All About the Z's!

Celebrations

2012-01-29T09:09:00.000-05:00

This weekend we celebrated Amy's Mom's birthday, along with Heather C and Rob D's birthdays. We also had a very belated Christmas gift exchange for the kids! Zachary was counting down the days for this weekend as he knew that he was getting more gifts - oh the excitement! :)

We started off the celebration with Mom and Aunt Louise coming over for lunch - Amy tried out two new recipes - veggie burger roast (yum) and crockpot scalloped potatoes (very yummy when made properly!). Unfortunately she went awry somewhere in the scalloped potatoes, so that was a little less than she had hoped for, but at least edible! :)

After naps, the kids headed off to the park with the men and the ladies headed to Deiningers to put dinner together. We had the pleasure of the Oliver family visiting from Sebring, so it was fun to be able to catch up with them as well. Lisa made a delicious cheesecake to celebrate the birthdays, and delectable potato salad and roasted potatoes (to go along with grillers and taco salad). We ended the evening with the gifts, and a quick tour through the Cochran pictures of their trip to New Zealand - beautiful! We definitely will be adding this to the future Zbaraschuk travel "bucket list!" :)

As a way of spicing up the fun of our blog, we decided to include a riddle this week and perhaps next. Then, we'll provide the answers in a few weeks - so don't post an answer comment on the blog as we don't want to make the answers too easy for everyone else! So this week's riddle is "What bakes in an oven but does not get eaten?"

Phrase of the week: Kaleb is struggling at home with putting on his sneakers every day (even though he does it with no problem each day at Miss Jennifer's!!!!) when Mommy asks. One day was particular difficult, resulting in much whining and fussing with him saying pitifully "But Mommy, it is just really, really, hard for me!!" Then when she tells him to put his finger at the back of the shoe to hold the back from getting pushed down with his heel, he cries even more pitifully and holds up his finger in a pathetic bent fashion in front of her face to say "But Mommy, my finger really, really hurts!" AHHHHH. The child totally has Mommy's "number" and doesn't want to be responsible for even such a small task as putting on his shoes! Our two children could not be much more different as Zachary knew how to put on his shoes (demanding to do it!), knew which foot they went on etc, at a much younger age. Zachary's phrase this week comes from his sweet willingness to help out a 'bro' from time-to-time - getting exasperated and putting on his shoes for him, getting his vitamins for him, helping him with all sorts of tasks. He looks up at Amy and says in an exasperated voice "Ugh, I have to do everything for Kaleb!" Amy informs him that he does NOT need to do any of those tasks for his brother (and she's never asked him to help) but that it is awfully sweet of him to help out his brother. Perhaps we should cut off all assistance - maybe that would help Kaleb get a march on! :)

Playing hockey with Dad - much to Zachary's delight, he "won"!

Sankey Sojourn

2012-01-22T21:10:00.000-05:00

We had the pleasure last weekend of having Aunt Elaine and Uncle Murray come to visit Florida. It was so fun to catch up and visit with them. Zachary and Kaleb were intrigued to ask them questions about their bison, and of course see pictures!

Going for a bike ride with Uncle Murray

Reading a Canadian Wildlife book with Auntie Elaine

We spent the day at Seaworld on Sunday - the entire day, which was kind of fun as we don't do that very often, so we were able to catch almost all of the shows which was a real treat.

Missing Karis, and Kaleb's face is dark, but Zachary was not in a "photo-mood" so we took what we could get! :)

Kaleb on the other hand was pleased to take pictures with Uncle Murray!

Ready for the Shamu Show

Best Seat at the Show - talk about riding in luxury!

Karis headed off for his second "male only" ski trip in Utah on Saturday, so Amy and the kids are batching it until Wednesday. We went over to Cochrans yesterday as they offered to watch Kaleb while Zachary was in Adventurers, so that was fun. Today we headed to the zoo to spend the morning with Deiningers, Hilliards and Cochrans. The weather was perfect, so we were really blessed!

All the kids, but Kieran is perfectly hiding behind Kaleb so he's not visible in this picture. Bad photographer! :)

Kaleb and Kieran plotting their path through the zoo on the map

Phrase of the week: Mommy, I prayed to Jesus that my head wouldn't hurt because I didn't take a nap today, and it worked! :) Yeah, thank you God, it is awesome to have some "yes" answers to prayer to help teach your children about the power of prayer!

New Year's Whimper

2012-01-08T21:07:00.001-05:00

Well, instead of welcoming in the new year with a bang, we definitely welcomed it with a whimper. Amy had a four day weekend off, so we joined Bergherms and Hilliards at the Science Center on Friday, which was very fun. The kids had fun at the bug excitement, the cars activities, the dinosaur floor, and of course eating lunch at the Subway! :) One scary moment, we lost track of little Maddie and couldn't find her anywhere. Beginning to panic, Amy prayed and no joke, turned around and there was Miss Maddie - where we had just come from. Thank you God!

We then went downhill, thanks for nothing. Saturday the boys both ended up getting fevers, which weren't anything much to write home about other than it wrecked our plans to go with Hilliards to SeaWorld for New Year's Eve. Bummer. We were up part of the night off and on - not from celebrating but from listening to our neighbor's fireworks going off - even until 2:30A. We know this as we were up with Kaleb, whose fever woke him up at 2A. Why do people think that it is acceptable to still be sending off fireworks at 2:30A??

The highlight of the weekend was that we opened presents with Grandma. The kids thought they had reached nirvana with all those presents to open and play with!

Monday, Amy ended up falling prey to a severe head cold - probably from the lack of sleep from the weekend. The boys recovered nicely and Amy has marginally improved each day - with several days being in quarantine to try and keep the boys from getting the cold!

So all in all it's been a relatively quiet week, although the big event is that Zachary has a new bike! It is two sizes bigger than his last bike, so our fingers are crossed that this won't end up in a broken bone, but Daddy believes that he can handle it just fine.

Phrase of the week: Inhale breath, tilt head up into the air, put index finger on pursed lips and say "Hmmmmmmm." Not sure where this new "trick" has come from, but both boys now have picked it up. It is funny to watch, so we parents have a hard time keeping a straight face! :)

Holidaze

2012-01-02T09:02:00.001-05:00

This was the Zbaraschuk family Christmas - and we celebrated together in fine style up at the farm. We spent a total of 10 days there. When we landed, there was NO SNOW on the ground in Saskatoon, which caused a bit of panic for one Zachary but thankfully as we drove the 2 hours to the farm, by the time that we got there about four inches of snow blanketed the ground.

The kids had a FANTASTIC time playing with their cousins Emily, Connor and Kaylie. Kaleb adored Kaylie, and immediately began referring to her as "my little friend" - they were too cute all week playing together and laughing. As the house is large, there was a lot of running around but the kids also went outside a few times each day to sled. We were fortunate that the weather was quite mild, and the kids could be outside as much as they wanted. In fact, we had a couple of times above freezing! Who knew!?

Korey and Rachel joined the family there, so we had all of the Zbaraschuk brothers together. It was fun to catch up with everyone, REST, read (okay, that is just Amy's favorite thing to do), and play. There was entirely too much eating (Lorie is much to blame as she kept making Amy's FAVORITE Ukrainian dishes!!) - in fact at one point Rachel and Amy were comiserating over the level of pain that we were experiencing as we kept over-eating at each meal! :)

We went to the bowling alley the first Sunday that we arrived, and it was quite fun as Kaleb was big enough to play. It was 5 pin bowling where the balls are small, so the kids could actually bowl without too much difficulty. They also have a small rides/activity area there, so we headed over to the bumper cars, bounce house etc afterwards for some final minutes of fun.

With the sun not rising until about 8:45ish, Kaleb treated us to several mornings of a post 8AM wake-up and Zachary did his very best to sleep until 7A each morning (pretty good for Mr. Z, so we'll take it). The parents however stayed up playing games and working on puzzles, so we did not cash on on the extra sleep as much as we'd like! :)

Phrase of the week: Grandma is the luckiest person I know. Why is that Zachary? Because she lives where it snows! Kaleb's phrase occurred after he bumped his head on the headboard of his bed. He looked up very worried to Amy and said "Am I going to lose the rest of my hair?" Poor kid! No you won't sweetie! On that note, we should give an update that his hair appears to be growing back fast and furious, of which we are SO THANKFUL!

Korey and his Dad enjoying some relaxed time on the couch!

Playing "Up and Down the River"

The kids wrestling with Uncle Korey

One of our delicious meals

Playing with the very cool car track - the kids got the hang of it fairly quickly.

Holding hands with his "little friend" Kaylie - so precious!

The whole family

Grandkids and Grandparents

Party, Party, Party

2011-12-17T21:57:00.000-05:00

Last weekend, we had a rare treat of going out for an "adults-only" evening out on Saturday night AND going to the Corporate party on Sunday to Epcot. It was a true party weekend! :)

On Saturday night we headed off to eat at PF Changs with Cochrans and Johnsons. The food was good but the company was even better! We actually started the evening off with a bit of a jolt - when we received a letter from our Discover card indicating that there had been potential fraudulent attempts to access our credit card. Karis called before we left for the restaurant, only to find out that Discover had actually issued an emergency credit card to a guy by the name of Mario earlier that week under our account. Mario had charged 8,000 in the 2 days that he had the card. Thankfully we aren't responsible for that, but it is deeply disturbing to 1) realize that someone has enough of your personal information to actually GET a credit card under your account and 2) that Discover suspected that it was fraud and yet still gave him a credit card?!!??? We're now in the process of trying to figure out how to protect ourselves from any further fraud attempts. Fun, fun, fun.

On to truly fun things - the rest of the evening was as blast as we ended the evening by meeting up with Steinkes at Sak's Comedy Club. It was a hoot as always, and we laughed ourselves silly.

Jeff and William hamming it up for the camera, while Kelli and Kent are hidden behind Karis!

On Sunday morning we headed off to Epcot where we met our friends the Hilliards. We had a great time exploring the educational exhibits and then the countries. We stopped at France to have some pastries - YUMMY!

Zachary and Loghann posing nicely for a picture

Kaleb, Zachary, Cole & Loghann waiting for the China movie to start.

The fam....not too bad of a picture

Merry Christmas! We wish everyone safe travels and a happy holiday season with family!

Phrase of the week: Zachary was talking to Amy one day and said "Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't - Mom, that's an 'spression, right?" Kaleb's discussion was with Mommy as well, in which he told her that he wanted to do something. She responded "No, let's not do that" Kaleb's response? "I did it already" She turns around and sure enough, he'd already done it before he even told her that he was going to do it! Good thing it wasn't anything too dramatic!

How Many Men Does it Take....

2011-12-10T16:49:00.000-05:00

It sounds like the beginning of a good old joke, and it is in fact quite funny! This story actually happened at the end of September, when Amy's cousin Jeff and Niesha moved down from Asheville to Orlando. Uncle Ken and Aunt Ev had come over to our house, and Zachary had coerced Uncle Ken into playing frisbee with him outside. Apparently one of Zachary's throws went wild, and landed high up in our tree. Zachary uttered a frustrated "UGH" and stomped into the garage, emerging with Dad's hockey stick to try and get the frisbee out of the tree (smart thinking Zachary!). That wasn't quite long enough, so back he stomped into the garage only to emerge with a long piece of baseboard molding. That apparatus didn't have a hook to try and unhook it from the branch, so finally Dad to the rescue. It took 3 men to rescue the Frisbee, with Zachary standing on Daddy's shoulders manuevering the hockey stick and Uncle Ken holding Zachary steady! :) What teamwork! They rescued the Frisbee!

While that was a random story, we didn't want to let too much time pass before we managed to get it into one of our blog posts, becuase it was such a great picture! Last weekend, we had a very busy time on Sabbath when we went to Pastor Mark and Deborah Reams house for lunch with all of the other table teachers/Sabbath School assistants from Zachary's class. It was really fun to get to know them all a bit better, and to talk with the teacher Miss Deanna without 40 kids running around! :) After that, Zachary and Amy headed off to Adventurers where was once again named "Adventurer of the Day" - we're proud of you Zachary!

After Adventurers, we zipped over to the Bergherm's house where they were holding their annual Christmas party. It was of course complete with beautiful decorations and yummy food! Jennifer set up a "decorate your own cookie" station for the kids, which they of course thought was delicious! Corey lead out in a game session, with probably 5-7 games that were very fun to play.

Karis and his partner trying to throw Christmas cards, one by one, into a bucket. VERY hard!

The highlight (or should we say DOWNlight?) of the evening was......GASP.....discovering a huge patch of bald scalp on Kaleb - right on the crown of his head. It is about as long as Amy's index finger, and about as wide. He was sitting in front of her on the floor when she caught a glimpse of it, and she reached out to tussle his hair and discovered it. Our friend Allen informed her that Karis must be messing with her, so she ran with Kaleb into the front room to inquire - only to have Karis be as bewildered as she was. We have no done as much research as one can do on hair loss, only to remain as befuddled as we once were. We've taken him to the dermatologist, only to have her remain in the land of uncertainty as well. We truly have no idea - but we have a sneaking suspicion that it was the zip-line the week before at the Corn Maze. The zipline ends rather abruptly, and the kids were taking fairly large "swings" at the end - somehow Kaleb managed to get turned around and when he "swung" up, he thunked his head REALLY hard on the wooden cross bar. He didn't cry, but several minutes later he was still walking around rubbing his head because it hurt. Kaleb's skin has always been incredibly sensitive, so we're wondering if the friction/impact of the zipline was enough to bruise his hair follicles, and it took several days for the hair to die and fall out. We probably won't ever know FOR SURE, but unless other patches start to fall out, we can rule out alopecea (thank you Lord) and the doctor said that it wasn't ringworm. Now we're just waiting with baited breath hoping and praying that it grows back, although she said that it could take several months to grow back. Poor kid, he doesn't have very thick hair to begin with (long hair, yes, thick hair, no)! Mommy's worst nightmare! A balding three-year-old!! :)

The other big event this week was the grand opening of Amy's new workplace. It was amazing. Jawdropping. Overwhelming. Wow. After a month it'll seem ho-hum, but for now it is eye-boggling. Monday she reports to her new workplace - a whole 8 minutes from home, and CLOSER than Karis' workplace! :)

Phrase of the week: "Mommy, I'm a super hero cleaner!" Mommy's ears immediately perk up! Let's try this out! Super Hero Zachary, pick up the books in your room! WHAT? It's working. Super Hero Kaleb, pick up the socks on the floor. WOW! It worked again! In no time, the house was CLEAN! Maybe these Super Heros will stick around and live here forever!!! Having Super Hero Cleaners zoom around picking things up as their Mommy stands in the Central Command shouting instructions is fabulous!!! Kaleb's conversation this week began with Mommy informing him "Kaleb, your nose is running." Kaleb's answer: "Where?"

At school this week, they had a Christmas party, and kids dressed up as Florida "Crackers" (Pioneers?) Not sure about our get-up, but it was the best that we had! :) Zachary had a fun time dressing up!

Corn Maze-ing It Up!

2011-12-03T23:00:00.000-05:00

Last weekend of course was American Thanksgiving. We so enjoyed the four days off, and tried to cram in as much as possible on our "to-do" lists as we could. It reminded us once again that we could REALLY do some serious catch-up if we ever could resign ourselves to a "stay-cation!"

We started off the holiday with Thanksgiving dinner at our house with Grandma and the Johnsons. It was a yummy meal and we have a fun visit.

The next day, we went on our second trip out to the Long & Scott Farms corn maze. We went last year, and it was enjoyable enough that we decided to do it again. It was a huge group this time (sorry, there were SO many people that I'm not even going to attempt to write down who was there, because I'll for sure miss someone, but let's just say that the usual suspects were there!) :).

This year, we decided to tackle the kid's maze, which was just perfect. They had five color stations where you would mark your fingers one-by-one, and at the end you'd have a fortune. It kept the kids very entertained hunting for these things because it was fun to mark your fingers! The kid's maze was much smaller, and so we were in there for about 30 minutes total - unlike last year where we wandered in the big maze endlessly until we found a map of the board and Amy "cheated" by taking a picture of the maze so that we could refer to her camera as a makeshift GPS to get ourselves out of there. This time, we all walked out of there with smiles on our faces, so it was a success!

Marking his finger at one of the stations

A few of the kids at the top of a rickety bridge!

The other entertainment there is really fun, so the kids had a blast on the playground set, a bounce "pillow', and of course the famous zip line. The kids could have stayed all afternoon, but the parents decided that afternoon naps should occur so we reluctantly left after a very fun morning.

What an action shot of Zachary in mid-air before landing on the bounce "pillow"

Zipline fun!

We ended our Friday with having the Isidros and Johnsons over for supper. We had missed Alan's birthday a few weeks back, so wanted to make it up to him. The kids all had a fun time - especially when we made "rockets" out of alkaseltzer tablets and old film cases.

First time holding baby Erik - Zachary is in love!

Saturday we hit the bowling alleys for a bit of fun - the kids really think that bowling is just wonderful. We are hoping to go 5 pin bowling while we're in Canada, where the balls are perfect size for the little guys!

Sunday ended our fun, but busy, weekend with a Zbaraschuk "first". We actually put up lights on our front hedge.....and tiny reindeer with lights. We didn't want to go too crazy, so we haven't done anything else yet but it is a far cry from the old dark house that we've had in years past. It is amazing what you'll do for a 5 year old, who is begging to have lights on the house. Speaking of which, we have begun the nightly "Christmas light pageant" drive, where Karis and the boys drive around neighborhoods looking for the most amazing lights. Good times! :)

Phrase of the week: We went to Amy's office to pick up some things (they're moving to the new Corporate Office building in a week), and Kaleb saw the baby pictures on her desk and said "That's Baby Me!" So sweet. Zachary's phrase this week was part of a conversation about school. Amy asked him whether he had made a new friend at lunch that day by introducing himself. Zachary said "no", and Amy replied that this is the method of making new friends, you introduce yourself etc. Zachary then said "I have lots of friends, but I'm keeping it a secret." Ha ha - not sure how they can be friends with you if it is a secret Zachary, but oh well!

Totally random, but I took a picture last time we went to Canada of them in their snowsuits. Zachary was in the red one last time of course! They're so excited, now cross our fingers for a lot of snow!

How Much Can Crazy Z's Fit into One Weekend - Camping and Legoland!

2011-11-24T08:12:00.000-05:00

Two weeks ago, Amy flew to Dallas on Thursday and Friday when she returned we packed into the van and headed out to Clearwater Lake Recreation Area where we camped (first maiden camping voyage) with 7 other families. The other families participating in the event were Bergerms, Biris, Cochrans, Deiningers, Isidros, Grodacks, and Vargas'. The only glitch is that the weather that night was 44 degrees. FREEZING.

Group shot but unfortunately taken after the Vargas' had already left for the day

So with the frigid temperatures, we crawled into our tent (all set up for us when we arrived - what customer service from our dear friend William!). Zachary first noticed that he could see the light at the campfire, and of course could hear talking from the other campsites. It was a difficult effort to get the boys asleep with the excitement but tucked snugly into their sleeping bags with tuques firmly tied on their heads, they finally fell asleep. Karis soon joined them in dreamland while Amy desperately laid there, wanting to go to sleep!!! Alas, Amy couldn’t get warm to save her life, and at 1A after laying awake looking at the ceiling, she decided that perhaps the fact that she needed a bathroom visit was the reason for the lack of sleep…….so imagine her running through the woods to the nearest bathroom (a good 5 minute walk away!) and along the road with her flashlight bouncing all around and her teeth literally chattering to visit the loo. Not recommended - why can't women pee as easily in the woods as men can!!? :)

She climbed back into bed, but frankly every time she moved, her tuque (which didn't have ties!) would shimmy up, exposing more and more skin, so the cold continued. She longed for a scarf at this moment, but it was not to be. She finally fell into a brief respite only to have Zachary cough around 3 and the boys woke up around 4:30 indicating that they too were cold, so climbed into our sleeping bags for a while before deciding that wasn’t going to cut it either…..so we all laid awake counting the minutes until it would be morning. Needless to say, as soon as they heard other voices from our friends' nearby tents they were up like a lightning bolt!

