Ellis Family Newsletter

President's Day

2011-03-05T10:32:00.002-05:00

This year we wanted to attend the Alexandria, VA President's Day parade. We had a date with some friends, the kids were excited (especially Aviva), and we even had a bag of supplies ready. But then it started to rain. So we improvised.

This is our President's Day 2011 Parade.

Lazy Saturday in November

2010-11-13T19:33:00.003-05:00

What would you say if you're at the mall, one lazy Saturday in November and you see two kids dressed like this?

Would you:

(A) Blame the mom?
(B) Quietly whisper to your kids to stay away from them?
(C) Leave the play area immediately?
(D) Encourage your kids to pull the "wild thing's" tail?

Today, we took our kids to the mall, and that's how they wanted to dress. We didn't put up much of a fight, but we did take a change of clothes. Except when we got there, we realized we didn't actually have a change of clothes for Max. So he walked around the mall as Max, King of the Wild Things.

At the play place, no fewer than 3 kids chased Max attempting to grab his tail. One little kid actually did get a grip on the tail for a minute and Max promptly dragged him across the floor. But it didn't deter the other kids, it only encouraged them. (The craftswomanship of the outfit really shined through today -- good work Larissa Kindred!)

Max also had his own fun with the tail. While walking through the mall, he had the unseemly habit of pulling the tail up between his legs so that it hung out the front of his legs. This was apparently my limit, because I told him that he could not have his tail hanging out in the front between his legs. He said he understood, but he still did it a lot.

Luckily, at the mall, we ran into some of our favorite people in the whole world Aida, James and Papa (Jamie). They were our neighbors in Quaker Hill. How we love them. For the first few years of Max's and Aviva's life, they had me as their dad and Papa as their Papa.

They didn't even notice that Max was dressed as King of the Wild Things and Aviva was dressed as ... something (Aviva said she was pretending that the pack of underwear was a bag of cookies and she was trying to go as Little Red Riding Hood; not sure I believe it). Other people at the mall clearly noticed. Many people were highly amused and I'm glad Max could bring some joy to their day. Other people were clearly not as amused. Luckily, Max didn't notice those people because he was too busy playing with the tail in front.

Stowe, Vermont -- Abram's View

2010-11-04T07:27:00.006-04:00

While Kristin was in Stowe, Vermont with the girls, Abram was in Alexandria, Virginia with the kids. It was a great weekend. Even though I had to enlist the help of our babysitter on the first two days (Thursday/Friday) because of work, Saturday and Sunday were just us and the kids. A few highlights:

Baltimore Aquarium. On Saturday I took all the kids to the Baltimore Aquarium and it was awesome. We learned that Leo is part dolphin. When one of the dolphins introduced himself with his dolphin-speak, Max looked up and said, "That's how Leo talks." And is if on cue, Leo proudly responded to the Dolphin with his own Leo sounds. Max and Aviva laughed very hard. I also learned that taking three kids anywhere where a stroller isn't allowed is like taking dogs on a log without a leash. And I am no dog whisperer. But the kids had a great time. I have no photos to prove it, but that's because I had three kids and no stroller. (Funny story: while I was in the parking lot near the aquarium, another family saw me get the stroller out. They told me no strollers allowed. Silly me put the stroller back in the car and then carried Leo/dragged Aviva the six blocks we needed to travel to get to the aquarium. Apparently, you're allowed to "check" your stroller at the aquarium. If I ever see that family again, I will update them on the aquarium's policies.)
Uncle James came over after Church on Sunday. And that's the only reason I made it. The whole weekend was great, except for Church, where I accidentally brought our super-bright markers and Aviva was wearing her flower-girl dress and a white cardigan (the mom behind me audibly gasped when Aviva first start pulled out the markers), Leo had a blowout during the sacrament so I had to drag all the kids to the men's bathroom to make the change and then drag them back in after (tough be reverent with all the dragging). So by the time church was done, I was ready for Kristin to come home. Luckily, James came over for dinner and maybe without even realizing it provided the adult companionship I needed to keep my sanity. Thanks, James. (Oh, and he helped clean up, which I'm sure Kristin appreciated!)
We normally have the kids get dressed, eat breakfast, and read a book of mormon story before they're allowed to watch TV. I fudged on those requirements over the weekend, and they loved me for it. I'm a bad dad sometimes, but it sure feels good to be loved.

Here are a few pictures of Aviva, unrelated to this weekend, but still cute.

Stowe, Vermont

2010-11-02T08:06:00.013-04:00

I went on a girls trip to Vermont in October and it was amazing. Lot's of laughs, good food, and good friends. I can't think of a more perfect trip.

Brandi and I

Shauri adoring me

Val and me.

Val, Brooke, Shauri, Mom, Brandi and Teresa at the Cider Mill. Gormet Magazine ranked their donuts #4 in the country. Yes, I organized my trip there around the food.

Mom, Brandi, Shauri, me, Val at the Cider Mill

Shauri, Meredith and me, snuggled up to the bear who looked like he really wanted a hug.

The Quinn Girls

Half of Emily, Arah, me, Jana and Lisa at the Ben and Jerry's factory tour.

Brandi and Shauri

We stayed at a ski lodge at the base of the mountain. It, and it's manager, Cliff, provided the comic relief for most of the weekend.

Here's Cliff grilling hamburgers for us in the fireplace during Shauri's bachelorette party. You heard me.

Cliff's headlamp

That's the kitchen window you're looking at. It was the perfect parting sight as we left for the weekend.

Doesn't she look thrilled?

Shauri and Becky

Brandi, Brooke, Emily, mom, Teresa, Shauri, Becky

Emily and Mom

We went horseback riding and it was SO MUCH FUN. It's been so long I'd forgotten how great it is. We got to canter with the horses along the trails and it was exhilarating.

Val and me

We missed the peak of the leaves changing color, but the scenery was still gorgeous. Here are some photos of the landscape.

Aviva's Dress Up Party

2010-11-01T15:46:00.003-04:00

Aviva turned three in September and was very excited about having a dress up party with a Hello Kitty cake. We outlined a runway with balloons so after they put together their outfits they could strut their stuff. Aviva was most excited about being "in charge" of her party. It was her day, and she knew it. And took full advantage of it. Here are a few photos.

Blue Steel

A Month of Fright

2010-10-30T16:10:00.011-04:00

We have had a lot of fun celebrating Halloween in our family this year, and it's only October 30! We get one more day. A few of the fun things we've done:

1. Carve Pumpkins with Aunt Shauri and Uncle James. The Betrothed were really, really nice and brought us dinner and pumpkins to carve last Sunday. (Which was nice, because we had been in Charlottesville for the baptism of our niece Katie -- Hurray for Katie!!!) And then they helped us carve some wicked scary pumpkins:

There really is never a good way to carve a pumpkin. It's gross, and dirty and messy. But there is a good company with which to carve a pumpkin. And never was there better pumpkin carving company than Uncle James and Aunt Shauri.

2. Max and Aviva had a Halloween parade at school. You can't tell from Aviva's pictures, but she chose to be Olivia the Pig, one of her favorite literary characters. Aviva refused to wear her piggy ears for the parade. Max was rocking the Mummy costume and was more than willing to do a mummy walk and groan upon demand.

3. We had a Halloween party at church. Max and Aviva stuck with their original costumes, and we stuffed Leo into the gorilla costume. It really is the best costume for that age group because Leo looks like a mini-King Kong with his shaking walking (see below for walking update).

We had a lot of fun at the party. Aviva and Max both won cupcakes in the cupcake walk. They also loaded up on treats in the trunk-or-treat. Sadly, Kristin's chili did not win the cook-off. I was pissed. I don't want to talk about it.

4. Leo is walking. He's only taking a few steps at a time, but it's cute. At first, he would only walk to Kristin. But then he started walking to Grandma Delsa. And finally, he now walks to me. He also runs from Aviva.

This video is a few days old. He's already much better and can walk across a room if being chased by Aviva or if he's walking to Grandma or Kristin.

Abram Jeremy Ellis Salon

2010-10-27T08:15:00.002-04:00

When Aviva is mad at me, she insists that Abram does her hair.

Max's Birthday Party

2010-10-23T07:02:00.004-04:00

I read design blogs. And I know very well that most of you reading this do too, so I am making myself very vulnerable by posting pictures of my child's birthday party sans Amy Atlas treat table and matching labels for the food, birthday banner, etc.

