My Prince

So the other day while Kennedy was at school and Leah was sleeping soundly, Jake comes to me while I'm laying on the couch and puts a dishtowel on my head. I'm thinking he's just trying to be funny, but then he keeps tugging on my hand trying to get me up and saying "pence, pence". I don't recognize this new word, and when I ask him to sign it he can't. So I get up and he takes both of my hands and bends side to side, starting to dance this different dance. I say to him, "oh, you wanted to dance?" and he just gives me this look like, "you don't get it, mom." Finally, he stops dancing with me and points to himself and says, "me, pence!" Finally I get it. He's dancing with me because he's my prince! And the dishtowel is my pretty hat. Kennedy will sometimes ask him to be the prince at the ball with her (I've even overheard her saying she wishes she could marry him, which I love.) I just thought it was so cute that Jake wanted to be my prince at the ball! So we continued dancing the special slow dance, the prince and princess. That is, until he saw his truck and promptly dumped the princess to go drive! Oh well. He's still my prince.

Little (big) Jake

I am starting to realize just how small Jake really is (physically). Leah has already outgrown her 0-3 month clothes, which I guess is right on time but seems so fast to me! Jake is wearing some shorts from two summers ago. He just barely switched to size 4 diapers and today I was trying to decide if I should buy size 3 for Leah because her diapers are getting tighter every day. Jake just got out of size 3's about a month ago! And when I measured him on the wall in the same place I measured Kennedy when she turned three, Jake was a full 6 inchs shorter! I feel like Leah is growing right before my eyes. Before I had Jake, I never would have wished to have a child with Down Syndrome, but having Jake stay so small so long has been one of the perks! I got to have my baby stay my baby for so long. He is still such a cuddler and has the best little body to hold-he just melts into you. However, I have to say that just because Jake is small physically definitely doesn't mean he has a small personality. That little boy has more personality and friendliness and just downright man in him that most kids twice his age! He walks around the room like he owns it, and when he leaves preschool each day he throws a great big kiss to all "his people". I think he thinks he's a rock star, and I'm never going to tell him otherwise. Love you little man.

Life is good

Fridays are like our Saturdays. It's the only day of the work week that we don't have to go to preschool, Jake's therapy, or work. I relish each Friday. My favorite part of the day is watching Kennedy and Jake play together. They are hilarious. Today I was standing in the kitchen, about five minutes after getting them dressed for the day. The next thing I know, Kennedy comes running out completely naked, quickly followed by Jake sporting nothing but a smile. Lots of giggles at my reaction to them. Of course they had to do a dance and song routine while in the buff. Kennedy ended it by sighing and saying, "I wish I could just be naked all the time." Isn't childhood great?

Where have we been?

I joined the world of Facebook (for good or bad, I don't know yet) so I haven't been blogging at all, but I decided I still want to keep this blog up to date so the kids and I can look back at things. They love to look at pictures of themselves and hear what I've written.

Kennedy's last week of preschool is next week, then it's off to Kindergarten in the fall! We went to the Kindergarten registration a month or so ago at the school; when we walked into the school and especially the kindergarten classroom, Kennedy's eyes lit up like a kid in the candy store! She is so excited to go to school and even more excited to ride the bus! I am excited for her to have her own grade school adventures, but at the same time I feel the need to protect her from the cruel world! It's hard to let go, even a little, and let her experience the "real world." Luckily for me, though, she's a pretty confident girl so she's going to do just fine. She's taken off with her reading and can read pretty much any kid book you give her. The other night she read me Guess How Much I Love You and I was blown away! She has picked up on reading like it was second nature to her. It is so fun to watch her read and understand things.

Jake has been going to his preschool/therapy place for a few months now and is doing great! He really likes his teachers and has made a LOT of progress both with his motor skills and speech. He is a big talker now; sometimes you can't get a word in edgewise! He's really patient with us when we don't understand him-he'll often sign the word while he says it so we can "get it." He also says "love you, mom" now, which is of course, the best!

