Becoming Daddy

Here are some things I never thought I'd see my husband doing. We've been together for over 12 years, and I never imagined it quite like this. But I am so very impressed and even surprise by the changes that being a parent have made in his life.

1. Change a stinky diaper. (I'm not saying this happens often or that he enjoys this, but he does it.)
2. Take 10 extra minutes out of doing yard work just to take our son for a ride (with the mower blade off).
3. Spend half a Saturday playing outside with our son when he wanted to get yard work done.
4. Put down the newspaper to pick up our son just for a hug.
5. Share his drink or food after a snotty-nosed toddler already ate/drank from it.
6. Give up Sunday afternoon naps to take care of the kid, so I can take a nap.
7. Order something at a restaurant, because Zachariah will like it too.
8. Take our son to the toy store and buy him 2 new toys just to keep him occupied for an hour.
9. Worry more about a sniffle or cough than I do.
10. Drop everything he's doing at night to hug and cuddle our son before he goes to bed.

Rock-A-Bye Baby

Oh, be still my heart, my son wanted me to rock him almost all morning long today. I cherish these few precious moments. A year ago I held and rocked my infant son constantly. So much so that I was itchy for a break when my arms weren't full of baby for just a few minutes. He always wanted to be held and rocked, especially when he was tired. But there came a time when that just wasn't cutting it anymore, and instead he just wanted to be put into his own bed to fall asleep.

This morning around nap time, I could tell that Zachariah was getting tired. I put him into bed, but apparently he didn't want to stay there. He would be OK for about 10-15 minutes at a time, but then would yell for me. Normally I just go in to check on him, and then I lay him back down. This usually does the trick and he'll sleep just fine. Not today. We went through this several times. And he didn't want to lay back down. He also didn't want down to play. He wanted to cuddle with me. A few times I tried cuddling with him in the rocker in his room then laying him back down. But after about 10-15 minutes he'd be back up yelling. Anyway, after an hour or more of this, I decided just to let him get up. I thought maybe he just wasn't ready to sleep (even though he seemed very tired).

I brought him into the living room and he wanted to cuddle in the rocking chair there. He did get down for a few minutes, but mostly he wouldn't leave me. Or he would sit on the floor right in front of my touching my legs. He got up and down. We read books. He ate a few goldfish crackers. But he always came back to cuddle and snuggle. Finally he curled all up on me and got really snugly like he wanted to sleep. I couldn't believe he wanted me to rock him to sleep, but I thought I'd give it a try. He got comfy in the same position he would as an infant. It was oh so sweet. AND, he fell asleep after just a few minutes rocking with me. Ahh. I just held him for a while enjoying the moment. Then I laid him down so peacefully in his own bed where he's still quietly sleeping.

Do you just love those wonderful moments? That's what makes us mothers want more children. :)

Creation Musuem

I'm interested in what other's think about this new museum. Please read the article, so you know what I'm talking about. Also here is their website.

I understand that people will view it differently depending on the religious (or non-religious) background you come from. I am a Christian and have been all my life. I was raised in a very religious home, and now we are raising our son that way. My father-in-law is a pastor too. I'm tell you this, so you know where I'm coming from.

I love the idea of a Creation Museum. I have always been fascinated in the creationism vs. evolution debate. I remember speaking to my biology teacher in high school about this. We were taught evolution in school, but that goes against my beliefs that God created the earth and everything on it.

I actually would love to visit this museum, and Matt and I just might have to take a visit to it this summer. It's not too terribly far from where we live. It's probably a 3-4 hour drive. I think it would be interesting to see the displays they have there with the explanations as to why they think it was that way.

I guess I'm not really sure what else to say about this. For now I'd like to see where you stand. I don't want to get into arguments with people, and I will not judge you. I'm merely interested in other points of view. If you are a Christian, what do you think about this? Is it biblical? Would you go visit? Take your children to visit? If you are not a Christian, what do you think? Would you visit this? Do you belive in creationism or evolution or something else?