Other than the frigid temperatures, it was a fun experience with everyone. We had a Sabbath School in the morning complete with Sabbath School songs, a story by Uncle William and with Aunt Lisa calling out a game of Bible bingo. After that concluded, we then walked down to the lake for the kids to play with the football. Allan brought PVC pipe cut up into small pieces and showed the kids how to make a marshmallow shooter (huge hit as you can imagine!!). We then ate lunch and then headed off for a walk around the lake (after an unsuccessful attempt to get Kaleb to nap) where Aunt Lisa created a scavenger hunt of special shaped leaves, moss, feathers, acorns, small pebble, bark etc (with the special rule that everything had to be found already laying loose on the ground and not attached to a living plant). The bear droppings discovered along the way confirmed the park ranger's words of advice as we arrived (keep ALL food and toothpaste in your cars as there are bears here!!)

Trying to warm up the next morning by the fire!

Sabbath School

Trying out the marshmallow shooter

Hiding behind Daddy so that he can EAT the marshmallows!

What walk is complete with swinging between Daddy and Uncle William!

Complete fascination with the fire - thank you Angels for making sure that he didn't fall in!

Filthy and happy eating a smore!

Just to keep our lives a bit crazy, we packed up Saturday night and headed home for a sound night of sleep (that was the sane part of our weekend!) before getting once again into the van and heading off to the Legoland (2nd time in 2 weeks!) with a group of friends. There were about 7 families, but we hung around with the Hilliards for the day as Madison and Kaleb were the smaller kids and thus were both limited in being able to do all of the rides. Oddly enough, the day was a Sunday and the weather was PERFECT and there were NO LINES – unlike the Friday that we had gone with the Gruias where the weather was terrible. Very strange. We literally waited for no longer than 5 minutes for any of the rides. Our boys have continued their love of roller coasters – going on four of them multiple times! :)

All the kids waiting to get into Legoland!

This Lego "man" was sleeping and snoring - Daddy teased that it reminded him of Papa Z, so the boys had to get their picture taken on Papa Z's lap! :)

That weekend marked the fourth weekend in a row that Karis has been away from our house on the weekend – so we’re looking forward to some quiet time to regroup and get some things done around the house. Although, we’re not sure when that will happen as the holidays are always crammed with too much to do in too little time!

This Sunday we actually had the FH Gala, at which Bill Cosby was the star entertainer. Always fun to get dressed up, and this year we saved a bit of money and Amy just wore a dress from one of our early galas - gotta love the ability to recycle!

Phrase of the week: Zachary upon seeing Karis in his tuxedo, complete with bowtie, looks inquisitively up at him and says "Why does Daddy have a hairbow like a girl?" Ha ha! Kaleb's is a sound..."slurp, slurp....slurp, slurp" This is the sound of Kaleb eating a yummy Vitamin C (one of Amy's childhood and adulthood favorites as well!) as he savors the vitamin without actually chewing it - it makes his mouth water so there is a lot of slurping! :)

Saying Good-bye

2011-11-19T21:39:00.000-05:00

Still in the process of catching up on our missed blog posts! :) Here is the 2nd "catch-up"!

Karis and Amy, along with Jeff and Niesha, flew up to Canada to pay our respects to Amy’s Dad. The memorial was held on November 5th. Kaleb managed to get croup the night before we left – the boys seem to sense when we’re leaving town! But, Amy had some leftover medication from the last time that this happened so she did what ever good parent should NOT do and she self-medicated him. Thankfully it worked like a charm so Amy’s mom didn’t have any problems while we were up in Canada.

The family all arrived Friday and left on Sunday, so it was a quick trip to enjoy each other’s company. It was great fun, especially as we hadn’t seen Amy’s cousin Kim for a long time. The funeral was a mixture of course of tears and some chuckles – but it was a nice tribute to Dad’s life. Brad made a great collage and video of pictures from Dad's life, and it was really special to see all of those. The church was full to the brim, with probably 100-120 people in attendance - many from our Portage days, so that was a real blessing to talk with everyone. The family had a time of remembering Dad that afternoon, and talking about the faith that he had and the hope of heaven - it was really special to talk about Dad with loved ones and remember the highlights.

Brad, Amy, Grandma, Cam, Kim, Scott and Jeff on the floor in front.

That Sunday we took Jeff and Niesha to the airport and then headed out to Portage to take some pictures of where Amy grew up – as it may be a while before we’re back (although we plan to take the boys on a road trip some day to see some of these places). We had a very fun lunch with Nicole and her husband Todd, where we caught up on everything. We ended the night with Norma James, and a surprise game of Scrabble with Dorothy Wollman and Pastor Jamieson and his wife.

The house where Amy grew up - it used to be yellow! It recently was sold to a new owner, and they were in the process of doing a lot of renovations on it.

Tiny church where Amy grew up - what fun memories though!

Childhood & Adulthood! friend Nicole

Grandma Norma!

The farewell "gift" of the trip was that as we got up Monday morning to leave, we were treated with 2 special events - one was the first snow of the seaon for Winnipeg as we woke up to a white world! The second was hitting the Roots outlet store as we walked in, asked where the kids clothes with the Canadian flags were, and then proceeded to have the fastest spending spree ever as we were on a tight time crunch to get ourselves back to the airport on time for our flights! :) We do love to wear Canadian gear though!

Anna Maria Island - Beach Living at Its Best

2011-11-19T21:19:00.002-05:00

The last month has been a bit crazy, hence the lack of faithful posts. Our apologies to the faithful readers, we’ll promise to try and do better so that you don’t abandon us! :) But, we'll try and catch it all up here in a few posts - all in one fell swoop!

The last post of course was the news of the passing of Amy’s Dad. That weekend, Amy’s highschool roommate and dear friend, Carmen Gruia and her family flew from Portland, Oregon to enjoy some warm weather at the beach. Carmen has three children – Anique (8), Ava (6) and Andon (2). Karis had to fly up to Chicago that weekend for a continuing education class, so we hung around Orlando that weekend until he returned on Sunday night before heading out to the beach. We had a lovely time in Orlando though – and took the kids to the zoo on Sunday where they had these cool air balls that the kids would be zipped into and could “run”/flip/crawl around inside the ball to get it to move around on a shallow pool of water. The kids thought that it was a blast!

A little older, hopefully wiser, but still the best of friends!

Monday morning we loaded the van and car and headed off to Anna Maria Island, where we had rented a 6 bedroom house. It was awesome , about 1.5 blocks from the beach down a very quiet street, heated pool, pool table and lots of room for all of us to spread out. The beach was pretty quiet, with the water being pretty shallow so the kids could go and play. Unfortunately the water was a little chillier than we would have desired but after the initial “brisk”reaction it was just fine to get into the water and play. On Thursday the wind kicked up a little bit and the kids were actually able to boogie-board. Zachary managed to figure out how to handle his board all by himself because the waves were pretty small and broke close to shore – so he confidently informed his father that he would NOT be needing assistance in the future. Good luck Zachary when we take you back to the Daytona side of Florida where the waves are bigger, faster and crest much farther out where you would have to be in much deeper water trying to get on the board! But, we’ll let the dream live a little longer…..

Doesn't this house just exude "beach"!? It was just around the corner from Publix (as well as the beach) - it was PERFECT!

Hurrah for being buried! - Zachary, Kaleb and Ava enjoyed the sand

Three beach babes - Ava, Carmen and Anique

Boogie Boarding School! :)

On Friday we packed up and headed to Legoland. The fact that it was a Friday and RAINING made us think that it would be relatively deserted. No such luck – 45 to 80 minute waits for rides. Ouch. But, we had fun anyway and enjoyed trekking around the park.

Sabbath we ended our week and on the way back to Orlando we stopped at the Clearwater Aquarium where the famous dolphin “Winter” who lost part of her tail lived. It was pretty neat to see the documentary on how they made the prosthetic tail for her. The bad part of the trip was that the aquarium is tiny and they don’t have room to handle all of the visitors now that they have become famous – so cars had to park on a gravel dirt lot. As Amy was walking into the aquarium she went to put her smartphone into her backpack and dropped it – only to have it drop face first down on a protruding rock. You guessed it – smashed to smithereens. It still worked but it was a cool $100 to get it fixed. Thanks for nothing! Oh well, could have been worse.

We were sad to see the week end with our visit with the Gruias. We had such fun – we’ll want to do it again soon! The boys actually played perfectly together with the girls – we weren’t sure as sometimes our kids can be little wild Indians, but they were on their best behavior all week and they had a blast playing together. Interestingly enough, they kind of switched who they played with throughout the week, but it seemed like Zachary and Anique gravitated toward each other and Ava and Kaleb paired off – even though Zachary and Ava are the same age. It's apparently a love of older women! :)

Uncle Ervin was "playing" the children's feet like a piano - to which they were of course laughing hysterically!

One of the first nights at the beach, we headed down to a nearby playground that was housed on the beach itself. While there, one of the trip's highlights was the fact that a dolphin was visible just off the shore as he swam around the water - coming up periodically and of course giving us much excitement!

Ervin and Andon on the walk back after the dolphin excitement!

Chasing the sea gulls while we waited for the dolphin to surface

Phrase of the week: Zachary's was his comment that weekend prior to leaving for Anna Maria Islando when he solemnly asked Amy "Mommy, can one of my girlfriend's ride in the car with me to the beach?" There truly is no question that Zachary loves his "girlfriends!" :) Lately, Kaleb has been very "Daddy-centric" and all roads lead to Daddy, so this week's phrase is devoted to Daddy. "No, I want to be with Daddy. No, I want to snuggle with Daddy. I want to ride in the car with Daddy. I want to sit on Daddy's lap. I want Daddy to hold me.....DADDY!"

Tribute - Eugene Peter Babiuk

2011-10-22T23:38:00.001-04:00

On October 22nd, Eugene Babiuk passed away, and this post is dedicated to him.  He was my Dad. He was loved, and will be dearly missed.

He spent his last years with a passion for Christ, enjoying giving sermons at church, children's stories and leading out in Bible studies. He wanted to show his love for Christ, and was re-baptized again 7 days before he died.  He also volunteered at the local Adventist Community Services, and it was a highlight for him to go and help in any way that he could - often driving an hour each way even in the dead of winter to be there for his volunteer shift.

He will be remembered for his kindness, his quiet sense of humor, and for his love. He will be remembered as someone who loved his three children immensely, and would make every effort to go and watch Cam and Brad's curling and hockey games every chance that he could after his retirement. Curling of course, such a truly Canadian sport in my mind, was one of his favorites and he used to be on a curling team all of my growing up years. He was a hard-working man who worked two jobs year-round, adding another two seasonal jobs during the summer. How he managed on so little sleep was amazing.

I'll never forget going out with Dad on my very first summer job, helping him to cut the grass on school lawns surrounding our little town of Portage la Prairie. He also helped to teach me how to drive a stick-shift - being brave enough to lend me his little truck to practice on!   He would always take me out water-skiing during the summer, always content just to drive the boat while I skiied behind. One of my favorite memories was taking the long drive to Alberta to visit family, and all along the way I quizzed him about what life was like when he was a child in the "olden" days! :)

His life and love will always bring a smile to my face, and my heart aches with the loss - but I know that he truly loved Christ and that he has the hope of heaven someday. Going through the loss of a loved one who has been in your life for so long brings a lot of reflections with it, it has been a rough couple of weeks but I am so fortunate to have loved ones in the form of family and friends who have walked every step of this with me. I will always be thankful for the memories that I have of Dad, and for the fact that I was able to talk to him so frequently as the end of his life drew near - even the night before he went to the hospital.

Gene Babiuk's life made a difference, to those around him and to those that loved him. His life made a difference to me.

Rest in peace.

Copy of Obituary:

EUGENE PETER BABIUK July 1, 1940 - October 22, 2011 Eugene passed away peacefully on Saturday, October 22, 2011 at Concordia Hospital, Winnipeg, with his family at his bedside. He was predeceased by his father, Peter. He will be lovingly remembered by his sons Cam (Tracey) and Brad, their mother Olga, daughter Amy (Karis), grandsons Zachary and Kaleb, mother Lena, sisters Evelyn (Ken) and Elaine (Murray), nephews Jeff (Niesha), Scott (Patricia), and niece Kim (Yan). Cremation has taken place. Memorial service will be held at Transcona Seventh Day Adventist Church, 133 Regent Ave. E. Winnipeg on Saturday, November 5, 2011 at 7:00 p.m. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to ACS (Adventist Community Services) or The Canadian Cancer Society. Our family extends special thanks to Dr. Du Plessis and Eugene's Home and Palliative Care providers.

O Canada!

2011-10-16T13:43:00.000-04:00

Of course this entry must begin with a nod to our northern loved ones. It was Canadian thanksgiving last weekend and Lisa D opened her home 24 of her nearest and dearest friends to celebrate the occasion. It was quite the food festival as one would expect, but Lisa really outdid herself by having Thanksgiving crafts there for the herd of children as well. Well done!

Jenn's TRYING to get Evan to look at the camera for the three little boys' pictures! :)

Segretation of the Sexes - Women on the side closest to the children to be able to pop up and assist as needed!

Kaleb is in gymnastics this year as mentioned, so Amy was able to sneak away from work this week to participate in one of the "parent watch" opportunities. He was proud as punch to have her there, and would wave and call to her throughout the time. So cute! There are four little boys (including Evan B), and Kaleb and Evan are the youngest. Kaleb isn't always quite sure what he is doing, so he watches the older boys intently and copies them. Evan is the "free spirit" of the group as the youngest by about 6 months, doing his best to follow instructions but sometimes adding his own twist to things! :)

Phrase of the week: Our power went out last Sunday for several hours just as the boys were going to bed - this disturbed them greatly as their respective noise makers went off in their rooms. Kaleb crawled out of his crib (yep, no keeping this kid in his crib anymore!!!) to come ask Mommy to turn it back on. When she explained that she couldn't turn it on because there was no power, he earnestly said to her "Yes, Mommy, you can - try really, really hard!!!" Zachary's phrase is actually something that his parents have begun at naptime that we say to him - it is a story of a little boy Zachary on an adventure.....Zachary usually requests "Tell me a story about Zachary, and include him seeing some really big animals!" Amy's stories have included Zachary over in Africa riding a zebra, white water rafting and flying back a grizzly bear, to making a snow cave to take a nap in......if these stories were true, what an exciting life! :)

Steinkes Arrive - Bringing the Cool Weather With Them!

2011-10-08T15:27:00.000-04:00

We were excited last weekend when Amy's cousin Jeff and wife Niesha moved down from N. Carolina. We were especially excited when they brought Jeff's mom and Dad - Aunt Ev and Uncle Ken with them! We were OVER THE TOP excited when they brought cool Fall weather with them! Yippee on all counts!

We are very excited to have Jeff and Niesha living down here - we hope that they will enjoy Orlando! They're living in Amy's Mom's old house until they figure out where they ultimately want to live and save to buy a house - so that worked out well for all parties.

Zachary asked Aunt Ev to play "5 Little Monkeys" with him - of course he doesn't know HOW to play, so poor Aunt Ev ended up having to read the instructions! :)

Zachary and Kaleb were beside themselves of course, because they LOVE playing with Jeff and Niesha. They played in the pool, and we went to the nearby school track where they rode bikes (even Uncle Ken!)

Jeff narrated the "races" around the track - added quite the excitement!

Uncle Ken taking a bike "stroll" :)

Uncle Ken is a professional cabinet installer, so we scored his expertise when Karis installed some utility room cabinets at Mom's new place. What a treat to have someone who is a professional do it! He apparently put his pencil behind his ear as he was hanging the cabinets, and both boys have been walking around since then with pencils behind their ears! :)

On Sunday we decided to enjoy the beautiful cool weather and we headed off to SeaWorld with Cochrans and Bergherms. In the morning the weather was in the 70s, what a difference from the last time that we were there when it was in the 90s! MUCH better! It was very fun - we saw lots of shows and animals. Zachary also went on the water roller coaster - Journey to Atlantis, which was his second 'real' roller coaster ride. Can't believe how big he is!

Kaleb on the roller coaster - his second ride - he loves it!

It is official - Kaleb no longer stays in his crib and calls for us to come and get him. He does stay in bed during the middle of the night thankfully and doesn't yet do the "jack and the box" game when we put him down for naps and bedtime, but in the morning and after nap he just comes trotting out, pleased as punch! :)

Phrase of the week: "NO, I will NOT do it!" This is obviously not a fun phrase that we share this week. However, it seems that easy-peasy Kaleb has entered into a new phase of his life where he is sowing his wild oats and giving us some attitude. Always look on the bright side! This week when discussing his behavior and attitude, Amy said "Mommy likes 'Happy Kaleb,' not this Crabby Kaleb so much." Kaleb's response? "No, I like Crabby Kaleb!!" Zachary is becoming much easier - most of the time he obeys willingly, a good little helper, and doesn't have as many emotional outbursts....but even he has his moments when receiving punishment for misdeeds. When told that he would lose a privilege for misbehaving, Zachary insisted that he needed MORE consequences as if to say "I don't care, that privilege doesn't matter to me!" We've told him it doesn't work that way and that we won't take more privileges away for a misdeed, but then you wonder maybe you should take more away because he's being lippy? Parenting 101 (or perhaps 505!) classes are needed!!!

Moving, moving, moving

2011-10-02T21:19:00.000-04:00

The past two weeks have been a mad scramble of moving - in more than one way! Amy's mom got a job a few months back up in Maitland, so we were thrilled to have her relocate. The house that she's moving into though needed a LOT of work - the guy living there hadn't maintained it very well and had two small dogs that did a job on the walls, tile and carpet etc.

Relocating would not have been that big of a deal, but Amy's cousin Jeff and Niesha were moving down to Orlando (YIPPEE!) and planned on arriving September 29th.....and they were moving into mom's old house. So with that deadline, Karis discovered what it was like to flip a house in two weeks. Mom decided on paint colors, carpet etc all on the first day and then it was an orchestrated calendar after that with workmen coming into the house to relay new carpet, fix things etc. Karis and Mom began painting like fiends in order to get as much painting done before we needed to move her furniture in (much easier before the new carpet came in as you didn't have to worry about spilling paint on the carpet etc).

There were a multitude of wonderful friends who helped us over the two weeks. Kent came to help paint, Allen came to paint and re-do the garage floor, Rob watched our kids one night so Karis could go over to the house while Amy was at church finance committee, and Bill and William Cochran aided in painting as well. We are so thankful for such blessings of these friends! Our friend William though deserves special thanks - he came over virtually every single day to help Karis. The one moment of "over the top" friendship was when the contractors were ripping out old tile and it was taking much longer than expected because of the way it was laid. We had a very tight timeframe at that point because we needed to get the carpet laid in order to move Mom that weekend. Karis realized that when the contractors left that if he didn't finish ripping up the tile, that there was no way it would all come together in terms of timing - so he took over the jack hammer and ripped up tile for HOURS. William came over to help paint, and realizing the task in front of Karis, he immediately threw himself into helping clear tile and take turns with the jack hammer. The exhausting work was completed that night, thanks to the two gentlemen's "get it done" attitude.

Bruce, Karis, William, Zachary, Kent, Bill and Rob

Kaleb & Zachary begged to help paint, so with no painting clothes, Amy had to strip them down to their undies and away they painted! They were covered in grey paint by the end of course, but what fun!

The same group of men (including now Bruce who came over when he wasn't feeling well after work - bless him!) also graciously gave their Friday afternoon and Saturday evening hours in order to then move Mom physically up to the new house. A late night meant that the next morning came WAY too early - especially for the same group of men who had committed to a 100 mile "Ride for Ronald" bike race that Sunday. It was Karis' first 100 mile bicycle race, and the two weeks of exhaustion and hard work took its toll and he was not feeling at peak performance. Bless Kent's heart (another great friend!) for 'pulling' Karis the last 30 miles by pedaling in front the whole way to create the draft for Karis.

Karis has now recovered from the bike ride and says that he'll do it again (crazy men!), and Mom is now unpacking furiously in her new house. Karis has also said that he enjoys "flipping" a house, so we'll see if he tries to do it again in the future! Jeff and Niesha moved down this weekend (more on that in next week's post) - so all of our moving parts (at least these ones) have settled down.