Anyway, here they are. Max wanted a camping party, so we had a fishing hole, where they caught their party favors, including a flashlight they used to go on a rock hunt in our basement. We had a tent set up in the dark basement and I brought them down there to tell ghost stories. At the perfect moment, the werewolf from last year's party showed up. Their screams were so satisfying. It made the whole party worth it.

Leo

2010-10-23T06:45:00.003-04:00

A few thoughts on my favorite Second Son of a Second Son of a Second Son of a Second Son (yes, Leo is at least the 4th in a line of second sons):

1. He recently started pulling himself up and walking along furniture. He will also take a few unassisted steps if -- and only if -- he's walking to Kristin. He will not walk to me, Max or Aviva, only Kristin. He has always had a special place in his heart for Kristin. Like the other kids, he likes me, and he likes to play with me, but he absolutely beams with light when he see his mom.

2. He is so sweet. So much of his personality reminds me of Max as a little boy, except that Max used to be so aggressive. It's like if you took all of Max, took away Max's aggressiveness, and put everything back in, you would get Leo. Leo cuddles (at least with Kristin), smiles all the time, is generally happy to be anywhere and do anything (other than be the subject of Aviva's affection). Just pure sweetness.

3. Leo loves Max with all his heart. Leo gets to pull Max's hair, which hurts Max, but Leo loves it. And you can tell that Leo loves Max for it. Max will also scare Leo -- Max will hide behind something than jump out and scream at Leo. I think it's annoying; Leo loves it. Even though he's also a little bit scared at first, when Leo realizes it's just his big brother Max, he starts smiling and laughing.

4. He is the only one of our three kids who wakes up talking to himself (and not screaming bloody murder to get out of the crib). And for that, I will pay for him to go to any college he wants. The others are going to BYU.

Aviva

2010-10-23T06:31:00.004-04:00

A few thoughts on my favorite little girl in the whole world:

1. Aviva is absolutely unrelenting. Were she a stallion, she would never be broken. Were she the queen of France, she would say "Let them eat cake." But she's a little girl. And when she wants something, she uses all the tools at her disposal: smiling, crying, fighting, tempers and tantrums, sweetness, etc. Redirection is difficult with her because she herself is a master at it, and has used it to her advantage. It is impressive to be in the presence of someone who knows what she wants, and often gets it through the sheer force of her will.

2. She has recently started being very chatty. When I picked Max up from the school the other day, with Aviva and Leo in tow, Aviva ran up and hugged Max, grabbed his hand and asked, "How was your day, Max?" Another student's mother was there and turned and looked at me and put her hand on heart. I agreed. I heart when Aviva asks Max about his day. And she does it a lot. She asks me about my day at the end of the day too. And she listens to my answers.

One day a few weeks ago after asking Max how his day was, she turned and said, "Don't you want to hear about my day?"

3. She has also recently started to give appreciative thanks. For the first 3 years of her life, I'm not sure I ever heard her give a sincere thanks. Mostly, I think, because she thinks she earned everything she ever got (see #1 above). But recently, she started being grateful without prompting. One day after school: "Mom, thanks for putting that yogurt in my lunch. It was so good." And from there, she's been thankful for a whole host of things: thanks for remembering to bring water on the trip, thanks for bringing a sweater, thank your for getting us cheese pizza you're the best mom in the whole world, thank you for taking us to the park, etc.

4. She loves our nameless neighbors the "bike neighbors." (They're obviously not nameless, and Aviva knows their names, I think, but only ever calls them "bike neighbors.") One of their favorite games -- and Max loves it too -- is Cops and Robbers. All of the kids but one are robbers, and the other kid is a cop. The cop is supposed to chase the robbers and put them in jail. Aviva loves to be the cop. She never catches any of the robbers, which suits the robbers just fine, but she loves to have people run from her in fear. She just loves it.

5. She tries to force Leo to like her. She used to do this by straddling Leo as Leo lay on the ground and Aviva said with a sweet voice (but forceful) voice: "You love me, yes you do." Over and over and over. It was clear to everyone that Leo hated it. When we would ask Aviva to stop, she would glare at us and say, "Leo likes it."

Leo now has a wary look on his face when Aviva approaches. They've reached a sort of detente, but he better always let her think he loves her or I'm worried about him.

6. We recently introduced Max and Aviva to the Wizard of Oz, mainly because I got tired of making up stories and decided to start borrowing fro Disney and other sources. When we first started watching the movie, she was so scared of the wicked witch. And she never remembered Dorothy's name. "What's that girl's name who's with Toto," she'd ask.

Now, she loves the wicked witch. Yesterday I asked her what she likes about the Wizard of Oz and she said, "The wicked witch." She said I could be one of her flying monkeys.

Max

2010-10-20T19:36:00.004-04:00

A few things I love about my oldest:

1. Max is full of enthusiasm and he cannot help but put his whole soul into the things he does. This often means he's screaming with happiness at 6:00 am. A few of the things that make him scream with happiness: watching dolphins at the Baltimore aquarium, watching the lollipop guild sing to Dorothy with their mouths in a crooked way, wrestling (which means him running at me full steam from the other room and ramming me with his huge and hard-as-rock noggin'), playing with cousins, and eating crepes with nutella.

2. Max is so affable. People everywhere love him. I picked Max up from school the other day and ran into his old teacher at the playground while I was waiting for Max's class to finish up. She took one look at me and said, "You must be Max's dad. You look just like him. I love Max. He's always so happy and the kids just loved being around him." That's the way I feel.

3. He cares for his family. Whenever his friends are being mean to Aviva (by, for example, not letting Aviva play), Max always sticks up for her. Always. He'll tell his friends that that's not how he plays, and then he'll go and grab Aviva's hand and say, "Come on Aviva. Come play with us."

And with Leo, he is always so quick to make Leo happy when Leo is crying. One of Max's favorites is to let Leo pull Max's hair. Max cries and laughs at the same time.

4. He hates homework. His homework consists of doing things like "writing the number 4 four times" and "learn the first three digits of your phone number" -- it's not that complicated, even for beginning kindergartners. But he hates it. When I asked him the other day if he was ready for his homework, he said, "I hate homework. I have to do it every day. Every day, dad!" Other things that he hates to do every day: put on clothes, brush his teeth, and go to bed.

5. A few cute stories about Max recently:

Last night while praying: "Please bless daddy to go to work tomorrow and makes lots of money."
Max said to Kristin the other day, while driving back from Michigan after a week-long trip there, "I can't wait to jump into daddy's arms."
Max sings in primary at the top of his lungs. He loves him some singing time.

OBX 2010

2010-07-31T09:22:00.000-04:00

We had our annual Quinn Family Vacation in the Outer Banks, NC in early July. I think I laugh more during that week than any other of the year. I look forward to it every year.

This year was particularly special because Garrett and Anna got married while we were there. Their photos are amazing. Our friend Meredith took the pictures and they are amazing. You can see them here, or here on her blog. Here are a few snapshots that Shauri took.

I'm trying to post some funny videos from the week, but it takes forever to do it on Blogger. If anyone wants to give me some hints, I'd be happy to take the help.

He Makes His Daddy So Proud

2010-07-31T07:32:00.003-04:00

The last time we were in Michigan, Lisa and Ben were playing with us at Grandma's house. She took him home (down the street) to take a nap. Ben laughed the whole way and Lisa kept shushing him so he wouldn't wake up the baby. They pulled into the garage and Lisa said, "Okay Ben, let's go take a nap." She turns around and just then, Max pops out of the back of the van and yells, "Surprise!"

Lisa's jaw dropped and she said, "Max! I am going to beat you." His response? "Looks like I beat you, Lisa."

Ha! Meanwhile, we were looking all over the house for Max. Luckily she pulled in with him before we had time to panic. When she told me the story I laughed so hard and I told her she must call Abram immediately. I mean, "looks like I beat you, Lisa."? I can't think of anything more Abram-like to say in that situation.

Proud daddy moment #2. We were at a friends house and all the kids were outside playing hide and seek. Max came in and his pants were soaking wet. He has been potty trained for a long time, so I was pretty surprised. I asked him what happened. Why didn't he come in and go to the bathroom? His response was, "I was hiding and I couldn't come out or she would have found me." I knew Abram would love that story. Talk about commitment to the game.

I had this conversation with Aviva last night:

A: Mama, Heavenly Father give me a treat?

K: I don't think He has treats Viva.

A: Yes He does (with attitude, of course)

K: No He doesn't (with the same attitude, of course)

A: Yes He does, the bread and water.

That was pretty cute. It got a big smile out of me.

