Monday, June 28, 2010

Our Weekend

Beach!!




We had such a great weekend!! I signed up for a bunch of free stuff on my birthday and had a free dinner at Gringo's Mexican Kitchen- our favorite Tex Mex restaurant. Hello, YUM. And our bill totaled $4.25 after tip. Sweet!


Saturday we headed to Galveston Island with our friends the Schurrmann's. Jon and Andrew work together at The Met and we are so thankful for this family! We played in the waves, made sand castles, ate lunch and hung out. Brennan didn't take a nap, except 20 minutes on the way home and he was still a really good boy!





Sunday we we're able to go to church together as a family, which was nice. Jon worked the past two Sundays in order to comp some vacation time. After church we headed home for lunch and to give B a nap. Then we dropped B off at Andrew and Cathi's, borrowed their van, and went on a little date to Ikea to pick up our new TV Stand/bookshelf combo. After we picked up Brennan, Jon spent the rest of the evening putting the darn thing together. Hopefully I can get a picture up here, it's so cute!

However, today is Monday and it started off with an 8 am dentist appt for me. What a way to start a week, ha! Do you guys get headaches after going to the dentist? I ALWAYS have headaches the rest of the day. Oh well!

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

The Little Things


Cute new shoes


My afternoon tea


Brennan's first time using a spoon by himself


Opening up my birthday presents


Swimming- we're doing a whole heck of a lot of this right now


Sleeping baby

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Happy Father's Day, Jon!



I just wanted to take a second to say Happy Father's Day to my rad of a dad hubby!!




Through labor, you were there. .
(this is right after I was pretty sure I was dying. . . and right after the epidural. )

You were there through diaper changes gone awry. . .


You were there through good times (Zach and Sarah's wedding)

You were there through tough times (one of the many nights he wouldn't sleep).
Like I said earlier today, we wouldn't have made it through the year without you. You are the BEST father to Brennan- we love you!

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

What's New?

Really? Not much. We joined a new Life group at church and are pretty excited about meeting other couples and families. We both need to be more intentional about meeting other people down here. I can tell that it's easy for me to wait for people to invite us out or pursue us but I know it's best for us to put ourselves "out there" more. It's definitely not my nature though. I'm quiet around people I don't know. Don't be shocked. Really.

Brennan and I went with some friends to tour the Blue Bell ice cream factory in Brenham, TX on Tuesday. Here's a picture of the kiddos before the tour, my son is the blurriness up front:


I'd not toured a factory before so that was actually really interesting for me. Watching workers do the same thing over and over and over again. We also got a free scoop of ice cream at the end, YESSS. Afterwards, we all went to the Blue Bell Aquatic Center to swim and eat lunch. So fun! Brennan is at an age where he's pretty easy in the pool, he will float around in my arms or sit in his floaty thingy for hours. I'm sure I'll be singing a different tune by the time he's 2 so I am really enjoying this with him. I take him to the pool a lot, we both are really loving it.

My birthday's on Monday. Just wanted y'all to know so you know, you didn't forget or anything :)

Anndd now I need to wrap this up because it's late and I spent all night at the church for VBS training and now I'm tired. I'm so nervous it's not even funny. I really don't like hanging out with kids and stuff like that. But I'm trying to be a servant so I know the Lord will bless that. It's just NOT my forte. Really. The instructor was talking about ways to get your kids to listen and I was thinking to myself, "how am I going to remember to do this stuff? It's so complicated". HA! Does this paragraph even make sense? I'm going to bed. Night all!

Sunday, June 13, 2010

Very Yummy Zucchini Bread

Thank You to everyone who encouraged us on our last post! We do try to keep his bedtime routine the same when we travel and we bring his blanket and lovey, and turn on a fan. But B is who B is and we love him for that! We aren't cancelling our summer plans as much as my like-to-sleep side wants to (and that's a big side of me, ha!!!). He will be sleeping in a separate room from us so that should help (right?? hopefully. . . ).

So anyways, to thank you all for your concern over our little sleeping dilemma I decided to give you one of my favorite recipes I found!! You all know my love of The Pioneer Woman. I have not made one recipe from her that hasn't been deeeeelicious. (not so much on the lo-cal side, but hey, every once in a while that's okay!). I try to cook stuff with veggies that are in season- and that's zucchini's right now. So I hopped onto her cooking forum, The Tasty Kitchen and searched for "zucchini". I found this fabulous recipe for zucchini bread- please make it!! Here it is (and it's got whole wheat flour and un-sweetened applesauce- very healthy):

Oh, and also, I did not add raisins or walnuts but I think those are both yucky in baked goods, but feel free to add whatever your little heart wants to.

