Jacob's Pirate Party

Last month, on the 23rd, Jacob turned four years old!

I can hardly believe the little boy who made me a Mama is already four! We celebrated with a Pirate party on Saturday the 31st. Jacob loves Jake and the Neverland Pirates and the soundtrack is on repeat in our minivan right now. Since the entire CD is 20 minutes long....seriously.... it needs to be longer, I know all of the words to all of the songs by heart.

I don't have many pictures since I was helping unwrap presents and serving food and drinks. This was the first year Jacob was really excited for his party. He knew it was his birthday and for weeks before hand he would hand out party hats at dinner, make us sing Happy Birthday and "practice" blowing out fake candles. Hilarious!

We had pizza for lunch and then ate cake. All the kids got pirate bandanas, pirate swords and eye patches! I can't believe that at his next birthday he'll be 5 years old and eligible for Kindergarten. He is growing up way too fast.

As for presents, this year he got Leap Frog Tag and four books, a Spiderman action figure, Spiderman and Batman books, a Cars race track with Francesco Bernoulli and Lightning McQueen, a baseball glove, baseballs and a Red Sox hat, a Thomas counting game, a drum, a Lightning McQueen t-shirt, a Mickey Mouse Look and Find book, a Chuck the Truck toy, a Spiderman puzzle and a remote control Finn McMissile!

On his actual birthday, we took him to see The Fresh Beat Band at the Orpheum Theater in Boston. This was the first time we left Eli since he was born and the first "concert" for Jacob and Grace. The FBB put on a great show and the kids had a blast. They were dancing in the aisles and singing along to all the songs while Jacob waved frantically yelling, "HI!!!" as if they could see and hear him. It was an unseasonably warm day for March with highs in the 70's so we wore t-shirts and had a nice stroll through Boston on our way to the show.

Grace's favorite, Kiki!!

Jacob's favorite, Twist!!

Eight Months!

**pictures coming soon!!!!**

Eli, you are 8 months old!

I can hardly believe it is now April and in a few short months you will be ONE YEAR OLD! This has to have been the fastest year of my entire life. I know they say that once you have kids the years fly by, but apparently once you have THREE kids they start going by at warp speed.

You currently weigh somewhere between 20-22 lbs and you are wearing some 12 month and some 18 month clothes. You wear a size 4 diaper and probably will stay in a 4 for quite some time now that your weight gain is slowing. You are still nursing around 4 times a day (more if you get up at night) and taking two-three meals of solids. You love yogurt, puffs, sweet potatoes, carrots, bananas, applesauce and oatmeal the best. You haven't been a fan of green beans which is shocking since the other two loved them! We have started trying out a sippy cup, but so far you just like to dangle it over the side of your tray and watch it drop to the floor. You have already cracked one of them so I hope that novelty wears off soon!

You have been on the move this past month and have mastered the army crawl. I have never, in my life, seen a baby more efficient and FAST at army crawling all over an entire house. You will occassionally scoot on your knees, but you realize how much faster you can move if you drag yourself so you immediately drop and start dragging. We have noticed you only use one arm and foot to propel yourself so we are trying to help you utilize your other half!

You have TEETH! Finally! On March 12th you had your first tooth pop through those gums and you aren't quite as cranky. Even though you were technically in your 9th month, I will also throw in that on March 29th your second bottom tooth came through. I am going to miss that gummy smile, but I am so happy they are finally cutting and hoping we'll see some relief in the sleep department. So far every night is hit or miss. You can be up twice or sleep straight through until 5-6 am. Hopefully this starts improving because we'd like to get you out of our bedroom and into your crib, but I don't want you waking up your big sister since you'll be in with her!

Now that you can move it is getting harder and harder to get pictures of you because you never sit still! You are constantly on the move and once you set your sights on something you drag yourself as fast as possible to the other side of the room to get to it before someone else does. I think you are starting to realize that you have two older siblings who move quicker than you do. You are fighting to keep up and before long you will be running around with both of them!

As for your siblings, you still adore Grace and vice versa. She loves being a big sister and as we pulled up to the register today at Target she said to the checkout cashier, "Hi! I'm the big sister!". She loves you and lets everyone know it, but just between us I think she was expecting a sticker! Jacob is really coming around and paying more attention to you, but these days he has more important things to tend to like Pirates and Spiderman. :)

You are well on your way to 9 months and have already had some exciting developments so I can't wait to update in a month on all the new things you are doing! It's also time to start planning your birthday party. Since you'll be having a shared party with Grace we have decided to go with a Carnival theme! I am so excited to plan this one!