Aviva loves nursery. She talks about her teachers all week long. They're clearly doing a good job because "Jesus wants us to be happy" is her favorite phrase. She loves to interject any time she thinks it is relevant to the conversation, which is more often then one might think. All we can do is agree though. Jesus does want us to be happy.

Brothers and Sisters

2010-07-31T06:47:00.003-04:00

Poor Leo. He was so content all by himself. As terrifying as his brother and sister can be, he gets so excited to see them. To see anyone really.

Leo is my only baby who didn't wake up screaming both in the morning and from naps. He just sits and plays and talks to himself until I come get him. When I walk in and he sees me, he gives me a smile that takes up his whole face. His body tenses up and he starts shaking, he is so excited to have me pick him up. I just love this little baby so much.

Aviva thinks he loves her that much too. I know because her favorite activity is to lay on top of him, get right in his face and say in her baby voice, "You love me, yes you do. Yes you do, you love me."

Max's favorite thing about Leo is when we, or anyone else, tell him that Leo looks just like him. He is eating the big brother/little brother thing up. Here is a photo Lisa recently sent us of Max and Keely. We showed it to Max and asked who it was. His answer, "Aviva and Leo." He laughed and laughed when we told him it was him and Keely.

2010-06-13T20:59:00.001-04:00

Daddy's Notes (June 6, 2010)

2010-06-10T11:44:00.002-04:00

Kristin and the kids have been out of town for about 10 days. Here are the things their absence has made me appreciate even more:

1. I miss kids running to hug me when I get home from work. Max usually drops whatever he's doing, runs to me, and screams "Daddy!" I miss that.

Aviva does not usually have the same organic reaction that Max has. She only really gets into the act after she sees Max doing it, and the reaction I give him. Her unnatural enthusiasm reminds me of Kristin and how hard it is for Kristin to fake emotions. Aviva can run to meet me all she wants, but she can't make herself smile from ear to ear like Max does.

But with Aviva, once she hugs me, she won't let me go. That's real. And I miss it.

2. I miss Leo smiling at me whenever he catches my eye. He may fuss from time to time, and he may be a bad sleeper, but at lest that kid knows how to smile.

3. I miss Max asking me a million times to play Batman with him. Not sure I miss playing Batman.

4. I miss their inability to focus when getting in the car. They must hate getting in the car, because they cannot get in the car without me asking at least 10 times each to get in their.

5. I miss hearing footsteps at night when Aviva comes running to our room to tell us she has to go potty.

6. I miss when, after Max has been asleep for a while, I'll invite Aviva to come hang out with mommy and daddy. How she jumps off her bed silently (knowing that if she wakes up Max it's all over!) and reaches for my hand. How she cuddles us on our bed and pretends to want to do whatever it is we're doing (usually watching Phil Dunfey do his best Abram Ellis impression).

7. I miss Max rolling his eyes. At practically everything I say.

8. I miss Max saying "yes ma'am" to get his sticker chart filled up. I miss not hearing Aviva say "yes ma'am."

9. I miss Max, Aviva and Leo's mommy. She's my best friend and I miss everything about her.

"Wucy wants a Tookie"

2010-05-13T21:52:00.002-04:00

Max has a hard time with his Ls. And with this Rs... okay, and his Cs and Ks. I have a friend who says she can never deny Max when he asks for a "Tookie." So sometimes it really works for him. And sometimes not.

We were with his friend Collin who stopped him and said "Why do you keep calling me Tollin?" Max gave one of his infamous eye rolls, sighed and explained "I talk different." It makes me laugh, but it also makes me want to hug my baby and tell him he talks just fine.

Daddy's Notes 5.13.2010

2010-05-13T16:11:00.004-04:00

Dear Posterity: sorry it has taken so long to update Daddy's Notes. But frankly, most of these are Kristin's stories and I'm telling them second-hand. She will likely (in classical Delsa fashion) have corrections. Until then, I get to write history.

1. Max doesn't want to be a dad. Max told Kristin the other day that he didn't want to be a dad. When pressed, he told her it' s because dads are too silly. Kristin said that silly dads were fun, and asked if Max was glad his dad was silly (yes) and fun (yes) -- Phew! But then Max said that the real reason he didn't want to be a dad is because he doesn't want to be bald. Ouch.

Too many bald men in his life (me, Grandpa Bob, and Grandpa Walt). I guess maybe it's a legitimate fear.

2. Maxwell Jeremy Ellis. The other day Max went to the bathroom and he closed and locked the door. Aviva was following Max around and was upset that Max had locked the door on her. Their conversation through the door went something like this:

A - Maaaaax. Mr. Max. Open the door Mr. Max

M - No.

A - Max Jeremy, open the door NOW!

M - NO! Don't call me Jeremy!

A- Mr. Jeremyyyyyyyyy....

3. Yes sir, Yes ma'am. Kristin has decided to whip the kids into shape by way of stickers. Every time one of the kids responds to a request from us with "Yes ma'am" (or, from one of my requests with a "Yes sir"), the kids get a sticker for their Yes ma'am/Yes sir chart. If they fill up the chart, they get a new toy. They only need 100 stickers each. So far, they've been at it for two weeks and they've each got about 15 stickers. Should take a while.

4. Leo is happy. Even when he's sick -- and sadly, that's been regular the last few weeks, with ear infections, an allergic reaction to pencillin, etc. -- he's a smiley kid. He especially loves his mom and has a special smile just for her. I wish I could describe it, or capture it on film. But he really does speak to Kristin with his eyes and his smile.

Daddy's Notes

2010-03-15T20:18:00.002-04:00

Here are a few stories; I wasn't present for all of them, but luckily Kristin shared a few with me:

Look, squirrel! Not too long ago, we were driving to church and Max, per usual, had a fairly complicated question that Kristin had trouble answering with a simple response (sample questions from Max: how come the Moon never falls into the ocean?). In any event, Kristin was in the middle of answering when Max hollers from the back seat: "look, a squirrel." Kristin and I immediately looked at each other, laughing, both thinking of the dog from Up. As soon as we start laughing, Max smiles and says, "hey guys, remember that one show where that dog could talk and he said a lot, look squirrel. That's just like me." We were so proud. His first pop culture reference. Even if it was him being like the dog from Up.
Purple's a girl color, unless you really like it. Today, Max's friend Gianna came to play. Really cool girl. Andrea and Dan's niece (sort of). She mentioned to Max that pink is her favorite color and it's a girl color. Max responded, "I really like purple. It's girl color too. But I just really like it." (Don't worry, Gandpa Walt, later Gianna tried to put bows in Max's hair and he refused.)
Aviva loves Leo. A lot. Yesterday, she full-on straddled him and put her face right against his and repeated at least 10 times: you my best friend, you my best friend.
Smiley Leo. Just like Max at this age, if you smile at Leo, he'll smile back. Doesn't matter who you are, how old you are, or what you say. If you look him in the eyes, and smile, you are guaranteed a smile in return.

Daddy's Notes

2010-03-07T09:33:00.004-05:00

Aviva now has two catch-phrases that I find adorable: "yeah, sure," said in a deadpan voice exactly how Kristin says it, whenever she and Max have been fighting and Max finally just asks something in a nice voice. For example, they could be screaming bloody murder over playing with the same toy and when we remind him to ask nicely. Once he does -- usually right in the middle of a hailstorm of negative energy -- Aviva almost always replies with, "yeah, sure." And immediately caves in. Aviva's second new phrase is, "that funny." Which she says instead of laughing when she is amused by you.
Yesterday we took our first family walk (with all 5 of us). It was really nice. We walked down to the smoothie store, which kept the older two kids interested. Leo fell asleep. While at the smoothie store, Aviva said, "Max ...," with her tone "motherly" tone (something she does ALL the time -- see earlier posts). It made me and Kristin chuckle a little bit. Max, seeing this reaction, imitated Aviva's voice. And his imitation was perfect. I cannot convey how funny it was. And I know it won't be funny to anyone reading. But hopefully, years from now, I can read this post and hear Max saying "Max" exactly the way Aviva says it when she's being motherly.
Max and Aviva will now sometimes watch movies together. Aviva won't usually last the full time, in part because she doesn't have the attention span and in part because she only likes two shows (Dora the Explorer and Max and Ruby). But it's cute when right after we put in a movie, Max and Aviva will cuddle under the blankets like the best of friends.
Aviva has been waking up first lately. And she just loves to wake up Max. Her money line is, "Max, [again, said in that 'I'm the mom' tone] it morning time." That usually gets Max up pretty quickly. It's usually a race between me and Aviva. I try and get her out of bed before she says "it morning time" a second time and she tries to get Max to wake up before I come get her. She hates to be alone in the morning. When Max does wake up, she is so excited. The other day we'd been up for a little while when we heard Max jump down from his top bunk. She hears the thump and says, "GREAT, Max awake." And she ran for the stairs.
Leo still reminds me a lot of Max. And now that Leo is smiling a lot, the resemblance is even more recognizable.