INGREDIENTS:
  • 3 whole Eggs
  • ¼ cups Vegetable Oil
  • ½ cups Applesauce (unsweetened)
  • 2 teaspoons Vanilla Extract
  • 1-⅔ cup Brown Sugar
  • 2 cups Grated Zucchini
  • 3 cups Whole Wheat Flour
  • 1 Tablespoon Cinnamon
  • 1-½ teaspoon Baking Powder
  • 1 teaspoon Baking Soda
  • 1 teaspoon Salt
  • ½ cups Raisins
  • ½ cups Chopped Walnuts

Preparation Instructions

In a large bowl, beat the eggs. Add oil, applesauce, vanilla, brown sugar and zucchini. Stir well to combine. Blend in flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir in raisins and walnuts.

Grease and flour two loaf pans. Evenly pour batter into prepared pans. Bake at 325 F for one hour. Cool for 10 minutes in pans, then turn out onto racks and cool completely. Each loaf makes 16 pieces.

Excellent for freezing.

You can substitute other nuts or chocolate chips for the raisins and walnuts, or leave them out entirely! You can add up to 2 additional cups of grated zucchini to this recipe, depending on your mood. If using frozen grated zucchini, drain it well.

You're Welcome,
Chaeli

P.S. Brennan LOVES this bread. But it also makes him poop. A lot. Lots of fiber in zucchini. Just a fore-warning to you mamas!

P.S.S. Please don't take into consideration my horrid chocolate chip cookie fail yesterday. Rookie error!!

Friday, June 11, 2010

Have Kids, Will Not Travel.

This is a total MOM post. I would probably stop reading here if you mom topics bore you. Really.

So, all of you who are left reading. . . can I just tell you that I am so frustrated! We live many hundreds of miles away from any family. Which means our lifestyle dictates that we travel. A lot. The good Lord above sought it right to bless us with a child who is extremely sensitive. I think he gets it from his dad, which will be great in about 10 years. But right now, it's killing us. Let me explain his personality a little bit more- for example, when we were looking at houses to rent, we walked into the house we ended up getting and set him on the living room floor as we walked around. He melted. I think he was scared, it was a new environment, etc. He is just sensitive to new things.

I am so frustrated with the fact that we can't travel well with him. So frustrated! I know it's part of parenting- I understand if perhaps the first night or two will be rough as he adjusts to his new environment. But seriously?? The dude screamed at us for four nights while we were at the Zuberts and one night we just moved our mattress into the loft in the middle of the night so we could try to get some sleep. We think he had realized we were in the same room as him and was SCREAMING at us. It sounded like he was in pain sort of a scream, know what I mean? Like, screaming. And whenever we get home from our travels, it takes a good week/week and a half to re-train him and get him adjusted to home life. The first week we're home he always wakes up super early in the morning and is tired from traveling and is a bear.

It's not like he's not used to traveling. Heck, he's flown and traveled more in his first 1.25 years of life than a lot of people have! He's been to Texas, Buffalo, Minnesota, Grass Lake, Bridgman, and back again! I would think he would be sort of used to traveling. And we are almost considering canceling our summer vacation plans just because he's such a poor sleeper when we travel.

Anyone out there relate? What works for your bebes when you travel?

Chaeli

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Ey?? Our trip to Minnesota and Back

Hi family and friends!!

We just got home from a long weekend in Minnesota visiting family! I'm so very thankful we were able to go though the weekend definitely didn't turn out as expected. Mark is the worship leader at Osseo Church of the Nazarene. The church hired Jon to produce a video piece for them- an introductory video of the church for their website and such. It worked out that they could shoot the video the weekend of Westin's birthday party and Lincoln's baby dedication- woo hoo!!


One of the days Mark and Jon were working on the video, Erin and I loaded up the boys and headed to a park right next to their house. All Brennan wanted to do was run up and down the hill. How he didn't completely wipe out every time is beyond me!

We went to the Transportation Museum in St. Paul, MN on Saturday as part of Westin's birthday celebrations. This particular museum focused on trains (the theme of Westin's party). Here we are on a train ride.

The boys

Lincoln's dedication. And sweet Brennan slept through the whole service on my lap because he was so tired (a whollle 'nother post). Unless were flying on a plane, he never sleeps in my lap, I loved it!

Unfortunately, some sort of virus was going around the Zubert household that weekend so Lincoln, Westin, Brennan, and Erin were all sick at some point during the trip. We rescheduled Westin's birthday one day later and it all worked out. We are learning as a collective family how much young kids change things and how to be flexible!!

Besides NOT sleeping AT ALL, Brennan did awesome traveling. He basically slept through both flights and was a little charmer to all the passengers. I get more comments about his hair than anything- totally cracks me up.

Thanks for hosting us, Zuberts! Mom and Dad, thank you for all your help with the boys!