So Daddy has been hard at working trying to find a name that he and Mommy would like (and Connor too). I’ve been pretty good at keeping it a secret from the Grandparents and only tried names out on Uncle Danny and Mommy. Mommy shared “the name” with Laura (Abby and Isaac’s Mom) and she also decided to share it with Connor last week.

One night when we were tucking Connor into bed, he goes over to give Mommy her nightly kiss and lifted up her shirt and kissed her tummy (like normal). Then he said, “Good night, Jacob.” Well, I was shocked and then I knew the name had been chosen! Plus, it was only a matter of time before he would let it sneak out to the grandparents.

Saturday night, Mimi asked me what the baby’s name was and I told her to ask Connor. He said it a few times and then she finally picked up on what it was.

Sunday, Connor spent the day and night with Grandma. Here is part of our conversation on the phone Monday morning…
Grandma — “You have to be careful with what you tell your son.”
Daddy (worried he picked up on a bad word, even though I don’t say them) — “What did he say????”
Grandma — “He told me the baby’s name.”
Daddy and Grandma — laughed on the phone together

And to officially announce it, here’s Connor:

More on the full name tomorrow night!

Mommy has noticed that Jacob is kicking a lot more than Connor kicked. He kicks at all times of the day and night. At times, I feel Victoria “jump” in bed and then I ask her what is wrong. She says, “The baby kicked.”

Definitely a little more active than Connor at this stage. Mommy seems to be getting around pretty good but she is feeling the summertime heat. She is freezing Daddy out of the house. Normally she is the one who is cold in the house and I am hot/warm. Well, I am sleeping with a down comforter at night because our room is freezing cold!

So, remember all the time and effort that I put into building Connor’s swing set.  For 1 week Connor loved it and played on it!

Well, on Saturday Mimi and Papa came over and dropped off a sandbox to go under Connor’s new swing set. Since it was assembled and put under his swing set, I haven’t seen Connor swing or slide down the swing set.  All he wants to do is play with the sand!

That’s alright…Daddy is planning how he is going to expand the swing set into the trees (my neighbors are going to love me!).

Dinner with Mommy and Daddy outside:

Enjoying an ice pop outside!

was a blast! He are a few pics and videos of Connor enjoying himself there.

We were there for nearly 3 hours and most of that time was him climbing up and sliding down the slides in the videos. He absolutely loved it. Everyone had been telling us he would enjoy it and that we ALL would have a great time. Well, they were right! I think I was smiling and laughing the entire time he was in the pool with me. What a great time!

He would slide down, walk by me and give me a high five and then head right back up! What a great time!

Videos:

This birdhouse has been in this spot for 5 years and we never had a bird nest in it. So, the plan was to take it out. When I started laying out where everything was going (about 2 weeks ago), I started to notice that a bird was coming and going. Soon, there were two birds and one looks a little plump…

Fast forward to this weekend…I decide to leave the birdhouse for now. I put some “padding” around the pipe used as a pole for the birdhouse and taped it with blue tape. Hopefully, Connor and his buddies can coexist with the new family nesting above. As soon as the birds have hatched and moved out, then we will relocate the birdhouse.

Connor played outside with Daddy until 8:30pm tonight.  We finally went inside because it was getting dark.  Here are a couple clips of Connor playing outside.

Here is the animated slideshow (click on this for the animated slideshow…it may take a little while to load):

And the still pics can be found here:

After many hours of routing, sanding, cutting, staining, and two days of putting it together with 3 other helpers…we are proud to announce the “Connor and Baby 2 Swing Set”…

Daddy had a lot of help and unfortunately has been sick since Wednesday…on Saturday and Sunday I hardly had a voice. I think Uncle Danny appreciated that as I couldn’t “bark out orders” as much!

This is not one of those swing sets you can by from Lowes, Wal-Mart, Toys-R-Us…rather it is one that I got the plans online for about $20 and bought the wood and did it all myself.

I haven’t total it all up…but the wood, parts, etc…will run around $700 and it will last for a long time!

Thanks go to Uncle Danny, Mr. Wes (Isaac and Abby’s Dad), Mr. Mark (Daddy’s buddy), Uncle Bucky (for his advice from afar), and Mommy, Grandma, and Ms. Laura (Isaac and Abby’s Mom) for making the food while we worked! I appreciate all the help you guys gave me…we did a GREAT JOB and it is so sturdy that I can swing on it with Connor!!! (Now we all know that is really why I made it!)

I am not quite done as we have to put a rock wall on the back. I didn’t buy enough wood for that piece on the first go round…I’ll post pics of that once it is done in about 2 weeks.

Here is the finished product!

After a long hard day of watching Daddy and Uncle Danny work on his swingset, Connor had a sleep over with Uncle Danny at Grandma’s house.

Here is Connor watching Daddy and Uncle Danny working on his swingset from the back door.  He’s go his water, crackers, and chair…and is relaxing as we worked hard.  He was waiting in anticipation of the final product.  (Sorry for the glare on the glass…)

Here is Connor having fun with Uncle Danny after dinner at Grandma’s house…

and…