Snowpocalypse

2010-03-05T21:38:00.002-05:00

This is a little late, but here's a picture of our deck after the big snowstorm. It was fun for the first few days, but it got old fast. I'm grateful for four wheel drive and a small driveway.

Smiley

2010-03-05T21:19:00.002-05:00

I really like this kid. Leo has started smiling and it is the best! All you have to do is look his way and he bursts into huge smiles. I love him, love him, love him.

February

2010-02-07T20:36:00.008-05:00

A little known fact about me... I love Black History Month. Before I had children to lug around, I would look up all the events going on around town, mark them on my calender, and try to find friends to accompany me to all the events. Lectures, debates, tributes, films, musical performances, you name it. What can I say? I love black history.

Anyway, it's been a few years since I've been able to make February the learning experience I'd like to. To be honest, I haven't even thought about it much.

Saturday morning I came down stairs to Abram reading library books to the kids (I picked most of them out and then the kids handed me a few I didn't pay much attention to). I picked up one of the books and it's title was, "Furaha Means Happy: A Book of Swahili Words." I laughed out loud and the following conversation ensued:

Abram: You didn't pick that out?

Kristin: Seriously? Why would I pick this out?

Abram: I don't know, I just figured it's Black History Month...

I really wished my roommates were there in that moment.

Raaaaargh

2010-02-07T20:25:00.001-05:00

Snow Days

2010-02-07T20:02:00.004-05:00

It has been snowing like crazy here. These pictures are from earlier this week, but this weekend we got 28 inches of snow. We stocked up on food, library books and DVDs, and Keva planks (At one point Max was building a floor and told me to put my house on his floor so it would "be stable. Like the wise man who built his house upon a rock)." Miraculously, we made it it through without anyone wanting to kill anyone else. In fact, I would even say there was some positive family bonding.

Here is Max with his friends Abi and Anna. Their mom just let us know that Abi told her Max is her best friend, but she is going to marry Noah. Ouch. Abram is trying to figure out how to tell Max not to worry, it runs in the family. It will work out eventually.

Aviva wanted to get herself ready to go play in the snow. I guess she didn't trust me to make sure she didn't get a sunburn.

Daddy's Notes

2010-02-07T14:14:00.003-05:00

1. "But funny." This morning, Max and I were playing with some building blocks. After I had built a relatively impressive structure, Aviva knocked it over. I was frustrated. I said, "Aviva, that's not very nice." She said, with a wicked smile, "... but funny."

2. Hockey Talkies. We were getting ready for snowmageddon 2010 here in Washington, and I wanted to get Max and Aviva some toys for the weekend. Max picked "Hockey" talkies. They are horribly cheap, but he still loves them. We play hide-and-seek with them; the person hiding is supposed to give the person looking clues via the "hockey" talkies. The problem is, they're so loud -- even without any speaking -- that all you have to do is listen for the white noise. And poor Max always wonders how I found him.

3. Leo smiles. Finally, Leo smiled at me yesterday. He's been cooing and smiling at Kristin for a while now. But he just did not like me. Even a little while ago when I got him in the middle of the night for his feeding, he scowled at me. Well, yesterday, he finally warmed up to me and smiled back. It's a lot easier to serve someone who smiles back, that's for sure.

Daddy's Notes

2010-01-24T19:02:00.003-05:00

1. Aviva thinks she's a big girl now. Mostly because she now sleeps in a big kid bed. About a week ago we asked her if she wanted to sleep in the bottom bunk of Max's big-kid bunk bed. Boy did she ever. The first night, she fell asleep quickly and every night since she's gone to sleep at night and for naps on the bottom bunk. After a night of successfully sleeping in the bottom bunk, she said to me, "I's a big kid. Baby Leo sleep in my crib." So that's that.

2. Aviva is also fully potty trained. Well, it's been a long time since we remember her last accident. You may recall that she potty-trained herself a few months ago. Then Leo showed up. She was all out of sorts with his arrival, but now she's back on track.

3. Max loves his mommy. Kristin now leads music time during primary at church (which is impressive since she has no musical training to speak of). But she shares the responsibility with another mom named Holly. Last week after church, Max and I were driving home and I asked how church was and what he did. He mentioned singing time in primary and I asked how Holly did. No lie, he responded with, "Why would you think she's better than mom?" Um, I didn't Max, but good to know you got Mom's back.

4. And his fingers, too. It's disgusting, but we cannot keep him from putting his fingers in his mouth. Argh.

5. Max and his CTR ring. In primary at church, Max's teachers gave him his first "Choose the Right" ring with the acronym CTR on it. He loved it. And lost it within 24 hours. On Monday, he got in trouble and Kristin asked Max why he did the thing she'd asked him not to. His answer, "I lost that ring that told we what to do."

6. Leo looks just like Max. Only I recall Max smiling a lot. I know that Leo is still young, but I wonder if we have a serious "Max" on our hands. It's almost incomprehensible because if there's one that thing that Max is not, it's serious.

7. Leo is a great sleeper. And almost doth convince me to have another baby. (Well, technically, Kristin would do the heavy lifting.) He'll take one long nap in the afternoon (3-4 hours), then he'll sleep at night from 9/10-5/6 on almost a nightly basis. And he'll go right back to sleep after waking up at 5/6. It's a miracle. Seriously.

8. Aviva hates to be at home. She's starting to recognize our neighborhood and as soon as she figures out what's going on (i.e, we're getting close to home), she screams like crazy from the back seat, "NO HOME. NO HOME!!"

9. Aviva thinks she's Kristin, or likes to act like it. When Max gets in trouble and Kristin reprimands him, Aviva will almost always repeat Kristin. Immediately. As if she's Kristin's echo. "No, Max, you no do that." Which prompts Max to scream, "You're not my mom." Aviva's not scared to get in on the act in other families either. At Max's friend Noah's house recently, Noah got in trouble and Noah's mom heard an echo: "No, Noah, you no do that."

10. Max loves filthy lucre. We forgot how much Max loved money until we recently decided we were tired of helping him get dressed every morning before school and get in his pajamas before bed every night. Kristin has started offering him a quarter every time he puts on his clothes/pajamas after only being asked once (don't worry, we stop shelling out quarters after he's shown he can do it on his own for a while). He's made a lot of money this week. Sadly, all he wants to buy are things like this: http://toys.goolian.com/index.php?case=product&proddb=9&pid=12786.

2010-01-22T22:36:00.002-05:00

These two are either best friends or bitter enemies. Aren't they cute? I thought taking pictures of two was hard. Three is a nightmare. Look at poor Leo. It's got to be nice when you can finally hold your own head up. Speaking of Leo, he's been sleeping from 9 pm to 5 0r 6 am every night. Knock on wood.

Christmas

2010-01-13T11:03:00.002-05:00

We spent Christmas at Ryan and Amy's house and it was wonderful, as always. The best part - Grandma and Grandpa were there! Here's a little video of the kids climbing all over grandpa.

Grandpa's best line over Christmas: "Aviva has the body of Tinkerbell and the personality of Mr. T." Nice. His favorite game was to take anything in the room when she walked in and say "MY blanket (toy, food, etc.)," knowing she would immediately take the bait and start screaming that it is her blanket. The "played" like that all weekend which as you can imagine, was a real treat.

Christmas Eve we tried starting a new tradition with lots of different appetizers instead of a big meal. It was a big hit. Presents were a big hit too of course. I think Max loved all of his presents equally, but it is very clear that Aviva's favorite Christmas presents were her backpack, or "pack pack" as she calls it, and her new dress up clothes. I got her a bunch of girly tutu's, capes, accessories, etc. and then I threw in a doctor's coat, hat and instruments for good measure. To her parent's delight, the Dr. coat is by far her favorite. With the fancy elbow length gloves and clip on earings of course.

Michigan

2010-01-13T10:51:00.003-05:00

My mom came and stayed with us after Leo was born. I felt really overwhelmed and as she was leaving I started to cry. Abram's response was, "Maybe we should go to Michigan." And by 3:00 we were on our way.

We got in at 1:00 am and Aviva did not sleep the whole way. I repeat, Aviva did not sleep the whole way. It may be a while before we do the road trip again.

