Jacob Home: Post-Christmas

One word best describes our home today as we wind down from our week long Christmas celebrations with all of our families......CHAOS!!!!!!


Presents are everywhere and the girls are still running 100mph since they have been on the go for the last few days. And even just now Ava is calling out "Let's get this Dora bowling party started right now" (one of her and Reese's new toys that they HAVE to play with right now!) Thanks, S,S,A and Z!


Despite the chaos today, we are truly lucky to have so much family to celebrate the holidays with!


Christmas posts to come! Lots of blog catching up to do!

Every room in our house is filled with Christmas after-math!

Jacob Girls+Super Heroes=Halloween 09

This year the girls followed the super heroes trend and dressed as Super Girl (Ava) and Wonder Woman (Reese). I had no idea super heroes would be so popular this year!!

Here they are starting off their fun filled night of trick or treating with Nana and PaPa Birky.

Shari Stuber was nice enough to provide us 2 big bags of candy! :-) The girls modeling their pumpkin bags.

Someone took their costume and their duties very serious!

This just makes me feel sick looking at it. Sucker in her mouth and bowl full of sugar in front of her.

Working those outfits!

Mid-November - Perfect time for a Tea Party!

This past week we got to be apart of one of Ava and Reese's favorite Aunt's vision...miss Lisa Kay of Happily Ever After Weddings and the wonderful Pam Cooley of Pam Cooley Photography.



For those who don't know, Lisa Ragan has been building her business, Happily Ever After Weddings for over a year, and now she's branching out to new things. Children's birthday parties, events, you name it.....she can plan it and style it!!!



The girls did a lovely job modeling in the outdoor tea party shoot photographed by Pam Cooley. I think you will agree its clearly adorable!!! Check out Pam's blogsite!!

Ava is 3!!!

The 3 straight weeks of celebrating birthdays is coming to an end. Yes, folks, Ava is officially 3! And with that we can close another chapter on the Jacob girls' birthday celebrations!

Instead of thinking of a word that describes Ava, I thought I would just use my new signature collages to portray the kind of girl she has been through the last 3 years! She's one goofy girl, with a head full of hair who knows how to turn on the charm! Yes, she's Aba Jacob! :-) She knows her name and she's not afraid to tell you who she is!



Ava got to have her birthday lunch today at her daddy's favorite hang out, Destihl! After that it was a stop at Target to pick out a game of Memory, and then daddy picked out something "the girls" just HAD to have! The picture below is somewhat disturbing, but he's just so darn proud!


Seth and Ava spent almost 2 hours shooting nerf darts all over the house! My girl Reese put on some bracelets and even shot a few rounds! The girl knows accessories are needed for whatever you are doing, too bad I didn't get any pics of that!! But I did manage to get one of her with my swim suit bottoms around her neck while she loads up her gun! Don't ask....I don't even know why....



The night ended with a healthy Hostess Cupcake as Ava's birthday cake.


Ava, just 3 short years have already compiled so many great moments and memories! You keep us on our toes and smiles on our faces and we wouldn't have it any other way. We love you so much "big girl" Ava!

2009 Jacob girls bday bash pics to come...

Reese is 2!!

Wow! How can it be that the baby of our family is 2!?!?

When I think about Reese and look back at the last 2 years and really almost 3 years, the one word that inevitably comes to mind about her, is SURPRISE!

I think almost anyone who reads this blog, knows that learning we were having Reese was an unexpected, yet truly amazing surprise we received in Feb of 2007. You see, we had just had a baby...who was barely out of the newborn stage.

Pictured below is the lovely Ava, just barely 4 months when we discovered our next bundle of joy was coming!


We spent the next 8 1/2 months planning for the addition of another baby. Reese's due date was Oct. 16, just 2 days before Ava's 1 yr bday. It was around midnight, the morning of Oct. 4, when I decided my sister better come over and stay with Ava, b/c SURPRISE Reese was making her appearance 2 weeks early. We welcomed her to our family at 11:59 am on Oct. 4, 2007.


Here's a picture of Reese on her 1st bday last year. Ava started walking right around her 1 yr. bday, so I just assumed Reese would do the same. Surprise, this girl was not walking until 15 months!


Here she is today celebrating her abbreviated bday. The real deal bday party is next weekend.



Everyday, Reese continually surprises us with all of the things she says and does, and of course the many faces she makes!

Reese you truly are a one of a kind! We love you so much! Happy birthday sweet baby girl!

Lake Geneva

At the end of August we traveled to Lake Geneva with Nana and Papa Birky for an end of summer trip! Lake Geneva is Seth's new favorite hang out. If he has his way we will be going there every year!

We stayed at the Timber Ridge Lodge which has an indoor waterpark. I think it's safe to say the girls got over there large indoor waterpark phobia and had a blast! We don't have a lot of pictures, but by the end of the weekend both girls were going down the toddler waterslides as fast as they could and face first!! I was asked to edit what I posted on here, so I can't show proof, but even Nana went down the waterslide more times than I could count!! The girls loved it!

I took some artistic liberties with this collage that just look wrong, but it's taken me almost 2 months to get these up here, so I'm just going with it!

We also spent some time on Lake Geneva. This was the girls first experience on a boat. Although it was windy, a little rainy and FREEZING, they enjoyed themselves. As long as i kept the snacks coming we were in great shape....and then the snacks ran out....and the life jacket finally proved to be too much for little Reese and the last 15 minutes were spent hightailing it as fast as we could to the dock, so Reese could get that thing off as fast as possible!

We played lots of games in the arcade too. I think everyone had a good time earning their tickets for prizes! The girls redeemed their tickets for candy bracelets and real bangle bracelets.

Nana and Papa were such great sports! We all had so much fun, and hope to do it again!

This is what happens when daddy's in charge....

Blow-up mattress in the living room, dinner in front of the TV and pretty much anything else you want to do that maybe you shouldn't be doing! :-) Well, with that going on I'm free to load my pics to the computer and work on the blog. I guess I should be thanking daddy!?!?