Warning: kinda long and and only interesting for those with a love of zeb.



Here is our little monkey playing his favorite game. He loves to play catch! The last month he has started following commands and understanding SO MUCH of what we are saying. Now if only he could talk back in full sentences! He's sticking to basics with his handful of words- but he's adding them quickly. He refuses to say ball. He loves to say uh-oh and up- but has yet to tell us "no". I'm kind of excited about that.

After yesterday he may be using "no" more often. He electrocuted himself in one of the sockets (the only one without those blasted childproof caps. He got a cord half unplugged and then touched the metal part) and I sat him down in front of it and had the "no" discussion. We'd had it plenty of times before that but apparently it didn't sink in. The poor guy was so dang scared after he got zapped. I was terrified that it was going to stop his heart or something. Kent and I were both home when it happened- are we bad parents or what?

He is so funny right now. He'll play-talk- follow commands-and smile and giggle like crazy (really, he's kind of like a pet dog). I can't wait to bring him for you all to play with! Just 38 more days :)

Ew- freaking gross. Our house has ants. I'm so insanely disgusted. I love insects- I collect them even- but I HATE ants. Of all the six legged three body segmented creatures on Earth, ants are about the only ones that I can't stand. I can't even walk into the kitchen without getting the creepy crawlies all over my body. I think it's because my dad used to force me to clean the winged ants out of our basement (they were IN THE LINT THING OF THE DRYER!!!) when I was younger. I would cry and cry but he'd still make me do it. Ants with wings haunt my dreams to this day.
I'm calling Al (our fix-it man) tomorrow. Kent tells me to just sweep them up or vacuum them. I cannot stand the thought of ants being in our vacuum cleaner- I could never vacuum again. And sweeping them puts them in a very uncomfortable proximity to me. Kent also thinks we should get ant traps. Whatever- as long as he does it. I want no part in the ant infestation.
The ants also cause problems with Z. They don't seem to phase him. He just crawls right through them when I'm not watching. I've tried setting up obstacles blocking the kitchen but he's getting trickier. I have found some other distractions however.

Pulling every item off every shelf of the cabinet is the best deterrent. It keeps him entertained for at least thirty minutes a day- and I can scurry around cleaning up all of the other shelves and drawers that he's emptied. He's getting closer and closer to walking by himself and he's just so funny right now. He giggles (and screams) more than ever and it's rather entertaining to me. He LOVES apples- but will only eat them whole. If I cut the apple up in pieces and give it to him he will not partake. It's all or nothing with this rugrat.

calories, calories, calories

My goodness, what a gluttonous day. For lunch Zeb and I visited Kent on campus and got free Panera (very similar to kneaders) at a military lunch meeting. It was delicious and very unhealthy- but the meeting was super informative and beneficial. It got me even more excited for our options of living overseas eventually! There were parts of it that reinforced some of my nervousness with Kent being in the armed forces, but I'm definitely super excited about our future in the Air Force.
For dinner I made my very most favorite Teriyaki Turkey Sliders. Oh my goodness- I love them! and they were quite the hit with the ward. I actually made them as part of a "healthy cooking" life skills youth activity. The kids were so surprised that the cucumbers on them actually tasted good! Kent helped out by making his fantastic fruit smoothies in the magic bullet.
Finally this evening (after we got home from all of our stuff) we dragged Zeb out of bed to go and take part in the 31 cent ice cream scoops at Baskin Robbins (half the ward and Kent's med school class were there too). Z was such a good sport. No tears and immediately back to sleep upon return home. There was a ten scoop limit at BR- Kent got SEVEN. What a little piggy. In his defense I must add that the lady scooping our ice cream was extremely stingy and the scoops were beyond miniscule.

To top off the day, unfortunately Zeb has a horrendous little cough and I had this wicked sinus headache so we didn't go running either- which just added to my guilt while consuming the calories. Oh well, huh? You have to have a few days like this.

Here's the little guy hanging out watching blues clues. I don't like when he's sick- but he's really cute just lounging on the couch. And I love this ladybug blanket- thanks grandma O!

Just a reminder - Tonight is 31 cent scoop night at

Wife neglect

As the school year winds down all the students anxiously discuss 'summer plans'. The summer after first year is basically the last summer we will have off. Many people have research projects planned, have scheduled to work in community clinics, or have a job lined up. This summer is the last chance to get some experience to get into a good residency program. My summer is going to be a little different than most... I'm abandoning Leisy. Three days after our final exam I'm flying to Alabama for officer training. I'll spend most of the summer in a classroom learning about the Air Force. The link on the upper left is a six minute video of some of the things I'll be doing.

