This is Sirius

When we bought our new car it came with a year free of Sirius Satellite Radio.  At first we didn't really listen much to it because there are like 999 channels and 975 of them are either sports or finance talk shows.  I just resigned to the fact that it would just be a button on my radio. 

Then I went on a road trip and realized I needed to find something to listen to while Zoe slept.  I came across an all 90's all the time channel.  It instantly transported me back to my youth.  Most of my care-about-music youth was spent in the 90's.  I can remember hearing Bel Biv Devoe for the first time and thinking they were the coolest band EVER!

Then came Janet Jackson, Paula Abdul, Beastie Boys, Aerosmith, Pearl Jam, Depeche Mode, Nirvana, Will Smith and many others.  I can sing almost every song they play on the 90's channel.  I LOVE it.

This morning I heard some Bel Biv Devoe, Pearl Jam, Depeche Mode, Duran Duran and Will Smith.  The only problem is that you also hear songs you'd rather not.  Here's where I may lose some of my friends with this admission.  I don't really like Dave Matthews Band.  Which, like Nirvana, are thee band of the 90s. 

I think it's cool they use every instrument ever created.  It's not often you can get someone to play a lyre during an acoustic set.  They are very talented.  My problem isn't the instruments.  It's Dave's voice.  It sounds like what a violin's voice would be if they could talk. 

We all know a DMB song because, like The Beatles in England, DMB is pumped into our subconcious.  You end up singing along to the nonsensical lyrics.  Lights down you up and die.  Really?  I don't get it.  I'll bet no one besides Dave himself gets it.  Yet you sing it because it's catchy with the horns and lyres in the background.

Nothing against all of you DMB fans.  I'm just not one of you.  If I'm around you and a DMB song comes on, please be fully prepared for me to sing along in my imitation Dave voice as I make up words.  It gets me through the 15 minutes of each song.

This is The Day

Our car is equipped with an iPod hook-up.  It's one of the greatest car features I've ever had.  The only problem is my memory to actually charge my iPod.  I created a CD of Zoe's favorite songs from my iPod, so she'll never know that mommy forgot to charge the iPod.

She has her favorites.  We usually have to shake to The Wiggles' Shimmie Shake and be princesses to Cinderella's A Dream is a Wish.

Last night, after we were driving home from our ice cream date, she was just looking out the window and singing to herself.  The song was a Veggie Tales song, This is the Day.  She usually makes me skip over that one since it's close to the Cinderella song.  Apparently the one time she listened to it was enough to help her memorize it.

There is nothing more heart-warming than hearing your child sing praise and worship songs absentmindedly while she looks out the window.  That song is now just part of who she is.  I'm so glad God gave me that day too.  It is definitely His handiwork.

A Table For Three

Since Zoe has been alive her daddy has either works nights or gone to school at night.  For the last three and a half years Zoe and I have done the weeknights together.  We would go on dates together, go shopping together or attend whatever activity she was involved in.  Many times we'd go to the YMCA to go swimming or go to her tap class.  It's always been the two of us.

Now daddy is home.  We are experiencing some transition adjustments, but for the most part, having N home at night is a HUGE blessing. 

This week alone he's gone to dinner, gone to AWANA, ran errands and gone to dance class with us.  It finally feels like we are complete.  Instead of texting him and sending him pictures of Zoe's and my outtings, he gets to experience them with us.  We are making our memories and getting a taste of what life will be like when we are done with school and the apprenticeship.

We like it.  It's so much fun watching our girls grow together.  It's one thing to tell him that Zoe spends all of dance class staring at herself in the mirror, but it's a totally different experience for him to see it and smile with me.

I'm excited for our family of three to do things together during the week.  It's been one week so far of a blessing I'm going to cherish for the next 9 months.

The Excitement Is Palpable

In AWANA the kids are divided into groups.  Cubbies are 3-4 years old.  Sparks are kingergarden through 2nd grade.  T&T clubs are 3rd through 6th grade and there is a boys group and a girls group.