Enamored with baby Erik waiting for the men to arrive at the finish line.

The waiting cheering section - Kelli, Zachary, Erik, Mom, Luke, Kaleb, Adam and Lisa

Kent, William, Rob and Karis

Phrase of the week: "Mom, can you wipe my bum today, it's faster!" Zachary has decided that he's big enough now to wipe his own bum most of the time, but he still likes the "concierge treatment" once in a while in the name of speed! :) "Mom, I get out myself!" Ahh....a milestone that Amy wasn't looking forward to. Kaleb has crossed the mental barrier of getting out of his crib after a nap (Friday) and in the morning (Sabbath). So far he hasn't gotten up in the middle of the night, but it surely can't be too far off. Depending on his reaction, we'll have to begin considering taking down the side of the crib if he keeps getting out of bed himself - no reason for the side if it doesn't keep the baby in! :)

To the Farm We Go

2011-09-25T20:33:00.000-04:00

Last weekend, we trekked off to Green Meadows farm again. It is one of Zachary's favorite activities and of course we're trying to get Kaleb over his animal phobia, so it is the closest thing to being on the farm as we can get!

Several of our us snagged the "groupon" coupons that they had a few months back for a cheap deal, so even though it is still hot in September, we headed off to the farm. Karis was at a conference, so it was Amy flying 'solo', and she was joined by Bergherms and Deiningers. Grodacks were supposed to come but were struck down with the deadliest case of pink eye we've seen (you were missed guys!).

Kaleb continues to make small steps forward in his fear of animals, so we'll continue to try and expose him little by little. He still wouldn't milk the cow, but he did run into the pen with the goats and willingly touch them without having his hand on top of Mommy's hand (just the finger tips would actually touch the sheep, but the goats were another matter apparently!). We were so fortunate because it ended up being fairly cool (relatively speaking) in the shade and twice it sprinkled (just like the Disney World misters, but only natural!) which kept us cool.

The chicken whisperer - no problems catching a chicken!

Ahh, a close encounter with Zachary's beloved bison!

Look mom, no fear here!

Last week Zachary was also 'inducted' into the Apopka Adventurers program. We joined this year as we thought we had a conflict with the FLEC Adventurers program (which hasn't yet ended up being a conflict) but we've REALLY enjoyed it. We know the Hilliards and Edris' as well in the group, so it is fun to be able to see them on a more regular basis. The program is very well organized and has a lot of fun activities, so we've been impressed so far. They had a bake sale last weekend, so we stayed to have a few "sweets" in the name of supporting the club - the boys chose the biggest cupcake they could to enjoy.

Tyler, Zachary and Cole

Love the icing face!

Phrase of the week: "Mommy, I want to swim with Uncle William" "Why, do you want to swim with Uncle William or just swim in his pool?: (Pool is very large and fun!). No, Uncle William. Why? Because he wrestles and plays with me, and he's just my best guy. Too sweet - kudos to Uncle William for being Zachary's best guy! Kaleb's sweet moment is when he has started to change his night-time song from the traditional "Night-night Kaleb, Mommy loves you, Daddy loves you, Night-night Kaleb, night-night Kaleb, Jesus loves you, Jesus loves you" - he now switches the first Jesus to Zachary and the last one to Grandma and then was squeezing in Jesus at the end to try and get in EVERYONE who loves Kaleb! :)

The Wheels Come Off!

2011-09-18T20:53:00.000-04:00

Right before we left for our trip to Canada on Labor Day weekend, Zachary decided that he was a big boy and wanted his training wheels off. Daddy promised that when we returned that he would teach Zachary, so when we got back on Monday after naps we headed over to Teague Middle School's track to start the adventure.

Amy remembered learning herself how to ride a bike, and of course has seen other children over the years - so frankly was expecting a lot of falls. In true "safety conscious" form, she brought elbow and knee pads to ensure that Zachary did not end up bloodied. Kaleb though insisted that he have his own knee pads, so we took off Zachary's elbow pads to put on Kaleb's knees.

Karis took him out into the grassy middle of the track, and off they went. He ran behind Zachary, holding on, and then let go and off Zachary went - with nary a fall! In fact, it was amazing, HE NEVER FELL!? What?? He fell once while getting on the bike (he insisted that he could only start if the left pedal was the one at the top, which was tricky for him to get it up each time) but seeing as he was just standing there it wasn't much of a fall to speak off.

Other than getting started, Zachary never had any problems and in fact that first day he began to "race" Daddy around the track with Karis sprinting as fast as he could go and Zachary pumping his little legs as fast as they'd go. Those "sprints" were interesting as Zachary's front wheel would wildly wobble as they went around the corners of the track but he managed to keep it together somehow! He also began to do "skid stops" that day where he'd be pedalling a mile a minute and then slam on the brakes - sliding a good 5-8 feet laying black rubber on the pavement from his tires - all the while perfectly balanced.

This was one of those moments in life where you're so proud of your child - for learning a new skill so quickly, keeping at it when it was a bit hard to get started. It was also a moment truthfully of misty eyes - how can our little boy be so big that he doesn't have training wheels anymore? We're not ready for him to be big yet! Sniff. :)

Phrase of the week: As we've mentioned in the past, Zachary loves animals. This morning he was snuggling with Daddy in bed, and their conversation went like this - Daddy: How much does a polar bear weigh? Z: "800-1600 pounds". D: How much does a Fox weigh weigh? Z: "6-20 pounds" D: How much does an alligator weigh? Z: "800-1000 pounds" This kid reads the numbers from the animal flash cards and has them memorized! Amazing. Mom actually had to go and get the cards in order to recreate this conversation because she can't remember how much everything weighs! Kaleb's is related to animals as well, but isn't an actual phrase but rather an activity- he was sitting with Amy one day, and he begins to take his little fingers and "pick" at things on her skin and put them into his mouth. After watching him repeat this several times, she asked him what he was doing and he said "I'm picking bugs and eating them off of you!" Ahh - didn't realize that there were bugs on Mommy and who knew that Kaleb was an ape! :)

Crazy faces - silly boy!

Here, There, Everywhere

2011-09-09T21:38:00.006-04:00

We've had a crazy couple of fun weeks! Two weekends ago, we had Amy's cousin Jeff and wife Niesha down with us for the weekend. It was super fun to have them and of course the boys were beyond excited. As soon as they found out that they were coming, Zachary began to beg to go swimming with Jeff. Amy responded that it would depend on how Jeff felt (he's been feeling a bit 'off' lately) when Kaleb pipes up "Niesha swim!" If it wasn't one, then it was going to be the other! :) We did have a fabulous time and the boys kept them busy playing "chase", swimming, reading books etc. Zachary was so enamored with them that early one morning, one of them had gone into the bathroom and he laid down on the floor outside the bathroom door just to see feet! At least until Mommy caught him and they had a discussion about privacy! :)

Awesome action shot - Kaleb's knee is up in the air - he was loving it!

Not to be outdone, Zachary makes the most of his throw from Jeff in his own action shot

Zachary had a "lease" on, and Jeff was walking him around like a dog (much to Zachary's delight!)

Last weekend, the adult Z-s flew up to Canada to visit Amy's Dad while the boys stayed with Grandma. Amy's Dad had been in the hospital the week before with a suspected TIA, and of course his overall health has been declining over the past year. We were very happy to be able to go and visit with him. We actually had a family meeting with his doctor (not sure that our doctors down here would have been caring enough to meet with the entire family to discuss medical issues, but who knows....) - anyway she spent about an hour and a half with us discussing all of the various medical problems etc.

After that we went out to eat with Brad, Cam, Tracy and Dad where we literally had the BEST apple crisp Amy has ever tasted. Coming from a cooked fruit hater, this is really saying something! We were able to go to Dad's church the next day where we really had a blessing from the sermon (all about spending time daily in God's Word) and then headed over to Norma's house for a fabulous meal. That night we actually were able to go to a concert at one of the local SDA churches that was celebrating their 40th anniversary. Sunday we just made it a day of relaxing and enjoying each other's company before we headed back VERY early on Monday. Something special happened on Monday when we got home, but that'll be next week's blog post! :)

Brad, Dad, Cam, Tracy and Amy

Dad's sporty wheels!

The boys had a fantastic time with Grandma -although they tend to get up even earlier when Mom and Dad are out of town. When Grandma told Zachary to sleep in, he said "well, when Mom and Dad are out of town, my body worries about when to get up!" They enjoyed the zoo, the Science Center, swimming and the highlight was going to the butterfly experience where Kaleb actually let a butterfly suck nectar off of his finger! Yep, you heard it here -KALEB, our animal-phobic child! :)

He is quite proud about the butterfly on his finger!

Phrase of the week: "I gonna take you DOWN Mommy!" When your 3.5 year old emphatically tells you that he is going to "take you down"when he asks you to wrestle with him, it is so cute that you engineer ways during the wrestling match for him to think that he has actually pinned you! It is hard to do when you're about 3 times bigger than he is! Zachary's phrase revolved around a midnight episode of a coughing fit. He was coughing with virtually every breath (he has a cold, but nothing like this!) and so Amy got up with him and after about 30 minutes in desperation she decided to give him allergy medicine and take him outside (it always works for her when she is in an allergic fit) - well at 1:00 in the morning Zachary is wide awake, telling her what each cloud looks like - "Look Mommy, that is a kitty kat.....and that is an alligator......and that is a cow!" All Mommy wanted to be doing was sleeping, but thankfully after about 15 minutes outside, the combination of the medicine and the fresh air calmed his cough down enough to go back inside where all parties went to sleep.

Water Works

2011-08-28T21:13:00.000-04:00

Thankfully this week's post is NOT about a Hurricane Irene hitting Florida. We are thankful for this near miss, and our thoughts are with the folks who are dealing with the effects of receiving the hurricane. We had some rain off and on this week as Irene went up the coast, but thankfully we did not have true ill effects.

Last weekend we enjoyed some play time with our friends the Isidros and Bergherms. The Isidros had a veritable water park in their back yard with fun apparatus for everyone! The kids had a great time splashing around and playing in general. The adults always enjoy an excuse to get together and visit. Karis played PT on Allen for a while, working on his plantar fascitis, much to Allen's pain and horror! :)

Riding little air mattresses down the water slide.

What a fantastic slip and slide!

Blake, Evan, Kaleb, Braelyn, Zachary

Allen in misery while the paparazzi take pictures! :)

We had some scary news this week when Amy's Dad was hospitalized for 'passing out' and was confused/unable to complete sentences. We are thankful to report that he has gone home now from the hospital but they are still trying to get to the bottom of what happened. We are looking forward to seeing him again soon (more on that in the coming weeks!)

Phrase of the week: Not fair! This seems to be a regular occurrence this last week in our house - not sure where Zachary has picked up that phrase, but we'll be thankful if we can figure out a way for it to gracefully LEAVE this house! :) Kaleb's phrase happened a while ago but we felt that it was better late than never - Amy was talking to Kaleb and said "Kaleb, ask your brother nicely for a coin and say please" Kaleb says "No, Mommy, you try it!" No need to use manners if your mommy will just take care of it for you! Mommy won out in the end and he had to use his manners! :)

First Days!

2011-08-20T16:29:00.000-04:00

Tuesday was Zachary's first day of preschool! It was an exciting day for all - Mommy had been warned that she would get teary-eyed, but in truth, she was just excited for him! He was so excited about the whole process, and really loved the school. The program is through Circle Christian School, which is a school dedicated for homeschoolers - and they started a pre-school program on Tuesday mornings. It was perfect, because we didn't really want to put him in a program for every day.

There are 5 BOYS in his class - no girls at all. It is a small class as you can see, and amazing that there are only boys. With such a small class, there should be lots of individual attention, for sure. He is taking 5 classes in all - starting with a sports class, art class, Florida A-Z, and a bug/weather class. He ends the day with a Kids at Play program that finishes up at 3:00.

This is the first time of course that we've ever had to send him anywhere with a lunch box (typically to Jennifer's we just pack bowls of food and throw in yogurt). This was momentous - not knowing how much to send was the real trick. So, we sent a thermos of mac 'n' cheese with big frank slices, a large container of carrot sticks with dip, a cheese stick, a yogurt stick, and a container of apple sauce. The child ended up eating it ALL! He's never eaten that many carrots in his whole life, but apparently he was hungry!

Kaleb also had a first this week when we enrolled him in the gymnastic class that Zachary was in last year. He seemed to be quite thrilled with it as well, and told us all about the things that he did. Zachary would ask him if he had done certain things, so Zachary still remembered the names, such as the "sloth hang" from the bars! It'll be fun when parent-watch week comes so that we can go see Kaleb show off his new "moves!"

Not a gymnastics picture YET, but a cute moment while he was reading stories in Zachary's room, swinging his legs

Phrase of the week: "Mommy, when do I get to go to school EVERY day?" Hopefully the fun of going to school lasts! "Mommy, I'm going to nim-nascxix!" Gymnastics is a real tongue-twister!

Happy Birthday Kieran!

2011-08-13T14:54:00.001-04:00

Last weekend, we had fun celebrating Kieran's third birthday. We headed off to the park, where we had fun playing and then going on a treasure hunt! The weather remains hot and humid here in Orlando, but thankfully we did receive fair amount of rain this week - just not on his birthday which was a good thing!

Kieran and Kaleb examining their loot

Zachary finding some goodies in the palm tree

Hard to see in a small picture, but heads are bowed during prayer and Kaleb is looking at what is going on through his "squinty" eyes (almost closed Mom!)

Other than that, we've had a blessedly quiet week, which is nice to have once in a while! With room to spare in our blog post, we thought that it would be a good time to capture what our kids' personalities/habits are right now, because heaven knows it is impossible to remember a few years later!

Zachary
     -Zachary remains as always an early riser - getting up usually somewhere between 6:30 and 7:00.
     -He is still taking a nap, but we feel sure that a blog post very soon will be devoted to the ultimate demise of the nap as he is starting to refuse a nap on some days.
     -He loves numbers (counting by 1, 2, 5, 9, 10, and 11s), and his current passion is animals (reading, flash cards, DVDs - anything animals!)
     -He seems to be a bit of a "mini-mommy" (although obviously of the opposite gender) as it appears that he is somewhat Type A - likes to control what is going on around him and if things don't go his way, he tends to have a bit of a quick temper (especially when tired).
     -He is proving that he is very athletic - and has been very muscular for his age now for a long time. He remains at the top of the growth charts in terms of height.
     -He definitely does not like to sweat, and insists that he is going to live in a colder place when he grows up!
     -He has a fantastic memory, and can remember places and people from a long time ago. He can memorize his memory verse each week with no problems.
     -He appears to have a great ability to focus - which he proves in Sabbath School when he sits quietly and listens to the teacher even when all mayhem is going on around him!
     -He is very task-oriented and loves to "help" Mommy or Daddy with work.
      -Zachary is not much of a "self-entertainer" and usually needs to have someone playing with him - the one caveat to this is when it comes to books, he is happy to go into his room and read his books for a long time!
      -He is definitely a "ladies' man" and develops crushes on girls of all ages within a very short amount of time. He then talks about them non-stop! :)

Kaleb
     -Kaleb is very laid-back, and we use words like "little charmer" and "charismatic" to describe him.
     -He seems to get along very easily with others, and loves to be in groups of kids.
     -He is very feisty, and is not afraid to stand his ground with the older kids.
     -He is quite independent, and can play on his own for long periods of time.
     -He seems to be very family oriented, always asking about a family member, or talking about "Mommys, Babies, or Daddies" when we read stories about animals.
     -He is very cuddly and loves to snuggle
     -At 3.5, he truly has not yet had a "terrible" time in his life yet that have lots of temper tantrums. Now while we say this now, we may need an update because this week seems to be showing a bit more of a strong-willed temper coming out in a battle now and then.
     -He loves to sleep - always has since a baby, and will sleep in until somwhere between 7 and 7:30.
     -He is "unfocused" in that he is much more content to move slowly, and could almost be described sometimes as "tiptoeing through the tulips..."
      -At 3.5, he still does not know which shoe goes on which foot. He does not yet know the days of the week either (that we know of at least!)
      -He does not like brocolli!! He also takes forever to eat, and still asks to be fed on a regular basis. He loves milk to drink still as well. Surprisingly, he seems to like some spicier food, such as Chinese food that was making his parents' mouths burn, but he just kept on chowing down!

Phrase of the week: Zachary is becoming my perfect student! This is what Miss Deanna told Amy the last Sabbath as she was leaving. Zachary's behavior in Sabbath School class just truly has been fantastic, he sits so well and follows instruction, listening very intently to her no matter what chaos is going on around him. It makes a Mommy proud!! The other phrase this week is "Mommy, I want to go to a rest-EW-ahhhnt (spelled phonetically as he says it) - the one where they burn the onion!" Zachary loves Kobe's because of the "show" that the cook puts on!

Erik Anton Johnson

2011-08-05T21:51:00.000-04:00

We are thrilled to our toes to welcome Kent & Kelli Johnson's new little boy - Erik Anton Johnson. Erik is a nod to their combined Scandinavian backgrounds and Anton is a mutual family name. Kelli went into labor last Sabbath and was a wonder woman - laboring at home until her contractions were 5 minutes apart (and then 2 minutes apart on the drive to the hospital - yikes!). When she arrived at the hospital, she was 6 centimeters dilated - you go girl! She had the baby by 10P that night and they instantly discovered the magic of being a parent. Erik is adorable - even if we're just slightly biased! :)

How cute is he!!?

Parents and baby were discharged on Monday and they have been discovering a family rhythm in the ensuing days. Sleep deprivation has arrived, but they seem to be hanging in there. The other amazing coincidence of this birth is that Erik arrived on Adam Deininger's birthday! Zachary and Kelli have the same birthday, and now baby Erik and Adam have the same birthday!

The happy parents

The Johnsons had grand plans (before going into labor) of moving to their new home last weekend. That clearly couldn't happen with a baby on the way into the world - so a group of friends all came together to make it happen for them. It was actually a pretty quick day of moving as some boxes had already been moved over, and there were lots of helping hands. So the Johnsons came home to a new home, new baby and no idea where all of their stuff was! Happy hunting! :)

Byron (Kelli's Dad), Rob D, Dave H, Will C, Karis, Allen I, Lisa D, Tangie I and Amy. Barb (Kelli's mom) was taking the picture, and Heather C had taken Kieran home for a nap.

I almost forgot in the excitement of the baby and the move. Our boys started swim lessons last week, and have been LOVING it. They're both little fishes, so we decided to also enroll them in swim lessons at Lake Brantley in the evenings, as their lessons continue for another 3 weeks (vs the morning ones which end this week). So, they actually were swimming in lessons twice a day this week! They both have been doing fantastic, and Kaleb is such a good swimmer that he is in with a group of kids much larger than he is! Zachary has an incredibly strong kick already, so it's just a matter of getting his arms into the game and he'll be set.

Swimming on his side, he already seems to be catching on to how to breathe!

Kaleb was practicing swimming on his back

Phrase of the week: We want the panda CD!! This is actually boomed out by both boys each morning as we get into the car. The 2011 VBS theme was Pandamania this year, and Corey Grodack (Thanks Corey!) bought us a copy of the CD. We play it in the car each morning on the way to Jennifer's, and the boys just love it. Zachary knows most of the words and some of the sign language movements to the songs (thanks to VBS and to his Sabbath School teacher) so sings out loud (AMAZING!) all the way. Kaleb has caught on amazingly quickly as well, so Mommy is treated to a duet on the way to Jennifer's each day - what a treat! It is awesome.

The Sauna and The Shark Cave

2011-07-29T21:23:00.000-04:00

Apparently our blog posts are just marching through the alphabet two by two, but hey, if the shoes fits, let's wear it!

