New Videos

I'm having trouble getting the links to work under the heading at the left, so for now I'll just post a couple new videos we have right here. The first one is Jacob naming family members in some pictures. I "caught" him the first time, and of course once I got the camera out he was being more shy and so the audio is really quiet. The people in the pictures are: Jeff, Daddy, Mike, Chris; and then Troy, Katy, doggy (Paige); and Mommy, Katie, Kati. Then he shows off his silly voice as the pictures go all over the place.



The second video is from early January, before he had moved into his new room. Jacob found some party hats from his 1st birthday and proceeded to climb into his crib and throw a party for his stuffed animals. He did this all on his own. All I did was grab the camera to catch as much of it as I could.

Big, big news!

We are pretty sure that Jacob peed in the potty last night! The reason we aren't completely sure is that he was on the big potty and it was just a tiny little trickle. We didn't see it, but I'm almost certain I heard it. He also said "yes" when I asked him if he went potty. He never says yes to anything. So for now, we are counting it as Jacob's first pee on the potty.

Even though we're not formally working on potty training, we've been letting Jacob try it whenever he wants. Not surprisingly, he's a lot more interested in the big potty than the little one. The seat from his little chair fits onto the big one, and we can tell that he feels really proud when he's sitting there. He usually won't sit longer than about 30 seconds, but last night that was long enough to get that little trickle out. It's a start! Yay Jacob!

Making us laugh

Jacob has been doing a lot of things that make us laugh lately, or we just think it's really cute. We've been wanting to jot some of these things down, so I might as well do it here.

• He finally started talking about his baby sister. We think he's understood for quite awhile and was holding out on us. He doesn't say much, but he kisses Mommy's belly a lot and has been saying "baby sister" when he sees baby things.


• He's trying to sing songs. One is about the letter T (long story) and he just sings, "Oooooh, letter T" over and over. Another one is the theme song to "Bob the Builder," a show he does not watch but he learned the song from a toy he got for Christmas. My favorite is the song they sing when they clean up at his class. The last part of it goes, "Clean up, clean up, everybody do your share." Jacob sings it, "Clean up, clean up, everybody share." It comes out "kweem up," which I love.


• Making Daddy proud, Jacob is attempting to learn the Minnesota Rouser (at least the cheer part at the end). He will say a sequence of letters, such as "E, G, H, Q, W" and then "yaaaaaaaay Gophers! Rah!" Someday we'll teach him how to spell Minnesota.


• He's been using tools when a problem presents itself. The other day he wanted to get into the bathroom while Daddy was in the shower, but we have a cover on the door knob that he thankfully hasn't figured out yet. He went and got a toy wrench to work on it. Today he wanted to open the door from the house to the garage, which we keep locked. He found his set of toy keys and was trying to unlock the door.


• One of his favorite things to say lately: "Hi Mommy, what are you doing Mommy?" This also works well with Daddy.


• We've been letting him sit at the computer and type letters on a blank page. He seems to have already memorized the layout of the keyboard. He likes when we ask him to find a letter, and after he types it he points at the screen and says the letter.


• He loves telling us (especially Daddy) to write letters. Lately, he has been saying "please" after each letter. We are certain he learned this from watching Wheel of Fortune.

That's all I can think of right now. Unrelated to this list, here is a picture I took of him a couple of weeks ago. He had just had his nap and wasn't quite awake yet. I think he was watching a segment of Sesame Street with letters. We do that a lot after his nap, because for some reason he finds letters to be very soothing.

Jacob's New Room

Jacob moved into his new room on Saturday night. He's been pretty excited about it. Once it was painted, we started letting him explore and play in there, and started talking to him about how it was going to be his room. Once the bed was assembled, he was really excited. One of the first things he did was jump on it. On Saturday, he helped put up his Curious George wall stickers, and then he was really excited about his room. We decided to try having him sleep in there that night.

He did great! We were nervous that he might be afraid of a new room, and being out of the crib that he's slept in for 2 years, but he acted like we were making a big deal out of nothing. He loves sleeping in his new bed. We're expecting a few bumps along the way, but it seems like he was ready to make this move and is enjoying his new living space. So far, night sleep has not changed. He goes to sleep just as easily as he did in his crib. I've noticed that he likes to sleep by the rails, probably because they remind him of his crib. Naps have been pretty good too. Yesterday it took him 90 minutes to settle down and I wasn't sure he was even going to sleep, but eventually he did. I guess sometimes you just have to jump on the bed and run around your room before you can fall asleep.

Here are a few pictures of his room. The wall color is pretty true to life. We were going for a dark blue that wasn't too dark, and has a touch of gray to it. I'll have more later. The Curious George ones didn't turn out because of lighting issues.

Jacob's new bed, with a quilt that he got when he was born

Close up of his new sheet with cars and trucks--very exciting for him!

Some of his room accessories: plastic drawers (his new dresser that can't crush him), floor mat puzzle, and toy bins. He loves to put things away and then dump them out again. We also took the closet doors off so he can't pinch his fingers.


This is his new lamp. It looks really cool in his room (he even said so). I hope to get a good picture of it one of these days.

Christmas 2008 Picture Extravaganza

First, a few pictures from before Christmas:

Helping Daddy eat some "burger and fry" from his favorite fast food restaurant



Reading his favorite piece of literature--the trash and recycling collection schedule



Doing some coloring and showing us his "Where is it?" pose. I don't remember which color he was looking for.

December 23 - Our Christmas

Sharing some juice with Puppy at breakfast


At the Children's Museum: waving to all the people and cars below



Showing Daddy how to ride the bus (this was Daddy's first visit to the Children's Museum, so Jacob had to show him the ropes)



Doing a little grocery shopping...


...before cooking Christmas dinner


Jacob the science kid, discovering that water will weigh down a shovel and make it tip over


More water fun



Checking out his stocking - yay, new crayons!



Showing off all his trains (he got 3 new ones). He also got some new Curious George books and some slippers from us. His big present is a big boy bed, not pictured because it is not put together yet. We'll have pictures of his new room soon!

December 24 - Schoenbauer Christmas

Grandpa, Uncle Mike, and Jacob playing a rousing game of "Scene It?"



Jacob attacking his cousin Libby with a giant bear



The big present of the day: a big truck with cars inside!

December 25 - Boyum Christmas at Aunt Jena and Uncle Ty's house

Playing with his cars at our house. Jacob was very lucky that Uncle Mike and Aunt Katie dropped the truck off at our house. It was somehow left behind at Grandpa & Grandma Schoenbauer's.


Jacob helping to make muffins. He loves to stir the batter. He also loves to taste it. Strangely, he doesn't love eating the finished muffins quite so much.



OK, now we're at Jena and Ty's house. Jacob got some help opening his presents from Claire and Gracie.



Opening his big present - an oven! Yay, now he can cook for us. I need to get a picture of him with his other very large present, a Coca Cola bear that is bigger than he is. He loves to wrestle with it.

December 27 - Christmas in Iowa

We spent over an hour putting the oven together once we got home, so that Jacob could play with it the next morning. Here he is checking it out.



Aunt Jena & Uncle Ty gave him some pots and pans to cook in.


Turning up the burner



Christmas at Great-Grandpa & Grandma Kuehn's house, sitting with Mommy's cousin Tony and waiting patiently for presents. Jacob had a lot of fun playing with the "big kids" and was very upset when it was time to go home.


Checking out his new toy, fridge phonics. The letters are all magnets and there is a base to put them in, which tells you the sounds each letter makes. Jacob loves this!


He also got more magnets, letters and numbers. Everyone seems to know how much he likes learning these days!