Memorial Day Memories

Yesterday I was reflecting on past Memorial days with my mother. When I was in high school, I was in band. We had to perform at area memorial day services. The little school where I graduated from is in between several smaller towns - 5 to be exact. For example, the one I lived in had a population of about 100 people. Yep, just 100. That's all. If you were driving through and blinked....you guessed it...you would miss it. I'm being quite literal here. Anyway, what this usually meant is that each town had it's own festivities for different holidays. On Memorial Day there were 4 different services at 4 different cemeteries. And the band had to go play at them all. Plus, I was a trumpet player, so I played Taps a lot. By the end of these long days, we were all tired. But I have precious memories of these small ceremonies. It was always very moving for me to see all the old graves marked with the US flags. And to see the families who came to remember those who gave their lives for our country was amazing.

I know most people just see this holiday is a long weekend to relax, do yard work, and barbecue. I do too, but I like to take a moment or two to thank those who are (and have) serving us.

Thanks!

Vacation - the second installment

So, we did have lots of fun on vacation. Zachariah enjoyed searching for shells in the sand once he got used to what they were, and then he thought they were OK to pick up. (Remember this is the child who doesn't normally like to get his hands dirty.) Shells = good clean fun...I guess.

Here is Zachariah on the beach in front of our house with his Grandma Barb, my mom, who I might add is looking very good these days. Well, she always looked good, but she's lost something like 20 pounds recently. Yeah Mom. Now I need to get to work too.

Zachariah sat and played in the sand a while. He figured out how to scoop the sand and put it in his bucket. The bucket was a thoughtful Easter gift from grandparents.

We went to a nice restaurant for dinner one night, then we walked out on the pier. This picture is from the top deck all the way at the end. Yikes, Matt made me really nervous when he was standing near the edge and then hoisted Zachariah up on his shoulders. Oh, my stomach went in knots. I told him not to do that anymore. ;)

Our favorite part of going to the beach is just seeing and hearing the sounds of the ocean. It's so lovely and amazing. Inspiring really. I could just sit on the beach for hours just staring and listening. Several mornings we saw a dozen or so dolphins not far off the shore. They are so neat to watch. I just love it. These are the things that bring us back to this place year after year.

Vacation - the first

Well, I have a lot of great vacation pictures, and I can't put them all in one post. So here I am starting to post about our vacation. Maybe it will keep me from having one long boring, rambling post about our vacation. I can just tell you little bits here and there. ;) I'll try.

We left Ohio and headed to Emerald Isle, North Carolina. My sister and her husband rode with Matt and I. Zachariah had a hard time sleeping and being comfortable in the car. We snapped this picture once he relaxed a little bit. He did well for an 8 hour car ride the first day. We drove part of the way through Virginia and stayed overnight.


Our trip started Friday morning, and by Saturday early afternoon we were in our house in Emerald Isle. So, we dressed Zachariah up and let him see the beach and ocean for the first time. I snapped this picture just before a big wave came and got us all wet. But I couldn't believe it when he wanted to get back in the water. He loved it.


This is the house that we stayed it. It is right on the beach. This is the back of the house. I took this picture from the beach. There are 6 bedrooms and 3 full baths. It worked out so Matt and I had a bedroom and Zachariah was in a bedroom in the same hallway. There was a bathroom in between AND a door so we could close that whole wing off. Then my parents and grandmother had a wing, and my sister and her husband had the downstairs. It worked out well for a little privacy. And then Zachariah could go to bed and we could still be up and playing games or hanging out.


Zachariah was ready for the beach. He didn't really keep him sunglasses on long, but he did like playing with them. He's holding Matt's sunscreen here, but he let me put on baby sunscreen constantly for him. The hat my mom got him was too big, so we figured out a way to tie it then Velcro it. It stayed on that way.


He was funny to watch in a new environment. Luckily he slept well in his room. Even in the hotel room with 4 other people sleeping in there, he stayed in the crib and slept through the night. I didn't know how that would go since he's used to sleeping in his own quiet room.

Well, more about the rest of our week tomorrow.

A little more cute

I don't know why this picture didn't post with the others, so I'll just add it separately. It's actually my favorite one. :) What an adorable child. I'm not sure where he got all that cuteness from.