While we were there we went to a party our friends threw with lots of our favorite people. I had so much fun it made me desperately miss living there. Of course most of them will probably move away over the next few years, so that's what I have to remind myself of and move on to convincing them to move HERE.

Grandma Delsa

2009-12-06T20:30:00.004-05:00

My mom has been visiting and it has been a dream. I'm not sure how I ever recovered from having Aviva without her.

One of my favorite things is how Aviva wants to cook with us when we're working in the kitchen. Of course all the laundry, child care and dinner making come in a close second...

And More Leo

2009-12-06T19:54:00.005-05:00

There's not much to tell about Leo. He's doing all the normal 1 week old baby things. But he sure is cute to look at:

More Leo

2009-11-29T22:54:00.003-05:00

We've had lots of requests for more pictures of Leo. Since he is up all night and sleeps all day, these will have to do.

Yes, that's a pink binky. We're still crossing back over from the last baby, give us a break.

There have also been some inquiries about Aviva's reaction. She adores Leo and the only sign of future jealousy is that she keeps getting into Leo's clothes and saying "Mine!" This is her in his 3-6 month shorts and coat and then in his winter hat:

Leo Tyler meets Max and Aviva

2009-11-28T08:22:00.006-05:00

Leo didn't express much when he met Max and Aviva. But Max and Aviva sure showed Leo lots of love. Mommy and Aviva were in the car when Aviva and Max first met Leo and they couldn't stop doing the following (guess who did what):

Touching Leo to get him to make a sound.
Saying, "Where Leo?" and smiling.
Begging to hold Leo.
Saying "We're a family now." (This one really made Kristin and Abram smile, except on further reflection, it makes you wonder why we weren't a family before ... .)

When we got home, Max and Aviva washed up and then fought to hold Leo. We compromised by cutting Leo in half ... I mean letting Aviva hold half of Leo and Max hold the other half.

Here is a picture of Leo with Max and Aviva and then some more pictures of Leo from the hospital right after joining the fam'.

Leo Tyler

2009-11-27T02:33:00.004-05:00

And he made it. I went into labor Wednesday night at around 11:30 pm after about an hour of sleep. I spent the next 3 hours packing, cleaning, doing laundry, and playing Scrabble on my iphone. I called the doctor at 2:15 when my contractions got to be 6 minutes apart. They left a message for her, but I had to call back an hour later because she never called. I was freaking out a little because I was terrified that the third one would come faster than expected and I'd end up not being able to get an epidural.

She told me to come in. By the time we got to the hospital I was 4 minutes apart, dilated 4 cm. They gave me the epidural and I kept waiting for it to fully kick in, but my contractions just kept getting worse. I'm not going to lie, there were some tears shed and once again I questioned how anyone is ever able to do this naturally.

Anyway, they checked me and I was already dilated to a 9. Apparently, right after they gave me the epidural, my contractions doubled in intensity and I started progressing like crazy, but they had only given me enough medicine in the epidural for someone who was dilated to a 4. So the anesthesiologist ran out of a C-Section shot me up with some more medication and ran back in. I just kept thinking, thank goodness I didn't wait another hour at home.

I had about a half hour to relax and then I pushed three times and out came Leo at 7:22 am, Thanksgiving morning. It's always such an amazing, happy moment. He is 8 pounds, 1 ounce and 20 inches long. When he came out they realized he had tied a knot in his umbilical cord, which didn't surprise me at all after all that dancing around in my belly. Luckily, it never got pulled tight, so it never affected his heart rate or anything.

He is super pink (he had a 9 on his apgar test) with a beautiful round head and he's already a little chubby with a little round belly. He's bald, just like Max and Aviva. He came out screaming and for the first hour I thought, "we're going to have our hands full with this one." But since then I can hardly get him to wake up to eat.

I already love him so much, and I can't wait for his brother and sister to meet him. I can't believe we're already a family of FIVE. Here's to good (and crazy) times ahead!

Max's Primary Talk

2009-11-25T19:58:00.002-05:00

I Will Prepare now to Become a Father

I am preparing to become a father.

My dad takes care of us by making breakfast. I crack the eggs all by myself so one day I can make breakfast.

My dad plays with us, so I am practicing my wrestling moves.

Most of all, my dad loves us. I am learning to love by being nice to people.

I know Heavenly Father wants me to prepare to become a father and I am happy to do it.

2 Days and Counting

2009-11-25T18:20:00.005-05:00

I am scheduled to be induced on Friday! My list of things to do before the baby comes is almost done. One of those things was decorating for Christmas. Max and Aviva LOVE the ornaments. They play with them all the time and consequently, we have about half as many as we started with.

In other news, Aviva decided to potty train herself a couple weeks ago. She still has accidents here and there, but I would definitely consider her potty trained. It's a Thanksgiving Miracle. There is an awesome picture I wanted to post of her doing the dishes with just her panties on backward with a sweet half wedgie, but I figured it might not be appropriate for the internet.

Max and Aviva have become good friends lately. Well, maybe not good friends, but friends nonetheless, and it is awesome. I love watching them play together and how she follows her brother around and wants him to help her get out of her car seat, fix toys, and all the other things she used to have me help her with. I also secretly love how she teases him, then he retaliates, she cries or screams and then goes back for more. It's like I'm watching myself 29 years ago. Or one year ago, but who's counting?

Halloween

2009-11-25T16:15:00.006-05:00

Thanks to my very talented friend Larissa (check out her Etsy Shop here), Max got to be King of the Wild Things this year for Halloween. He loves the book and points out his name in print every time we see it while we read.

Aviva and I had been goign through a little bit of a rough period so I passive aggressively decided she would be a witch for Halloween.

She of course tried to foil my plans by finding an old dress up outfit of Max's that Keith and Jeanene brought us from China and spent half of the day in it.

Our First Visitors

2009-11-25T15:53:00.005-05:00

We moved in September and we've been settling in nicely. We love it here, but we really miss our friends and family in Michigan. So you can imagine how excited I was when Elizabeth piled her three kids in the minivan and came to visit us in October. We had so much fun. Here are some photos of the good times:

Collin and Max at the Natural History Museum

Aviva and Ashlyn at the Zoo. They were so cute holding hands everywhere they went

Gravelly Point is a park right next to the airport where you can watch the planes take off and land. The kids LOVED it.

Scooby Doo Party

2009-11-25T15:18:00.005-05:00

Max wanted a Scooby Doo birthday party this year, and we had a lot of fun putting it together. Not nearly as much fun as actually participating though. The highlights were when the kids threw Jello and whipped cream at Scooby's (Abram's) mouth, and when the werewolf (Uncle Garrett) stole the presents and the kids found him, got scared out of their minds, chased him down and unmasked him.

Here are some photos:

Max wanted to dress up like Shaggy for the party

He had a surprise visit from Velma (Joanna)

Unfortunately, my art and design skills haven't really improved since about 7th grade. See both decorations above and cake below.

It's supposed to be a bone.

It took the kids awhile to get the hang of this. Jana couldn't stand it, so she cut in line and got a few good throws in first to show them how it's done.

I wish I had a better angle so you could see the kids faces when Garrett jumped out at them. It was priceless. It's three months later and Aviva is still saying, "Uncle Garrett, Raaaarrrgh!"

One of the things I miss most about Collin is hearing him call Garrett and Shauri "Uncle Garrett" and "Aunt Shauri."

I'm Pregnant

2009-08-20T08:19:00.004-04:00

You may have noticed that I stopped blogging around March. That's because I'm pregnant. And once I'm pregnant I like to milk it for all it's worth. Abram finally shamed me into posting, now that I'm 5 1/2 months along.

I'm due November 28th and it's a boy. We're taking name suggestions, so feel free to leave one.

We're Moving

2009-08-20T08:09:00.005-04:00

Again. For those that haven't heard, we're moving back to DC. Same job, same area, same everything. We just found a place to rent that we're really excited about. It's right next to GW parkway, so I've been trying to convince Abram he should bike into work everyday. I thought it was going pretty well until he had dinner with Ryan and Amy, mentioned it to them, and Amy just laughed. That was enough of a reality check for him and now we're banking on the express bus.

Abram is driving the truck down on Sept. 12 and my mom is going to drive down with the kids and me on Sept. 14.

Here are photos of some of our friends that we love and are so very sad to leave.

New York

2009-08-20T07:28:00.007-04:00

Thanks to my mom and Abram, I got to go on a kid-free girls trip to New York. Here are some of the highlights:

Grimaldi's Pizza

Breakfast at Norma's

In the Heights

Central Park

Our Rickshaw ride with Angel

(me half heartedly encouraging a little girl after Jana embarrassed her for falling off her bike)

I don't have any pictures, but I will also fondly remember our many inappropriate conversations on airplanes and subways for all the world to hear.

