Mario!

I've been seeing a lot of the back of the kid's heads these past few days. They both were generously rewarded for their helping me when I had to work a few weekends ago. I put them to work pushing computer buttons while I ran back and forth supervising the software installations. They did a great job and I was thrilled for their assistance. I gave them $10 each, and then they both got a gift card from my client!

So they used their money to buy Super Mario Bros for our Wii system. It has been a lot of fun for all of us to play, but Sydney had gotten a bit territorial over it :) Zack bought a Lego set and also a Hot Wheels Wii game. Fun!!

Party drop off

Today Zack went to a party at Hero's. It was a party for his classmate. In the past we've always stayed with Sydney during her birthday parties, except for the most recent one she went to a friend's house. During that conversation Sydney was a bit nervous about being dropped off. Zack piped up "at my next party you can drop me off!". So, this was the day of his "next party". I was actually nervous about dropping him off. I mean, he's only 4, can he handle that? When it was time for drop off, Zack just gave me a kiss and said it was fine to leave. And off he ran to play with his friends. Hmmm, really? So off I went, shopping for two hours!
When I picked Zack up I asked him how the party was. He said it was fun. Then he also added "it was nice to have no one bothering me".
"What do you mean? Not having Mom hanging around?"
"Yes, just runnning around by myself"
"Yes, it was nice to have some time alone by myself too, to go shopping all by myself. I know what you mean." :) And it was. It's OK to have some time apart. (just not too long my little guy!!)

Scooters & a new camera

The weather is turning so nice. And it's so hard to stay inside and do homework! sigh. The kids are loving their new scooters that Santa brought them. Sydney is getting pretty skilled at riding it, but Zack still takes quite a few spills when he makes a quick turn.

I also got a new camera (my second new one...). I think I like this one! yahoo!

Happy Easter!

For being a holiday, the kids woke up realtively "late"... 7 am. In our house the tradition is to put out our Easter basket, which has been reused each year, for the Easter Bunny to fill and hide - and we also put out a supply of plastic eggs to be hidden. We picked out 10 eggs for each of them to find, plus a "golden" egg also. The kids did a great job of finding the eggs that were hidden around the house. Luckily the Easter bunny put the golden egg in a highly visible location on the kitchen table, eliminating the "I found it first!" fight that was sure to happen had it been hidden well. :)

Zack's basket had the normal treats (chocolate bunny, jelly beans, peeps, etc) and 2 Hot Wheels cars. Sydney had two nail polishes in hers.

We also bought the kids a set of walkie-talkies (which they have been begging for lately!) and Hungry Hungry Hippos.

After our treasure hunting we played our new game for many, many times!

Easter Egg Drop

When we saw the ad last year for an "Easter Egg Drop" at a local church, we were quite intrigued. The ad said that a helicopter will drop thousands of eggs. hmmmm Well last year it must have been raining or something, because we didn't go. But of course the kids remembered it, and when it was advertised this year, we promised to go. We had no idea what to expect. The kids talked about it for weeks! When the day finally arrived, it started out beautiful! It was a wonderful warm spring day. Then, by lunch time, it got really windy and stormy. We had to remind the kids that it wasn't safe to fly a helicopter in high winds and warned them it might be cancelled. But still, we promised we'd go check it out. When we got there, it was still windy, and starting to cool down - but sure enough, they were going to have the helicopter fly in.

So we found a bag to hold the eggs and waited it out. When we saw the helicopter fly in from the distance, everyone started cheering. The pilot dropped one test egg to see how the wind was blowing, then buckets of plastic eggs came showering down from the sky!

The kids were able to grab quite a few eggs, and I think the bad weather kept some people at home because it wasn't even a crazy madhouse as I expected. Sadly, we didn't find any of the "cash eggs" that were promised but we got enough trinkets and treats to make the trip worthwhile.