Adorable ahead

Well, I finally did it. I got Zachariah's photos back. I'm so glad I was finally able to get him in. I just did it at a store photo studio. I think they turned out OK though. It's just nice finally having new pictures to send to the family. We'll be seeing most of our families over the Memorial Day week, so I'll be able to just hand them out then.

In the meantime, it's been a very hectic week. I hope to have time to share more soon. I still need to tell you about our vacation and share more pictures with that. And also there are some new developments happening here. I'd like to get a chance to blog about that too. So, until I get a little more time to catch up, here are the cute pictures we got. (Yep, he smiled for them all.)

Peek-a-boo...Here I am

We've returned from our vacation, so I better get back to this blogging thing. I was doing pretty well before we left. I've been trying to post every day. I really enjoy doing this, and I know my life is dull and boring most of the time. But what can a girl do, it's my life.

We had a wonderful vacation. We spent the week in Emerald Isle, North Carolina. My family rented a house right on the beach. It was a little early in the year, so it wasn't as warm as we'd have liked it to be. But we were still able to go to the beach a few days and play. Zachariah did really well. He seemed to enjoy the new environment. I will post more about it later. I'm still trying to get things in order here at home since we've returned.

I have lots of great pictures that I can share later. For now here's a good one to keep you coming back.

And weeeeee're outta here

Bye my blogger friends. We are off to our vacation destination. A week of rest and relaxation and fun at the ocean. I probably won't get a chance to blog, so goodbye until I return. We're planning to be back home by May 20th. Then I can share pictures and tell you all about the trip.

Pudding Mix

The smell of wonderful homemade cinnamon bread is in the air. I have some baking in the oven right now. I can't wait to try some. (Oh, it uses pudding mix - hence the blog title.)

I don't have anything in particular to blog about, but I'll think of some odds and ends.

We have ants in our kitchen. There aren't tons of them. But every few hours I see one or two. Matt sprayed around the base of the house outside. And we put some ant traps inside behind the stove, fridge, etc. Anyway, they are creeping me out. I just cringe every time I see one. Err. Since we won't be here next week, we will spray more before we leave. Then we'll just clean up the spray when we get home. I sure hope that helps. And my kitchen is very tidy, that's what makes me so mad. I think I feel like it's dirty when I see ants in there.

We are leaving for vacation in 2 days. We will leave our house Thursday night. We'll stay at my parents' house and leave Friday morning from there. We will drive to Virginia then stay overnight in a hotel. And on Saturday we'll drive the rest of the way to the ocean. We're headed to Emerald Isle, NC. We are going with my parents, grandmother, my sister and her husband. We all went 2 years ago. (And a side note: Zachariah was conceived either there last time or right after we got home. Fun times!) Actually this is a typical vacation destination for my family. It has been for years. We love the ocean and the whole area down there. This will be Zachariah's first trip to the ocean. I'm sure he'll have fun playing on the beach and splashing in the waves.

Did I mention before that I finally got Zachariah's pictures taken professionally. I just took him to a department store studio. They turned out pretty good. Not as good as some in the past, but that's OK. I guess I just get so many real life shots here with my own camera that are great. But I ordered plenty of prints so all our relatives and friends can have pictures. We have big families. So, the photos will be back a few days after I return from vacation. I will be sure to post one or 5 for you to see. ;)

Usually when we have vacation coming up I start getting worried about having everything ready. This time...not so much worrying. I'm not sure what the difference is, but I'm organized and ready. Tomorrow I will get some things packed. I already have lots of things laying out ready to pack. And I have made lists of the things that I might forget. As long as I remember the kid, I'll be fine. I am very excited and can't wait to go.

That's all I can think of for this post. Just for good measure, here's a picture of my son in his Sunday dress clothes.

Gerber baby?

It's so hard to know how to react to another mother who is gushing praise over your own offspring. Do you immediately return the favor? Say thank you? Blush and run? Yeah, I'm not sure what to do either.