I also applied to go on a medical mission in August to Nicaragua! I just found out I got in and I'm super excited. We will be working in a clinic for underprivileged. We will have a dentist on the team so I may get a chance to pull rotten teeth! Who knows what I will see while I'm there. I hope I get to assist in a delivery or something outrageous like that! I'm sure it will be crazy and a lot of really hard work - It will be so cool. The summer should be packed with some really exciting experiences. Unfortunately I will be leaving Leisy home with the growing rugrat. I'll miss his first birthday and a few milestones, but I think I'll miss Leisy the most.

zeb loves animals. We went up to Michigan to visit some friends this past week and they had Ellie- the giant dog . She loved Zeb and he loved her right back! His mouth was wide open the entire time she was around him. He does that with the vacuum and blow dryer as well. It's what he does when he's super excited and fascinated- but slightly worried.

spoiled little rugrat

Here you can see Zeb in all his pre-toddler glory. He's in that stage where he wants to walk and talk- but can't quite yet- so he whines and squeals when he gets flustered. My goodness, it's obnoxious. He's still cute though. We got the walker at the used toy place for five bucks. Best five dollars spent in quite some time. He's in heaven and should be walking on his own this next month. He can stand by himself and even took a step today (the step ended in a faceplant, but at least he attempted). He also said "head" yesterday while kent and I were singing "head, shoulders, knees, and toes". We'll try to record it next time he sings it with us.


* please note how quickly he can go from utter despair to pure happiness. What a little faker.

this week....

Hi 82 F

Very warm

So, Friday nearly kicked my trash. 82 freaking degrees and something like 60% humidity. Can we not work our way into summer gradually? This is disgusting. We are supposed to get a rain snow mix on Monday- that should help a little.

The rest of the week wasn't as rotten! We actually had a few good days of 60 degreeish weather. Zeb and I took advantage with many outside runs. You may have to enlarge this picture to get a good look but as you can sort of see, there were deer EVERYWHERE- all along our running trails. I am still nervous about one of them attacking me, but at least I didn't see any big antlers (that tear through little babies) this time. I do however have greater reason to be afraid of the parks. Apparently there was a stabbing at MY park (Swan Creek) this week! Some crazy man was hitting his wife and a man with a dog tried to intervene and was stabbed! then the crazy man stabbed the dog too! the dog ended up dying. See the news story here.

I never go running at night so I'm not too worried. There are plenty of senior citizens on the trail looking out for me :)

Zeb also decided to take advantage of the weather. We made him a little swimming pool on the deck. Initially we just filled it with a little water so he could dip his hands in and splash around. He ended up getting over excited and going in head first. At that point we stripped him down and added more water. If you enlarge this picture little Zeb looks like a miniature Quasimodo.

our last day

Our last day in Chicago was one of our most eventful and luck filled. We started off the day by piling onto the bus to go shopping downtown! We strolled the magnificent mile and could have stayed all day. We didn't even get to a small fraction of the stores! I really want to go back and go to the ghiradelli ice cream shop. There was way too much to see and the weather could NOT have been more perfect. Rain was forecasted for everyday that we were there- but the only times we got rained on was late in the evenings while we were headed back to the hotel!

We were with skyline high school (my neighbor's sister is in the choir) but wanted to shop longer while they headed early to the Cubs game, so we decided we'd take the "L"/subway to Wrigley Field. The L is NOT stroller friendly. We had to pick up our strollers and carry them down all the dingy stairs and down the dank train corridors. I think that the L man felt bad for us (perhaps we looked despondent and motherly?!) and he told us we didn't have to pay for our ride!! The trains were all jammed with Cubs fans so we had to wait awhile but eventually got on one.

Once we got to the game we searched for tickets to scalp. The game had been sold out and we were going to try to get them there. Apparently Cubs tickets are a hot commodity. The cheapest tickets we could find were thirty dollars a piece (we needed tickets for the two of us AND our rugrats) so we quickly succumbed to the news that we were not going to be going inside the world famous Wrigley Field. We wandered around the outside of Wrigley field (apparently looking more despondent and motherly than ever) and some man approached us with four tickets that he just wanted to GIVE us at NO charge! FREE. ZIPPO. ZILCH! We were beyond ecstatic. We grabbed the tickets and scurried in! The tickets ended up being just a few rows from Lindsay's family!! out of the 41,000 other seats in wrigley field- we got the tickets next to her mom and sis!!! it was outrageous and wonderful.
We enjoyed some great hot-dogs and a near blowout game! The cubs pummeled the pirates 13-1. I had never been to a Major League Baseball game. It was CRAZY and so much fun. If you look closely at the seating behind me in the above picture you can see people sitting on the roofs of buildings and house surrounding the stadium! People sell tickets from their roofs!!! Zeb loved the game- but was getting pretty pooped. We took the L back to our hotel and little Z crashed as soon as we exited the riotous stadium.