It was a great trip and I'm so glad I got to go with my girls before I leave.

OBX

2009-08-20T07:18:00.007-04:00

We went to our favorite vacation spot in July: The Outer Banks of North Carolina. My family rents a huge beachside house that can fit all 20 of us (Travis is engaged for those of you counting). We swim and play and eat and laugh for a whole week together. That's not to say we don't have rough moments. You can click here to read Shauri's account of our trip there.

Here is the only picture I have of the trip. Not very exciting, is it? Hopefully this will push my sister/sisters-in-law to send me all their photos.

a few more...

Homecoming

2009-08-20T07:03:00.004-04:00

We've had a lot of good days this summer, but July 6th takes the cake. That's the day my parents came home from serving a 3 year mission in Australia. I can't even tell you how hard it was to have them so far away for so long. It didn't matter how long they were gone, or how used to it I was, I would periodically tear up in the middle of the day because I was so lonely for them. So reuniting brought with it sweet jubilation.

Max was totally pumped up for his grandparents to come home. Grandma rode in our car home from the airport and Max talked her ear off. He was especially excited to sing his "Grandma Song" for her from the kid's CD she sent the grandkids. It starts out: "I have a friend who's just pretend, and you can't see... but my little friend is real to me." I know, sad commentary. Anyway, he was a different child than the one who came to visit her in Australia. Of course it helps not to be 12 hours off schedule and having just endured a 33 hour trip.

Fourth of July

2009-08-20T06:48:00.005-04:00

The 4th of July just keeps getting better and better. This year's parade was a smashing success. How could it not be with these two in the show?

Max loved the fireworks. Aviva, not so much. We put her to bed beforehand (note Ben's pajamas) and then she woke up to the noise. After that, hysteria.

Daddy's Notes

2009-06-06T13:15:00.008-04:00

1. Max and I went camping about a month ago for our church's annual fathers & sons camping trip. I hate camping, but I love Max. So we went. And judging by this picture, you would think Max didn't have a very good time. But you'd be wrong. He loved it. That was his new flashlight. He played with it until I forced him to turn it off. At that point, it was around 11 at night and it was hanging from one of the pockets in our tent.

We shared a tent, but we brought Max's tent so he'd have one, too. That made him really happy. But he was a little disappointed that he didn't get to sleep in it. We tried that, but since his tent doesn't have a door (it just has a little opening, like the igloo that it is painted as), for the 15 minutes he was trying to go to sleep, he was really sneaking out of his tent to wander around with hist flashlight on. At one point, some big kids came by and saw him playing with his flashlight and asked for help because they couldn't find their tent. Well wouldn't you know but that Max Ellis just would love to help the poor little boy find his dad!

Luckily, I was sitting on a bench about 10 feet away watching the whole thing. I hated to put an end to it, but after he helped the little boy find his way, I invited him to join me in my tent for the night.

Anyway, although they tried, the bugs and the midnight train running through the state park (yeah, who planned that one?) couldn't make me hate the campout.

2. It was great that we went on our campout. Max hadn't been as nice to me over the past couple of months as he had been earlier in life when I used to be his best friend. Slowly over the past year he's really started to favor Kristin because mostly when I'm home Aviva dominates my attention. Since the campout, though, things have kind of returned to normal, and he even wants me to play with him some times. I'm so grateful.

3. A couple of months ago we took the kids (along with cousins Ben & Keely and friend Collin) bowling. Only Collin and Ben enjoyed the repetitive nature of the activity. As usual, Max and Keely just used the event as an excuse to hug a lot and cheer. (See picture.)

4. We've been trying to encourage Aviva to start speaking. She clearly knows how to speak, she just chooses not to. Really frustrating. Mostly she grunts -- with a slightly positive sounding grunt and a really negative sounding grunt as the two most common. The other day, I was trying to get her to use words when she was grunting. We were in her room and clearly wanted to go to the other room and play, so she started grunting. I says: "Aviva, can you use your words please?" So she looks at me with that look'o'death she's perfected. And instead of using words she just pointed at me then pointed at the door. Then she nodded. With finality.

Who needs words when the whole world bows to your every whim expressed in grunts and pointing?

5. One of my favorite Maxisms is when I ask: Max, who taught you that? And he says, "My body told my mind. My body is really smart." He says it a lot.

6. Max finished his first year of pre-school. He and his classmates did a little lip-psynching to some '50s0-era songs at their graduation ceremony. Max loved hamming it up. And having people cheer for him. I couldn't find any footage, but maybe Kristin can upload some at some point.

7. So Kristin was sitting on the couch the other and was telling Max, who had rolled his shirt up under his armpits, that she loved his belly and that she wanted him to come over to her and giver her his belly. He turns around, points to his derriere and says, without missing a beat, "you love my bum? you want my bum?" You can't teach that. You just can't teach that. And I love it.

8. We were singing songs as a family -- not unlike the von trap family -- and Max happened to fart in the middle of the song. So he turns to Kristin and says, "My butt's playing the drums." Seriously, you can't teach that.

Big Winner

2009-05-21T09:29:00.007-04:00

I don't want to brag but.... Abram has entered I don't know how many fantasy footbal leagues over the past 7 years that we've known each other. He's never won.

This year he and I entered a fantasy American Idol league and... I won! The whole thing! Can you believe it? So now I have $350 I get to spend any way I like. So I would like some imput from you, dear readers. How should I spend my moola? Here are some ideas...

Pay someone to watch the kids for a weekend while Abram and I go to Lake Michigan (this would obviously take a little extra cash, but might be worth it).
Buy some Kitchen stuff I've wanted/needed for a while - rice cooker, dutch oven, crepe pan, you get the idea. (This may seem really lame to some of you, but It would be a little like Christmas shopping for me).
An iphone

What do you think?

Cinco de Mayo

2009-05-13T09:30:00.002-04:00

We had our annual Cinco de Mayo fiesta last week. Here is a little footage. I don't know why I turned off the camera when I did. The ensuing chaos was impressive. I mean, if you want to see a bunch of well mannered children turn into vicious animals in a matter of seconds, break a pinata open in the middle of them.

Max's New Bike

2009-05-12T09:18:00.000-04:00

Max got his first bike! He rode it all the way to Keely's house the other day with Abram. Abram later told me that while Max was riding he was saying, "Mommy is going to be so proud of me. She's going to be so proud of me she is going to get me a trophy." Abram and were both impressed that he made it all the way over there. Abram was less impressed when he had to carry the bike all the way back home.

I'm pretty sure the trophy thing came up because he recently found a bunch of Uncle Garrett's old basketball trophies in the basement. Max has been fascinated with Uncle Garrett since his last visit. Whenever we talk about how healthy food will help him grow up, he wants to know if it will make him grow up at big as Uncle Garrett. And when telling Max the story of David and Goliath, we were able to put Goliath into perspective by explaining that he was even bigger than Uncle Garrett.

Getting Ready

2009-05-11T09:11:00.000-04:00

This is the dress Aviva wore to church last week. It is not however, the first dress she wore that day. I was really on top of my game and had her ready to go at least a half hour before it was time to leave. Hair done, face clean, onsie on, dress on, shoes on... I was feeling really good about myself.

In the midst of my satisfaction I looked over at her and she was peeing on the carpet. What? I was so confused. How could she be peeing on the carpet? I grabbed her and realized that I missed one important getting ready step: diaper on.

Really, what is wrong with me?

Happy Mother's Day

2009-05-10T08:27:00.002-04:00

A few thoughts from our family on our favorite mothers:

Max:
Delsa --
1. She helped me make chocolate chip cookies in Australia.
2. She lets me live in her house.

Mimi --
1. She makes good pictures.
2. She plays with me.

Mommy --
1. She helps me be happy.
2. She makes me be super-happy.
3. She takes pictures of me.
4. She helps me pray.

Aviva:
Delsa --
1. Ugh.

Mimmy --
1. Ugh.

Mommy --
1. Argh.

Abram:
Mimmy --
1. Taught me to become the man I hope to be.
2. Taught me to laugh and play.
3. Loves my kids as much as I do.

Delsa --
1. Never had a better roommate.
2. Taught my wife to become the woman that she is becoming. (And, not coincidentally, the woman I hoped she'd become :) .)
3. Lets me live in her house.

