Greeting Friends

My friend, Cynthia, and her two kids Tabitha (2 1/2) and Tristan (5 monts) came over to play the other day. Jake was so excited to play with Tristan, he couldn't wait for us to get him out of the carrier! Jake loves to play with other kids, and is especially interested in other babies. Unfortunately, he hasn't learned boundaries yet! :) I was actually able to snap off this picture before Mitch made his way in front of the camera. Most of the other pictures I got have a least parts of Mitch in them. He hates to be left out of pictures! I can't imagine why. It's not like I've ever taken any of him! :)

I love this picture!

The other day Jake was playing in the Jumperoo while I was getting ready, and Mitch put his hat on him! It was so cute!

Girls Night Out? Not so much...

My friend, Christy, made one last visit before officially moving to Michigan. She was planning on coming up with the kids, and we had a sitter scheduled to come one night and we were going to have a Girls Night Out with us and Amy...ha! This was already a "reschedule". We were supposed to do it the week before, but Mitch got sick. This time, Luke (her baby) was sick, so Girls Night Out turned into Girls Night In w/Kids...and lots of them!

Christy came up with her kids (Kendyl, Kaitlyn, and Luke) and her mom, and spent the night. (We just kept Luke away from all of the other kids.) So, she brought Bucca di Beppo take out and Amy and Thomas and Cynthia and her kids, Tabitha and Tristan, came over and we all had dinner outside on the deck. For a house with 3 babies, 1 two year old, 3 three year olds, and a five year old, it was amazingly calm. After we ate, Jake was asleep, Luke was being held, and Tristan was in the Exercauser, and all of the "big kids" were in the playroom...we girls sat on the deck and drank some wine (most of us did, anyway).

When everyone left, and it came time to put the Mitch, Kendyl, and Kaitlyn to bed, they wanted to sleep together. We didn't let them, but we got some good pictures of them trying! Mitch was so excited to play with Kendyl and Kaitlyn again...he hadn't seen them in a few weeks, and had been talking about it for a week! Here are some pics of the kiddos!

Long Overdue!

In the two years that Lindsay I have known each other, we have never had a "couples outing"... We were finally able to fix that on Saturday! We didn't have the "big boys" this weekend, so on Saturday, my mom kept Mitch and Jake for us, and we had an "adult" day on the lake with Lindsay and Neal. It was wonderful!

Gary bought a couple of floats for us last week, so Lindsay and I were able to just float around on the lake and relax, with nobody asking us for "juice" or "snacks" or asking us "why" a million times a minute! Gary was the cook (we grilled on the boat for lunch), the bartender, and the chauffer. We had it made. My only complaint....the time went way too fast! Yep, 5 hours of quiet, and then back to reality! What a great break it was, though! (Thanks, as usual, Mimi! What would we do without you?)

Here are some pictures from the day. Oh, and by the way, these are the ONLY pictures of Lindsay and me together...ever! Sad, huh? Of course we could fill an entire album of our kids together...but isn't that the way it's suppose to be?

Interview with Mitch

My cousin's wife, Laura, "tagged" me to interview Mitch. Here are the always unpredictable responses of my 3 year old!

What makes Mommy happy? "my be nice" (in Mitch's language, "my" means "I")
What makes Mommy sad? "my not be nice"
How does Mommy make you laugh? "funny"
Hold old is Mommy? "bree" (translation for those of you who don't speak Mitch: 3)
How tall is Mommy? "that tall" he says as reaches way up over his head (I love 3 year olds)
What does Mommy like to do? "get me something to drink" (wishful thinking?)
What is Mommy's job? "get me something to drink" (think he was thirsty?)
What is Mommy's favorite food? "cereal" (it was the last thing we both ate)
How do you know Mommy loves you? "be happy"

Okay...Lindsay...TAG you're it! I want to hear what Sam and Gabe have to say, especially Gabe!

8 Months Old!

Wow! Jake is 8 months old already! Really? Where has the time gone?

