How about a picture montage of Jacob's favorite activities:


Swinging in the big kid swing at the park just a few blocks away.


Monkeying around with daddy.


Hanging with the family (including grandma!) in San Francisco.


Attempting to crawl. Really, just rocking back and forth and smiling about it.


Reaching for things to play with, suck on, pinch, etc. while holding on to the couch.

He's still a happy boy, giggling for everyone and actually happily eating 2 rice cereal meals a day (this is only true since last week). Enjoy the pictures!

Jacob (the liar.)

Well, really Jacob never lied..I shoudn't call him a liar. He just made me a liar! Apparently typing that Jacob didn't like rice cereal made him willing to try it:)

He's eaten it sparingly but at least he isn't aggressively turning his head away. Honestly, his cereal covered bib and empty spoon seem to appeal to him more than the actual spoonfuls.

Cabbage patch kid growing in the garden...

5 months old and such a blast! We know we’re really lucky to have a kiddo with such gleeful demeanor and flexibility. Though he is able to eat his toes, I mean less physical flexibility and more flexibility with schedules, locations, who he’s around, etc.

His days here at seminary have been fun and chockful of interesting places and people. Aside from visiting the Berkeley marina and San Francisco, Jacob spends his days chilling with his buddy Jackson (21 months old), flailing and flying in his Johnny jump-up, and flirting/schmoozing heavily with all the seminarians. Obviously, we think highly of our little one but it sure is fun when other adults have fun playing with him, too. One such person told Jacob he is in the cabbage patch phase- chunky, bald, and smiling. We agree, thus the title this post. Though, to his defense, Jacob is finally beginning to get some more hair as you can see in the following pictures if you look hard enough.

Jacob doesn’t protest tummy time nearly as much and actually seems to enjoy doing what “big kids” (i.e. parents) do. From push-up position, he can easily flip himself onto his back and he now does so when he’s about to get his diaper and pj’s on at night. About 2 weeks ago, Jacob started some independent sitting. He's now up to about 30 seconds before he just can't quite maintain the upright position.

He also now enjoys standing a bit while holding on to the couch. He happily stands there until something distracts him and he turns his head with his whole body. But just look at those legs....they'd hold just about anyone upright :)

Needless to day, our little nudist doesn’t prefer clothing. In hopes of wearing him out before bed but avoid the cranky stage, we just have about ½ an hour of naked time for him. We can’t say that the end product is a baby who sleeps better, but at least he’s delighted up until the pj’s get put on.

We didn't want to introduce rice cereal too early but we felt that since Jacob is grabbing for food, drooling, and pretending to chew, we'd let him have a taste of some cereal. His reaction to it leaves us wondering if he'll ever willingly taste it again. He appears to absolutely hate it- to the point of clamping his mouth shut and shaking his head to avoid the spoon after just three bites. This is the kid that will put anything in his mouth and gnaw away. Perhaps when he's ready for pureed foods we'll just bypass the cereal all together....

That's the overall life of Jacob. He squeals, flails, and gnaws on anything around him. He is wearing mainly 6-9 month clothing but being that September is the "hot" month in Berkeley and we have no fans, little boy is having some flashbacks to AZ and naked afternoons. He really doesn't mind :). Much love to all from Berkeley! -We've only had one earthquake and it wasn't too bad, so don't be scared about visiting :)