Rock Climbing

There is an REI store at the mall near our house.  Every time we go to the mall and walk by REI, Jackson wants to go inside and look at the climbing rock.  He BEGS to climb it.  So, one time we were in the store, I asked one of the employees if there was an age range for climbing, and they said no - it was open to anyone.  So, we had a free afternoon this past Saturday and headed down to REI to let the boys give it a try.  They watched as an older girl climbed all the way to the top, and Adam decided that he was brave enough to give it a try. 

Here he is getting all roped up.

 and climbing...

 and this is about as high as he got before panic set in and he wanted down. 

 Then it was Jackson's turn.  I think he looks so little getting a his harness on.

Here he is - all ready to go!

 

 He made it about 2 feet off the floor, before this happened...

He wanted to be so brave, but he just couldn't do it...

Here are a couple of videos of the climbers...



J-man is 3!

My Jackson is growing up!  How did he get to be 3 already?  This guy is SO much fun!  He's also very stubborn!  And he's just so darn cute!  Daddy made him a funny face pancake for breakfast on the morning of his birthday!  He was super excited about it!

 And then we let him open a couple of his presents before Adam left for school.  It was a Spiderman birthday for Jackson this year.  Here he is in a cool Spiderman sweatshirt.

 And what he really, REALLY wanted - a Spiderman costume! 

 For dinner that night, we headed to daddy's restaurant in Renton.  It was our last chance to have dinner at that particular restaurant before daddy started his new job, and Jackson has loved going to The Rock to eat with dad.  The best part was that Uncle Brian was there too, so he got to see his buddy too!  He opened the rest of his presents (notice the Spiderman t-shirt he has on...) and enjoyed blowing out the candle on a cookie skillet.

 That night, he even slept in his Spiderman costume!

 The next morning, the celebrations continued!  The day started with a super hero battle between the good guys - Spiderman and Ironhide (Adam's costume from last year), and the evil daddy!  Not sure who won, but they had tons of fun!

 Then grandma and Aunt Rachael and Robyn joined us for a bowling outing.  We've gone bowling a couple of times, and Jackson loves it!  So, off we went!  Here's Jackson carrying a rather large bowling ball - I think it was 8 pounds!

Here's a silly video of Jackson bowling/dancing!

 After bowling, we headed back to the house for pizza and cake.  Jackson wanted a Spiderman cake.  So, he got a web with some Spiderman guys on it!  He thought it was pretty cool!

What else can I say about our J-man?  He keeps us all entertained!  He's got such a great vocabulary and talks pretty much constantly!  He was weighed at his 3 year check up and weighed in at 40 lbs, 10 oz. (98th percentile - Adam was 38.5 pounds at 3).  Jackson isn't afraid of anything - he'll jump off of anything and swing off of anything!  I can't imagine our family without him!!

Love the J-MAN!!

Adam turns 7!!

Adam turned 7 years old on September 13th!  It's hard to believe he's 7!  He's growing up so fast!  His birthday was a school day, so no sleeping in for this guy (although, he is truly his father's son, and can't really sleep in.  Most mornings he's up between 6:30 and 7:00 - sometimes earlier!  Ugh!!)

He really wanted to have breakfast in bed, so we made him a funny face pancake and let him eat in our bed...

 Jackson joined him...

 We let him open one present before heading off to school.  He has become quite the Seahawks fan, so he was super excited to get this cool sweatshirt!

 We let him pick where he wanted to go for dinner.  He chose Red Robin.  He wasn't too sure about the singing part...

After dinner, we came home and he opened his presents.  Adam has really started to love Legos and Ninjago!  So, that's pretty much what he got for presents.

 And and Seahawks jersey!  He loves to look for his jersey during the games now.  He's always excited when Rice makes a good play!

Adam really wanted to have a Lego party to celebrate his birthday.  So, we went to the newly opened Lego store at Alderwood Mall, and bought several things of random legos and some surprise lego guys.  Everyone who came got to open a surprise guy, got a green lego board, and went at it building whatever they wanted too with legos!  Luckily the weather was beautiful, so we laid blankets outside on the grass and let them go for it!

 Soon Grandpa, dad and Jeff (Xander's dad) joined in the building!

 I wish we would have taken a picture of the finished products.  There was some very creative Lego building going on!

 After building with Legos for more than and hour, we had some cake.  I found some directions for a Lego cake on pinterest, so gave it a shot.

Turned out pretty good - huh?  Adam and his friends thought it was great - so that's all that matters!

 We did cake outside too!  We had to block a bit of a breeze that kept blowing the candles out!

 Then, Adam opened up his presents.  I think every single one was a Lego item. 