Jake is finally sitting up and playing now. He still gets excited sometimes and flops over, but he's getting better. He still only has the two bottom teeth, and I can't tell that he's working on any others yet. He doesn't so much love the Jumperoo or the Exersaucer any more. I can sometimes get a few minutes out of them, but he's not too crazy about being confined anymore. He still does okay in the doorway jumper, but he now uses it as a swing. He runs (yes, runs) forward in it and lifts his little legs off the ground and swings. He just giggles and giggles when does it. It is too cute!

As for the crawling...if I ever get around to figuring out how to upload a video onto this blog, I'll have to post one. My friend, Lindsay, calls it the "army crawl" and she is exactly right. He crawls all over the houses without ever getting his tummy up off of the floor! It is too funny! He has discovered the door stoppers that make noise, and loves to play with them. What is it about those things that babies just love? I've never known one who didn't like to see how much noise they could make with a door stopper.

He is now officially holding his own bottle, and jabbering all the time. He is quite the little vocalist. Janice says he's going to be a singer. He's also quite the little piggy. He LOVES his food. He's getting two stage 2 food jars for lunch and dinner, and a stage 2 and cereal for breakfast. Plus he's still getting around 24-26 oz of formula a day. I got on the scale with him yesterday, and he was 21.5 pounds! He wore an outfit yesterday that Mitch wore when he was around 14-17 months!

He is finally out of the infant carrier. I just went yesterday and got Mitch a new car seat and moved Mitch's old one over for Jake. He didn't seem to be too crazy about his new ride at first, but he got used to it pretty quickly. I hope he likes it as much as Mitch has!

Oh, and last but not least, he has stared giving me kisses. Yep, the sloppy little open mouth baby kisses! Who ever would have thought being slobbered on would be so wonderful?

4th of July

We seem to have developed a new 4th of July tradition. For the last few years, we have gone to my Mom's for dinner and fireworks. The kids (big and small) have a great time! Every year Jack asks, "Can we go to Miss Rita's and shoot fireworks?" My brother, Josh, and his wife, Leah, were even there this year. I think "Uncle Josh" had as much fun as anyone! Maybe they can make it "tradition" to come home for the 4th and play with explosives with the rest of us! :) Janice, a friend of the family, has been part of the tradition, also. She brought these disks for the kids to play with in the yard, and they loved them! I think Mitch about wore Janice out playing with them. She'll probably think twice about bringing something like that next time! :)

After dinner, Gary and the boys (Jack, Alex, and Mitch anyway) went to buy fireworks. Uncle Josh passed out $$$ to each of them before they left, and they were soooo excited to be able to pick out their own fireworks with the money he gave them. Those of you who know Gary, know that he came home with the big mack-daddy box of fireworks! It was a good show, and Jack has gotten old enough to light them, which was a big treat for both Jack and Gary! Of course, in the Roberts family, we don't use a wimpy little lighter...we break out the blow torch...and no, I'm not kidding! :)

Josh "practicing" for the day when he FINALLY has kids

Jack and Jake...I think I have probably mentioned that when we named Jake, we considered how similar it is to Jack. Our conclusion was, that with over 12 years between them, the wouldn't even be around each other enough for it to matter...we were wrong! They are thick as theives!

Alex protecting Mitch (like a good big brother) from Daddy...shouldn't it be Daddy doing the protecting, not the picking?

I told you I wasn't kidding...here's Jack with the blow torch!

Sleepy Boy!

Mitch was sent to his room tonight for...again...not doing what I told him to. When I went up to get him, he was not in his room...He was in the Bonus Room... PLAYING!!!!! I couldn't believe what I was seeing. So...I sent him to his room, again, and told him that he was to stay there while I put Jake to bed. And that when I got through with that I was going to come up and put him to bed...early! When I came up the stairs after putting Jake down, this is what I found...

Think he was tired? I picked him up and put him in bed and he never even woke up. I guess he's sleeping in his clothes tonight. I only hope he doesn't wet the bed...He didn't "potty" before he went to sleep!