Leah is growing like a weed. She can roll over but always gets her arm stuck under her. She is such a happy, smiley baby, especially for Kennedy. She loves to stretch in the morning when I'm changing her diaper. She has the shortest, chubbiest legs of all my kids. Everyone is saying she looks a lot like Jake, which I can see more and more each day. She is so tolerant of all the running around we do-from taking Kennedy to preschool, Jake to therapy, and mom to work. She takes it all in stride and usually has a big nap when we finally return home each day around 4:00. Even though I knew it would happen, it has always amazed me at how a new little person just fits into the family like they were always here. I can't imagine life without her now.

Jake loves to sing

Jake is really enjoying singing songs lately. Lullaby is his favorite.

Whirlwind

Things have been crazy lately (are they ever calm?) but tonight Brian lovingly took the kids for a ride so mom could have some down time to herself (lets just say 12 kids in nursery today, and ALL of them tried to climb on the table! Aagghh! No more marshmellows for snack time!)

So what is new here in Nampa? After the eons of time it took for Kennedy to adjust to a "big girl" bed when we moved here, we decided to get a jumpstart on things with Jake. We got him a toddler bed, which we figured would be better for him considering his, uh, vertically challenged genes (he should be able to climb into his own bed, right?) and his tendency to sit up and plop over in the middle of the night about 20 times (didn't want him falling too far). So here are some pictures of Kennedy fixing it up for him in the living room. They had a ball playing together, and scruffie the cat got in on it too. He hid under the bed and the kids would stick their hands under to get punched by the cat. Sound familiar aunt Michelle?

In other news, our good friends and neighbors the Seely's moved to Virginia (greener pastures, for sure) with Micron, so we had a last hurrah at our house with a few friends and their kids. Boy did those kids have fun! I can't believe we fit all of them in our small kitchen! Notice in the picture that Jake is the only one aware of the camera. He can pick out that zooming noise from across a football field, and immediately makes his cheesy camera face. Gotta love it.

This is just a picture Kennedy made the other day on her white board. It's a picture of her and Jake and says "I love Jake." She is so darn sweet with her brother, I'm saving up all of these memories for later....

Another cute thing of late is how well Kennedy and Jake play together. We moved Kennedy's little table into Jake's room, and their new favorite thing to do is color together. Jake LOVES to draw, especially with markers. He even makes sound effects with each swoop of the crayon. And Kennedy makes the sweetest pictures and notes now, she sounds everything out and writes, "To mom, love Kennedy, I love you!" and she'll draw me with a big belly. She always has a big story to tell about her drawings-she has such a good imagination and I just love to listen to her.

Kennedy also recently had her "feast day" at preschool. The kids made all their own pilgrim food just like the pilgrims did, and then all the parents got to come watch. Of course, Jake didn't want to be left out when Kennedy offered him some of her popcorn. He felt pretty big.

And finally, here is Jake, in training to be the next computer whiz at our house. He loves to move the mouse around on the laptop.

Halloween Fun

Halloween started earlier in the week with Kennedy's preschool Halloween carnival. They did a trunk-or-treat, games, food, etc. Jake loved the cupcake walk-he didn't really care if he won a cupcake, he just wanted to walk on the colored circles!

Kennedy made a Halloween necklace, played all kinds of carnival games, and had a great time!

Later in the week we went to a pumpkin patch to pick out some pumpkins and play. Kennedy found this tiny pumpkin for Jake. Too bad he threw it off the hay ride later on :)

Kennedy's favorite part of the pumpkin patch was the "corn maze" made out of hay bales for the little kids. She ran through it at least 5 times, each time coming down the home stretch with this big grin on her face.

I was taking pictures of Brian and Kennedy carving their pumpkins, and Jake kept leaning over, like "hey, take some of me too!" So here he is.

Kennedy & Brian looking serious about this pumpkin. Those black spots are "bruises" Kennedy colored on her pumpkin. Don't ask me why.

This was on our way to our ward trunk-or-treat the night before Halloween.

Kennedy with Braxton, Brandon, and Dillon at the ward trunk-or-treat.