Why I Love Sunday Nights

2009-04-20T13:56:00.004-04:00

I really wanted to include the video of Shawn giving Shauri the helicopter, but I decided to use some discretion since not everyone was modest the whole time. Just imagine it instead. It's still funny.

Quotable Max

2009-04-20T13:29:00.006-04:00

I realize there is a problem when Abram has posted twice in a row and I'm no where to be seen. So here are a few of Mommy's Notes to make sure I stay relevant.

Our neighbor's daughter and grandson came into town this weekend and they invited Max to go to the Fire Engine Museum with them. Later the mom pulled me aside to tell me how impressed she was with Max. She said he was so happy and well behaved, they had a great time. I of course told Max what she said and how proud I was of him. He acted ever so pleased with himself while I told him everything and then at the end he shrugged his shoulders and said, "That's what big boys do, mommy."
A few weekends ago our friend Jamie came to visit with her cute kids, Walker and Olivia. Walker kept calling Max, "Dallin" (his friend from home). At the end of the weekend we were climbing into the car and Walker asked, "Where's Dallin?" From the back of the car Max yelled, "I'm right here!"
Uncle Garrett came to visit recently too. Apparently he and Max had a lot of alone time where Garrett could feed him all sorts of ideas. Case in point, Max said something the other day I was really impressed with and I said, "How did you know that?!" He responded, "I'm just smart like my Uncle Garrett." Indeed.

A picture of Aviva, just for good measure. Thanks to Jamie for the great photos!

Daddy's Notes

2009-04-18T14:52:00.008-04:00

A few notes from April:

1. Two interactions with Max and Aviva, respectively, that perfectly capture my relationship with them:

Max: When I get home every day I come up to Max and say, "I need something." He thinks for just a second, then rolls his eyes, wrinkles his dimples with a smile and says, "A hug and kiss?" Right answer. I love that he always knows that what I need is a hug and a kiss. And he gives a great hug. His kisses need a little work, but I'm OK with that.

Aviva: This story will make no sense to those who don't know Aviva's looks (they really do pierce to the heart, the bones, the sinews, everything), but the other night I went to put Aviva to bed and had the bottle ready and she just looked over her shoulder at me, nestled closer to Kristin (who was holding her), and disdainfully looked down her nose in my general direction. I knew right then that I would get no closer to her that night, and maybe not the next day. Her force of will mirrors that of only one other woman I've ever met: Kristin.

2. In case you haven't noticed, Max has a single pose for every planned picture. It includes the following ingredients: (1) A tilt of the head; (2) One arm crooked at the elbow with the hand on the waist; (3) One hand hanging loosely to the side; (4) a mischievous smile and (5) a hip sticking out just so.

3. Uncle Garrett was in town last week and, as I've said before, nothing draws me more toward my family than when I see them play with my kids and see how my kids respond. I love Garrett more now than I did before (which is saying something) because my kids, even Aviva, love their Uncle Garrett.

4. There's something special and idillic about the first week of real spring, where the kids play at the park cheerfully, you can talk to your wife for a little bit without any worries, and everyone is just so happy. It's a bummer that eventually allergies, hotter weather, and cranky kids get in the way.

5. Max has recently developed a little bit of 'Tude lately. Big time, in fact. We're pondering how best to respond and teach him to respond nicely to his parents, his friends, and strangers. 'Cause everything recently has come out as a scream and a protest. Any thoughts?

6. We thought we had Max potty-trained. Check that. Max is potty trained. He knows how to use the toilet and when to use the toilet, it's just that he'd rather play in his own pee than stop and go to the bathroom (luckily, the poo still bothers him). We've tried a number of different tactics -- rewards for going potty, delaying gratification until he goes potty, etc. Nothing seems to work. I'm afraid we may be close to undertaking what one of my colleagues did with his four year old son: each trip to the toilet the 4-year old son got $1. Yeah, that could add up and he could have more discretionary spending than me. Thoughts, suggestions?

Daddy's Notes

2009-03-22T09:37:00.005-04:00

Lately, the thing I've been most grateful for is a wonderful wife. I may appear to be a perfect husband and father, but I'm not. I can be selfish, unintentionally harsh, uncompromising, etc. etc., and Kristin treats me like I am the perfect husband. So thanks<>
Aviva is exactly like a cat: cosmically powerful and intelligent, impossible to control (not that you'd want to control her), and absolutely adorable. She consistently gives the meanest looks ever seen on an 18-month old and the best hugs, all in the space of about 2 minutes. Plus, if she doesn't have enough hands to carry her toys, she'll put them in her mouth. I always see her walking around the house with bottle in one hand, one toy in the other hand, and then her favorite stuffed animal (her giraffe/cow/???) in her mouth. Super cute.
Aviva loves to get in trouble. I try to give her the attention she wants/needs, so she doesn't feel the need to get in trouble to get attention. I'm starting to think she just likes living on the edge. Her biggest smiles come when I tell her "No" and she doesn't anyway. Like this morning I told her "no" when she went to go play with a magic marker in Grandma Delsa's bedroom. I'd never seen her smile so big as she ran as fast as she could straight back to the room.
The only thing that almost makes her as happy is winning. Like when I tell her I can't play with her and then she overpowers me with her cat-like skills. She gets really happy and smiles real big when she wins in these situations.
Max is potty training himself. It's awesome. Apparently, if you are sufficiently derelict in your parenting, the kids will raise themselves. That, and a little candy helps. Last week, we even had a "Potty Party" (which you feel really silly saying, by the way) the first day he stayed dry all day. I'd post pictures, but we didn't take any. Bummer.
Max cares most about two things: ranch sandwiches and being fast. The ranch sandwich consists of bread and ranch, no crust, and sometimes a slice of cheese. His record is 10 in one day, I've been told. As for being fast, he really, really wants to be fast. I think it's because he's always racing with some of the big kids and they tell him he's slow. So recently, he's been learning that vegetables make him fast and sugar makes him slow. We normally don't let him eat sugary cereals, but when Aunt Shauri buys when, he can have some. Well Max wants to be so fast, he even forwent Lucky Charms this week in the hopes of being faster.
Max's favorite song these days is the one he calls Grandma's Song and it's from a CD Grandma Delsa gave him. Not sure what the song is really called, but the first line is "I've got a friend who's just pretend...." Pretty stinking cute.
Here are pictures of Max and Aviva helping me make Max's Potty Party cake: he wanted a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting, but Kristin convinced Max his favorite color is green so she could make a pistachio frosting.

Busy Body

2009-03-16T14:12:00.002-04:00

Aviva goes crazy if we don't leave the house. Every morning, once she's had enough of our house, she walks over to the mud room, finds her shoes, and hands them to me to let me know she's ready to get going.

There aren't a lot of places to get going to in the dead of a Michigan winter, but she's usually happy with our weekly rotation: mall, library, Gym America, Urban Toddler, Lisa's house.

These photos are of her at Urban Toddler.

Don't Let the Door Hit You on Your Way Out

2009-03-12T23:00:00.002-04:00

This picture may look like cute little Aviva welcoming you into her home. It's not. She gets really excited for people to leave. She's just opening the door to get rid of our guests in this photo.

Here she is, waving goodbye. She'll wave goodbye from the moment you start to put on your coat, while you pack all your kids in your car, while you try to maneuver your way down the driveway, until you are driving down the street. Then she will slam the door shut and look at me expectantly, ready for my undivided attention.

Max

2009-03-11T12:57:00.000-04:00

If I had a weekend...

2009-02-24T12:57:00.002-05:00

This past weekend we celebrated our fifth anniversary. We did so in two important ways. First, we handed our children over to Shawn and Lisa for the entire weekend. And second, we ate as well as possible.

If you ever wondered what I would do with an entire weekend if I had one (and I know that has been on all your minds), here it is:

Run a few errands (so I feel productive)
Eat a cheesesteak sandwich from Mr. Spots
Browse my favorite specialty food stores.
get my hair done
a little clothes shopping
Eat at my new favorite special occasion restaurant EVE. I almost died of happiness Friday night
Go to bed by 9:30 and sleep until 6:30 with no interruptions.
Get up and go to Panera for breakfast. Work (and by work I mean surf the internet) on my computer while Abram reads the paper.
take a full hour to work out and watch Oprah
Take my sweet time getting ready for the day
go to breakfast again at Zingermans
take a nap
read
work on my food blog
go to a movie
Eat chocolate fondue with friends
sleep in till 8 on Sunday and then do more of the above until picking up my kids for church.

I am a new woman.