D & E are in T&T Girls.  They LOVE it.  Zoe is in Cubbies and LOVES it too. 

Each group has what's called a starting book.  It's basically an introduction to the program and there are memory verses.  You have to pass the starting book before you can get your club's shirt (a vest for the Cubbies and one for Sparks and a polo shirt for the T&T group).  It's a big deal for our girls to say all the verses in their starting book to get their vest or shirts.  A certain mommy may have used that as leverage to help her Cubbie learn her verses.

That Cubbie may have gone to AWANA last night and said all her verses to her teacher.  When N picked her up last night Zoe's teacher told him she could now get a book and a vest.  As Zoe and N waited in the foyer, I ran to the office to buy a book, bag and vest for Zoe.  I didn't even make it back up the stairs before I was tackled by Zoe as she screamed, "MY VEST!  MY VEST!  CAN I SEE IT?  OH BOY!  CAN I WEAR IT?"  She jumped and hopped in excitement.  I don't think she's ever been this excited in her life.  She could not contain it.

That smile makes this mamma's excitement just as palpable.

I have a feeling next week, we're going to have another girl who is just as excited.  D will likely be getting her shirt next week. 

It's a good week at our house.

A Family of Five

Tonight is AWANA at our church.  It's a children's ministry for kids up to 6th grade to learn verses, play games and hear some story about Jesus.  I attended AWANA at our church when I was little.  At 8 years old, it's where I heard the story of salvation in a way that made sense.  It was because of my AWANA leaders that I went home, verified the story with my mom and accepted Christ as my savior.  This ministry is near and dear to my heart. 

For the first time ever, this is a family event.  I'm co-directing the younger kiddos, N is leading the older boys, Zoe is in the Cubbies program and D and E get to come this year.  Tonight will be the first week we're all going together. 

Two years ago I never would've thought this day would come.  I never would've believed we would have D and E during the week and that N would agree to be a leader.  Today it is that way.  I love to see how God has worked in the lives of my family.  To Him be the glory.  May each of us grow in Him this year through AWANA. 

I Heart Sleep

This weekend was the first week N was home to stay.  It's been gloriously wonderful.  I got home for work on Friday to a spotless house.  He didn't just clean, he organized, threw out old food and deep cleaned the house.  I know flowers are what most girls like, but a man who cleans so I don't have to speaks my love language. 

My mom offered to watch Zoe that night so we could go to dinner.  We ate Chinese food, bought a movie and lounged at home. 

I think I left the house only once more all weekend.  We ate home cooked food, sat in sweat pants and just relaxed.  I think I finally caught up on sleep since before Zoe was born. 

I think I'm really going to like having N home in the evenings. 

We're a Whole Hand Now

If you would've told me in high school that I would marry the guy with the mullet, I wouldn't have believed you.  In fact I didn't believe people when they told me that. 

I'm so glad they were right. 

N,

Five years ago you made me your wife.  I'm so blessed that you picked me in high school and years later.  I love you with everything that I am.  Thank you for being God's greatest blessing in my life.  Thank you for blessing me with three beautiful girls. 

Thank you for introducing me to the Marvel Comic movies.  Thank you for making me BBQ'd food.  Thank you for letting me always be right, even when you know I'm not.  Thank you for never making me learn how to use the lawn mower.  Thank you for cleaning up your shaving bits in the bathroom after you shave.  Thank you for giving me rides on your motorcycle.  Thank you for not making me feel guilty when I eat two doughnuts and you only eat one. 

I have learned so much from you these past five years and it makes me excited for the next fifty.

I love you with all that I am. 
Killer

A New Routine

I'm not sure where the blog posts have been this week.  When I don't have pictures to tell the story, I forget I can still blog.

