker!

On December 24th 2005, my third born son entered this world. I had no idea at the time how he would change me as a person and as a mother. And here we are three years later and I am still so amazed by this little person! He is such a sweet, caring, energetic, funny little boy and I couldn't imagine life without him. Happy Third Birthday, Parker! We love you so much!

Look at what a chubber he was!
When he sleeps, I still can see this face.

After he blew out his candles, I relit them so all the boys could blow them out. Parker is so sweet...he even said they could help!

He received some very nice presents...lots of rescue vehicles and this very fun ladybug game (which we have played a bazillion times since!). This time of year is always stressful...trying to squeeze in the holidays and birthday celebrations, but I think we managed to keep it pretty fun despite that. My parents were able to come up and celebrate with us and all of the boys enjoyed that time with grandma and poppa!

Arrrr

Blake put this together himself. I was very impressed!

This is Parker's version of a pirate.

Family Celebration in GA

Since my side of the family were unable to celebrate Christmas together this year, we had our family celebration the beginning of December at my parents house. It was a fun filled weekend packed with gift opening, cookie decorating, christmas light seeing, and hot chocolate drinking! And that is just in one day! We had a lot of fun and were pretty worn out the next day. I will spare all the present pictures, but here are a few to give you an idea!

Parker and Uncle Jim were pretty close this weekend. He spent lots of time reading to him!
One of three light sabers the boys received!

Icing the cookies. I think there was more tasting then decorating going on!

Picking out their cutters.

Baby Update

I am going to post these for my own sake. I think if I don't write it down, I will forget. There is always so much going on. Anyways, I had my second prenatal appt yesterday (already!). I am 14w3days for those who are wondering. It was an awesome appointment! I had been feeling the baby move for over a week now, but kept it to myself b/c it is pretty early (I usually don't feel them until closer to 16 weeks). Anyways, it took the midwife and assistant a while to get the heartbeat on doppler b/c......he/she kept kicking it away! It was pretty amusing actually. They were all surprised as well. All of the boys were in the room and got to witness it and Jacob found it pretty funny. There is no feeling like that of a baby inside of you. Whatever crabby/grouchiness I had from the morning melted away after that! I am measuring small right now, but I am not too surprised. That will probably change once I can actually start eating like I should. And that is about it until next month :) This pregnancy is going by soooo quickly!

12 Acres Academy

Monday, our homeschool group took a field trip to a local Alpaca farm. The family that runs the farm is just starting to offer tours to homeschooling families, so it was totally free! We started the tour with an educational talk on the history of Alpacas as well as what they are used for (here in America, they are used strictly for fiber. In other countries, they are also used for meat). Their hair is unbelievably soft, by the way. After the talk, we took a break for lunch and then headed outside to meet the animals!

A few of the Alpacas.
This one is a female and I think her name was Ileana.

The little brown one, Chippy, is only a month old. Isn't he cute!

One of the several chickens that roamed the property. Blake is VERY afraid of chickens and every time it started to even walk in our direction, he clung to me.

Two of the very friendly goats. They have such small ears!

This little one kept trying to get the camera.

Parker LOVED the goats. He kept laughing at them everytime they came to smell him. A little later, the kids were able to feed the goats, but I didn't get any pictures of that. I was helping to pass out the feed. I think Parker would have fed them all day!

Some of the "feral" kittens. There were actually about 8 of them, but almost all of them ate really fast then scattered when the kids came to pet them. Jacob loves cats the most. He was busy most of the time trying to catch them so when they finally were still to eat, he was so happy.

The horses! They were pretty friendly, but were much more interested in eating then receiving pats.

Blake was VERY nervous feeding them the carrots. I finally grabbed his hand and just made him do it. He was a little upset with me, but I said "well if you are going to do it, you just have to do it". I am not sure why he is so afraid of animals and I am hoping this is a fear he will outgrow.

Nova, the horse.

My Reindeer

Jacob did not want to participate in the photo shoot...turkey.

Blake wanted to make this face. When he saw it, he said "it looks like I ate something good".

Dakota always has the same pitiful look.