What a Birthday

Have to get pictures of the sibling love moments
No words necessary
Opening gifts a day late

Yesterday was Nate's birthday and it did not turn out like he expected. We knew he had to work, but something broke at work so he had to work 15 hours. We had plans to go out to dinner with some friends, but we had to cancel. The kids were disappointed we didn't open gifts and sing to Nate on his birthday! We made up for it today though. I made white chocolate raspberry cheesecake for his birthday and the kids don't like it. Oh well! Nate will have to work more than expected this week, but hopefully it won't be too bad. I love Nate so much. He is a wonderful Christian, husband, father, provider, friend, Mr. Fix-It and he's only 32!

Seven Years Old

Excited to get a new scooter
The panda cake
How are there so many candles on that cake?
For dinner he requested pancakes, eggs, bacon and sausage- he knows how to eat!

Happy Birthday Caleb! For the past week I have been calling him a 7 year old and he would emphatically say, "No, I am still 6." Now he is more than happy to be 7 and told me it might take awhile for me to get used to that number. :)

He brought a birthday treat to school today. I made 5 blue cupcakes topped with a toy bug and 5 pink cupcakes topped with a toy ring. (Nate helped me realize I don't need to make an extravagant birthday cake and an extravagant school birthday treat for the kids!) Caleb requested breakfast for dinner which always makes me happy too. I was a little surprised when he picked the panda cake. I thought he would go for something like a pirate ship or dinosaur cake. However, he enjoyed seeing pandas at the Atlanta zoo and he likes Kung Fu Panda (even though he hasn't seen the movie!). I must note that I cringe whenever the kids pick a cake that requires alot of red or black frosting- those colors are so hard to make! Caleb received a new scooter, flashlight and work gloves from us. He also received some toy army men and a Veggie Tales devotional book. I record their gifts here so I have gift ideas when our other children turn 7!

Tonight I considered making a comment to Caleb like, "Seven years ago I labored for 18 hours and was so excited to finally meet you." But, I was afraid that would bring lots of questions! Exactly when should kids start learning about how babies enter the world??

We thank God for the blessing of Caleb. He is a smart, athletic, compassionate and kind-hearted boy. It is a joy to watch him master new skills. I feel like we're embarking on a new life stage- the grade school years. We've changed his bedtime to 8 pm instead of 7:30 pm when the other kids go to bed. I kept insisting he needed to be in bed early because he gets up at 6:30 am, but he would just lie in bed awake until 8:30 every night. So now he gets to read with us on the couch before bed without any sibling interruptions- kind of nice. We also finally bunked the boys' beds. (Actually I wasn't so nervous about Caleb on the top bunk, I was nervous about Isaac crawling on the top bunk and falling out!) I'm sure we'll be making other changes as we realize Caleb is no longer a "little boy" but a regular "boy" now- nothing little about him! We pray for many more birthday celebrations with Caleb!

School

First Day of Preschool! I laugh at this picture b/c he'll stand like this and say, "look, I'm a pickle!"
Julia wanted to be in a school picture too
First day of 1st Grade! Still trying to work on natural smiles...
Cardale, Caleb, and Isaac riding bikes at the campground
The frog cupcakes Isaac is bringing to school for his birthday treat. They're supposed to be frog eyes peaking out of the water if you can't tell!
We actually did get a picture of Julia by herself!
The Jongsma family


This is our second week of school and things are going well. Caleb wasn't nervous at all about starting first grade. We felt a little bad that we made him ride carpool the first morning and didn't take him ourselves, but it didn't bother him. He has 10 kids in his class, 5 boys and 5 girls. I don't mind smaller class sizes. Unfortunately the little trouble-maker from last year is still in his class. I figure this is a good learning experience for Caleb b/c there will always be people trying to influence him in negative ways. Hopefully he can learn young to make the wise choice! Caleb was a little bummed to hear he would have homework every night, but it takes him about 5 minutes to complete it. He heard that 1st graders get to do science experiments and he is excited about that.

Isaac started preschool this year! He is going to a local preschool four afternoons a week. He wasn't sure if he was excited about school or not. The first couple of days he clung to my hand when I dropped him off and had that 'don't leave me!' look. However, he is now singing songs he has learned and talking about classroom jobs. Tomorrow he gets to bring his birthday treat which is very exciting for him.

Julia REALLY wants to go to school. She loves Isaac's classroom. On the first day she was ready to stay when Isaac wanted to head out the door with me. Julia often says, "I go to school when I'm big?" When Isaac is in school Julia takes a nap and my house is quiet for a couple hours- awesome!! We are potty-training Julia. It is much harder with the 3rd child. It is more difficult to stay home all the time and focus on potty-training. There are just more places we have to go. With the older two boys I did not use pull-ups. I was all about going cold turkey from diapers to underwear. Now, we use pull-ups for when we're going somewhere. Potty-training is still my least favorite parenting task. :)

Last weekend we went camping with Cardale's family. It was slightly rainy, but we all had a good time. The boys played hard the whole weekend. Cardale shows Nate and I more affection now and it just warms my heart. For the past 2 years we've tried to not "push" ourselves on him and let him interact with us according to his comfort level. Now he'll come up to me and snuggle on my lap and say, "I love you." Puts a big ol' smile on my face. Cardale has a little brother, Abe, who is 5 months old and such a cutie. Cardale is a great big brother. The boys are constantly asking when we will camp with Cardale again!

Tim's Wedding

What a good-looking family!

The kids were SO done with pictures by this point.

Adorable 4 year old

Handsome (almost) 7 year old. (We couldn't get Julia to pose for a picture by herself!)

We clean up well

I love this man!

A glimpse of what is was like trying to take the wedding pictures

Julia enjoyed the cupcake

My awesome sister and Mom.

I got to party in the limo while Nate drove the kids in the van

Dancing the night away

Isaac "danced" by pointing his fingers repeatedly. He was so exhausted.

My siblings- Tim, Jenny and Steph