It Was The Best of Times, It Was The Age of Wisdom, It Was The Age of Foolishness...

Sorry Charles Dickens, I had to rearrange the quote a little because there were no "worst of times" this year. Unless you count the fact that my baby is going to be in FIRST GRADE IN A FEW MONTHS!!! Sigh. Seriously, we, and by we I mean Jacob and Jon and I, have been so blessed to have such great teachers be a part of my son's education so far. He had great Mother's Day Out teachers (they were both FB friends and didn't mind me texting them throughout the day), fantastic PreK teachers (again with the FB and texting, but we also had and still enjoy GNO's together), and this year his Kindergarten teacher was great (even though she isn't on FB and never gave us her personal number). You know you have a great teacher when your very-resistant-to-change child is fine the first week of school. Jacob often astounded me this year with random information that he had learned (astounded me bc he was actually listening, but also because it was stuff I was surprised kindergarteners were learning) like random facts about presidents, Belgium, and the universe. So here are the pics from our end of the year party.


 My friend Angel made us a cake that looked like a box of crayons. Totally adorable. Unfortunately, I didn't get a close up and you can't see it well in this pic. Mrs. Fanning is holding it.

Buddies Jacob and Semmes. They are toasting. In the video the teacher made for us, each child is asked what his/her fave thing about kindergarten has been. Jacob said his buddy Semmes.   

 This is the police officer assigned to the school. Clearly the kids love him.

 Eating cake and drinking Sonic Slushes!!! That's right, no juice boxes for this class!!

 Mrs. Fanning opening her gifts. I don't know if all schools do this, but apparently each teacher at our school fills out a sheet which provides info for the room mom such as fave restaurant, places to shop, etc. So most of us contributed to a gift basket which had all kinds of good business in it.

Mrs. Fanning-She is actually wearing shoes with a heel in this pic. She is so short. It must be great for her as a Kindergarten teacher though because I know whenever I am in the room, I feel like Gulliver in Lilliput....

Obviously I dressed Jacob up for this party....

Field Day

So it is the end of the year, which means field day. LOVE IT. I was clearly more excited than Jacob, probably because he has never experienced the greatness of field day. Oh, and maybe because I am just such a school activity nerd and clearly always have been considering I have only fond memories of my field day experiences. I mean, not only did I watch Jacob's class during the event, but I volunteered, and was the only parent volunteer to show up I might add, to help with the other grades. Love me a good field day. Anyway, here are the pics.

 The blond girl he is sitting next to is Sylvia. She was famous at the beginning of the school year for having lost four teeth already. Each time Jacob lost a tooth, he would announce how many more he had to lose to catch up to her. Thank goodness we have. And the other girl is Laia (sp?) like princess Laia. Enough said.

 This is Semmes. They are good buddies.

The red head is Hunter. He and Jacob get in trouble together often at school. And it is always for "no reason at all."

My little track man. He was the only one in his class who didn't knock over the hurdles. He was quite proud.

The sponge relay. They were supposed to pass the sponge to the kid behind them and then squeeze all the water into the bucket at the end. Which ever team had the most water in the bucket won. Except they thought the goal was to squeeze it on themselves, of course. 

Soaking wet.

This last one is clearly not from field day. But this is his night time routine on the weekends. In bed, watching a movie, drink and snack next to him. Such is life.

Shout Out To Anderson

It seems that Anderson has officially entered the "obsessed with trucks and tractors" stage so I wanted to share my memories from that stage with Jacob. Enjoy Anderson!

These first two are from the spring and summer before he turned 2, so I guess around 18 to 22 months.

 This next one is a tractor that was "for sale" on the side of the road out in Oakland. Yep. This one actually became the birthday invites since at the time it was impossible to find tractor bday stuff.

The birthday cake. If I remember correctly, I had to supply the toy tractors for the cake maker...Between the tractor and Ghostbuster obsessions, Jacob is a birthday party theme savant or something.

This was one of his presents from us: the giant, blown-up version of the above tractor picture. We actually still have it, it is hanging up in his closet.  Notice the spatula in hand...

The favorite ride at Chuck E. Cheese:

Ok, brace yourself, these next pictures are crazy. When we first moved into our house in Oakland, there was a beautiful woodsy area behind us that Jon actually sort of landscaped; he made a path and planted grass that would grow in shade. A neighbor even built a swing and bench.  That explains why we had a cute little picket fence along the back, with a gate. Well, much to our chagrin, but to Jacob's happiness, it was all bulldozed down to build more houses. sigh.

Love their little faces poking through the fence.This is right after his birthday, so Jacob is 2 and Morgan is about 20 months.
Next we have the main (sarcasm) attraction at this really cool farm out near Oakland that opens to the public in the fall.  They have a corn field which they carve a maze through, pumpkin patch, and places to build bonfires. Oh, yea, and they have tractors...

Living out in hillbilly Oakland definitely had its advantages when raising a boy. For example, they bring Santa to the local tractor sale lot...

And finally, that winter, it snowed. Even on the tractors and bulldozers behind our house.  This is probably not a "bulldozer," but some other crazy-named thing. I promise you, Melissa, at this age-about 30 months-Jacob new EVERY SINGLE, SPECIFIC NAME.  Meanwhile, Morgan was counting, in English and Spanish (thanks to Dora) and saying her ABCs. Whatever.

That last pic obviously does not have a truck, tractor, or any other vehicle in it. It was just in the same section of the photo album as the snow/tractor one and I think it is so adorable. Jacob has a huge smile on his face. That is my dad pulling him :)