Older Brothers

Most of the time it is hard to have older brothers. (Thomas pushed him off a toy at the playground.)

But then every once in awhile, Donny is probably happy for the extra attention and love.

Columbus--The Best Family City Ever

For those of you who ever never been to Columbus. It has got to be one of the best family cities in America. First of all, their zoo is amazing. It has been rated number one in the country by many magazines, so people agree with me. But the habitats are designed so that you can view the animals in what would seem their natural environment. They have a lot of space and everything feels very real. I especially loved watching the manatees and cute baby elephant. They also have plenty of interactive and hands on exhibits. Amazing.

The other highlight of Columbus is the COSI science museum. You should see this thing. The most kid friendly place ever. Lots of water, creative toys, and places to run and explore. Every kid's dream.

And the last place I will mention, but certainly the list could go on and on, are the bunny fountains. Water shoots up out of the ground in different patterns and velocity. My kids obviously loved it.

Sadly, this is probably the last time I will visit Columbus for a long time. I used to have many family and friends here that I could visit, but now one of my best friends is finally moving after five years. She has been a life saver. I will miss my annual visits. Thanks Rachel for showing me around Columbus. It definitely has been a wonderful place to call a home away from home.

Camping in Canada

For our first real vacation as a family since Steve started residency, we decided to take Memorial Day weekend and go camping. I must admit that I was dreading the thought of sleeping three nights outdoors with my boys and/or one of them getting lost. Well, thank goodness all of my fears went unfounded, because we had a wonderful time. I like camping enough to go again. I think it will become a fun family tradition. That being said, I think it really helped to go camping with a family much more experienced then us. You should have seen her "miracle" bins. She was like Mary Poppins pulling out pans, utensils, seasonings, towels, tablecloths, tools, and any other random accessory. I began to think that we could live for a few weeks out of those things. Her preparedness definitely made our first camping experience a positive one.

It also helps that she has three older boys that Thomas followed around like a long lost puppy. They were good enough to pretend to involve him in all of their hikes, baseball games, and fire activities. They also made sure he didn't get hurt, which definitely was a real possibility. Hurray for the great outdoors and smores made with peanut butter. Bless you Julie for originating that new ingredient. I don't think I will ever go back. Thanks also for providing Bocci-ball and hours of fun. Speaking of smores, our friends like theirs burnt to a crisp. I tried it, but I still like mine perfectly brown and soft inside. I am not a huge charcoal flavor fan unless you include the stripes on a chicken when it comes off the bbq. Here our some of the pictures from the trip. We went to the Pinery on Lake Huron. It was my first time swimming in a great lake. Mind you, it was totally cold, but ten degrees warmer than the Puget Sound. Those lakes are absolutely huge. They looked like the Sound minus the salt water, rocky beaches, and jelly fish. Beautiful for swimming.



We went on a few hikes that were so much fun. We took pit stops at every cool natural monument we found. Thomas was really excited to climb this tree with the big boys.



We rented a canoe for an hour. Thomas peed off the side twice. Speaking of peeing, we didn't anticipate the long one hour wait to get back into the U.S. at the border. Apparently, Memorial Day is a busy crossing time. Thomas and Hewitt were forced to go pee in a bottle. Actually, they were quite thrilled and I'm surprised they haven't tried it again. Steve, on the other hand, got mad at me when Hewitt slipped out of his and barely missed hitting him in the face. He really was mad. Like I've ever held a water bottle to a peeing boy before. Who knows where those things will shoot. So regardless, cheers to camping.

March Madness

Ever since I was little, I have filled out a NCAA bracket with my family. It has become one of my favorite times of year and I look forward to watching constant basketball and circling my wins. This year the final four has come to Detroit and although we don't have tickets, there have been plenty of other opportunities to get involved. On Friday, our friends invited me to go and watch the teams practice and the Senior all-star game. I was a bit wary of going by myself with the three boys, but with the help of a friend and the determination to watch some of my favorite teams up close, we went downtown. It was so much fun! I have never been to downtown Detroit before so I loved seeing the Lions and Tigers Stadiums up close. Thomas and I quickly resolved to go to a Tigers game as soon as possible. But the highlight was watching North Carolina practice and have a little dunk contest. We walked down to the court and I couldn't believe how big those boys are. We were impressed. Thanks to the Kunz and their entertainment, the boys were pretty good. They watched for the first part and then played with trucks for the last part. I'm glad I went. Steve did promise that he would take me to a final four before I died. I'm holding him to it.

Poor Hewitt

Ever since potty training in January, Hewitt has been incredibly backed up. Going poo is a process especially since he only goes every two days. I've been pumping him full of juice and limiting his dairy, but still he continues to struggle. He will cry and complain that the "poo is stuck" and "I can't do it." I just hope we can resolve this problem before school starts in a few years. I've heard it can continue for awhile. The weird thing is that it doesn't hurt him to go anymore, he is just scared. So Hewitt will walk around like this for a few hours before I finally make him sit on the toilet for thirty minutes and go. So although I feel bad that he is backed up, I still think his posture is funny. I giggle at how ridiculous he looks. Just go!!!

Bird in House Brings Luck?