Soccer class

Zack has been taking a soccer class. They teach the skills of soccer and the basics, not play games, so this is perfect for Zack. This is his first class, other than swim lessons, and he just loves it. It is so exciting to see him run around with such a big smile on his face. Here he is learning to throw the ball back into the game (he's the one wearing shorts).

Churchills Half Marathon

On a cold March morning, Alan ran the Walt Churchill Half Marathon. We gladly came to cheer him on!

This year the race start and finish was at a new location - over at the Fallen Timbers mall. 

Here comes Alan - finishing strong!!

His official time was 1:34:31.  Good job!

He looks happy to me!

Monster Jam

On the spur of the moment, we decided to take the kids to a Monster Truck show last night. We thought it would be extra fun to surprise them, and not even tell them where we were going until they got there. The suspense was killing them! When we got there Zack's eyes were wide as saucers, he was pretty excited. Sydney on the other hand must have had some other ideas on what a "super fun" destination would be because she was intially a bit put off that this event was the destination. I think she was envisioning Monkey Jump, Chuck E Cheese and water park all rolled into one instead.

We were pretty surprised at the loudness of the arena. Our first order of business was a beeline straight to the vendor table to buy some earplugs. Wow, they worked great! I may have other uses for those babies in the future.

It was pretty amazing to see those huge trucks go jumping around. Too bad the area wasn't a bit bigger because I'm sure they would really get some air, but it was cool none the less. They could have gone a little lighter on the sales promotions (Grave Digger hats anyone? How about a truck mug with a snowcone in it or a Digger Disc??). Overall the kids had a good time, and Sydney seemed to really get into it after a little while too.

Tooth extraction

We finally decided that baby tooth of Sydney's was just not coming out on it's own. And the replacement adult tooth was fully errupted and "grown up" right behind the baby tooth! After weeks of pleading and deal-making, I finally just made a call to the dentist to get that thing pulled out. Sydney chose to had Daddy with her, so I didn't have to witness it first hand. She did good I am told, although she was just a "bit" anxious when she saw the huge needle that was going to be used to numb her gums. That was when they needed restrain her arms, mostly so she didn't grab the needle out of the Dentist's hand!! After the numbing was done, the tooth gave a little bit of a struggle but eventually came out. It did have a visibly longer root than the first one that came out. I can definately see why it never got very loose on it's own.

Not only did she score $1 from the tooth fairy last night, but she also got the baggie of money she had taken to school to practice counting coins with. Probably a good 2 or 3 dollars in there. We also made a trip to Meijers to let her pick out a flavor of ice cream. Heck, it's not every day you get a tooth yanked out. (thank god!)

Ski trip to Boyne

We spent our Presidents day weekend (and Valentine's too) skiing up at Boyne Highland & Mountain. We left on Saturday morning and got to Boyne Highlands just in time to go on a sleigh ride. It was very nice and peaceful in the snow covered forest.

We had a great dinner at the Mitchell St. Pub and then the next day we spent all day skiing at Boyne Highlands. Except for one time we snuck over to another chair, we spent the whole time at the beginner area. The kids are getting good at skiing, although it was rough at first for Zack. After lunch time we let Sydney use her poles, which really helped her more than we expected.

Sydney even had her first "yard sale". Here she is picking up all of her equipment that scattered around the mountain. Luckily she wasn't hurt at all and it didn't bother her much.

We had a major disappointment after skiing when we tried to buy tickets for tubing. Apparently they changed their policy so that only people 5 years and older can go tubing. Zack bawled when he found out we couldn't go. But no fear, we had plans to go tubing on Monday, when Zack mysteriously turned 5 years old. wink wink.

Sunday night dinner was spent at Papa Lou's, chowing on some super yummy pizza. On Monday we went skiing at Boyne Mountain. We were supposed to go skiing, then tubing, and then head back home, but we found out that tubing didn't even start until 4pm, so we ended up getting all mountain lift tickets instead of the just the free area. The kids did an excellent job skiing on the green runs, and Zack said he even wanted to go on the blue runs!