We had a very busy and fun week - we started off by going last weekend over to our friend the Hilliards. We had been with them every day during Maine, so it was fun to get together again down here in Orlando. We were able to visit with several friends that we don't see very often, so it was really a blessing. The kids ended up getting into the pool in the afternoon as it was SUPER hot in Orlando and Karis jumped in with them to provide some adult supervision. By the end of the pool play, Karis had become the 'human caterpaulter' and was throwing kids in the air off of the edge of the hot tub to plunge to the depths of the deep end of the pool. They all thought that they had reached nirvana - even the little tyke who over-rotated in the air and did a huge 'back flop' (OUCH!) - but even he was brave enough to get back up there several more times!

Hard to see, but Kaleb is in the air above Karis' head at the back middle of this picture with the kids all in a line waiting for their turn.

On Sunday, we lost our ever-living minds and traipsed out to Seaworld. Did we mention the SUPER hot weather that Orlando is having???? What were we thinking? To make matters worse, we dragged Cochrans along with us so they could suffer as well - and this is their first true summer in Florida!!! We're not sure that they'll forgive us. It wasn't our best outing to SeaWorld, even aside from the blasting heat because Zachary managed to fall right at the beginning of the day and make a mud-pie out of his white Canada shirt. Amy salvaged it by washing it in the sink but then he refused to wear it until it was dry - which takes a while in this humidity! Ending up the day he took another tumble as we walked back to the car, but oh well - we enjoyed at least the middle! :)

Walking with Auntie Heather. As Zachary had his shirt off, Kaleb had to have his off as well.

Our highlight of the week was a short visit from Amy's cousin Jeff and wife Niesha. They were down in the Orlando area (hopefully securing future jobs so they can move here!) so they stayed one night with us. Jeff does not realize it, but he has now become Zachary and Kaleb's personal playmate for life. He indulged them in playing for a very LONG time in the pool - chasing them and pretending to be a shark and throwing the kids in the "shark cave" which is aka the hot tub! :)

Our friend Kelli is drawing ever closer to the date of the baby's arrival - next week we may have a picture of a new little one to share! But, they're trying to stave off the birth for a few more days as they move out of their house into a new house they just bought - talk about close timing! :)

Phrase of the week: This phrase was actually said to Amy up at President's Council by another mom, and it has just stuck in her mind ever since. While discussing kids, school and life in general, a friend said "Yes, the days are long but the years are short." Isn't that so true? Some days seem to go on forever but you look up and your little one is 5 years old already! Where did the time go?

The Two M's - Massachusetts & Maine

2011-07-24T06:59:00.000-04:00

It was time for one of the two annual work conferences that Amy attends, which affords us yet another opportunity for a vacation. We truly are lucky - although Karis and the boys are probably the most lucky ducks because they don't have to attend work meetings, but hey - let's count our blessings!

We took the opportunity this year to add on a few extra vacation days at the beginning of the trip, which worked out very nicely. We flew up to Boston on Friday, and spent the weekend there until Monday when we drove up to Bar Harbor Maine for the rest of the time. We had a blast in Boston, and kicked it off with a carousel ride in Faneuil Hall, a street performer and frankly some of the yummiest macaroni and cheese that we've ever had!! Who knew!

The next day we trotted off to the Aquarium where the highlights had to be the penguins, the sting ray touch tank and the seal show - the kids loved it - even Kaleb managed to touch a sting ray which is saying something for our little guy! That evening we hooked up with our friends the Hilliards to tour through the USS Constitution which was very interesting (and correlated to a book that Amy was reading, so very timely!) and then we availed ourselves of a quick call to our friends Corey Grodack who used to live in Boston to tell us where to eat in Little Italy. Little did we know that parking in the North End is almost impossible and of course with no reservations a party of 9 was crazy to assume we'd get in. However, fortune smiled on us, and apparently Amy's conversation with the hostess paid off and we were seated in about 15 minutes when we skipped ahead of a very long line when a large party left! Yeah!

Thanks Corey for the awesome recommendation, it was delicious!

On Sunday, we went to the Plymouth Plantation where we toured the Mayflower II and the Plantation. They have people dressed up like it was 400 years ago, which was very entertaining. Zachary got to feed a baby goat there, so it was a highlight. Kaleb wasn't ready to venture near the goat, so it was a solo adventure for Zachary. We watched a little video at the beginning and it was so precious, the boys sat in their own row holding hands! We ended that day with a Duck Tour - which is a tour of Boston in a "truck" that is also a "boat" so during the tour they drive it into the Charles River and then let the kids drive it around.

Before heading up to Maine on Monday, we went to the Boston Children's Museum which was VERY impressive. The kids could have stayed all day - and the best part you ask? We got in for free because of our annual passes to the Orlando Science Center! Yippee! The romping at the museum resulted in Kaleb falling asleep for 3 hours in the car as we made our 5 hour drive to Bar Harbor and Zachary was a veritable angel as he kept quiet to allow Kaleb to sleep. Wonders never cease!

We enjoyed Bar Harbor immensely - the weather was a bit warmer than expected but still cooler than Orlando so we'll take it. We had so much fun visiting with the other families with young kids there, we really look forward to it every year. We had several highlights there - one of the best was a boat ride that we took from "Diver Ed" in which this very crazy, wild man dawns scuba gear and dives to the bottom of the ocean with a high definition camera and shows the kids on the boat all of the things on the bottom of the sea - plants and animals. He then brings all of the animals up in a bag and puts them in huge water containers and the kids get to touch them. Zachary held a lobster, hermit crab, sea urchin and a star fish! Awesome!

The next night we headed off to the Timber Tina Lumberjack show. It was fun as expected but the surprise of the night was when Zachary held up his hand to compete in a lumberjack yell ("Yo-ho!") contest. While he didn't yell the loudest (which is shocking as he can yell VERY LOUD - the nerves must have gotten him), the cheering section from all of us from AHS was impressive as it was judged on the amount of cheers that each child got. He didn't win, but it was very close! :)

Kaleb and Madison were cross-cutting a saw at the show. All of the kids got a chance during intermission.

All the AHS related kids that were at the lumber jack show - Kaleb & Zachary are at the end.

These blueberries were yummy!

We enjoyed some beautiful time driving around Acadia Park, and enjoyed their nature center and running around on the rocks at the top of the mountain as well as swimming at their Sand Beach (the kids at least!). However, the most spontaneous fun that we had was when Karis spotted a blueberry patch and we stopped by the side of the road and ate blueberries! One of the famed things to do in Acadia Park is to eat at the Jordan Pond restaurant where they have delicious pop-overs. Wow - very good - so much so that Karis has made a rendition since coming home (not quite the same, but close enough!)

Too pooped after a long day and no naps....

Eating outside at Jordan pond - beautiful!

Phrase of the week: Zachary - "I wish that we didn't have to go home. I want to stay on vacation forever. In fact, I want to live in a colder region!" Colder region? Such a Canadian at heart, but such funny words for a 5 year old! Kaleb's word is "cimmanon" - not related to vacation but cute anyway!

Fourth of July Festivities

2011-07-18T20:42:00.001-04:00

The Z-family has been on vacation (yes, again!) for the last 10 days during which we went up to Boston for a few days and then headed over to Maine where Amy had a work conference for the next 6 days. We'll have a post on everything that we did on our vacation, but we thought that we'd also do a quick post on all of the fun stuff that we did over Fourth of July.

It was a fun-filled weekend, and Amy started it off by taking the boys to the Pinocchio Marionette theater at the mall. It was quite crowded and loud, so the experience was not as fantastic as we hoped, but fun nonetheless.

Based on the boys' fascination with animals lately, we decided to see whether it was possible to make a quick trip to the zoo after church on Sabbath - so we packed a picnic lunch that we ate in the van and headed on up there. It was actually perfect, as the zoo is fairly small so we were able to roam and see pretty much everything and still be home for naps.

Touching a snake - Mommy stayed a good distance away to take this picture!

On Sunday, we headed over to the local fire station where Blake and Evan were celebrating their birthdays. It was perfect because we were able to get through the entire tour of the station and were on our way out before they received a call - so we were able to see the fire trucks leaving with lights flashing. We headed over to Bergherm's house where Jennifer did her usual fantastic job of baking and decorating - YUM!

The actual Fourth of July found us at the Science Center to watch the Animalopolis movie and then we headed over to Isidros where we enjoyed the pool and then some barbecue. The rain didn't cooperate and actually began to POUR shortly after we arrived at their house (thankfully not while we were at the pool though!) but we were able to outlast it and still enjoy some fireworks. The kids really didn't seem afraid of the fireworks at all, so they enjoyed seeing them go off.

It was a downpour - by the time it finished, the water was so deep in the grass that it splashed as you walked through it!

Engrossed in the fireworks

Phrase of the week: Mommy, if I make a mess, you're going to be "sasperated" with me! :) Kaleb's phrase is "I'm hurt-nin" - this seems to be a common phrase and may mean that he needs to go to the bathroom to an actual stomach illness - it all applies! :)

Showers of Blessings

2011-07-03T14:57:00.000-04:00

Over the past few weeks, we've had the fun of having several baby showers. Amy's two directors at work, Gren and Kelli, are both due within 4 weeks of each other so they had a combined work shower to celebrate. It was a come-and-go shower to celebrate the "Mommies-to-Bee" with a bee theme! The come-and-go shower was nice, it removes the pressure of being "on display" off both ladies (and of course Kent). The ladies received many useful and precious gifts.

Gren's husband Jeffrey did not come to the shower, so Gren is 'pretending' that he's in the picture with Kelli and Kent! :)

Only a week after the work shower, we had a personal shower for Kelli. Melody Huffman and Loretta Hauck joined Amy and Lisa in hosting this shower and it truly was an elegant, tasteful nautical affair. Loretta is amazing with decorations, so the shower was really beautiful. Kelli rounded out a lot of the necessary baby paraphernalia so she'll be in good shape when Baby Joey arrives! :)

Kelli and her mom, Barbara

Grenadette has since given birth to her baby boy (which was a surprise as she didn't know the sex of the baby) Gage Augustus Bittenbinder on Tuesday. Amy will now be "holding down the fort" for the Finance department over the next three months.

Aside from baby blessings, we caravanned out to the beach a few weeks ago with Deiningers and Cochrans. The boys had a fantastic time playing in the sand and the water and the weather was perfect. The Z-family never really went out to the beach pre-kids, but they have such a good time that it is something that we'll be sure to be doing more often now. The boys enjoyed boogie boarding but the waves were definitely bigger than when we were in Destin, so there was a lot more "dunking" especially when Mommy was the one managing the board as her skills are not as advanced as Daddy's for launching the boys!

The boys playing in the water - so cute when they're holding hands!

Phrase of the week: Mommy, I don't want to have a baby in my belly. Why do you say that Zachary? Because I don't want swollen feet! Apparently Aunt Kelli's poor feet has made Zachary swear off bearing children in the future! Good thing that he didn't need to worry about that! :) Kaleb doesn't have a phrase so much as more of a nick-name this week - he seems to have tendencies towards his mother's chattiness (unlike his big brother). He has the ability - when he desires - to literally talk your ear off like a little chatterbox. One night he wanted Amy to come back into the room after he went to bed, and she ended up being in there for a good 15-20 minutes (which is a long time when you should be sleeping!) as he chattered away about every animal under the sun without taking a pause or a break!

Kaleb had his first dental cleaning - so Zachary showed him the ropes. They were both A-students - no cavities and well behaved according to the Dentist!

Family & Fun

2011-07-01T20:29:00.001-04:00

Well, it would appear that the Z-family is losing its touch of having a proper update each week, when did life get so busy? It is just crazy! Hopefully with the long weekend we'll get several updates done so that we can truly catch up.

One fun event that we didn't get a chance to post an update on was the local Zellwood corn festival. Karis took the boys along with Cochrans to it the Sunday before we left for Belize. Amy stayed at home to pack and get us ready for leaving that week. The boys had a blast on all of the rides. At one point Zachary did say though "My stomach is ticklish!" Uh-oh, you know where that leads if you're not careful! :) Zachary however emphatically told Amy when he returned home that he loved roller coasters! Amy loves roller coasters as well, so she was delighted with this news. Hopefully he ends having a strong stomach because while Karis loves roller coasters, all conditions have to be just right in order to not be sick by the end.

Zachary finished up his year of gymnastics as well with a pool party and a trophy. He really had a great time this year, and we hope to put Kaleb into the class next year while Zachary goes to his one day of Pre-K at Circle Christian in the Fall. It is hard to believe that Zachary is old enough to start Pre-K already!

When we got back from our vacations, Zachary began his very first Vacation Bible School at Markham Woods church. This year's theme was "Pandamania." They had a Friday evening program in which they showcased all of the songs, accompanied by the hand motions. Zachary just loved the entire week - he was excited to tell us everything that he did. Zachary has really been enjoying these songs, because they also sing them at Sabbath School - so he has learned them very well and participates the entire time each week. One of his very favorites is the "God is Watching Over You" song in which a portion of it says "24/7, God is Watching Over You" where we put to the watches on our wrists. He always has to have Mommy's watch for this song! :)

It is hard to spot him, but he's in the front row just to the left of the lady's curly hair in the middle of the picture

We've had the pleasure of visiting with both in-town friends and out-of-town relatives over the last few weeks as well. We love the fact that Orlando seems to be a place where folks come - either to enjoy the theme parks or the fact that there are a lot of conventions down here - it really gives us a wonderful unique opportunity to see folks over the years that we might not otherwise. The first visitors were Amy's Uncle Gene and Aunt Bert from Oregon. It was very fun to catch up with them and enjoy a nice visit at Aunt Louise's. That very same week, we were thrilled to host dinner for Karis' Uncle Elwyn and Aunt Maddy from British Columbia. The boys thought that they had died and gone to heaven - Uncle Elwin and Aunt Maddy played cars with them, went outside to play, and of course lots of book reading!

Amy's Mom Bobbi, Aunt Bert, Uncle Gene & Aunt Louise

Karis, Kaleb, Aunt Maddy, Zachary & Uncle Elwyn

One evening we went over to the Isidros with the Johnsons to enjoy some fellowship and fun. The kids were entertained by the men twirling them. The men fared probably worse than the kids in terms of dizziness, but it sure was a hoot watching who could stay up the longest after the twirling stopped! :) Zachary seemed to have the technique down pat - he would start running in an arc shape after being put down and never once actually fell - no matter how hard Uncle Kent tried to get him to fall! :)

Kaleb and Uncle Kent were victim to the twirling!

Kaleb believes that Aunt Kelli's tummy is a perfect pillow! :)

We'll conclude this particular update now to keep it from being a marathon-length post, but we'll have another update this weekend- we promise! :)

Phrase of the week: Kaleb has learned to be the negotiator in the family by parroting Amy's early warnings for things like bedtime, or leaving a friend's house. When he's asked to do something that he doesn't want to do, he'll then begin shouting "Two more minutes, Two more minutes!!!" It is a phrase that Amy has used herself ever since college when she'd promise to begin studying in two more minutes! :) Zachary's phrase is "So, what do you want to talk about now?" This took Auntie Kelli by surprise and momentarily she was at a loss about what to talk about because this was just such a grown-up thing to say! :)

Playing in Destin

2011-06-18T16:32:00.001-04:00

Well, this is the third and final post to get us caught up from our Memorial Day weekend festivities - and then of course we'll have to catch up on what has been happening in the ensuing weeks next time! :) So, as if going to Belize wasn’t crazy enough, we also decided to liven up our lives a bit by flying back on Thursday from Belize and then packing up our kids Friday morning (less than 12 hours after getting home!) and driving up to Destin to rendezvous with our friends the Hicks family. It had been too long since we’d seen them, and now that they live in Chattanooga, a “meet in the kinda, sorta, middle” was doable!

Neither of us have ever been to the Destin area before, but a lady from church shared with us a place called Seacrest Beach Resort, which is a community of about 500 homes (a good majority of them appear to be rentals) with a 12,000 square foot pool and a golf cart that will pick you up at the house and take you over to the beach boardwalk! Is that service or what??

The sand at the beach was white and like sugar - it was the fluffiest and softest sand that we've ever seen! And the water was a clear, green color that was really fun to play in. There was a bit of seaweed in the water, but for the most part it wasn't a problem. The waves were just big enough for the kids to ride the boogie boards on, and even Kaleb got in the action this year. He didn't seem to mind a bit when he'd fall off into the water - came up laughing and wanting more!

We had such a fun time catching up with the Hicks' - in fact, this may become an annual event! :) The kids all got along swimmingly and had such fun together playing and running around. We would go to the beach in the mornings, and then while the Z-boys were napping in the afternoon the rest would head off to the pool to play.

Seeing as the Z-boys had never actually driven anywhere on a long drive before, we were a bit apprehensive about how they'd do - but on the drive up they were fantastic! We didn't even break out the portable DVD player - instead we read stories, colored, ate food, watched the license plates and even tried to rest (albeit not successfully!). On the way back, after several days of slightly reduced sleep, increased sugar intake, and general letdown that we were going home caused the drive home to be not quite as fabulous as the drive up, but all-in-all it was still pretty positive. Traffic was heavy on Memorial Day Monday of course, so the drive home took a bit longer than driving up there but we did keep the peace by having them watch an Animal Atlas DVD and of course Kaleb's favorite "Boz the Big Green Bear".

Kaleb's potty training is going amazingly well. No real accidents to speak of, and our only difficulty (if one could even call it that) is in the "pooping" department. He has gotten over his fear of pooping, thank goodness, but he still sometimes takes several trips to the bathroom before he can get his "business" taken care of. The amazing news in all of this is that he has already started being able to go through his entire nap without a diaper! To top even that, he's had one night where he woke up entirely dry! This has yet to even happen in the world of the eldest Z child!!!! Amazing!

Phrase of the week: "Life's a bummer" - oh to be 5 - it's hard work. When asked who he had learned that phrase from, he said "Daddy." Daddy must have used the phrase when making Zachary do something that he didn't want to do! :) Kaleb's phrase is "it's locked" with both hands firmly placed over his mouth as he refuses to eat something...usually broccoli lately. Now, we have to take an unofficial poll here - Amy has never known kids that didn't like broccoli - in fact, some kids ONLY eat broccoli. Our kids have always eaten an amazing variety of vegetables because Amy makes all of their baby food from Day 1, so has the gamut from kale to brussel sprouts etc. So, this new "I no like broccoli, it's yucky" has stumped her. She commented to a few friends that "how can this be, all kids like broccoli" They looked at her as if she had lost her mind and said that no kids like broccoli. So, is this true faithful readers? Do your kids (or you growing up) like or hate broccoli? Be honest now! :)

Happy Father's Day!

The Hicks & Zbaraschuks after a very fun weekend

Daddy enjoying some "cool" time under the sand!

The waves were small, but perfect for riding the boogie boards

Kaleb and Leah enjoying licking the beater

Ready to drive over to the beach

Mommy and Kaleb about to jump some waves

Googles were a godsend to keep the saltwater out of our eyes

Relaxing in the shade

Zachary, Leah and Kaleb jumping into the pool - the pool guard quickly put a stop to this, much to their disappointment

The Big 4-0 and Belize

2011-06-10T21:48:00.004-04:00

As you know from last week's post - this has been a momentous month for Karis.....this was THE year – the year that Karis has crossed over into a new decade. He isn’t too pleased by this, but when queried as to what he’d like for his birthday, his only response was that he would like to have a trip. In light of the fact that he not only turned the big 4-0, but also finished his DPT (see the last post for those that missed this!), we packed up and off to Belize we went (with Johnsons in tow for their “baby-moon” as Baby Joey’s introduction to this world is quickly approaching). We’ve never been to Belize before, and it was a blast. We stayed at Coco Beach Resort (highly recommended for folks who like really nice accommodations, full kitchens, and fantastic pools (one complete with a water slide). Grandma stayed with the boys (full time party for the boys, full-time job for Grandma!), and they had a wonderful time going to the Science Center, playing nonstop and being pampered by Grandma.

