ROI

In today's economy everyone is looking for a little return on their investments (ROI). Well, I have found the answer. If you have small children and are seeking a little bit of freedom from constantly entertaining them. Invest heavily in large play toys for them.

Grandma and Grandpa C and Aunt Kacey and Uncle Eric and Daddy and I chipped in and bought McKenzie her own little kitchen for her birthday. Boy does she love this thing. She has spent countless minutes playing independently with her kitchen cooking. Any safe independent playtime for McKenzie means time for me to get something else done like feeding or bathing Benny or tackling my giant laundry pile. We gave her the kitchen on her birthday and she was so excited but the real excitement came the next morning. When she woke up and I went to get her out of her room she pushed past me frantic to see if her kitchen was still on the landing or if she had just dreamed it. She ran over and started making me some breakfast and then didn't even want to take a shower when I took one which is a first as well. The other really funny thing is that she mostly just uses the microwave. I have noticed this fact in all the play kitchens I've observed her in. She will put food in, push the buttons and then say "beep" and take the food out. Looks like Mom might need to start using the oven a bit more!

So far the kitchen has been worth its' weight in gold. Lucky for us since this thing weights a ton!



Benny has a some exciting news of his own. Last weekend I tried giving Ben some rice cereal. He just wasn't too sure about that so I gave up. Last night at dinner time he was really making a fuss in his highchair and was intently watching us eat so I decide to try again. He did a lot better this time and ate every last bite. Then he slept through the night for the second time ever! I am hoping and praying that this small change of adding rice cereal at dinner time will be what it takes to get him (and me) sleeping all night. Here's to hoping for a second night tonight.

Here's Ben eating, followed by a rerun picture of McKenzie during one of her first eating adventures.



My favorite part is the food hand print on Kenzie's forehead! What was she thinking?

Two On Tuesday!

Quite a fitting day for a second birthday! McKenzie had a great birthday complete with cake, balloons, presents and best of all "colors" on her toes! I actually painted her toes the night before, she has been wanting "colors" on her toes ever since I got my toes painted for our Hawaii trip.

I'm not sure exactly sure what I was thinking when I decided to do this. Has anyone ever tried to paint a house during a tornado? That is probably the best way I can describe trying to paint McKenzie's toes. Luckily I picked a really light color of pink with sparkles in it so you couldn't tell as much that one, I'm not cut out for pedicure work, two she touched all the toes almost immediately after I applied the nail polish, three she ran off barefoot into the yard as soon as I finished the last little toe. The toes nails had enough of the sparkles on them to satisfy her desire for "colors" and make one of her birthday wishes come true. She also got some new sandals for her birthday which allowed her to show off the "colors." The funniest part was we Skyped with Grandma and Grandpa C so they could wish her a happy birthday and she got the computer and sat down and put her feet right up to the camera to show them her toes. I wish I had a video of that. Nothing like looking at someones feet over the Internet.

And just so you don't feel you are missing anything here are the famous toes!



Before we left for Aunt Kacey's house McKenzie discovered the birthday cake that I baked for her. We had a really hard time leaving after that. I'm lucky that McKenzie's favorite friend, "flat monkey" is fairly easy to create out of frosting! Not a bad likeness if I do say so myself . If nothing else he is Flat : )


Here's the birthday girl sneaking a peak at the cake!



Here's McKenzie having her cake and eating it too!



Another highlight of her birthday was the bouquet of balloons her Daddy got for her! I think we could have just had the balloons and it would have been a great birthday. She carried those balloons around all evening. Luckily they were tied to a weight so we didn't lose them or McKenzie.



Overall, it was a great birthday for McKenzie and it's not over yet since we still have our zoo party on Saturday.

Here's a picture of Mom and Dad getting ready for the party with our animal hats on! McKenzie thought these were pretty funny.





This is Grandma C editing The Zaremba Family blog so that Colleen can print the blog as a Christmas gift for Matt. I'm mostly re-wording the text so that it is easier to read, taking out a million "..." and reducing the number of exclamation marks.

As you read above, Colleen wished she has a video of Kenzie showing Grandpa and me her “colors” on her toes. These are the three pictures that we took on the other end of Skype. This is a BIG plug for Skype. It really lets us sit her in Chelan and visit with our grands as often as we want.

Big Ben

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about taking Ben to the doctors for his neck rash and his cradle cap. I'm happy to report that the athlete's foot cream and Selsun Blue have worked wonders and he's on the mend. At that doctors appointment they weighted Ben at 13 lbs, 8 oz. Since that was a few days before he was four months I came home and compared him to McKenzie's four month check up. She weighted in at 14 lbs, 9 oz at four months. I told Matt that Ben didn't have a chance of catching up before his real four month appointment the next week. Turns out this guy likes a challenge!

Aunt Kacey and I had noticed he was super hungry even before the first appointment so we started giving him a little formula added to his bottles to keep him happy through the day and all was good. Fast forward one week to his actual four month appointment and the guy weighted in at 14 lbs, 11 oz. Over a pound in a week! Let's hope he does not keep growing at this rate or I'll be on the talk show circuit with the worlds heaviest toddler. Anyway, it goes without saying that Ben is doing great growing like a weed. The funny thing was after the doctor appointment he hasn't been crazy hungry, so I sort of feel like he just wanted to bulk up for that appointment.

Aunt Kacey's prediction is that Ben might have started as the smallest of the four cousins at 6 lbs, 5 oz but he will be the biggest someday!

Here's a picture I took of the kids yesterday along with one of my favorites from shortly after he was born. Ben sure has grown! McKenzie still loves her baby brother and always has a kiss for him.

Party Animal!

McKenzie's Turning Two
And Heading To The Zoo!
How About You?