Once at the hotel we went swimming to tire the kids out for the ride home. Zeb used his new walmart special floaty (only three bucks!) and loved the swimming to death. We only had one near drowing! A little girl in the pool with us flipped him over and he went head first over the edge of the floaty. He came up sputtering but never cried :)

The ride home wasn't bad at all (only four hours) minus the last thirty minutes (as aforementioned in "day one's" post). Chicago is definitely a future vacation destination.

day 2

Good fortune seems to follow me wherever I go. I'll attribute it to the positive energy I emit into the universe :) The powers of fate always seem to give back and this trip was no exception. My mom has the same luck- maybe it's genetic.

On day 2, we went to the famous Chicago Field Museum of Natural History and I was in heaven! If I only I could have taken my Biology students to this place. It was incredible. Even better than the great exhibits was the price. Tickets run 14.00- kinda pricey. We have a Coyote Point Museum pass that gets us into many museums across the country for free, but I didn't think this museum was one of the participants. I pulled out my card to see if it would at least get us a reduced rate and the guy let us in FREE. Hip-hip-hooray. That pass has more than paid for itself already!! I can't wait to use it this summer to go to the new Utah Children's museum!

I loved the evolution exhibit (pictured below) and zeb loved the dinosaurs!








We got to see Sue- the largest and most complete T-Rex in the world! Quite impressive. There was also a really cool children's area where Zeb had a blast. He crawled around and touched EVERYTHING. I've included a picture of him studying the fungi and poppies. I really want to go back when he's a little older and can enjoy it more, and when we can go with Kent.

After the museum we went and walked down "Navy Pier" and Zeb loved the water. Chicago really is an amazing city. I think I loved the food most! We ate dinner at this really great place called "Fox and Opel's". We had the greatest sweet potato fries and turkey paninis. I found out that Zeb is obsessed with pickles. He LOVES them- he ate quite a few whole ones on the trip. I also got Kent a fabulous souvenir there- a Bacon-chocolate bar. Kent likes bacon and I love chocolate so I thought it would be a great treat for the two of us! We ate it when I got home and it was DISGUSTING.

the WINDY city

We are back and ever so happy to see Kent (and our beds). We had an adventurous weekend to the Windy City! One of my neighbors here was headed up to see family and at the last minute asked if Zeb and I could accompany her on the drive! Having never been to Chicago, we eagerly accepted. We had a blast- but I would NEVER wish to be a single parent and will NOT go on a trip of any sort without Kent when we have more than one child (unless of course, for some odd and exorbitant reason, I have a full time nanny).

Baby Z was so good. I dragged him through the windy streets and museums of Chicago, neglected his naps, and even forgot formula one day! but the little rugrat didn't ever cry until the last hour of the car ride home (he did at that point nearly hyperventilate however).

Chicago has so much to offer- and I think that we got a piece of everything. After the first night I could have gone home happy. We got Chicago deep dish pizza and saw WICKED (I wore my green coat for the occasion)!! I am the last of us (family) to see it (the least loved as well) but the wait made it all the better! It really was AMAZING. I couldn't believe how much I enjoyed it. The talent of elphaba was unreal. This woman had one of the best voices I've ever heard. I'm still listening to the music (as you can all hear). The pizza was equally as astounding. Pizza is my favorite food anyway- and this just cemented the preference. Chicago deep dish spinach and cheese stuffed pizza- TO DIE FOR delicious.

I'll continue with the rest of our adventures later tonight after the house is clean and the rugrat is rested!

history lesson

We are back home! and finally back into the norm. I'll post about the trip soon.

Yesterday we took a walk at Fort Meigs- an old fort built for the war in 1812. It's just a few miles from our house and something new. There was a good sunset and kent rolled down one of the hills and got sick (no throwing up though) so we had fun.Here are the boys on one of the canons that overlooks the river. They (the canons) were protecting the Maumee river against invasion from Canada. My knowledge on history is severely lacking and I had no idea that the brits had taken Detroit and most of the area Southward down to Toledo during the war of 1812. Pretty boring stuff (in my opinion) but a really great place for a Sunday walk and another great place to visit while in Toledo!