Sydney's skiing improved incredibly this season. She even was a "tour guide" for us and lead us down the mountain. She is working on her turns. A highlight for her was when she went over one of the jumps in the terrain park! It was a huge jump and she popped up in the air when she hit it. She landed on her butt, but she had no problem getting up. What excitement!!

Zack was also doing pretty good with his skiing - although he is using an edgie-wedgie which we think might be a "crutch" right now, but at least it keeps him happy and going down the hill with the rest of us! :)

Spider monkey boy

Sleep and kids, it's an odd combination in our house. We have one, but not the other. I mean, you know how people say those days of "sleeping in" are over when the baby comes? well for some of us those days never pass when the babies are long gone. My kids have to get up early during the week, so they are automatically hard wired to wake up extra early on the other days too. No matter what they did the night before or what time they went to bed. It's surely a shame for those of us who think 8:00 is "sleeping in". I mean, I'm not asking for much of a miracle, but I think a rest until 8:00am would be just heavenly!! But I digress, I'm really here to discuss the odd sleeping habits of our little one Zack.

He's never been much of a good sleeper. He was pretty good when he was a baby, sleeping through the night and all. But as toddlerhood came and went we noticed he was quite a restless sleeper. There was all of those nights he would get up numerous times for no reason, and then the tonsillectomy to help him stay asleep and breath better. But it appears he just has some natural tendency for movement! Case in point, our weekend ski trip. Sydney and Zack share a bed - queen size, big enough for both of them. But for some reason, Zack is magnetically repelled to beds and laying down "still". He has this odd ritual of squirming around and around in his bed before he falls asleep. Most nights none of us need to endure this craziness, but when they have to share a bed, I feel so sorry for Sydney. He's got his legs up, then his butt, then he's burrowing his head in his pillow, then flipping around in a circle again, and kicking all of his blankets down to this feet. This behavior goes on for at least 5 minutes if not longer - causing everyone to eventually be saying "Zack, lay still!!".

When it comes to my sleeping habits, I think they were passed down to Sydney because we are both the "Monica Geller (from Friends)" of sleeping. We smooth our our sheets and blankets until they are "just so" and then 5 seconds after lights out, we are fast asleep. Apparently Zack has inherited his sleeping habits from Alan. When he was a kid his sisters used to call him "spider legs" because he never settled down. No one liked sharing a bed with him. Poor Zack... in addition to his stunningly good looks, he's got this "curse" of movement too. But don't despair, all is not lost - at some point he will grow out of it perhaps like Alan did, be able to be still, and just want to sleep in all morning just like Dad!!

Father - Daughter Dance

Tonight was the Father-Daugher dance at school. Alan surprised Sydney by getting her a beautiful rose for their night out.

I was told there was over 400 people who RSVP'd for the dance! The girls had a lot of fun. Sydney reported the best part of the night was when they got to make ice cream sundaes. I'm sure the best part really was being the star of the night with Daddy :)

Here they are doing the limbo!

I'm not sure what they were doing here, but it looks like a lot of fun!

That Library book!

On Thursdays, Sydney has library day at school. She gets a new book when she turns her old one in. As we left for school yesterday morning, we were pulling out of the garage when I remembered it was library day. So I asked Sydney "do you have your library book?". Not surprising the answer was "NO!". Then she got concerned that she would not be able to take the test on the book (Accelerated Reader test). I told her I'd run in and get it, thinking that would be the quickest solution. So I ran to her room, dug through all of the books, couldn't find the darn thing. I went back out to the car and told Sydney. That caused her to get very excited and insist that she needed the book and knew she had taken it out of her room, to put into her backpack! Well, after suggesting that she go get it herself (hoping that she would change her mind...) I reluctantly went in the house with her to help her find it. After another search of her bedroom I realized that she had probably taken it with her, but left it somewhere on her way to her backpack that morning. Sure enough, there was the book in Zack's room.
We sprinted back to the car, and by this time we were quite late for the bus. In fact, but the time we got to the bus stop, the bus was there and kids were getting on. Luckily I alerted the "bus stop mom" Angel by honking the horn and they waited for Sydney, who came running in a mad rush. Whew, disaster averted!