That's right my little girl is going to be TWO next Tuesday! How did that happen? If anyone is interested we're going to the zoo for a low key birthday on June 13th at 10AM with lunch and cake on the zoo grounds at noon. Just let me know if you're going to come out so we can figure out where to meet!

Here's McKenzie's birthday picture from last year. Wow what a difference a year makes. And no for the record I didn't just happen to catch her wearing this jaunty little birthday hat at just the right moment. Last year I bought the silly thing and then realized it was way too small for any human head so I just took a picture of it and then printed it out and stuck it on a picture of McKenzie's head. It turned out to be a hit so I figured why not just keep it going year after year and keep putting it on a new picture of McKenzie each year. Won't she love that when she's sixteen? That's what Mom's are for I guess!



More on the upcoming birthday soon!

Fantastic Four!

Ben is now four months old and he is fantastic! He is now rolling over both ways, reaching and grabbing everything and anything that gets near him. He's working on his cute baby sounds and endearing old people everywhere with his laughter! His next plan is to learn to sit up unassisted.

Here's Ben's four month picture, still has the wild hair. : )




Still looking pretty similar to me but that could just be the lack of eyebrows on both of them!

We took advantage of the three day weekend as well as my parents neighbors being out of the country to head over to Chelan for the weekend. Grandma and Grandpa's house was full with Aunt Kacey, Uncle Eric, Nathan, Kayla and some of their friends so borrowing the neighbors house worked out perfectly. We were also joined by Aunt Jennifer, Uncle Chris and cousin Claire. It sure is fun to watch all the kids interact. Here's Claire and McKenzie enjoy breakfast together.



Being right across the street from Grandma and Grandpa's had its advantages and we took advantage of it by letting both kids have a little quality time with the G's. Ben stayed and played with Grandma while Matt and I took McKenzie to the pool ("wa-tee" as McKenzie calls it). She thought that was the best. The only thing that got her out of the pool was the promise of going on the swings at the playground near the pool. Here's a picture of us with Grandpa C and Nathan. Guess everyone else should have been wearing their sun glasses in the pool too.




McKenzie and me, happy in the pool!




Daddy with Ben after dinner at one of our favorite places in Chelan - Lake Chelan Winery where we like their wine and LOVE their BBQ ribs! We eat at the BBQ every time we come to town.

The drives over and back were long but the kids did great. Ben loves his car seat and would prefer to sleep there over anywhere else. Guess he's just practicing for when he grows up and gets a Lazy-Boy recliner. At least he's happy!

There's A Rattle In My Car

My car is barely three years old, but yes it has some sort of rattle in it --literally. I need to do some serious digging in the seats to find whatever kids toy has fallen though a crack because every time I go over a bump in the road I hear it back there rattling away. These are the things that no one ever tells you about before you are a parent. That and why your baby would possibly need a shirt like Ben is wearing below. A picture really is worth a thousand word or a thousand diapers in this case!



I have heard that one day you'll wake up and your little boy will be a man. I sort of felt like that on Tuesday when I purchased the items below for Ben.



Poor guy has a bit of rash on his neck lately but apparently it's nothing a little athletes foot cream can't handle. He also has a pretty extreme case of cradle cap that I've been battling against since he was born. Now we're pulling out the big guns and trying Selsun Blue. Good thing Ben doesn't wear a lot of black clothes I guess.

On to more exciting topics. Our good friends Rachel and TJ got married this weekend and we were lucky enough to get to spend a sunny afternoon helping them celebrate their marriage. McKenzie loved attending the wedding. Her favorite parts were the candy, cupcakes and dancing. Here's a picture of all of us at the wedding. Rachel was the most beautiful bride. Check out her blog for pictures of the actual wedding!


This past Sunday was a perfect Seattle day...perfect for doing yard work and just hot enough to require some rest in the shade while the kids were napping. McKenzie is finally getting to a good age where she can entertain herself for longer periods of time so Matt and I were able to get some stuff done in the yard while she played in her house making pretend snacks for the dogs and Benny was sitting in his swing enjoying the slight breeze.



Here's a little preview of the yard. I think this is the year we'll finally get everything in shape to enjoy it. We've come a long way since we purchased this house five years ago. Check out the contrast from the back of the house.




We're heading to Chelan for the long weekend so we should have some good pictures to share next week.

It's Amazing What a Full Night of Sleep Feels Like

Not to mention an all expense paid trip for a week to Hawaii!!! Matt and I were fortunate enough that he won his works Achievers Club trip again this year (last years post about our trip to Atlantis) but the real prize was that Grandma and Grandpa C came over and stayed with McKenzie and Ben while we were on our trip. Thanks you dear parents.



We had a wonderful time and really enjoyed all the activities that Matt's work planned for us. The hotel we stayed at was fantastic. It had both a boat system and a tram to take you from one end to the other because it was so large. We did find that if we walked really fast we could usually beat either one.




This year we did a snorkel cruise again and of course massages at the spa. The most exciting adventure was a Zodiac tour out on the ocean and going to snorkel by Captain Cooks Monument. We thought that our snorkel cruise had some of the best snorkeling we had experience but the amount and variety of fish we saw out on the Zodiac tour was amazing!






We saw four sea turtles and actually swam with two of them. Below is one of the ones we swam with and then Matt on the shore outside our hotel room with a turtle. We really made use of our cameras underwater features on this trip. We can't wait until we can take pictures of the kiddos in the water this summer.





It was a quick trip, Monday to Friday and then we were back home with the kids to take Grandma out for Mothers Day breakfast on Saturday and then have a relaxing family weekend. Thanks Grandma and Grandpa C for taking good care of our babies!