This past week we've been getting into a new routine.  Zoe started preschool and LOVES! it.  She's still tight-lipped about what they do during the day.  If there weren't two Graces in her class, I don't think I'd know there was even a first one.  They do color because I got one assignment sent home and she had marker on her hand on Monday.  She won't really tell me anything more than "yep" or "no" answers.  It's so frustrating.  I thought this was supposed to start when they were teenagers.  I get more out of D and E about school and they're tweens.

We also started dance classes one day a week.  Fortunately they have a two-way window so I can watch her.  If not I don't think I'd get any information out of her there either.

Tonight we start AWANA at our church.  D and E also get to come.  It'll be like a family date night in the middle of the week!  Zoe will LOVE seeing her sisters.  She tells them all about school and dancing.  I guess I could get the information second hand from them.

This has been a week of firsts and a new routine.  Tomorrow N comes home from his summer internship for good.  He'll be home for 9 months and be at home in the evenings.  In Zoe's entire life, he's not been home during the week.  I'm excited to have a glimpse of what our future holds with him being home in the evenings and I'm ecstatic that he'll get to do things with all the girls during the week. 

In some really great news, he passed all his testing this summer and was officially invited back once he graduates in the spring.  That means he'll be guaranteed a job.  It's an answer to prayer.  That also means I can continue to make dam jokes.  Which is one of the highlights of this week considering that's really all I've got since my three year old is like Fort Knox.

Party Tricks and The Zoo

You can only sit in a hotel room so long before you come up with new things to do.  By day three Zoe was ready for something new.  N, being the coolest daddy ever, decided to teach her how to arm wrestle.  She took to the arm wrestling like a penguin takes to water.

She shut daddy out.  She took all three games.  Daddy's a good sport and still offered to do a celebratory "show me your muscles" pose.

After all the wrestling, it was time to give the muscles a rest and check out some animals.  The first stop at the Oregon Zoo was the ever wild, never before seen...cows.  That's right.  They have cows at the zoo.  Zoe wasn't totally impressed by a couple cows laying in a pen.  She wanted to see the giraffes.  I think she's been watching too much Dora because she's tell us to "vamanos."

We left the cows and headed toward the giraffes.  I was quickly distracted by the new orangutan area.  Those are some huge apes!  Zoe quickly made friends with the female.  They stopped for some girl talk before we headed on.

It wasn't long before we made it to the giraffes.  We got there just in time for feeding so both the parent (I'm not sure if it's a daddy or a mommy) and the baby were out eating.  Zoe loved it and could've stayed there all day just watching the giraffes.  They are her favorite new animal. 

I could only look at them for so long before we told her we needed to head to the train station!  Riding the train was the second coolest thing at the zoo right after the giraffes.

She loved seeing all of Washington Park and feeling the breeze on her face and we rode the tracks.

My favorite part came later, on the way back through the zoo.  The elephants were out back and I got to see the baby elephant.  Although technically I'm not sure it's a baby elephant anymore.  It's probably more of a toddler now.  Either way, it was totally awesome and adorable.

That sums up our vacation.  Baby animals, sand in our toes, a fall at the waterfall, a small injury and great fellowship with friends.  It was busy, but it filled our memories and our hearts.  We can't wait for the next long weekend.

Sand on Our Toes

This past weekend I had the privilege of introducing the two loves of my life to the Oregon coast.  N has no recollection of going there ever in the history of ever.  I know Zoe has never been.  I was excited to show them the town of Cannon Beach where I spent many a weeks during summer vacations growing up.  It's one of my absolute favorite places to go.  I think I've successfully converted N and Zoe too. 

N's first question was, "how crowded do you think the beach is?  I don't want to spend time on a crowded beach."  His imagination took him to Waikiki beach.  I agree, that's too crowded.  He was pleasantly surprised to see so much room on the beach despite the many people.  Immediately he started thinking of bringing the trailer down next summer for some time just at the beach.  With that my heart started to sing.  He is my soul mate!

Zoe could care less about crowds or future plans, she needed to get her feet in that sand and in the water now.  It's the beach!