...well, not so. When I got home that night, I found out that Sydney had indeed left that darn library book on the bus, because she had gotten distracted looking at the other kid's Valentine's mailboxes and didn't put the book in her backpack. ugggghhhhhhh

This has got me thinking about the organization (and lack there of) in our house, especially in the mornings. Some school mornings go good, others like this one fall apart in the last minutes out the door. We have a mud room, and I think it's time for some major organization to happen in it! Details to follow soon (I hope!!).

Tooth report

I took Sydney over to the Dentist on Monday to have her teeth checked out. The adult tooth is very big now behind her lower front baby tooth, and it's a toothfest in there! The dentist said to give it a few weeks, and try to wiggle the baby tooth ALOT. If it's still not out, he can pull the baby tooth out. Of course that means he'll have to numb the area (A SHOT!) so I'm hoping it won't come to that, but I sure don't want to cause her complications in the future, so we'll do what we need to do I guess. Let's just hope she gets a little more motivated to get that thing out of there!!

Sweet nothings

I took Zack over to his favorite library today because some books that he wanted were being saved for us. The book was "Big Book of Trains". He was so thrilled! He turned to me and said "You got me the Big Book of Trains??! You are the best! You and Daddy are the best parents and Sydney is the best kid". I believe he might be a future Oscar winner with that list of acknowledgements! It was so sweet to hear him say that though, I was impressed.

However, that infatuation was short lived as within 3 short hours he didn't want to go pick up his sister at school and told me that he wasn't going to talk to me anymore and he wasn't going to be my friend. Ah, it was good while it lasted.

Imagination Station

A trip to the Imagination Station is always a welcome break in the middle of a cold winter.  There was a special display today in which you could make your own movie with special effects like they used in the Matrix movie.  It was a sort of stop action film.  I only had a video of it, so I couldn't post it here, but it turned out really cool!

The tilted house is always a good time.  It's a challenge to stay standing!!

There was also a special TV set in which the kids got to be sports casters.  When we watched it on TV, they were standing in front of a football field, just like the people on TV. 

 Which ball will make it to the end first... you'd be surprised - it was the one on the hilly route!



Scrapbooking

For Christmas Sydney got a scrapbook kit from Santa. We have been having a lot of fun with it. She has made pages with pictures of her friends, Daddy (of course!), the family, our trip to Mexico, and other fun stuff that has happened over the last year. It is interesting to see her style - she likes "extraction" style. She cuts around all of the pictures so they will fit in her book. This will make a great keepsake for her. A great start to a lifetime of memory keeping just like her mom!

Pokagon toboggan run

Today the kids had the day off of school for Martin Luther King day, so we ventured over to Pokagon state park for some winter fun! We had been promising the kids that we would take them over to the tobaggan run for a couple of years now since we always check it out when we are camping there. I have only been on it once, and remember that was one heck of a fast ride!


Here are some people reaching the end of the run. Near the end of the run we reached 32, 34 and 35 miles an hour! wow, that was fast! I did hear someone saying that they hit 45 miles an hour (a sled with 4 guys on it). The kids had so much fun. As soon as the got to the bottom of the first run they were jumping up and down with excitement wanting to go again. They were pretty brave.

Good thing we got there early - we got the last "light" sled, which only weighed 35 pounds. The heavy sleds weighed 60 pounds! but heck, I wasn't carrying it so I didn't mind either way (haha, only joking Alan!!)

Our first run took us only 25 minutes round trip (waiting in line) but the ones after that were 40 minutes as it was very busy that day. Well worth the trip!!