In Belize, we did a lot of “hurry up and relax” but we also took a day where we flew over to the mainland (we stayed on the island of Ambergris Caye) to visit the Xunantunich (Stone Lady) Mayan ruins and then drift down the river on a cave-tubing adventure (very fun!). On that day, our guide showed us how delectable termites are (as he showed us how to eat them by sticking his finger onto a tree that was swarming with termites and then popping them into his mouth, he told us that they taste like minty carrots.....no thanks!!!) The next day we went snorkeling at Shark Ray alley where we saw tons of nurse sharks prior to getting into the water (they dispersed when we actually got into the water, which was probably a good thing for avoiding a full panic attack by the ladies) and HUGE sting rays. We saw lots of really cool coral and bright fish and even a moray eel as well. One of the highlights of our trip was to charter a plane and fly over the Blue Hole – one of the 7 natural wonders of the world. It was truly amazing and beautiful – such an amazing world that God has created for us to explore!

The folks in Belize speak English, and were incredibly friendly and polite. The weather was warm and windy while we were there, but the wind did a nice job of keeping us cool. One highlight of the trip was when Kent invited Karis to come learn how to wind-surf (one of Kent's hobbies). Apparently you CAN teach an old dog new tricks because by the end of his training session, Karis had the hang of it (at least enough to have a fun time going back and forth on the waves in the ocean!).

On the home front, Zachary sweet-talked Grandma into letting him get up early in the morning by climbing into bed with her, snuggling for a few minutes (who can resist that!) and then stating "Grandma, please read to me, I need to learn new things!" Wow - who can argue with that? The boys had a great time, and in fact were so "into" Grandma that they called Amy and Miss Jennifer "Grandma" the rest of the week after life returned to normal! :)

Soon, very soon, we'll have the final post from the Memorial Day weekend, which was a trip to Destin to visit the Hicks! Very whirl-windish of us, but VERY fun! :)

Kelli, Amy, Karis and Kent snorkeling in Shark Ray Alley

Kelli, Kent and Karis as we 'toured' the San Pedro city - there are only three streets!

The Blue Hole - isn't this picture just amazing?

The men getting ready for their cave tubing experience - the headlamps were for when we were completely underground - it was PITCH black when we turned off the lights!

Standing on top of the Mayan temple - both of us were afraid to get much closer to the edge as we were 130 feet high - it was a long drop!

Kent, Karis and Amy standing on the steps of the temple

Karis flying out of the short but FAST waterslide!

Ahh - what resort is complete without a hammock! We enjoyed a very nice rest on these hammocks, listening to the waves and enjoying the nice breeze.

There are three big sting rays under Karis in this picture - amazing!

Celebrating Dr. Zbaraschuk!

2011-06-05T16:19:00.014-04:00

For some this is a big news – while some of our other friends and family are already “in the know” – but Karis is now officially Dr. Zbaraschuk now that he has completed his Doctorate of Physical Therapy (this means that he has a DPT, not a PHD for those that are wondering). He informed Amy that only she needs to call him Dr. Z – everyone else can continue calling him Karis! J He started the program about 2 years ago, and wasn’t sure that he would continue – he was just going to “test out a class or two.” He had staying power though and managed to juggle two very active little boys, managing a household, and keeping a wife happy – all the while taking online night classes. It was an interesting learning experience and he’s thankful that he has crossed the finish line. We’re so proud of him!

We promise that we'll have more of an update soon for the vacations that we've taken over the past few weeks (Belize and Destin, Florida for those that don't know), but sadly we've been kind of swamped since getting back and so the updates are slow in coming, but they'll come, we promise!)

One more note that we'll add is that a few weeks ago (since our last post), Karis went out early in the morning for his Sabbath morning bike ride, and noticed a very large 'dog' walking between two homes, just two houses down from us. Upon taking a second look, he realized that it wasn't a dog, but a black BEAR! Apparently after talking to the neighbor whose home the bear had been walking by, we now know that this bear lives in a nearby large park, and has been seen on numerous occasions walking in our neighborhood late at night! We're not sure if we should be wowed, or scared!?

Dr. Zbaraschuk - not in cap and gown with diploma, but a close second - on the beach in Belize to celebrate!

I Poop In the Potty!

2011-05-14T19:05:00.000-04:00

Those words are music to any parents ears! We have now been on our potty training journey for two weeks, and it has been amazingly easy. Pooping has been the hardest part so far, and it is only hard because Kaleb seems to be afraid of the sensation of needing to go poop. He will say that he needs to go, but when he sits on the toilet he doesn't actually produce the 'goods' so it usually takes about 5-6 trips (very time consuming) to the toilet. Towards the end of these many trips, it will obviously be building in terms of pressure and he'll begin to cry and say that it hurts. Eventually his body takes over and the 'goods' appear and thankfully it does not appear that he needs to strain to get it out and it is not hard - so he's not constipated. With that in mind, we're pretty sure that the "hurts" is just the pressure that he's not comfortable with and the notion of pushing.

In the beginning, he seemed to be holding it for several days at a time (very unusual as he usually pooped at least daily, and most times more than once a day) - so we did worry about potential constipation but we seem to be getting onto a good routine with no constipation to be seen, so we're breathing a sigh of relief. At one point during the week, Amy thought that she smelled a "smell" and asked Kaleb if he had pooped his pants, to which he told her "no, I poop on the potty!" We've had only a few wet accidents the first few days, and other than that, he's been dry as a bone. We would not be so bold as to declare victory over potty training, but Kaleb has been amazingly easy so far. Kudos to waiting until he was three! :) Life will be shifting into vacation mode over the next few weeks, so we'll see if that change in routine means an increase in accidents, but even if it does, we'll take the success and be glad for it!

Karis is celebrating his 40th birthday this year - doesn't look a day over 29! :) As with all things, Karis is taking it in stride and doesn't seem to be bothered a bit by it.

Phrase of the week: This was a conversation - Zachary really is developing his negotiating skills, which will serve him well in the future.....Zachary asked Amy what we were having for supper tonight. Amy "Probably leftovers." Zachary: "I don't want leftovers, that's not yummy." Amy "You can have what I make or go to bed without eating." Zachary: "Humph........Daddy, can you make supper?"

Super Grandma playing baseball with Zachary!

Loving the finger paints that Auntie Kelli gave us for birthdays!

All boy - pounding nails to his heart's delight

My Underwears!

2011-05-07T17:22:00.000-04:00

This was the momentous week in which Kaleb began potty-training. Last weekend, we bit the bullet and did away with diapers (except for naps and nighttime) and went to big-boy underwears! Kaleb loves his underwear, and in fact we put all of the his brand new underwears (no hand-me-downs, thank you!) on our family couch so that he could have the joy every day of perusing them at leisure and picking which was his favorite to wear that day.

Knock on wood, it seems to be going very well. We have made a point of asking him about every 60 minutes (more like every 30 in the first day) if he needs to go to the bathroom. He has responded very well, and has had a few accidents over the week, but nothing too dramatic. Our most difficult part of this is the pooping - it seems to scare him a little bit and he says that it "hurts" even though it is not hard when it comes out. The first time he ran to the bathroom about 5-6 times saying that he had to go poop, but then would get off saying that it wasn't coming. Finally the sixth time was the charm and some actually came out!! He's had two poop accidents so far, but has also managed to go in the potty as well for most days. All-in-all, we're quite pleased with his progress and he loves being a big boy!

Zachary has been very supportive of the whole process, and joins in the celebrations when Kaleb is successful. He was QUITE interested in the beginning and would want to stand right in front of Kaleb while he was on the potty - even though Zachary himself always asks for privacy! :)

Happy Mother's Day to the ladies - may tomorrow be a celebration of how special you are!

Phrase of the week: Kaleb's phrase is "It's coming!" Of course this means the pee, and we're pleased that he seems to understand when it's coming! Keep up the good work! Zachary's phrase this week is "Did you know that a humpback whale can hold its breath for 30 minutes underwater?" He truly is an animal lover right now, and LOVES facts. He routinely informs Miss Jennifer of some new animal tidbit, and she texted Amy this week to pass along this particular tidbit! :)

They had just finished sticking their respective "booty's" out at each other to compare the underwear designs on them - both Thomas the Train of course! Cute little rear-ends if we do say so ourselves!

Easter Fun

2011-04-30T15:48:00.000-04:00

With Easter being last week, we had the great fun of going to the Hilliard Easter party again. It was beautiful as always, and there were lots of fun Easter games for the kids to play (complete with an Easter 'toss', bunny sack races, and of course the live Easter bunny and Easter egg hunt. Heather always outdoes herself, and it was very fun to visit with folks that we don't see all that often.

Kaleb was a master bunny sack racer - he could totally jump and hold onto the sack - it was amazing! He did three races - while Zachary did 0 because he was more intent waiting on his turn for the swing! :)

Beloved Miss Morgan - the boys followed her and her sister Miss Madison around the entire party!

This week had a sad note with the passing of Fred Lysiuk - who has been a long-time friend of the Babiuk family (going back to when Amy's Babiuk grandparents were just starting off as farmers in Canada) and of course is Lisa's grandfather. We were so sad to hear the news, but appreciate that we could know this very special person - what a fun person with deep faith, always a twinkle in his eye and a funny story, and a way of making you feel loved and cared about. On a lighter note, Lisa flew up to Canada for the funeral on Friday, as Rob was flying back from a business trip in California - so we ended up added two boys to our crew. We took them out to supper at Sweet Tomatoes (the BEST restaurant for families!), and it went very well - the four boys were amazingly well behaved, but it did give you a sense of the logistics of having more than two kids! It makes only two kids seem easy! :)

Phrase of the week: Kaleb's word this week is really a sound - the sound of slurping - whenever he sits down to eat something that he thinks is yummy, he now makes a slurping sound in anticipation! This would NOT include "broccolis" however as he has been stating firmly lately that "I no like broccolis, yucky!" What kid doesn't like broccoli!? Zachary's phrase this week was hilarious - when Amy was out of town last week, we had to have backup childcare as Miss Jennifer's little boy Evan had an outpatient procedure done. One of the high school girls that watched him was Miss Madison - she is VERY blond and fair-skinned. The other girl that watched them was Miss Morgan (pictured in our of our Easter pictures). Miss Morgan has a younger sister that the boys have never met also named Miss Madison - who is very dark like her sister Morgan. After hanging out with Morgan and Madison at the Hilliard birthday party (they were the official babysitters for the party, helping to ensure that the kids were all taken care of), Zachary asked Amy the next day "How did Miss Madison get black?" Amy was stumped for a moment before she realized that Zachary thought that Miss Madison #1 with her blond hair and light skin had turned into Miss Madison #2 (Morgan's younger sister) with her dark brown hair and very dark tan skin! Ha ha - so funny!

Festivities Abound

2011-04-23T20:48:00.000-04:00

We apologize for the lack of a post last week - Amy was travelling to N. Carolina and Tennessee and just didn't have enough hours in the weekend to get everything done before she then packed up again and flew to Texas for this week - all in the pursuit of training executives on an expense report software that the company is implementing. Anyway, it was a busy, tiring two weeks but hopefully life will be relatively quiet again for a while. It had been a pretty exhausting several weeks prior to the trips, so even though Amy was in a hotel bed (which is never as comfortable as your own!), she actually slept in one day until almost 9A Orlando time (it was 8A where she was) - which that hasn't happened since the "pre-children" era! :) It was heavenly, but the fact that she had to get up at 4A on her last day to catch the flight home pretty much negated any feeling of being rested.

So onto this week's post - with Kaleb's birthday being only 6 days after Zachary's, the Z-household is basically in party mode for a LONG time! :) We celebrated this year with a Curious George party at the Orlando Science Center, and it was really fun. They did several little experiments at the beginning of the party, including shooting 'rockets' up into the ceiling with the help of Alka-Seltzer. The kids all thought that it was a blast, so all-in-all, it seemed to be a successful party.

Kaleb's Sabbath School singing Happy Birthday to him

Zachary participated in the Adventurers Little Lamb program this year, and while the family was all here he had the Investiture program (aka graduation) - which was entirely too long but was fun to see him walk in with his little outfit on and receive his little trophy. He had a good time in it this year, and so it was a success.

Blake, Luke and Zachary looking very handsome

Gram-Z and Papa-Z then headed home which always leaves us feeling sad, but we were fortunate that we had something to look forward to - Amy's cousin Scott and his wife Patricia were passing through Orlando after enjoying a cruise, so we had the opportunity for a too-short visit, but a visit nonetheless! It was really fun to be able to catch up for a bit.

Phrase of the week: Mommy, I don't think that you should say "maybe" - I think that you should say YES! How well we remember as kids thinking the same thing - Mom should say Yes, not maybe!! :) Kaleb's phrase is not so much a phrase, as trying to capture how precisely his speaking patterns are. When you ask him something, such as "did you see that duck, Kaleb?" His reply is always a very crisp "Yes I did" - if only we were more literate with how to make movie clips, it would be precious to get his little voice!

The boys each had a Curious George shirt with the words "Look Who's" and then the age that they were turning. It was cute to see them in their matching shirts, and they weren't hard to make (thank goodness for PhotoShop!)

Making slime....ooey, gooey fun!

About to make a volcano - little scientists with their lab coats and goggles on!

Birthday Extravaganza

2011-04-09T15:00:00.000-04:00

The week of birthday activities began last weekend as we began to celebrate Zachary's 5th birthday and Kaleb's 3rd birthday. We like to spread our partying out, so we've had a present every day, and Gram-Z and Papa-Z arrived on Thursday. The festivities began Friday night when we went out to Kobe Steakhouse with Auntie Kelli and Uncle Kent to celebrate her birthday (the same day as Zachary's) and Kent's which is in 2 weeks. We continued continued through Friday night when we had our traditional family birthday dinner.

The big shindig is tomorrow at the Science Center where we'll have the party that celebrates Luke Deininger, Zachary and Kaleb's birthdays. It is a Curious George themed party, so the boys should love it hopefully!

Phrase of the week: Happy Birthday Zachary! Zachary responds: Mommy, I thought that I would be taller today! Ha ha - we had no idea that he thought that he would suddenly be big the day of his birthday! That evening, Amy said "So how does it feel to be 5?" Response "Pretty boring." What! Why is it boring - what was your favorite age. "My favorite age was 18 months, because that is when I went to see the bison at Uncle Murray's!" Now let's be clear, Zachary has no memory of this trip, but he dearly loves bison right now, so we showed him pictures of his trip to the farm where Uncle Murray does indeed have bison - so that has become his most favorite time in his life! :) Aunt Elaine and Uncle Murray - you may wake up one day to find Zachary there to see the bison again - he keeps begging to go! :) Kaleb's phrase this week: "Super-hewhoa" Kaleb loves to run around the house pretending to be a superhero, and we especially love his pronunciation! We don't have anything in the house relating to the popular superhero characters, so we're not sure with this came from, but they both love it!

The Birthday chair in Miss Deanna's class

Superhero capes for our superhewhoas!

Reading with Gram-Z

Playing with our new marble run - thanks Auntie Lorie and Uncle Kent! We love it!

Fancy birthday hat from Miss Jennifer

The big-deal birthday gift - a new BIKE for Kaleb! It is the same colors as Zachary's but is a 12 inch bike so is his size. He loves it.

Baby Joey

2011-04-02T21:31:00.000-04:00

Last week, we had the pleasure of a visit with Amy's cousin Judy and her long-time friend Joelle. Joelle has three boys of her own, and soon Zachary became VERY attached to her. Before we knew it, he was giving her a tour of our house - even behind closed doors (thanks for nothing, we had not cleaned up our master bedroom and bathroom, but there were no 'private' areas during this tour!!!) He wanted her to regale him with stories about her three boys. Upon the end of her visit, he pronounced that he wanted to go home with her! It is very clear to us that Zachary attaches himself very quickly and deeply to women - which has its pros and cons of course! :) While Joelle was entertaining Zachary, we had a really nice visit with Judy and it was fun to catch up with her.

The boys reading with Cousin Judy and Grandma

The obsession with Joelle has now begun in this picture....

Today, the big embarrassing story at church occurred at the end when we were having communion. The tray with the tiny glasses of grape juice and the bread wafers were being handed out. We were in the very last row. Amy was sitting beside Kaleb, and then it went Zachary and Auntie Kelli. Amy took the grape juice and bread wafer and then reached to hand the tray to Kelli. As she did so, she raised the tray in the air so that it wouldn't pass right in front of Kaleb and Zachary (avoid all temptation)......but apparently she did not raise it quite high enough. Kaleb was curious, and definitely wanted whatever was on that tray, and his hand shot like a rocket up in the air and grabbed the tray. Grape juice then proceeded to splash out of all the cups onto the tray and onto Zachary's lap. The best laid plans...... Thankfully there weren't many people left in our row, and almost all of the grape juice landed on Zachary's 'stain-resistant pants' (thank you Children's Place!) so when Amy brought out the wipes, there was hardly even a mark left on his pants. So all in all, other than being very embarrassed, it wasn't a terrible disaster. Next time, she'll raise the tray VERY HIGH.

Phrase of the week: The title of this week's post is really the phrase. We headed out to eat with Auntie Kelli and Uncle Kent at Kobe Steakhouse this week, and we all climbed into the van together. On the way there, Amy asked Zachary what he thought that the coming baby's name should be. He answered "Jason" and then when asked for a middle name he said "Joey" - so the baby's name would be Jason Joey Johnson. We all thought that was amusing, so started to laugh, and then Kaleb says "Baby Joey!! - Auntie Kelli Ka-roo" Ka-roo of course is Kangaroo, and Kaleb was putting together the fact that Baby Joey's are with Kangaroos so with the baby being in Auntie Kelli's tummy, she must be a Kangaroo! Clever child :) Ha ha ha - it was really cute, so then we started to call the baby "Baby Joey" as the new nickname. It's quite cute, so we'll see if it sticks as a nickname until the baby arrives and the real name is unveiled!

At this point, Mommy can still manage to wrestle both of them to the ground, but it won't be long until they easily overtake her!

Beautiful Spring in Florida

2011-03-26T20:14:00.000-04:00

Floridians really suffer in the heat for much of the year, but this is really the BEST time to live in Florida - it is so beautiful this time of year! We try to take advantage of it by going outside as much as possible, and it is this time of year that we have our annual picnic with a group of friends. Sadly this year, not many of us "usuals" were able to come, but we were pleased to have some new families join us. The weather cooperated and was beautiful all day.

Kaleb and Kieran are two peas in a pod - and they just play SO WELL together! We're thankful that the Cochrans moved here for many reasons, but this is a big one!

Braelyn hanging out with Zachary and Luke

Kieran - a dream child who will actually take a nap in his Daddy's arms out at the park!? Whose child does that? Certainly not the Z children! :)

Crazy Kaleb - walking around with a camp chair bag completely over his head - waiting to see when he'd run into something or trip!

Playing the tree made for a perfect picture moment

Last weekend we went over to the Isidros to celebrate Braelyn's birthday with a arts and crafts extravaganza. It was very fun, but the true highlight was when the Dads had to do a three-legged race - our friend William and his partner won the race!

William and his partner in the heat of the battle (middle of the picture both in green shirts)

Crafting it up

The highlight of the party - a pile of puppies (aka children!) piling onto the hammock and swinging wildly!

Phrase of the week: "Red!" This has probably been mentioned in the past, but Amy swears that Kaleb is color-blind for greens and reds. Now, we will confess that we've been wrong in the past (such as we thought FOR SURE that Kaleb was going to be left-handed and it is now quite clear that he is right-handed), so we'll see what happens in this situation. Kaleb has been a little slower than his brother (okay, much slower) to learn his colors but he's finally getting many of the colors right (blue is always right, and the others are a little more hit or miss). However, he NEVER gets green right - he always calls it red. Karis swears that Kaleb only does it when Amy is around, so she must be the weakest color link in the Z-family (as an aside, Karis says this last night to Amy as she's drinking a glass of water - to which she begins to laugh, then cough, then choke so badly that Karis is asking her if he needs to do the Heimlich maneuver on her! Thankfully she did not need to undergo this technique, but it was sweet relief when she finally got an unencumbered breath of air!). So, this documents the 'wondering' of whether Kaleb is color-blind and hopefully we'll remember in a few months to come back and give an update! Zachary's favorite phrase lately is "Mommy, where does [fill in the blank - usually animal related] live?" so we've been making good use of our map in our dining room lately to discuss where our relatives and wild animals live.