Daddy's Notes

2009-02-14T15:38:00.003-05:00

Thanks to all the well-wishers who posted nice things about my recent celebration. It's nice to feel so loved. And to know that I've still got it.
Max is now old enough to realize that kissing Aviva on the lips is nasty. And he refuses to do it. He's single-handedly trying to teach Aviva to kiss on the cheek, and results have been very mixed. Often, he ends up with a trail of drool starting at his cheek and slowly working its way over to his lips. That too is nasty.
Aviva has developed excellent non-verbal communication skills. Her commands are easily given to her underlings (me and Kristin) by (1) a wave of a hand in the direction of the object she wants -- she keeps waving until we've selected the right object; (2) she brings us her shoes whenever she's bored -- it's her "get me out of this house" line; (3) she reaches up and pulls your finger when she wants to go to a different room; and (4) has the meanest look of any girl since KQ was a baby.
Max is an excellent craftsman. Many of you saw Kristin's post on the busybox, well I'll tell you what, Max is now way better at crafts than me. This morning, we tried to do a valentine for mom, but Max eventually got so frustrated with me he went and asked Kristin to tell me how to do it the right way. So there's Kristin, telling Max how to make her valentine.
I sure do love living by family. Max and Keely played together at one of those indoor play gyms this morning and nothing makes me happier. We sure love cousin Keely.

My Valentine

2009-02-14T15:30:00.002-05:00

I was hoping Kristin would be my valentine this year, but looks like some little boy took my spot. Still, I love my Kissy Krissy and I'm willing to share.

Thing One And Thing Two

2009-02-09T21:09:00.003-05:00

Shawn and Lisa brought these shirts home from Florida for Max and Aviva. I believe Lisa's words were: "I wanted to get them for my kids, but they just seemed so much more appropriate for your kids."

Nice.

True though.

"I will pick up the hook.

You will see something new.

Two things. And I call them

Thing One and Thing Two.

These Things will not bite you.

They want to have fun."

Then, out of the box

Came Thing Two and Thing One!...

Thing Two and Thing One!

They ran up! They ran down!

On the string of one kite

We saw Mother's new gown!

her gown with the dots

That are pink, white and red.

Then we saw one kite bump

On the head of her bed!

Then those Things ran about

With big bumps, jumps and kicks

And with hops and big thumps

And all kinds of bad tricks.

-Dr. Suess

Celebration

2009-02-05T03:46:00.000-05:00

Saturday night Abram and I celebrated a very big event in his life. For six months he has been exercising 6 days a week, only eating one dessert a week, and eating three healthy meals a day. As a result he has lost 40lbs. That's right, 40 lbs. I am so proud.

A couple shout outs:

To Gary, for betting large amounts of money against him. I would have killed Abram if he missed a day and he knew it.
To Shauri for shouting "Go Harder!" as he exercised and she watched TV.

You may notice that I don't get a shout out. I was impossibly hard to live with and made brownies and ate ice cream without hesitation. Abram read somewhere that spouses are the biggest saboteurs when it comes to dieting and I can definitely see how.

Pistons Game

2009-02-03T14:51:00.006-05:00

A couple weekends ago we braved the snowy, icy Michigan freeways and went with Elizabeth and Ryan to a Pistons game. They won the tickets at some event for married students and their families at U of M.

You may notice the wall behind us - apparently when it comes to families, Michigan isn't a big spender. But we didn't care. It was a great night. I even got a free Rodney Stuckey bobble head doll that Aviva made out with the whole next day.

Dirl

2009-01-30T07:00:00.002-05:00

Aviva is a dirty girl. Or a dirl as I believe T and G Q used to say. (You like that Amy L?) Anyway, call her what you want, but she always has food on her face, on her clothes, and in her hair.

Some might say as a one year old, it's more likely that she just has a lazy mom. That may be true, but unfortunately lazy mom for me still equals dirl for her.

Taking Care of Zach

2009-01-29T08:59:00.000-05:00

On Monday I had the pleasure of watching Zach for Michelle and Chris. He is the cutest, happiest little baby you'll ever see. Oh, and he is huge. He's 4 or 5 months old (right Michelle?) and look at him next to Aviva (16 months old):

Aviva loved her some Zach. She was completely entertained by him all day (except when I would feed him - then her fiery jealous side reared its ugly head, but I'm trying to be positive here). I brought her old swing up from he basement but I couldn't find the plug. So Aviva decided that she would go ahead and swing him manually:

When she wasn't swinging him or bringing him toys she was nuzzling him:

And she was indeed grateful for his visit because she rediscovered this beauty. It's her preferred place to eat snacks now. Even over her doll's pack and play:

All Hail Lisa

2009-01-28T13:59:00.003-05:00

So it turns out that my foot and toe agility is really impressive. Last Sunday night Keely and Max made a game out of trying to get my socks off of my feet. You should have seen me, my feet were like lightening, all while I stayed seated/laying down on the love seat.

As you might suspect, Shauri and Shawn couldn't resist getting in on a little of the action. So they tried to hold me down to give the kids a better chance. However, having grown up in the middle of four brothers, if there is one thing I'm better at than keeping my socks on, it's keeping myself from getting pinned. Because once you've been pinned, anything can happen really. It's an important survival technique.

All this time Lisa watched from across the room. Then began the familiar interaction. Shauri taunts Lisa, saying she's not tough. She could never get the sock off, etc., etc. Lisa shakes her head, responds to every comment, but something always holds her back. Well not last Sunday Night ladies and gentlemen. Lisa darted across the room, sacrificed her daughter so she could shield herself from my kicks, got a grip on my socks (And it was quite a grip - I'm guessing there was some major hair pulling going on in the Shumway household) and ripped those babies off in no time flat.

Here is Lisa in her ghetto fabulous track suit proclaiming victory:

Daddy's Notes

2009-01-25T14:30:00.002-05:00

1. One of Aviva's favorite games is "steal and run away." The game requires two ingredients other than herself: Max and one of Max's favorite toys. We don't let Max take the toys back directly from her, so she loves to just stand there and taunt him with the stolen toy.

2. Max's voice is still a little scratchy from the tonsillectomy/adenoidectomy, which is really cute. But I miss his laugh, which he hasn't really done since his surgery. It sounds like he's forcing it, but he's not. I miss it a lot. Hopefully he'll laugh again soon.

3. I finally broke Kristin down and she let me get a Wii. I swore I'd never be that guy that let his kids win, just because they're kids. But I let Max knock me out in boxing this morning and it was so cute how he pointed at me and said, "I pushed you down daddy. Yes." (Cue fist pump.) I did knock him down the next match, just to make sure he didn't get too cocky. So I haven't gone completely soft yet.

4. I'm lucky to be married to a great Mom. She makes up for my many deficiencies by being patient, tolerant, loving and kind. Again, I'm so very lucky.

Aussie Shirts

2009-01-24T08:36:00.001-05:00

This is me forcing my children to take a picture with their Australia shirts on for their Grandparents. You know, so the grandparents will see how cute and happy their grandkids are?

How Does He Do This?

2009-01-23T08:09:00.001-05:00

What's more relaxing that a bag of Cheez-Its and a hardwood floor? This is how I found Max asleep yesterday afternoon.

Kids Busy Box

2009-01-21T09:20:00.005-05:00

We've already established that fast doggy is Max's favorite Christmas present, but a close second is the Kids Busy Box I got him. It is definitely my favorite of all his toys. It's a box full 20 organized crafts. Each one comes with easy to follow directions and everything you need is right there. I love it. He loves it. I feel like a good mom whenever I pull it out instead of sending him off to watch another show. As soon as we run out I'm ordering a new one.

**UPDATE** I just found out that I get a discount on my next purchase for every 5 referrals I give them. So if you buy one, make sure you mention that I sent you there - I'm on a role.

What?

2009-01-19T22:02:00.001-05:00

Pre-Inauguration Kick-Off

2009-01-19T21:30:00.002-05:00

How cute was Pete Seeger at the Inaugural Kick Off?

God Bless America and Jamie Foxx. I was thoroughly entertained.

Max's Tonsillectomy and Adenoidectomy

2009-01-16T13:19:00.006-05:00

Max, pre-surgery

Max had his tonsils out this morning. It was a little (well, a lot) traumatic for both of us. Here's how it unfolded:

7:00 am - Max asks for something to drink or eat. I explain that he can't eat before his surgery and he is upset but easily distracted.

7:20 - I try to get Max and Aviva ready to go out to the car and Max flips out because he can't have anything to eat or drink. He proceeds scream and cry.

7:40 - Drop off Aviva at Mandy's house. