Jan 22: A Visit from Pops

Kelli’s Dad came down and spent a week with us in January to help get us through crunch time at work (year-end and audit season).  His visit coincided very nicely with Erik’s daycare being closed this past Monday for a teacher’s professional day.  Both of our last 2 babysitters are now away at college, so getting coverage for Erik during the work-week is going to be a challenge going forward.  Thankfully, Dad was available to assist.

We had a great week with Dad cooking us breakfast every morning and having supper ready every evening when we got home.  He even went out and did some of the grocery shopping during the week!  We are completely spoiled now.  Pops had a great time playing with Erik and getting to enjoy some warmer weather.  Dad sends out daily devotional emails to family members and friends and he always starts out with a comment or two about the weather.  Lately, the comments have just been pitiful with comments about how cold, windy, snowy or wet Ohio is.  Well, he got a vacation from that here in Florida and was able to enjoy 70 degree temperatures.  We did get a cold front last Friday where it got down into the 50’s, but he was still wearing shorts!  Probably just to prove that he could.  :)

While Dad was here, we took him to a nearby neighborhood park where we were all surprised to see a small black bear curled up in a tree.  We also wore Dad out playing soccer and catch with the Bergherm, Cochran, Hilliard and Zbaraschuk children (we had to let Pops use the hot tub after that!).  We spent Sunday watching football games and seeing any remaining teams that we liked get eliminated from the SuperBowl.  Stupid football.  You spend all season rooting for your favorite teams or players just to see them implode at crucial moments.  We played 3 games of Mexican Train (dominoes) where Kelli decided that Dad hides dominoes in his pockets and that’s how he wins.  Erik took his Pops on a lot of walks around the house and up & down our street.  They investigated lots of sand piles, sticks, driveways and whatever else catches a 18-month’s eyes.  Erik slept really well while Dad was here!

Look for the black bear in the branch, 2nd from the bottom on left.

  

Unfortunately, I didn’t get very many pictures of Pops and Erik playing together.  We did have a mini photo shoot the morning Pops left, so I’ve included some of those pictures.

Cute Erik story:  The first morning that Dad was here, Erik watched as first I went to work and then Kent went to work.  After Kent picked up his computer and headed out the door, Erik stared at the closed door for a moment and then ran into our office.  He picked up an old modem that was sitting in a box, tucked it under his arm like Kent had tucked his computer and then Erik headed to the door and asked Pops to let him out.  Dad tried to get his camera out in time to take a picture, but wasn’t successful.  Erik is becoming quite the copy-cat.  I guess we have to start watching what we say and what we do now!

Jan 20: A Big Helper

Sunday at our house is generally a day full of chores and attempts to mark items off our house to-do list.  It is always a challenge to get through chores with a toddler running around getting into things, but lately Erik has decided to try and help Kent and I get things done.  He helps me with the laundry by helping to push the laundry baskets from our closet to the laundry room, sorting the clothes and moving clothes in & out of the dryer (mostly in the correct direction).  He also likes to help fill & empty the dishwasher - sometimes a little too much, but again, mostly in the correct direction!

What Erik really loves, though, is to help Kent out in the yard.  He begs for rides on the John Deere tractor whenever Kent mows the grass.  Erik seems to enjoy sitting on the tractor as much as riding...pulling the levers and knobs and getting on and off (repeatedly).  The last time Erik went mowing with Kent he fell asleep about half way through.  It wasn't just a little eye blinking...this was a full on "there is no way I can keep my head up" nap and he didn't put up a fight when he was carried in the house.  Something about noise and motion I guess.  Erik also likes to putter around while Kent is outside doing chores.  He has a route around the house that starts with throwing things in the fountain (if left unsupervised), which mostly consists of pine bark and precious leaves from our plants.  Then he goes by the garage and circles the air conditioner a few times and finishes by stepping in a large hole that was created by a vacated plant (that was dying).  Then he goes back by the pool equipment and navigates the maze of pipes and machinery.  He picks up little rocks and hauls them around the pool equipment jungle-gym.  It's interesting to watch his routine!

Today, we finally took our 8 foot live (or rather, dead) Christmas tree out of the house.  Erik was fascinated by the whole process as you can imagine.  Kent got the tree up on a furniture mover and then slowly rolled it down the hallway to the front door.  Kent & Dad then tipped the tree over and smashed it through the door out to the front yard where we finally took off the lights (didn't want to do that inside with all the dead pine needles).  Erik "helped" with the lights and then he had a grand time helping all the adults sweep and vacuum up the pine needles that were littered from one end of the house to the other.

If we can keep Erik interested in doing chores, maybe we can get him to start changing diapers when the baby arrives in June!!  Here are some pictures of Erik helping with chores.

Erik helping to put away silverware at Christmas time!

Sorting laundry - so heavy!

"Give me the lights!"

Keeping the lines straight

Helping Daddy sweep up needles

This is going to take forever!!

"Oh good - Dad is back to help me"

All done!

Jan 1: New Additions

Happy New Year!  I don’t know about you, but I am really not ready for a new year; I do know, however, that it doesn’t matter if I’m ready or not, because it is here!!  

Do you set new year’s resolutions or goals each January?  I think that I set some official resolutions once; that was enough to convince me to never do that again.  :)  However, this year I decided to pick 1 or 2 things that I will attempt to do differently.  See - very different than setting a resolution, right?!  For 2013, my attempt at a new behavior is to be more deliberate (aka less procrastination).  If I think about doing something, I just need to get it done rather than spending the next 2 months thinking about it or fretting that it isn’t done yet.  This new deliberateness includes regular posts to my blog.  How am I doing so far?!?  Yep, it is the end of January and I’m just now posting my January 1 blog entry.  Oh well, I blame work.  You’ll note that I will make no attempt to come up with a different explanation for my poor communication habits!

In light of the New Year, I decided to post pictures of some new things that have happened at our house lately.

#1: We finally put a child-proof fence around our pool so that Erik can go out on our back deck and play without us holding his hand the whole time he’s out there.  This was done near the end of November.

#2: We hung a swing from a tree in our front yard for Erik.  This was also added around Thanksgiving time.  At the playground this past fall, Erik never wanted to get out of the swings.  Now that he has his own, he will only swing in it for about 5 minutes before he wants down!  

#3: Kent & I decided to give each other a joint Christmas gift this year - an Acura MDX!  It is a 2012 model that was a service loan vehicle and has about 6,000 miles on it.  But that means a discounted price!  I still drive the Volvo while Kent drives this. The Lincoln is for sale.

#4: This last new addition hasn’t arrived yet, but should be here this summer.  Baby #2 is on his/her way and plans to show up on June 23, provided the doctors are correct.  We are very excited, though Erik has no idea how his life is going to change.  We are working on getting him to say “Baby” now.