The party was a great success!  Everyone had a great time and got to go home with their Lego masterpiece!
I'm so proud of the young man Adam is growing up to be!  He is really enjoying school, and it's been so fun  (and frustrating) to watch him learn to read, and discover new and exciting things he can do!  He's getting super excited to be baptized next year!  It's amazing that he's getting to that age!  He saw the doctor for a checkup and continues to grow!  He was 4'2.5" tall (88th percentile) and 61 lbs, 6 oz in weight (87th percentile)  Based on his BMI he is in the 79th percentile of kids his age. 
It's so fun to watch him learn and grow!  I feel so lucky to be his mom!

Breakfast Hike

The youth in our ward have an amazing opportunity every year to do a breakfast hike.  Scott and I went last year and it was awesome - even being 7 months pregnant.  When I was released from serving in the Young Women's program, I told the bishop that was fine, but I really wanted to go on the breakfast hike.  Luckily, it was easy to do, since Scott is the Young Men's president.  Unfortunately, there weren't many youth that were able to go.  But, Scott and I went, and we brought Adam along too.  We had such a great time!  We didn't get to leave home until a little bit later, so we ended up doing most of the hiking in the dark, which wasn't super fun, but we made it and got our tent set up.  Then we had dinner and a devotional with the youth and leaders.  Adam was so tired, he didn't make it too much later...

 The next morning, we enjoyed the view - hiking around and just had fun being together!

 Adam was purifying some water...

 Eating breakfast!

 The ward has been doing this particular hike for close to 15 years.  The first year of the hike, they did a polar bear dip.  Across the lake from where we camped, there are some great rocks to jump off of.  We decided to give it a try this.  We hiked around the lake and watched some of the kids jump in.  Then Scott felt brave and jumped in...

Then Adam decided he wanted to jump in...

Then, I decided to jump in...

Really?

It was COLD!!

After a little swimming in the frigid water (where Adam jumped in, onto my head and we both almost drowned!), we headed back to our camp, packed up and headed out.  I wish more of the youth from our ward would have made it this year - but it was fun to go with some of the new beehives that I was so looking forward to serving before I was released.  It was fun to spend some mommy and daddy time with just Adam.  Scott's decided Adam is ready for his own backpack and to start doing some backpacking trips.  It's was a great way to spend a Friday night and Saturday!

On the first day of 1st grade!

School started on Wednesday!  We had a bit of a tramatic start to school the day before - we were walking over to the school to find out who Adam's teacher was and who was in his class (they didn't post class lists until the day before school!  Crazy!!)  We walked over with our good friends who live down the street - they have a girl Adam's age, a boy who is 4 who Jackson LOVES to play with, and a baby who is 5 months old.  We walked our normal route to school, and got up to the busy street.  Jackson and his buddy Jonas for some reason ran out into the street (which is something they don't normally do).  Both moms yelled and told them to come back.  Jackson came back, but Jonas continued to cross the street.  His mom told him to stay there, that we would cross at the crosswalk and be right there with him.  He started crying and getting really upset, and then next thing we know, he's darted out into the road in front of a car.  There was no chance for the driver to stop, and Jonas hit the hood of the car and bounced right off into the street.  It was a very surreal moment.  Not something I ever thought I would see, and not something I ever want to see happen again.  Miraculously, Jonas is fine.  After a trip to the hospital in an ambulance, he was cleaned up, x-ray'd, bandaged up and sent home.  Three days later, Jackson still talks about it pretty constantly.  We've seen Jonas every day since the accident, and it's so nice to see him up and playing as if nothing ever happened.  There are a few reminders - like the patches of road rash on his head and cheek, and the huge bruises on his elbows and knees.  We are so thankful he is ok!  And I'm thankful that everyone who witnessed the accident is ok as well.  His sister was having a really hard time, but the priesthood is such a powerful tool!  I am thankful for that blessing!  Everyone is healing and moving past it - and I think all of those involved learned a very real lesson about looking both ways before crossing the street.  There has been a lot of second guessing about how we could have prevented this from happening, but it was an accident.  We are grateful that the ending is good!

So, Wednesday morning - I was still feeling a bit shaky about everything, but it was still the first day of school, so we got up and moved on!!  Adam requested chocolate chip pancakes that said "Happy first day of school".  This is what he got!

 If you can't tell - it says "Happy 1st grade" - which ended up being ok.  He wasn't even able to eat one of those pancakes all gone!  At least the pancakes were whole wheat!  Talk about a lot of sugar in the morning!!

First day of school pictures - Adam wanted to show how old he was going to be...

 Doesn't he look grown up?

 All the kiddos!  Jackson is adjusting to Adam being gone again.  He's been missed!

 Standing in line with his class.  These two boys were in his class last year!

 And walking to class.

I'm really happy with the teacher Adam got this year.  She has been a very popular teacher at Hilltop the past couple of years.  He seems to like her - although it's only been 2 days of school so far!  We seem to be off to a good start!  He told me this morning on the way to school, that he really likes going to school!  Yay - I hope he says that in another month!!