I have to say this trip to the beach was a little sad for me.  Since I had a minor toe injury at Multnomah Falls the day before, I could walk barefoot in the sand.  I was so sad.  We didn't let that stop us from all the fun!

My two converts:

In search of the perfect place to build a sand castle:

Instead of a sand castle, we decided to bury Zoe's toes.  She LOVED it.

You can only bury your toes for so long before you have a deep need to fly something.  We pulled out our dollar store kite and let the wind take it away.

Zoe had a blast flying her kite.  I think this girl would spend all her time on the beach with a kite in each hand if she could.  When we went shopping she was amazed at stores that just sold kites.  She would've taken one of each if she could. 

It's always fun going back to someplace that holds special memories from your childhood.  What's more fun is creating memories for my child.  Here's to many more summers spent at Cannon Beach. 

Preschool

I'm going to interrupt our vacation pictures to celebrate another milestone.  Zoe's first day of preschool! 

It was a great first day.  I saw a few moms cried over this milestone, but I had no twinge of tears.  That's actually pretty rare for me.  Maybe it's because I know how ready Zoe is for this.  She knows her shapes, colors, letters, etc.  She's now wanting to read.  We got to McNary and she goes, "M, C, N, A, R, oh what's that letter?  What's that spell?"

I think preschool is exactly what she needs to keep her moving forward.  When I brought out a pair of jeans and a cute top, she told me she wanted to wear a dress to school!  We practiced putting on our own tights since she'll have to do that if she has to go potty.  Then she did no less than 5 poses for me outside the house before we left.

This one is my favorite.

As we walked in the school, she ran up to Ms. Lucy (her teacher) and gave her a hug.  We put her coat and backpack on her hook and found her name on the story rug.  She never looked back and never said good-bye.

When I picked her up, this was our conversation:

Me:  What did you do today?
Zoe:  I don't know.
Did you color?
Maybe.
Did you hear a story?
Yep.
Did you make new friends?
Not really because I don't know their names.
Did you play with play-doh?
Yep, red stuff.
Did you sing songs?
Yep, about Jesus created me.
Did you have fun?
Yep, my teacher said I have to go back tomorrow though.
You want to go back?
Mommy I have a rock in my shoe.  What are we doing for lunch?
Apparently it was just another day in the life of Zoe.  No big fanfare, no big milestone.  Just what you do on a Wednesday morning.

In all honesty, that's exactly how I would want it to go.  She does not take after me.  I wouldn't let go of my mom's leg and the teacher said I cried for 15 minutes straight. 

Not Zoe.  This is where she was meant to be.  I couldn't agree more.  I can't wait to see how God continues to mold and shape her this year in her non-monumental preschool experience.

The Falls, A Fall and Friends

After we spent time at the dam and saw fish bigger than a boat, we headed to Portland for some time with family.  That wasn't without a stop at one of the area's most famous water falls.  Multnomah!  It has become a family tradition the last couple years to visit.  This time we had daddy!

He graciously carried her up the mountain on his shoulders.  By the time we got to the bridge, I was still fresh and thought we needed to make funny faces.

She will so thank me later for all the goofy shots I make her take throughout her life.  Fortunately she's totally my child and just does it because.

Unlike years prior, okay year prior, this time we played around in the water.  It was ice cold and we couldn't feel out feet.

Fortunately the water was only to her ankles because exactly 10 seconds after this shot, she fell into the water and got soaked.  There were tears and as I tried to get her to to the top of the little embankment of pure asphalt, I left some of my toe and half of two toenails.  It was the injury that prevented me from walking barefoot on the beach.  I'm still a little sad about it.

Fortunately we had dinner with some friends of ours, Phil and Anna.  They have three munchkins around Zoe's age.  It was play time for her, fellowship for us and they had Band-Aids.  It was like a quadruple win!