Fifth Disease

2011-03-19T23:51:00.000-04:00

Welcome to the world of parenting - all kinds of crazy illnesses that you've never heard of before. On Wednesday, Kaleb woke up with a red rash on both checks, but when Amy picked him up from the bed it just looked like he was flushed from sleeping (the time zone change has meant that Kaleb has been sleeping in until 8A when Amy has to WAKE the poor kid up every day in order to get out the door) - but the rash didn't go away throughout the day. But, he didn't seem to be feeling bad, no fever etc. The next day the rash is a bright, fire-engine red color - so our dear friend Jennifer & babysitter extraordinaire offered to swing him by the doctors office on the way home from the library. Diagnosis......Fifth Disease - aka "slapped cheek." Apparently this is fairly common for kids to have, and when the rash appears on their face, they're no longer contagious.

This is the day after we started putting Cortaid on his face, so it is MUCH MUCH better (not the fire engine red that it was the day before), but you can still see the remnants of the rash on both of his cheeks.

We're waiting to see if anyone else will get it (although about 50% of adults have already been exposed and thus are immune). The one stinky thing about it is that it isn't great for pregnant women to be around, as it can be a risk for about 5% of pregnant women to the fetus. Our friend Kelli is of course pregnant, and she saw Kaleb last weekend at church (although thankfully he did not sit with her the entire church service), so we were a bit concerned that she could have been exposed but so far so good.

The other thing that occurred this weekend which really could bring Amy to tears is that Kaleb has discovered how to get INTO his crib. Why would this be a downer, you ask? Because we can only imagine that it will be a short amount of time before he figures out how to get OUT of the crib!!!! Soon, the random middle-of-the-night wake-up calls will begin.....ouch, it makes us tired just thinking about it. That transition phase is just not fun!

Phrase of the week: Zachary and Kaleb are REALLY into animals right now, and so we read a lot of animal books for bedtime stories. Kaleb is always particular about telling you which animal is the mommy, daddy, Zachary and Kaleb (so cute that he calls the baby animals by his and Zachary's names!). When we get to the kangaroo portion of the books, he'll say "Look, baby kee-roo!" A few weeks ago, Zachary was playing a game with Grandma and informed her "Grandma, you're pretty good at this game for being old!" Just what a lady wants to hear! :)

Getting filthy in their mud pies - what great fun!

Kieran & Kaleb getting a ride upside down on Uncle William!

Kaleb and Kieran playing in the sand

Riding tandem on the tricycle

Grandma Norma!

2011-03-12T15:11:00.000-05:00

Last week, we had the treat of Grandma Norma coming to Orlando. It was the sad event of her sister's funeral, but we did enjoy seeing her very much. Zachary remembered Grandma Norma and how she taught him to play the "Numbers game" (aka Trouble), so he insisted on having a game with her. She beat him twice to his one win which did result in a near cry, but she taught him a little about the fact that life is like that, and it doesn't mean that someone else is smarter etc, and he seemed to handle it alright.

Other than that, it was a relatively quiet week with Amy flying up Atlanta for a day trip to do some training while the boys stayed close to home. We're looking forward to the end of allergy season here, as we're beginning to wonder if Amy has allergies - it seems like she has been getting a sore throat and swollen lymph glands every 1-2 weeks for the last 6 weeks or so but it has never developed into an actual cold. It is hard to tell, and fingers crossed it isn't something else. Amy's mom went back to work after her hip surgery, which she recovered from amazingly fast. The minimally invasive surgery that she has had now both times really does seem like the best way to go.

This was the week that Amy was able to sneak away from work in order to go watch Zachary in his gymnastics class. He is the oldest child there, and as such, the teacher has him go first etc for the different exercises. He has really come a long way in his coordination and abilities - it is really fun to watch since he began last Fall. With being the "first" in most things, he's also getting a lot of confidence and really trying hard to catch on to what the teacher is asking them to do. Hopefully we'll start Kaleb next year into gymnastics.

Phrase of the week: Mommy, what is a EP? A leader (he was trying to say VP). What does a VP do? They make decisions. What kind of decisions? At this point in the conversation, Karis can't help himself and starts to laugh - saying "Zachary, those are VERY good questions that the rest of us workers would like to know - what are they DOING!?" Kaleb's favorite word this week is "blue" - perhaps this is the one color that he knows consistently, and he wants to have a blue spoon or fork at every meal! Good thing over the years we've accumulated a lot of them!

Just like Daddy, ready to shave with shaving cream on his face!

First Time Skiing!

2011-03-05T20:15:00.001-05:00

This was the annual trip to the CFO conference, which is also the annual skiing trip. This was the first year that we took Zachary - believing that he was at the optimum age (in that 5 range, although he's technically one month shy of 5 years old!) to learn. We headed off to Deer Valley, Utah on an early morning flight in which Amy was a bit nervous about that long of a flight with a plane full of coworkers. She brought an arsenal of entertainment options, with the fallback option of the DVD and kid-friendly educational apps on the I-touch. But, we're pleased to say that both the trip out and back, she managed to entertain him the whole time without the use of electronics! This feels like quite an achievement as it would be SO MUCH EASIER to just turn on the power button and sit back to relax the trip, but she wanted to keep him engaged rather than mesmerized.

Anyway, we were fortunate to have our friends the Johnsons, Deiningers and Cochrans come with us. We were able to get an early check-in, so we headed up to the condos (we had rented two side by side to accommodate everyone) to see if Zachary, Luke, and Kieran would take naps (which they did) while Karis, Kent, Rob, Adam and William headed off to Brighton to ski.

Monday was the first day of ski school for Zachary and Luke - while Lisa and Amy nervously waited for the outcome. Zachary was emphatic at the end of the day that "I didn't learn anything, I didn't like it, and I'm NOT GOING BACK" Zachary is a bit of a perfectionist, and if he doesn't master something in the first day, he doesn't want to do it again - and it appears that he had a hard time making the 'pizza' shape with his skis that first day. So, Amy gave him the pep talk of "you learn a little bit every day - and someday you'll be able to ski with Daddy!" That didn't work, so she moved on to "In life, you have to learn perseverance because lots of things are hard, and you won't learn everything in one day." That didn't work either, so she moved on to "I'm sorry you don't like it, but we've paid for a week of ski school and you'll certainly be going whether you like it or not. I only expect you to TRY your best, and to LISTEN to the instructor." At that point, Zachary finally seemed to capitulate and informed her "Fine, I'll go back tomorrow but I want a LADY instructor this time, not a man!"

Thankfully, Tuesday through Thursday went fantastic in ski school and on Thursday the Z-parents picked him up from ski school and actually skied down the bunny hill with him 4'ish times. He could have kept going on all afternoon but we decided that a nap was necessary as we'd be on the plane again the next day. He LOVED it, and seemed to be doing fantastic with the pizza shape (with a little help from the 'edgie-wedgie' elastic bands which help them from getting the skis too far apart) - he turned and stopped very well and loved going fast down the hill.

The other highlights of the trip was a sleigh ride at the conference dinner (which actually came in handy as an incentive (aka bribe) in order to go back to ski school the next day) and a tubing adventure at Gorgoza Park. Zachary loved the tubing experience as well, so it was a smashing success. Sleep was at a precious minimum with Zachary waking up at 3:30A, 4:30 and finally 6:30 on each respective day. The last day was also in the 6 range, which we were thankful for!

Karis hurt his back before we left, but managed to recover enough to where he enjoyed himself as well. Amy had a great time skiing on the first and last day, but will admit that her quads were screaming on the second and third days! :)

Kaleb stayed at home with Grandma to have fun with her, bonding over all kinds of fun activities. The big highlight is that he's definitely gotten the hang of going "pee in the poddy" so now we're trying to figure out a good weekend to really launch the full-on poddy training.

Phrase of the week: Zachary informed us on the last night that he wanted to live in "Ew-Tah!" Kaleb's phrase as he would tell Grandma that he needed to go poddy "It's coming Grandma!"

Zachary in the tube, getting ready to go down the hill

Luke & Zachary

The newest ski lover

A family picture in our ski gear

Skiing on the last day with Karis through the hoops course - very clever for getting them to turn as their skiing in order to go under the hoops!

Zachary is in the blue looking at his instructor in the middle of the picture in the "magic carpet" ski school area

The Deiningers with Adam & Luke, the Cochrans with Kieran, the Johnsons with baby on board, and of course the Z-family

Getting ready for the sleigh ride

Pregnancy Conversations

2011-02-26T14:00:00.036-05:00

First off, the title is probably making some folks wonder if the Z-s are expecting again, and the answer is No - just to set the record straight. However, our dear friends Auntie Kelli and Uncle Kent are expecting! YIPPEE, YAHOO! We're very excited about this news and couldn't be happier for them. Since they shared with us the news, we've had several very funny things happen with Zachary. He was there when Kelli told us the news and while it was still very much a secret, he then went around informing those folks that would be interested in her news. We tried to explain the whole "secret" thing but it just didn't work well, so it was a good thing that his social circle is pretty small.

Since then, we just have to write down some of the conversations that we've had:

1. When Auntie Kelli eats, does the food get on the baby? No, the food is in another spot in her tummy, so it isn't on the baby. How? Well (thinking hard on this one...), it's like there are two sacks in her tummy, one for the food and one for the baby - kind of like you have a Ziploc sack in the morning for your gummy vitamins. Oh, Mommy, I think that you're right - like one sack for the green gummies and one sack for the red gummies!

2. Then, while looking at a Christmas ornament of Zachary that was an ultrasound picture, he asked Amy - "Mommy, was that when I was still in your tummy?" "Yes." "Oh - well, where is Kaleb, I can't see him in that picture!" " Kaleb wasn't in there yet." " Yes he was, because I was born first!" At this point, distraction was the only way that could end this conversation, so distraction effort began immediately!

3. Mommy - I'm going to have a baby when I'm older! No, Zachary, only girls have babies. Well, what did Daddy have in his tummy then!!? Nothing, he didn't have a baby!

4. Why can't Auntie Kelli go snow sledding, if the baby has no bones yet, how can the baby get hurt?

It has really been a fun experience to watch his little mind trying to figure this whole thing out, and these conversations really haven been delightful.

Phrase of the week: Kaleb's word this week is 'nuggle' - which is for "I want to snuggle!" What mommy says no to that!? :) Zachary informed us this that he was going to marry Kaleb. Ha ha - such funny stories to tell them when they're older!

Uncle Kent came over for the "Daytona 500" on our back deck - running the boys around and around in their cars at top speed while they laughed their heads off

Grandma playing with the boys - throwing balls into a bucket on the other side of the room - the requirements before throwing the ball include saying a rhyming phrase, blowing on the ball and then lobbing it across the room.

The main stage of the family room - the jumping trampoline - aka the couch. Poor thing, it'll never be the same

Spa Day - enjoying mommy's robes!

Green Meadows Fun

2011-02-19T16:21:00.000-05:00

Last weekend, we headed off to the Green Meadows Petting zoo to enjoy the lovely weather and the fun animals. It's been over a year since we went last time, but Zachary remembered vividly being able to milk the cow! That remained his favorite thing this year, but it was sure fun to pet all of the animals. They have a lot of animals for the kids to interact with, so it is always an entertaining visit to see how delighted the kids are. Kaleb has always been afraid of the animals, and while he certainly wasn't all that brave this time, he got to the point where he'd reach out with one finger to touch the animals, or he would 'pet' them if you put his hand on top of your hand, and then petted the animal with your hand. He'd then be brave enough to slide his hand forward and touch the animal with his fingers. One step at a time! :) For the record books, there was a slight mishap at the end of the day when Zachary and his friends were playing on one of the old-time tractors and the small ledge became just a bit too small and Zachary fell off - about 5 feet to the ground. So for the fading memories, it is NOT a good idea to have more than one kid up on those tractors!

Phrase of the week: Zachary informed us last night that he was going to marry Kaleb! :) Kaleb's phrase today was yelling from his crib "I SLEPT!" when he had clearly never even closed his eyes - thinking that surely Mommy or Daddy could come get him up if he told them that he slept!

At the beginning of the day, Kaleb, Zachary, Luke and Adam on the tractor

Zachary milking his cow

Loves petting the sheep

The chicks is always one of the favorite moments

Even Kaleb was brave enough to touch the chicks

Zachary on the pony ride

Kaleb riding the pony, although not wanting to PET the pony!

Kaleb had a fantastic time playing on the playground afterwards, and was the only one who wanted to go get his picture taken looking out the 'peek-windows' - he's in the middle one looking out

Park & Re-Park

2011-02-13T21:22:00.000-05:00

We had a great weekend with some outdoor activities. We actually went to two separate picnics yesterday, which was very fun and the weather was cool, but still lovely. We headed first off to the Wekiva Springs Park where we met the Hilliards and Ottatis, and enjoyed a picnic lunch and then playing around the springs. Some folks (not in our group) were actually brave enough to get into the water on a cold 60 degree day - brr!

The 'explorers' walking along the trails in the woods

Zachary and Kaleb sitting along the edge of the springs while Mommy prayed that they didn't fall in, because it was going to be Daddy having to drive into that frigid water! :)

After that, we jetted off to the Chapin Station park to enjoy a supper picnic with the Cochrans, Deiningers, and Johnsons. There were bikes out at this park, so the kids played on the playground sets and rode bikes. It was hard to beat such a fun day outside, although the missing of a nap had us crossing our fingers!

Kieran and Kaleb enjoying a spin in Uncle William's bike trailer

Phrase of the week: When Zachary was three, he would always call blueberries "burlies," and we kind of wondered what Kaleb would call them, whether it would be the same or something else. But of course Kaleb has come up with his very own version and calls them "blue-eies" :) Zachary's phrase continues to be his obsession with numbers, so while we're driving he'll ask how fast we're driving, and then proceed to tell us what the speed limit is. He'll then tell us EVERY time that the speed limit changes, shouting out the numbers and informing us that he's going to tell us every single number! Thankfully he doesn't do it every time, although perhaps necessary as sadly Amy has been stopped twice over the last six months for speeding (and no, unlike our friend Corey, both times have resulted in a ticket!! Next time she's just going to be bold and ask the police officer if he'll just give her a warning instead, although Karis is now convinced that her car is 'marked' and there will be no getting off! :) Sad to say, because Mommy is not the fastest driver in this household although Daddy loves to gleefully inform her that she is! Not so!!!

Celebrating Grandma's birthday two weekends ago

Luke & Zachary, the hockey players

Riding the Mommy horsey

I winned!

2011-02-06T08:40:00.000-05:00

We've had a week filled with mostly illness and work - at least on Amy's side of life. Amy and the kids (thankfully not Karis) got the stomach flu last weekend. Amy's mom had taken the boys down to her house on Sunday, so she had the unenviable job of dealing with Kaleb as he threw up multiple times. She had it over the span of 24 hours - but thankfully was up on her feet on Monday. It was a critical week at work, so she worked very long hours and on Friday started coming down with something again - which laid her flat again on Saturday with a 102-103 fever. Karis is impressed with her ability to hold off illnesses until the weekend when it isn't important that she be up on her feet for work! :) Amy would be more impressed if she could just avoid the illness to begin with!

We had the Cochrans over on Friday night for supper, our boys just love to play with their little boy Kieran. Auntie Heather had given all three boys a bath, but after supper while the adults chatted, the boys went into the front room and were romping on the couch until they were hot and sweaty - with soaked hair and all. Crazy kids - so much for the bath.

Phrase of the week: Competition is alive and well in the Z-household. A typical conversation that you can hear every morning as the boys run out of the house to the car in hopes of being the first one to open the door and make the car light turn on "I'm gonna win!" "No, I wanna win!" "I winned!" "No, I win!", "I WIN!" "I winned second!" Thankfully the "I winned second" seems to be enough of a win to keep folks still happy without a complete melt-down. Kaleb is usually the one winning second as he just isn't big enough yet to keep up with Zachary, nor has he figured out how to "sneak" out to the car when Zachary isn't looking to get a headstart, but he is young enough to think that winning second is still winning!

A first in our house - Zachary giving Kaleb a horseback ride. Of course he would start to go fast and Kaleb would fly off the backend, but thankfully Zachary is low enough to the ground that no harm was had with being "bucked off"

His vs Hers

2011-01-29T20:26:00.000-05:00

Last weekend was truly the example of "his version" vs "her version" in which of course Karis flew off to Salt Lake City with 8 other guys for a fantastic 5 days of skiing himself silly every day. Amy on the other hand stayed at home being the single mom for the same 5 days (amazing coincidence! :). Grandma came over to stay for a couple days, so there was extra helping hands around which was appreciated!

Both the "his and hers" experience was fun, although his was 100% fun while Amy's had more of fun thrown in amongst working, juggling house chores, getting boys from one daily event to the other etc. Karis came back to us safe and sound, which we considered a thankful answer to prayer. He skied at Park City, Alta and Brighton while he was there, and believes that Brighton may be his new favorite mountain in Utah.

Our church is building a new parking lot, and somehow one of the water pipes backed up and resulted in 2 inches of standing water in the children's Sabbath School rooms. So, off to the zoo we went on Sabbath. The zoo is just a small local zoo, but we enjoyed ourselves very much seeing all of the animals. It was as bit chilly and windy, but we bundled up as if it was very cold and stayed warm.

Zachary, Kaleb & Kieran on the riding toys at the zoo entrance

Holding hands as Zachary and Kieran walked - that was a Kodak moment!

Looking at the macaw birds

Posing with Auntie Kelli

Kaleb ousted Kieran from his spot in Kieran's stroller, but thankfully Kieran was able to hitch a ride!

Phrase of the week: My tummy hurts. This isn't a fun phrase, but it is one that we're slowly learning as parents to take seriously. We've mentioned in our blog posts over the last six months or so that Zachary will randomly say that his stomach hurts and 100% of the time, it ends up with him throwing up once or twice. After he throws up, he is completely fine. We can't figure it out - he doesn't seem to be sick because he's always fit as a fiddle after he throws up, and the rest of us never get sick either. It is obvious that his food is not digesting when he throws up, because you can clearly tell what he's eaten that day. Odd. If it was an allergy, it would seem like it would happen more often because our diet doesn't vary all that much. Who knows. But, one thing is for sure, we don't "hope for the best" anymore - so last night we had towels all over the couch, on the floor, extra protection on the bed etc, so when the puking began at least the damage was mostly on things that could be thrown into the wash vs having to have a carpet cleaner out! Kaleb's phrase that we wanted to write down for our memoirs is "poon" which of course is spoon. It is so cute when they don't say the word quite right! Soon they'll be able to say everything just perfectly and these precious little words will disappear.

Snow Cone Heaven

2011-01-21T21:42:00.000-05:00

Last weekend, we went to the Circus for the first time with the boys with our friends the Hilliards....and unbeknownst to us there were many of our other friends as well there! It seems like everyone had the same idea of the circus over the four day weekend last week! :)

The boys were mesmerized the whole time - of course their personalities are completely different when it comes to being "into" something though. Zachary sits intently staring at what's going on - without hardly moving a muscle or turning his head. You could almost think that the child is bored until you realize that he's just afraid that if he looks anywhere else that he'll miss something - no time for even blinking your eyes! Kaleb on the other hand of course is clapping his hands for the entertainers, waving his arms in the air and bouncing his head to the tune of the music. Zachary's favorite part was the elephants, and Kaleb kept telling us that there were zebras there!!

The best part though was probably the snow cones - the boys have never had a snow cone before, so they thought they had died and gone to heaven. Karis thought that he'd died as well when he got the bill for the two snow cone clown mugs and a small popcorn - $25!!! He then informed Amy that those snow cone mugs would be a permanent fixture in our house, because they weren't going to go in the trash for that kind of money!

Kaleb has continued with his fever this week - wishing that he would finally get through sprouting this molar. Although Jennifer told us that a friend of hers in Tallahassee had a son who had a fever recently for 21 days - and the doctors kept saying that there wasn't anything that could be done, it was just a virus that you had to wait out. So who knows, maybe it is just a virus.

