Problem Solved! thanks everyone for your help!
here is what I did:
I removed the jumper from VCC to JD-VCC and powered JD-VCC separately on a power supply at first. that worked fine, the relays were pulling ~0.25A just to stay on, no way the arduino could have handled it on top of all other things I plugged on it.
In order to avoid using a separate power supply I wired the JD-VCC to a 7805 chip that allowed me to provide a good 5V supply to the relay from my 12V main power line. The chip can hold up to 1A so I think I should be fine, I also screwed it directly to the aluminum structure the system sits on so I'm not too worried about heat either.
thanks again for your help everyone!