Thank you Phil and Anna for the great fellowship, the wonderful dinner and the baby cuddles.  Next time we're coming for much longer!

The Dam Visit

Since N got the job, Zoe and I have wanted to see where he works.  I'm almost positive that Zoe thinks he works at the Arena where we pick him up every Thursday.  She has no concept that it's far away. 

That was until this weekend.  We decided to visit N on his turf.  We spent the night in the trailer with him and headed out to the dam early the next morning.  Apparently in the world of dams, this isn't called a dam.  It's called a project.  You can't make as many jokes about a "project." 

Zoe saw the letters on the side of the project and she started to spell it out.  I told her to pose in front of it and this is what I got.

Then I convinced N that I needed a picture with him and Zoe in front of the dam project. 

He showed us the power house and some big thing they're working on that apparently funnels water that makes power.  All I heard was big and turns and funnels.  I was too shocked by the size of this round turbine thing that wasn't in the hold where the water was. 

I was also slightly distracted because in the power house they have a drinking fountain that is exactly the size of a three year old.  She thought that was the coolest thing EVER!  She took no less than 1,000 shots of water off that fountain.  N and I got the privilege of watching every single one.

After I got my lesson on Dam 101 and Zoe's thirst was taken care of, we headed to the salmon viewing room.  Since we were on vacation, I had to take a picture of Zoe and N outside the room with their fish faces. 

Zoe didn't quite understand that this wasn't like Coco's tank.  These fish are swimming upstream.  They are doing the swim of their life.  She didn't care.  When they wouldn't come, she would pound her fist on the frame and say, "come. here. fish!"  Like they could hear here, they would come.

Sometimes little:

Sometimes huge!  These windows are 4 feet long by 3 feet high. 

It was the perfect start to our vacation.  Tomorrow, more of our road trip adventure.

Radioman

Years ago our church did Rich Warren's 40 Days of Purpose.  I had a minor role in all that.  There were weekly drama sketches associated with the lesson for each of the 6 weeks.  I played a woman named Ronda.  She was absolutely clueless about God's plan for her life, but sweetly innocent in all her shenanigans.  Ronda was a BIG hit with our congregation. 

As a result I was typecast at church.  People didn't know my real name.  They didn't know me outside of Ronda.  The best part of all this was that Ronda was actually as crazy as I am.  Which is probably why I played her so well.  Even though she lacked common sense, we shared a sense of the outrageous.  I loved playing Ronda.  It wasn't until this year that I actually retired Ronda.  They have asked her back for the last 7 years to do announcements or small sketches on things. 

One gentleman in our church especially loved Ronda.  His name was Ray Daves.  He would yell "RONDA" across the foyer and give me big hugs.  I think if I were to label it, I would call him Ronda's groupie.  At the time I had no idea that Ray had such an amazing past.  He never really talked much about it.  I think if you'd ask him, he'd introduce himself as Marian's husband.  He has one of the best laughs and a great sense of humor.

The more I learn about Ray, the more I want to be around him.  He had a book written about his time in World War II called Radioman.  Now he is being honored by having the control tower of our airport named after him.  It still has to pass through the House before it's official, but I don't really see why it wouldn't.  He's an extraodinary man who is the first to tell you his family is his first accomplishment.

Even though Ronda is the part of me that Ray always identified with, it's Kelly who is in awe of his character. 

The Second String

Lately Zoe is all about daddy.  Because he's not home during the week, it usually involves comments like, "we should call daddy and tell him!"  That comment follows things like she ate most of her dinner or her favorite Caillou episode is on or she's only wearing one sock.

It doesn't have to be something big or important, she wants to share all of her moments with him.

On the way to preschool orientation this morning she said, "mommy are you strong?"  I replied, "I don't know, am I?"

She smiled and said "NO!  Daddy is strong.  I'm strong too.  Only me and daddy are strong."

I take no offense to being the weak one in the house.  I will always step back when Zoe and daddy have something that bonds them.