Amy's mom went home this weekend to recoup in the quiet of her home. She's coming back this weekend though for one day as Karis is flying off to Salt Lake City for an all-men's skiing trip. There are 10 guys going - mostly all from Amy's work. Her old boss that moved to Texas remembered that Karis loves to ski, so when there was an opening in the group, he called to see if he was interested. Interested??!! Can we see how fast a plane ticket can be purchased?! :) He'll be gone for five days, so single motherhood here we come (and of course during the busiest time of Amy's year - now THAT'S a loving wife for you! :) Hee Hee - easy to say as the wife is writing this blog! :))

Phrase of the week: One of the only things that Kaleb wanted to eat this week was "ahdubs" - in case anyone needs a translator, that would be Kaleb-speak for olives! :) Zachary's phrase this week was "Mommy, I can reach your shoulders, I'm almost as big as you!" He is just growing as fast as a weed, and he can now touch his hands to Amy's shoulders, so he thinks that he's reached the big-time. Now there are constant comparisons to how big he is, especially when she told him that he would soon be taller than she was. He thinks that it'll be any day now! :)

Playing with bubbles on the back deck (before of course spilling both bottles entirely!)

Zachary and Luke playing "dead" on the playground. Imaginative play has definitely begun

New Body Parts

2011-01-16T06:17:00.000-05:00

This week, Amy's mom had her second hip replaced. She had her first hip replaced just before Zachary turned a year old. That day is burned in our memories because both of us had the flu, so Karis was throwing up in the parking lot as he walked to her to the hospital. When Amy got down to the hospital (thankfully Amy's Aunt Elaine and Grandma were here to watch Zachary), they both laid on the floor in an alcove wishing that the nausea and stomach cramps would go away! Thankfully this time, there was no sickness. The surgery went very well, and she's staying with us on her way to being youthful again with two new hips! She's a tough lady and is walking around well with the walker.

Mom was "car"jacked here by Kaleb, who loves to drive the walker around!

The Z-boys went to the Science Center last Sunday with Aunt Heather & Kieran, which was very fun. Unfortunately Amy had to work as it is year-end - the craziest time of the year! They explored all of the fun things to do there, and are eagerly awaiting their next visit! Poor Kieran had an accident and ended up with wet pants, so Aunt Heather tried out the hurricane booth to try and dry his pants out as there were no hand blowers in the restrooms! Clever!

Kaleb is running a low-grade fever this week, which we THINK may be related to the fact that he's getting a new molar. He is telling us that his mouth hurts, so that's what it making us think this is the issue. Of course doctors will tell you that teething doesn't cause fevers, so we really don't know but Amy's Mom swears that she had a fever every time that she produced a new tooth, so it may be possible. One night however he was crying every 20 minutes between midnight and 2A. So finally Amy decided that at least one parent should be getting some sleep, so she took her blanket and pillow into Kaleb's room to lay on the floor with him until he fell asleep. Well, the child was happy as a clam that she was in there, but still wouldn't go to sleep. He kept popping his head over the crib bumper pad and saying "Mama??" After about an hour, Amy realized that he was playing with his hotwheel cars, so she made him fork 'em over and imagine this, he went to sleep shortly thereafter! It was about 3:30A before Amy was able to stumble back to her bed and fall asleep for the very short remainder of the evening. The lesson learned in all this - Amy is too old to "sleep" on carpeted concrete! :) Ouch!

Last week, our friend Heather turned another year older, and her husband William threw her a murder-mystery dinner theater. It was a "superhero" murder mystery, so we all had to dress up as superhero characters. It was quite fun, and folks were very creative! Karis was "The Red Wonder" and his character loved to rap, so he was a rhyming wonder all night! Amy had to be "Gothicon" which was a female rocker in "Goth" (aka scary!) get-up. None of us guessed correctly the "whodunit" but it was fun anyway!

Mr. Fabulous (Kent), Blue Blaze (Kelli), The Red Wonder (Karis), The Wisher Genie (Lisa), The Jester (Rob)

Amy in the scary "goth" make-up & fake leather pants along with Kelli

One last story for the week - yesterday as we were eating lunch, we noticed a heron walking around in our back yard, which is kind of unusual. We didn't realize that our screen door to our pool patio was open, and before we knew it, the heron walked into our deck. The boys were enthralled and thrilled, but it then became obvious that the bird had no idea how to get OUT of the pool deck. The poor bird kept flying into the screen, which didn't make him or us very happy. Amy and Karis finally had to go out and try to gently guide the bird towards the now two open doors to freedom without scaring the poor thing and giving it a heart attack! Thankfully we were successful and the bird is now free to fly in the open again!

Phrase of the week: "Baby Llama!" This has become one of Kaleb's favorite books right now - it is a Dora search and find book where there are baby animals on a disk that you spin. He loves to read this book and is very pleased with himself when he finds the right animal and says "Dere it is!" Zachary cute word this week is "Efushions" - in case you aren't sure that word is, it is "Ephesians!" Try keeping a straight face when he recites his memory verse from "Efushions!" :)

Grandparent Bliss

2011-01-09T07:50:00.000-05:00

Zachary and Kaleb said good-bye to Gram-Z and Papa-Z this Thursday, much to their disappointment. Zachary has already begun asking when they're coming back, and how many days that is! The boys had a fantastic time with them, and Zachary found Papa-Z to be the perfect playmate! They played Frisbee a hundred times, went biking, went searching for sticks to build a "manger," wrestled, played hockey and read books. Gram-Z was in charge of bedtime every day, which the boys found great delight in. The house is very quiet and empty with them gone, so we're looking forward to their next visit.

Playing with Daddy's new Crokinole/Carrom board

Making sticky mosaics from Auntie Lorie & Uncle Kent!

Riding a very "bucky" horsey!

Searching for sticks to make a "manger"

Phrase of the week: "I'm the fastest runner because I'm the oldest." Zachary has been fascinated with birthdays, and how everyone's age fits in. He has figured out that he is older than his friends (a whopping three days older than Luke, and only 2 months older than Blake) but this has now given him the "oldest" bragging rights. He also loves to "race" Mommy to the bathroom each night to brush his teeth, but he's still at the age where he thinks that he has to win - so if Mommy is winning, he grabs her shirt and makes them go back to the starting line for a re-do! Kaleb's phrase this week is his own special little prayer that he said all by himself this week "Dear Jesus.....I luv you, Bless Mommy, Daddy, Zachary.....Kaleb. Heart (this we believe is for 'live in my heart')......Men!"

A Merry Christmas & A Happy New Year!

2011-01-03T20:27:00.000-05:00

We had a fabulous time for Christmas last Sunday (the kids not having any real idea of when Christmas is, we avoided the Sabbath issue by just having presents on Sunday) opening presents. We actually opened one present on Christmas Eve from Gram-Z and Papa-Z of which the boys each got a scooter. Kaleb's first question the next morning is "More presents? My 'cooter!!" They both loved their presents, although Amy and Karis were questioning our sanity when both boys opened their whistles and then let out ear-bursting shrill whistles! But when a spatula and a whistle is all that you ask for, it kind of seems like you should get one...:) Zachary received a new watch, and he was over the moon with excitement. This then led to a tantrum later in the week when Kaleb cries "I need watch!" after which he was informed that perhaps he would get one for his birthday to which he replied "NO, NOW!" Good thing for grandparents who are allowed to spoil their grandkids, because he ended up with a watch from his benevolent Gram-Z and Papa-Z!

Blowing on the whistle....

A little known fact is that the Zbaraschuk family is also Jewish - or at least we practice the Hanukkah practice of opening presents each day :) We decided that there were just so many presents on Christmas that the boys would benefit from being able to play with the presents they'd already opened, so we saved the ones from us parents for the rest of the week. So, it will be a disappointing day when the presents stop and they realize that Christmas doesn't keep going all year round!!

The funniest story of the week came from beloved Daddy and Kaleb last week at church. On the way to Sabbath School, Karis decides that he needs to use the facilities - so into the bathroom they go. Karis gives Kaleb strict instructions to stand behind him and DO NOT TOUCH ANYTHING. Well, as Karis is preparing to relieve himself, Kaleb decides that the red trap in the men's urinal is very intriguing and runs over to grab it. Horrified, thinking of all the dirty germs this involves and hoping against hope that Kaleb won't put his hand now into his mouth, Karis attempts to stop his current activities and run over to grab Kaleb away from the urinal. Daddy's next thought is - wow, my pants are undone here and I'm very exposed - I need to try and remedy this AS WELL as trying to de-germ Kaleb's hands at the same time! Needless to say, Karis was aghast by the whole event but it sure did provide some hearty laughs from the rest of the family!!!

Phrase of the week: Both phrases came from this week's daily evening drive to look at Christmas lights - during which Zachary exclaimed "So much excitement!!" and Kaleb says in wonder "Oh goodness!!"

Topping Off Ceremony

2010-12-25T17:12:00.000-05:00

Last week, there was a topping off ceremony for Amy's new office building that is being built. The very last beam was put onto the top of the building, so all of the employees had the opportunity to sign the beam before it was hoisted by the crane up. It was a fun event, and Amy is definitely looking forward to next November when we should be moving in - her commute will be all of 2 miles long! Yippee!

We also took the boys to the Pinocchio's theater to see the Nativity play, which was very good. The boys seemed to enjoy it, and it was a nice diversion on a Sunday.

The big deal of the week was when Papa-Z and Gram-Z arrived on Monday. Very fun! The kids were out of their minds with excitement on Monday night - so hyper we weren't sure that we'd ever get them to bed! They've had a great time and we hope that the grandparents have as well (when they're not exhausted!). Papa-Z has been playing Frisbee, basketball, and wrestling with Zachary non-stop!

Zachary had his Christmas program for gymnastics this week and it was so awesome! She dressed all of the little boys up in "toy soldier-like" costumes with little red dots on their checks. They then showed off their skills! It is pretty impressive how much he has learned since joining gymnastics - his skills are definitely improving. He can walk on a balance beam unassisted with nary a bobble, front and backwards somersaults, hanging on the bars, jumping on trampolines and the list goes on. It makes a Mommy proud! There are only six little boys in the group, so it is a perfect size.

We braved the cold to go to the Gaylord Palms "Ice" show on Friday. It is all of 9 degrees in there, and we were bundled up like Eskimos. It was quite amazing as always to see the ice sculptures. The ice slides were the highlight, but unfortunately Zachary wasn't heavy enough to really get going fast on the slides, so there were tears - which only makes a person colder! Gram-Z and Papa-Z were laughing that they didn't come all of the way from Canada to just go into the cold! :)

Merry Christmas! And, for those wondering whether we've fallen off the bus - our Christmas letter will clearly be late this year. If anyone wants to write it for us, we're accepting applications! :)

Phrase of the week: You 'kay? Kaleb is always very concerned about folks around him, and if he perceives that they might be hurt or something might be amiss, he very quickly will pose this question to be sure that you're okay! Zachary's phrase is "Can I have another present?" - we wondered when the kids would really get the fact that there are presents at Christmas, and it appears that 4.5 is that magical age. He definitely is excited about the presents aspect. He also has blown one of the presents that Amy bought for Karis by "innocently" asking about the present in front of Daddy (there was a stern lecture for that one!)

David & Goliath

2010-12-18T16:13:00.003-05:00

Zachary has thus far been one that hasn't engaged in a lot of creative role-playing, and is much happier reading books or doing tasks (cooking, mowing etc) or playing sports (latest obsession is Frisbee!). However, his favorite Bible story seems to be shaping up at the moment (ever changing by the moment!) to be David & Goliath. He loves to pretend that he's Goliath, and has confiscated two wrapping paper center rolls (wrapping paper all gone of course) to become "swords" for he and Kaleb. He runs around the house shouting "I am Goliath!" and then laughs a maniacal laugh that is on the David & Goliath DVD that we have. We parents are now realizing that we have perhaps gone astray with David & Goliath as he seems to becoming more aggressive with it - so we've instituted a week-long "Goliath-free" week to hopefully fix our ails. But we are pleased to see the creative role-playing going on, so there is a bright side!

Last week we had a real treat when Amy's Aunt Marge and Uncle Melvin came to town. They are some of our favorites, so we were thrilled to visit with them for a bit. Uncle Melvin won Zachary over by the end of the visit by wrestling with him - what more could a boy ask for!

Aunt Marge & Kaleb looking at colors & letters - he's much better with the letters than the colors! :)

After the wrestling match

We had the AHS Christmas party last Sunday night at Mickey's Very Merry Christmas. Against our better judgement we ended up going even though it would be a horribly late night. The lines were very short, and the kids had a fantastic time as you'd imagine. We road Dumbo, the carousel, the "It's a Small World," Winnie-the-Pooh, and the Car ride (there is surely a name but we can't remember it!). The Car ride was the favorite as the kids got to "drive" the cars - Zachary has been talking about it all week. We ended the night with the parade, free hot chocolate & cookies, and then the fireworks before scrambling to leave before the masses all had the same idea. We spent the evening with the Hilliards and we really had a wonderful time even though the kids were up too late. Thankfully, they haven't gotten sick from the experience, so perhaps we dodged a bullet there! Zachary was so enamored that he refuses to take off the Disney pass bracelet, so we've negotiated that he'll take it off when Gram-Z and Papa-Z arrive this week!

Getting ready to drive his very first car - so proud!

The Disney castle is in the background, all lit up with Christmas lights!

It is hard to believe that it is Christmas in one short week with SO MUCH to get done! Sadly, we haven't even started the annual Christmas letter, but there is still a chance that we'll get it out on time now that we've gone "green" with the e-letters! :) Whew! Karis' parents come on Monday, so the kids are very excited about Gram-Z and Papa-Z coming! Auntie Kelli gave the boys some presents last night, so now they're definitely in the 'spirit' of Christmas and are now asking whether they will have any more presents (never fear kiddos, there will surely be one or two more....)

Phrase of the week: "I am Goliath" really has to be the phrase of the week, with Daddy's response of "Zachary, you're 'betting' on the wrong guy in the story!" as the other funny phrase! All the adults in the room laugh when Karis says this of course, but it doesn't seem to phase Zachary yet. Kaleb's phrase is "LIGHTS, Mommy, LOOK LIGHTS!!!" We drive around each evening before supper to see all of the Christmas lights, and Kaleb is non-stop shouting the whole time with excitement over the lights. Karis actually bought one sorry string of lights for our front bushes as well to please the Z-children, so after Christmas is over and the sales are on, we'll have to beef up our lights-display!

Time of Worship

2010-12-11T20:46:00.000-05:00

We received an unexpected invitation this week from a coworker of Amy's to join his family for a special dinner and Christian concert on Friday night at his church to celebrate the 25th anniversary of their church's organization and of the Christmas season. This is not an Adventist church, and we had never been before, but we were honored to be invited so accepted the invitation. It turned out to be a very touching, special evening. It was wonderful to join in a church's celebration of their years of worship - and the church was incredibly friendly and warm with folks greeting us and initiating conversations. The grand finale of the evening was the Christian artists of Meredith Andrews and Josh Wilson. They were both amazing, but in very different ways. Meredith had a great mix of Christmas and general Christian songs, and this fantastic voice. She could make the song itself an expression of intense worship, and it was very moving. Josh Wilson was more light-hearted, but incredibly talented musically. He was alone (aka no band members) but he with his acoustical guitar he became a one man band with a "foot loop". This machine sat on the floor and he could push buttons with his foot as he was playing music, and anything that he had just been playing would then repeat itself and he could in essence build "layers" to his music. So as he would play his song he could add "drums," background melodies, harmonica etc etc. Totally amazing. It was a wonderful way to really begin the Christmas season.

Just to wrap up last week's blog - Heather came over and listened to Kaleb's lungs on Saturday (during which he had spiked another fever that afternoon) and felt that "something" was going on his right lung. This coupled with the fact that he was coughing so hard that he was making himself throw up, Amy then bundled him up and took him to Night Lite Pediatrics. They were fantastic, and took a chest x-ray of him as well. They confirmed that in fact something was going on in his lungs, although they weren't sure if it was pneumonia or just inflammation from the virus that he'd had. The big shocker was that he had TWO ear infections, one of which was quite bad. Thanks for nothing - that just makes a parent feel fantastic to know that your child has been in pain and you've done nothing. He doesn't pull at his ears, so you just have no idea that something is going on unfortunately. Thankfully after some breathing treatments and antibiotics to tackle the lungs and ears, we're all back to somewhat health!

The poor patient

Listening to himself with Auntie Heather's 'toy'

Phrase of the week: Karis says to Zachary - "what do you think that we should get for Mommy for Christmas" Zachary: "How about let's buy her a (baby) monitor to put in MY room so that I can see when SHE is sleeping." Karis - well, what else would want to get her? Zachary: "How about let's buy her a frog humidifier for her room when she's sick." Karis: "Do you think that we should buy her a book?" Zachary: "No, she has one". Ha ha ha - just too funny on many levels, these conversations are hilarious! Kaleb's word this week is "Ta" which is the shortened version of "ta-da" that we mentioned a while back, but apparently he's decided that the "da" portion is just unnecessary! He loves this word though and will use it throughout the day to bring your attention to anything that he thinks is particular special.

The "Unhappy" Ending to Thanksgiving

2010-12-04T16:47:00.001-05:00

Yikes, we ended a Happy Thanksgiving with a packed weekend of fun as we mentioned...but it quickly went downhill from there. We had a great time Saturday night with the Johnsons and Cochrans putting up the Christmas tree. With the three little boys - Zachary, Kaleb and Kieran - it was really fun to see their excitement. Zachary has been obsessed with the tree ever since - and loves to sit looking at it.

However, that Saturday night, Zachary started to act a bit sick and his temperature had a low-grade fever. We put him to bed early (which we KNEW that he was sick when he agreed to go to bed before everyone had left!), but he was definitely sick the next day with a fever, hurting head, and hurting stomach. Apparently Amy has brainwashed him very well, because when someone asked him why he was sick, he answered by saying "Because I didn't take my afternoon nap on Thanksgiving day!" Ha ha ha ha (although you'd think that would mean he wouldn't fight the nap, but he still does!"

Anyway, by the end of Sunday, we had two sick boys on our hands. It has been an entire week of madness - fevers every day off and on (nights being the worst), hurting heads, nausea, stuffy noses, NO appetite (in fact the kids are visibly losing weight, although still drinking a lot of liquids thankfully), and even....puking. Kaleb has puked three times, but the true trophy has to go to Zachary. On Thursday night, Zachary was laying on the couch in pure misery, so Amy put a blanket underneath "just in case" he had to be sick. Karis (who was now sick himself) felt cold and took the blanket to cover up with.....just in time for Zachary to puke all over the light yellow couch, and blasts of puke all over the carpet. Amy wasn't upset with Zachary for puking, but the same can't be said for her sentiments towards Karis at that moment! :) We had a carpet cleaner come the next day, and thankfully it looks like we won't have to be getting a brand new couch.

The kids are very slowly getting better, although Kaleb has quite a bad cough. Daddy Karis is still suffering a bit, but thankfully Amy is keeping it together so far (mind over matter as this was an incredibly busy week and next week is her Corporate meeting week, which is a marathon from beginning to end). We do wish that we'd be healthy again as this has been pretty miserable.

In other happy news, we wanted to take a moment in our blog to congratulate our dear friend, Kent Johnson, who has just accepted the CFO position at our nursing home division - Adventist Care Centers! Very exciting, and well deserved! Congrats Kent!

Jennifer's little boy Evan had surgery this week to remove a portion of an over-developed thyroid. Thus, Amy had to find alternate childcare this week, which it ended up being a blessing with the kids being sick because they could stay at home, and in the mornings they didn't feel too bad. We've now discovered two lovely ladies to watch the kids for days when Jennifer cannot - Jessica and Morgan. We're very thankful!

One weekend when Kaleb was over playing with Kieran, William took some fantastic pictures of him, which we wanted to include here below.

Phrase of the week: Mama, I hurting! AHH, give us anything to help fix the problem when a child says that to you! Poor Kaleb was truly miserable and was following Amy around saying "Mama, I hurting!" He has always been a snuggle-bug, this week he's been extra cuddly as he just wants to be held and comforted. Zachary's phrase this week: I am sick because I didn't take my nap - why didn't everyone leave that day, I wanted to go to sleep - then I wouldn't be sick! (ah, how quickly memories fade, Zachary NEVER wants anyone to leave, and certainly doesn't want to sleep!