The other day, much to my shock, a bird flew through our kitchen and living room. I didn't know that I was scared of birds, but I soon discovered that apparently I am afraid of confined, black birds. I would say large, but as you can see in the picture, it was a medium size bird and I have no idea how it got in my house. The bird made its entrance in the late afternoon. Thomas was obviously thrilled. He kept running around trying to catch the bird while I had all kinds of horrible imaginations about crazy diseases. I went and got his yellow plastic bat to try and herd it out of the door. It probably was one of the funniest scenes. Thomas would run at the bird and then I would stand by the door swinging the plastic bat to try and convince it to leave out the door. Unfortunately, after trying for about 30 minutes, I simply gave up. I definitely was not going to stay in the house with the bird though so I took the kids and we went to the YMCA. Steve wasn't planning on coming home that night as he had a late lecture, but I convinced him that he needed to make a quick stop for the sanity of his wife. Steve only took five minutes to get rid of the bird. He was much smarter. He turned off all the lights in the house, turned on the porch light, opened the window and then herded it out. He said it was quite easy. Whatever. The bird scared me to death. I did learn by my friends at the YMCA that birds in your house bring luck. So here's hoping!!!!

One other quick story. I had a scare a few weeks ago when I thought Donny was choking. He was crying so I knew his airway wasn't completely blocked off, but I had no idea why he was gasping and struggling for breath. I was on the phone with a good friend of mine who immediately sent her husband over to help. In the meantime, I called 9-1-1. My friend's husband and our neighbor arrived about five minutes before the ambulance and by then, Donny had already dislodged whatever was choking him. We then waited for the ambulance together. After a few more minutes, we saw the fire engine and ambulance pull up to a house down the street so we had to wave them over. The whole time I was so grateful that Donny wasn't actually choking. Seriously, I learned an important lesson to call my friends along with 9-1-1. Their response time was much faster. Hewitt stood in front of our glass screen door to look out at the emergency vehicles and screamed everytime a firefighter made him move. It was a bit embarassing. Thankfully, they didn't stay too long and after doing a quick checkup of Donny's lungs, they promptly left. My friends and I were talking when we suddenly noticed Thomas and Hewitt playing with a big, black machine (defibrillator) on the floor. My friend explained to Thomas what a defibrillator did including that it will shock your heart. Thomas was pumped. I hurried and called 9-1-1 back to come and pick up their machine before Thomas started doing experiments. What a crazy morning. Donny fell asleep soon afterwards and we had a nice, quiet afternoon.

In less exciting news, Donny is getting into everything.

Week Away

For my Christmas and birthday presents, Steve surprised me with a trip home to Washington. I got to go home for a week with only Donny while Steve stayed home with Thomas and Hewitt. I must admit that I was a little confused at first. Why would Steve take one of his weeks vacation and then send me away? But then after hearing his reasoning, I agreed that it would be good for him to spend some quality time with his boys. He really hasn't seen them a whole lot these past eight months and it would be good for him. So off I went, a little guiltily, but very excited to Washington for a week. I must say right now that I absolutely love the water. And most importantly, I love being with family and I love the way they treat my children. So here are some highlights:

I got to play a ton of games. My favorite were Hyperdash, Canasta, and Blokus. For those of you who have never played Blokus and Hyperdash, I recommend them both. We played Hyperdash at the church gym for FHE. It didn't take me long to realize how out of shape I was. I had to talk to Steve extra long on the phone to catch my breath. Another highlight was staying up watching movies with my Mom. If only we lived closer, we could enjoy so many more chick flicks together. Thanks Mom for buying me all of birthday presents. I felt so spoiled!

Like other members of my immediate family, my Dad is amazing with children. Even as a kid, I knew that my Dad was special. He would challenge us to pickleball games every Sunday, beat us in Horse and Bump (still does even at 50. In fact, I think he was a little put off by my basketball shots. Apparently, I need to practice), and come up with the craziest challenges and games that would entertain all afternoon. Even though he was in the middle of tax season, my Dad did manage to win over Donny. He's pictured here sucking on a candy cane. As soon as Donny would see it, he would lunge for it. So cute.

Another highlight was visiting with my Grandpa and Grandma who have been on a mission. I haven't seen my Grandpa for four years so I was so excited to visit Grandpa and Grandma's house. There really is nothing better.

Probably the biggest surprise and highlight of the trip was visiting Seattle with my two sister-in-laws who spoiled me to no end. We stayed at the five star Fairmount Hotel in Seattle for a night and spent two days in Seattle. Thanks Mom and Daniel for taking care of Donny for me. I was especially grateful when I heard that Donny woke up at 3:30 am. Sorry about that. The trip was amazing. I love Steve's sisters. They are so much fun. Thanks to Heather, I was able to get a free haircut at a salon next to Nordstroms. I have never done the salon thing and it was awesome. The 20 minute head massage was absolutely amazing. So we shopped, ate room service for breakfast, visited Pike Place Market, and ate lunch with friends. It was great!

Thanks Steve for such a great trip. The picture on the right is of me trying to rock climb in my garage. Its actually much harder than it looks. The picture just below was on a three mile walk with my Grandpa and Mom. I included the famous Linx (sorry about the spelling) golf course that will host the US Open in 2012. What a beautiful view.