On Sunday another mother was going on and on about how adorable my son is. "He is sooo cute!" "And he's just such a sweet child." "He's happy and smiling all the time." "He should be a Gerber baby; he has the personality to match his adorable looks." She was saying all this while holding her son (who is the same age as mine). She almost didn't give me time to say anything. I did say Thank You. And I did try to talk to her son. But really, he wanted nothing to do with me. Actually he started climbing up her when I was talking to him. He thought I was trying to take him...oops.

This particular woman has 3 children. I only have 1. Maybe she just really likes adorable babies? Who doesn't? And I know my son is adorable, cute, charming, friendly, happy, loving,...OK enough. Maybe I'm the only person who doesn't know how to act in these situations. I don't really gush about other people's children. I guess I used to more before I had my own child. And I love babies, but they just aren't as appealing to me since I've had my own. When I see a baby, I really don't need to go try to hold them. I would rather just have another baby of my own to hold. This may change over time. It still is fun to hold babies. I did enjoy holding the darling baby girl who was being bestowed with gifts at a shower. And she got so many great little girl dresses and other frilly girly things. ;) Maybe that's just me wanting a girl of my own, too.

Sidekick

Today, Zachariah wanted to help Daddy. He had to be nearby watching his every move. When Matt took a load of sticks to the backyard, Zachariah wanted to follow. It was rather cute. And such a HUGE difference from when I posted about this.

It was a wonderful blessing to me to see my son enjoying "helping" his dad. And it may have been even better to see Matt enjoying spending time with his son. Even though he was still doing all the work. He let Zachariah ride on his lap while taking a load of sticks to the back. This was the most thrilled part of the day for the boy. He stayed outside with us for hours.

Here are some pictures I took documenting our morning. Enjoy.

This is what Zachariah thought after I told him he could not go outside and wait for daddy to come home. (He hadn't seen Daddy yet today, so he was really antsy.)

Then Daddy came home and brought doughnuts with him. Oh, the joy! Zachariah loved his first doughnut ever. I had to get the video camera out, it was so funny watching him. He kept saying "MMmmm" "Mmm". And he ate the whole thing in about 4 bites!

Daddy taking Zachariah for a ride was great. You can see that he was completely curious and enthralled with this new contraption.

Then Zachariah got to sit in the driver's seat. Oh boy!

And this...the moment that made a father proud. Zachariah wanted to go give him hugs before we came inside. We didn't think he'd ever let go. What a sweet boy.

Battles

This morning did not start out on a good note. I always change Zachariah's diaper as soon as I get him up, then I get him dressed for the day, and breakfast after that. Today he fought me about changing his diaper. He squirmed and wiggled and tried getting up. I really had to tackle him. After a few minutes of the struggle, I finally got him pinned down long enough to get the dirty diaper off and a new on one. Guess it's not love & cuddles today. And to make it worse...while he was fighting with me he stuck his foot in the poopy diaper. Ewww. :P I'm glad the rest of the day didn't carry on like that.

How am I going to change his diaper as he gets older and stronger. I just hope that I'll get stronger with him too. I know it has really helped my gain arm muscles since I've had him. All this lifting. And the weight slowly increases to give me a great workout.

I do have something more to say about the young mother I told you about before. But I think I'll save that for another post all it's own.

Oh, I did get professional photos taken of Zachariah finally. I'll let you see them when I get them back in 3 weeks. They turned out pretty good. For now I'll leave you with this good picture. Honestly, I think this beats any of the photos we got today...but that's OK.

Love & Cuddles

Why does this child of mine have to tug on my heart so much? This morning for no apparent reason at all he decided to come have some cuddle time with momma. He brought his blankie and came over to be picked up. He snuggled right into my chest. Ahh, so sweet. So, I rocked and cuddled with him. He would sit up occasionally and look adoringly into my eyes. Then smile and snuggle back in. He did get down once...to get a stuffed animal and come back to cuddle. He hugged the doggie and snuggled with him on me for a while too. It was one of those priceless, precious moments. If only this feeling would last the rest of the day. (It almost made me forget about the moment of outright defiance I had to deal with yesterday...almost.)