Happy Thanksgiving

2010-11-28T07:02:00.002-05:00

We hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving day with family and friends! We had Amy's mom, the Johnson family, and the Isidros over for our Thanksgiving day. It was quite fun - we had lunch at 12:30 and then kids then played all afternoon together. We slightly miscalculated the time that it would take the turkey to cook (by an HOUR), so it was a bit stressful for a while. Amy kept watching the meat thermometer, to which her mom aptly reminded her that "A watched pot never boils!" All in all, it worked out so we ate about 1:30.

Kaleb was very enamored with the Isidro twins, and kept wanting to hold them. Inevitably this leads to the Johnson adults egging him to tell Amy that he wants another Z-sibling! :) Zachary had a fantastic time with Braelyn, and wanted to go to her house the very next day.

Black Friday usually is a non-event in our house, but Amy found a couple of deals that she wanted to take advantage of, so when Zachary came into the room at 5:50A, she just got up and headed out. Can you imagine that at 6:30 when she got to the mall that the parking lot was FULL! There were a couple of stores that she went into that had long lines, so she promptly left - she might be shopping on Black Friday, but nothing is worth that long of a line! She did get a couple of things that she had gone for, so it was successful.

After the morning stint of shopping, we headed off to a local corn maze - the Long and Scott farms. We've never been, but it was super fun! Amy scored the tickets off of Groupon for 1/2 price, which was awesome. We'll definitely go again next year. There is a big corn maze, a mini corn maze (for the kiddos who have shorter attention spans), a tree maze, and then a whole adventure area for the kids to play in. There was a putting green, play sets, a 60 foot slide, and........a zip line. The zip line was a HIT, and Kaleb insisted on going as well - although Mommy was not too thrilled about this, Daddy insisted that he would be fine. Karis ran alongside the swing as Kaleb was in it, so that just in case he fell that Karis could catch him, but Kaleb was a champ and never had a problem - but he had a HUGE smile on his face. Zachary must have done it 5-6 times before we headed home. The Cochrans came with us, so the kids all had fun playing together.

Amy actually went out shopping again after we got home down to Stride Rite in order to take advantage of their buy one, get one 50% off. When you have to buy wide size's (Zachary), the only ones that we can count on are Stride Rite. At the mall, they're about $45-50 dollars a PIECE (AHH, for shoes that they only wear for a few months!) - Amy just can't do it, so she braves the traffic periodically to go to the outlet mall. Traffic was insane as you'd imagine with Black Friday, but she scored a parking spot pretty easily which was amazing - people were parked alongside the road for a mile from the outlet mall on a grassy shoulder! Anyway, she did manage to get six pairs of sneakers/church shoes, so the trip was worth it because it was on average less than $20 per pair! Yahoo!

Phrase of the week: Kaleb was quite excited when he found out that Kieran was coming to the corn maze with us, and informed us "Kieran - REALLY fun!" When we were headed back from the corn maze, we asked Zachary what his favorite thing was about the corn maze. He clearly took that literally and thought only about the corn maze (instead of the adventure area with the zip line) and he said "Getting OUT!" Ha ha, apparently walking around amidst corn got a bit tiring for him!

Coming out of the bumpy slide on the burlap sack to make him go faster!

Going into the wind tunnel - this was appreciated after we were a bit hot from the corn maze to cool off!

Looking at one of the puzzle stations scattered throughout the corn maze

Posing in the corn

Trying out a teeter-totter

The zipline

Karis running with Kaleb on the zipline

This made Karis' heart happy - a tractor made out of hay bales!

Not a Moment to Spare

2010-11-25T19:32:00.001-05:00

Every holiday season, it just seems like it is insanely busy - but every year we wonder how can it get so busy, did we imagine it last year? Well, last weekend began the craziness once again of our holiday season - so hence no post because we didn't have time to sit down and write it! Apologies!

We started off the weekend with Zachary (and many other little kids) participating in the church service at church. The little kids were the "king's courtiers" bringing money to the church (we're fundraising to build a new parking lot at the church) - they all had costumes on, and then picked up the offering. It was quite precious - and at one point Zachary and his friend Blake were standing right beside the pastor, and he had his hands on their heads - as if it was rehearsed, it was perfect for the "scene" at the king's court!

Immediately after that, we hurried over to the Bergherm home for their "Give Thanks" potluck - everyone brought over items for the Harbor House, which is a home for women and children. It was great fun to see everyone and visit. Jennifer is very crafty, and made a turkey cut-out for the kids.

That night, we began the "Celebrate William's 40th Birthday" extravaganza weekend. A group of of us went mini-golfing in the dark - which we haven't done in years, and it was quite fun. The glow in the dark venue was also something unique! We ended the evening with dinner at Cheesecake - how can that ever go wrong! :)

The next morning, Karis and I (thanks to Grandma) headed solo out for breakfast with a long-time friend, Tim Martin, who we haven't seen in years - he was in town for continuing education, so we had a lovely breakfast catching up with him. Not to waste a single moment, we then rushed from breakfast over to Zachary's final soccer game. They gave out little trophies to the kids after the game, so Zachary was pleased as punch! We'll sign him up again in after Christmas for the next season of soccer.

The kids were all lined up to receive their trophy, and Kaleb didn't want to be left out, so he ran over and sat beside Blake!

The boys with their trophies

After the conclusion of soccer, we went over to the park for cake and ice cream for Will's birthday - this celebration was fun as the kids were able to participate. The gag gifts for Will were "princess" dress-up items. He was a very good sport and managed to put on all of the gifts that folks had brought for him!

As soon as the cake festivities were over, we headed on home and began preparations for this year's Florida Hospital gala that night. This is always a fun event to get dressed up for a fancy night out. It was fun to see the folks who we sit with (they are lawyers from Chicago) - we've been blessed to sit with them now for three or four years, so it's great fun to sit with people that you know, because the evening is full of fun conversation and laughing. The food and the entertainment was not the best that we've ever had, but it was still a great evening out.

Whew - so last weekend was kind of crazy! The week has been equally crazy with Amy having to work very long hours at work in order to prepare for a big meeting on Monday even in light of the short Thanksgiving week.

With that in mind - Happy Thanksgiving, and we'll try and do a faster job of posting this weekend!

Phrase of the week: "My cah!" Kaleb has always been much more interested in cars than Zachary has, and he has taken to going to bed with a little car. When you go in the morning he's usually quite distressed if he doesn't know where his car is! Zachary's question was "How did the angel get into the lion's den with Daniel if the door wasn't open!" Auntie Kelli fielded that question as she was putting him down to bed - it sure makes you think about how to explain things that we've just taken for granted, and explain them in a way that a four year-old can understand!

Growing Up Too Fast

2010-11-14T15:23:00.000-05:00

We've been told that the second child grows up much faster than the first one does (even when as parents we try and baby the second one...) and we can definitely attest to this in some ways with Kaleb. Zachary for the first time started to go up at church for the story-time and would sit by himself listening to the story a few weeks ago. After about two weeks of this, Kaleb decided that he was not to be left out of this, and so now at 2 1/2 he's also going up to the story-time! Mommy goes with them, but she sits on the front pew while they sit up on the stairs - ready just in case Kaleb decides that he wants to wander around up on stage! :) Thankfully this hasn't happened yet, although Kaleb does decide that he thinks other stairs look more interesting, so sometimes will move around during the children's story. Harmless enough we tell ourselves! He is also drinking out of a "big boy" cup at meals now as well (although he still perhaps isn't quite ready for this entirely as he tends to "dip" his utensils in the water instead of drinking it, and then invariably it spills everywhere if he's too vigorous!)

Kaleb is sitting on the left looking who knows where, and Zachary is sitting three kids to the right of Kaleb in the stripped sweater.

Zachary continues with his soccer league, and seems to be really enjoying it after a bit of a rocky start. The weather has cooled off, which helps him not to over-heat so much. It is amazing how much better the kids have gotten in only 4 games! Zachary does still have a habit though of just kicking the ball in the direction that he's running - regardless of whether that's out of bounds or towards the OTHER goal! :)

Last weekend, the Adventist church school here, FLEC - had their Fall festival. We took the kids after soccer and they had a blast with the firetrucks, ambulances, petting zoo, bounce houses etc.

Zachary on the fire truck looking at all of the levers

Zachary inside the ambulance - we've seen enough of these to last a lifetime!

Kaleb running through one of the bounce obstacle courses

Zachary getting up close and personal with a duck

Zachary and a baby goat having a little conversation (Kaleb was not interested in getting close to the animals or touching them, but he was intrigued from afar!)

Phrase of the week: Ok - we all know that conversations like these will happen, but at FOUR??? So, Daddy was telling Zachary what he looked like when he was born and how bright-eyed and bushy-tailed he was. Well, Zachary then looks at Mommy and says "Mommy, how did I get out of your tummy?" Hmm, how to answer this......so Mommy says "I pushed you out" to which he says "What, do you mean like you pooped me out?" AHHH - get us out of this conversation please!!!!! Kaleb's phrase thankfully is benign and demonstrates how much he takes after his mother's love of peanut butter. He has become obsessed with peanut butter, and asks for "appoes" so that he can have peanut butter, and he has figured out that he can just use the apple to get peanut butter up to his mouth to eat the peanut butter, forget the apple! Well, he pointed to the peanut butter jar tonight and clear as a bell says "Pea-butter, I LOVE it!" He then jams his whole hand into the peanut butter on his plate and shoves a huge glob into his mouth. Yum - and his Mommy looked on wishing that she too was eating that peanut butter if it wouldn't all end up on her hips!!!! :)

Kaleb "flying" like a helicopter through the air with Daddy - oh what fun!

Drunk as a Skunk

2010-11-06T14:42:00.001-04:00

This week, Amy quite possibly had her first "drunk" experience. Never having imbibed a drop of alcohol in her life, this was of course a virgin experience and it happened through.....drinking too much water! The caveat to this story is that we're not medical professionals, so it could all be made up, but the situation seemed to fit the explanation that we read on the internet later, so why not!? Never having heard of water intoxication before, this was a new term and while it can't be confirmed that is what she has, it makes for a nice title of this week's post! :) Confession is good for the soul, so last Sunday Amy weighed herself to discover that she had gained a fairly big amount of weight in the last week'ish or so. Horrified, she decided that it must be water weight, so decided to focus on drinking what used to be a normal amount of water when she was nursing (yet not nursing anymore, so perhaps a bit much...). Amy loves to drink water, so this really is not a big deal. So as Monday went by, she drank about 5-6 large water bottles at work, along with a few other cups of water at home. Sure enough, by the end of that day, she had lost 6 pounds!!! CRAZY.

The next day, she just continued to drink the same 5-6 bottles of water, but noticed that as the day went by, she was not excreting the water and her head started to hurt, feel a bit lightheaded or "fuzzy," her stomach started to hurt and feel a bit nauseous, had hiccups at least 5-6 times in the span of a few hours, and her skin started to have a tight, "pulsy" feeling. She got a wicked headache, so was pretty wiped out by that night. Odd. By the end of the day, she had gained the same 6 pounds BACK! The next day, looking at a glass of water made her slightly ill so she tempered her water intake, taking only about 3 water bottles throughout the day. Her body seemed to recover from the wild swings of water that day and started to try and normalize itself out. She's religiously been drinking the 3 bottles of water at work to try and keep a 'norm' for her body, and hasn't had a repeat of the experience - whew!

Last week we enjoyed having some friends over with their kids. The children are all girls with the exception of baby Kohlden who is still a bit young to really play yet. So, the whole "girls and boys" differences was very interesting to watch. Our boys are quite rough and tumble, very rowdy, and very loud. At one point, they were all on the back deck pushing each other back and forth in the cars, when Zachary bumped his car into the other little girl's car. Now, just as an aside, this is quite normal for our boys - they'll often bash their cars into each other and then laugh uproariously. However, this is not normal for this little girl, and she very seriously informed Zachary, "Zachary, that's BAD BEHAVIOR!" Ha ha ha ha - too funny, we all cracked up. We'll have to remind him of that in the future. When they left, the same little girl walked up to him though and gave him a hug and a big kiss on the lips! So it looks like all was forgiven. The kids seemed to have a fun time playing together, and of course much of this was due to Auntie Kelli who kept them entertained the whole time!

Yikes!! Kaleb is playing with the barbies that Calleigh brought over!

Playing with the Thomas the Train book that makes sounds

Duncan showing Karis the constellation app on his new smartphone, so they were figuring out what constellations were above our house (it has a GPS so shows you which ones are above your sky - very neat)

This Elefun game rarely makes it out of the box, so it was nice that it was getting some use!

The weather has definitely turned winter-ish here in Florida with a high today of only 65 degrees. It was downright chilly going to church - brr!!

Phrase: Kaleb's word this week to questions has become "cause" - as in "because" - so, it has started already with this one, so if you ask him why, he'll answer "cause." AHH - even Zachary will say to him, "Kaleb, that's not an answer!" :) At least we've trained the older child well by this point! :) Zachary's this week is actually just noting that he can count to 100, and he can also now count by 2s. He LOVES numbers (counting, the time on clocks etc) so perhaps he'll be an accountant like Mommy or an engineer like Papa-Z!

Reading with Grandma a new story

What Makes Me Happy

2010-10-31T20:59:00.000-04:00

One of the Adventurer campout homework assignments was to make a list of 20 things that make you happy. Zachary did his assignment with Miss Jennifer this week, and the items below were his list:

1. Playing with Blake
2. Playing soccer
3. Going to SeaWorld (he got to go on Friday, so he was anxiously awaiting this outing!)
4. Reading books
5. Going to Sabbath School (what a blessed change from a year ago when he would be upset about going to church and even in Sabbath School he would be kind of dis-engaged) Yippee!
6. Playing dinosaurs
7. Going to grandma's house
8. Playing outside
9. Eating!
10. Listening to music (we received a child's version of the Lord's Prayer which he asks to play every day in the car)
11. Riding his bike
12. Going to Ms. Jennifer's house
13. Cooking with mommy
14. Playing with Auntie Kelli
15. Mowing the grass with Daddy
16. Going to the Deiningers house
17. Swimming
18. Playing Thomas Trains
19. Going to the park
20. Taking gymnastics

He also had to draw a picture of his family, which this is the first family drawing that he's ever done, so we had to include the picture here! It's the small things in life that we can be happy about, because this is the first time as well that his stick people didn't have legs coming out of their cheeks on their faces! :)

In other news, our friend little Luke D had appendicitis last night, so had to have emergency surgery this morning to remove his appendix. Thankfully it did not rupture, and the surgery was done laproscopically so he'll soon be up and at it again. Zachary has been enamored with having his friend Adam here for the day, and wants him to stick around rather than go home! :)

Chef Adam helping to make the dessert for Saturday night

Phrase of the week: Kaleb's thing this week was to ask for Mommy to sing "Jesus Loves the Little Children" and substitute "children" for names such as "mommy, daddy" etc - he went through many names but one kind of stumped her for a minute until she realized that he was asking for her to sing about Aunt Louise, but he said "Wheeze!" (phonetically that's what it sounded like, but he was trying to say her name! :). Zachary phrase this week was: "Mommy, do trains eat food?" Mommy's answer was "No." to which he said "Why not, they 'choo'?!" Ha ha, he was dead serious but it was so funny we had to laugh!

Playing the memory game with Grandma

Reading a new story together

Action Jackson

2010-10-24T15:18:00.000-04:00

Well, as promised, we'll give an update on last week's crazy whirlwind activities. We're beginning to wonder if this might be our new life, because this weekend is going to be just as crazy! :)

We went off to Zachary's first ever Adventurer campout....or should we say camp-"in." We went to the Pine Lake Retreat, which is complete with cabins that families can stay in. We stayed in a cabin with Deiningers and Jennifer Bergherm and her son Blake. The four boys were beside themselves with excitement, which translated into very little sleep. We finally had to remove Luke and Blake to other rooms, which meant that the final sleep arrangements had Adam, Zachary and Auntie Lisa is one room (two twin bunk beds), Luke and Uncle Rob in another room (queen bed), with Miss Jennifer, Blake, Amy and Karis in another room that had two bunk beds. Zachary woke up at 4:30 the next morning (after a 10P go-to-sleep time), which just about gave Mommy a stroke! But, being outside all day is wonders for good moods, so the boys really did well. We had a worship in the morning.....during which they announced that our beloved Pastor Morris is leaving our Forest Lake Church....many of us were super upset about this, and he will be greatly missed. Our prayer now is that they find the right pastor to take his place, because these are big shoes to fill. Anyway, after that there was much playing on the playgrounds, and MANY bike rides. Deiningers went for a canoe trip in the afternoon so Zachary and Blake went down for a much-needed nap.

The boys wrestling in their room - it was quite the dog pile, and thankfully no-one got hurt!

The night we had a hayride, which the boys really enjoyed, smores (which Amy is not convinced that there is anything special about smores - they're just not that great!), and then playing in the bounce-house in the gymnasium. The kids had a blast.

The glowsticks around their necks/wrists were a highlight as well, along with the singing on the tractor/hayride.

First campfire "smores"

The next morning we got up bright and early, and hightailed it back home to pick up Grandma and Kaleb (who had spent a well-rested weekend together!) and went to Zachary's very first soccer game. He did very well, but between the heat, being knocked over several times, and perhaps general laziness he wanted to just sit and watch by the last period (bribes worked however in getting him back out on the field!).

Zachary, Blake & Luke

Coach Eli with the kids - Zachary has asked for a whistle like Coach Eli!

Zachary's cheering fans

Love the little shinguards that Zachary has on!

Phrase of the week: "Daddy, I want to be bald" Zachary may just get his wish someday to have no hair like daddy, and then we'll remind him that he brought this on himself! Kaleb's word this week was "tweat!!!" when he begged to get some of the M&M's that Zachary's Sabbath School had handed out.

Kaleb had a rough nap one day, so Amy ended up sleeping with him on the floor in his room for a while - after which she snuck out of the room, and he continued to sleep on the floor for another hour! Oh to be so young and pliable!

Busy, Busy Bees

2010-10-17T21:20:00.000-04:00

We have been busy bees this weekend, or rather busy Little Lambs! :) We joined Zachary into Little Lambs this year for Adventurers at church, and this was the family campout weekend. We also had the very first soccer game, AND a birthday party today! :) We'll post all about it next weekend, but that's the reason for the late post. With exhaustion reigning, this will be a short post with just some random pictures from the last few weeks! :)

The boys have a tradition when they get out of the shower on Sabbath that they MUST lay on their towel beds (two towels please mommy!!) They usually end up wrapped like little burritos before it's all said and done as well.

Amy has become a serious coupon addict (it began when Karis complained that we spent too much on groceries, so she took the job of grocery shopping back and began to seriously work on reducing the cost - which we have successfully reduced the cost by at least $40-$50 per week from what we used to spend, and we have a lot more to show for it!). Anyway, she stock-piled up on a bunch of cereal that we eat int his picture. Our house isn't great on the storage space, so we became creative and used what SHOULD be the TV cabinet in our office to store it! We don't have a TV there because we just don't watch enough TV to make it worthwhile, but it is a great place to store diapers and cereal! :))

The boys discovered the great fun of dragging the leather ottomans over to the couch and using them as launching pads - here you can see Zachary flying through the air. Kaleb was not far behind, although he usually manages to just clear the arm of the couch at this point.

Phrase of the week: "How many T's is it, Mommy?" Zachary figured out that his clothes sizes usually have a T in them, such as 4T (although somewhere around 5, they drop the T and it just becomes the number itself). So now Zachary will ask How many T's is it for clothes and for his shoes (which the T doesn't apply for shoes, but it is too cute to correct!). Kaleb's word is "Fun!" - he loves to tell you the things that he thinks are "fun!" - and it can range from pointing at Miss Jennifer's (babysitter) van where lots of fun things happen to using it as a way of convincing you that he should be allowed to do whatever activity is next on the docket. He is very convicted about "fun" activities, and truthfully he has never called anything fun that really wasn't, so he definitely gets it! :)