Here’s our current posterity in order of age: Emma (13), Rebecca (12), Katherine (10), Abigail (7), Natalie (4), Sarah (2), and Jacob Andrew (four months). We were out in the yard the other evening and Jessica asked one of the kids to bring out the camera. It’s a good thing to occasionally record our children’s growth with pictures. The light was just right (for a minute or two) and we had the time, so we snapped out pictures of everybody.

All seven children are ours, and yes, we had six daughters before we had our son. And a good thing too, because we knew this pregnancy was the last one before we knew the gender of the child. There is something satisfying about the round, perfect number of seven, crowned at the end with a child to bear my name.

Someone mentioned that they hadn’t seen a picture of Jacob Andrew. Behold!

Jacob’s favorite thing to do (besides eat, which he does eight times a day) is standing up. So here we are in the living room on a Sunday afternoon, practicing his favorite thing to do. Jacob is four months old, in the 90th percentile for both height and weight–and in the 95th for head size. When he was born the pediatrician said, “It looks like he’ll have size 11 or 12 feet.” Which may mean he got his uncles’ tallness gene from both sides. I have to be nice to him now, while he’s still smaller than me.

Jacob is named after my great-grandfather, who immigrated from Switzerland in the mid-nineteenth century. I am proud of my Swiss heritage and of my stalwart forebears who were faithful to the gospel of Jesus Christ. I want to pass on that honorable heritage to my son by his name and by teaching him the principles that make for a happy life.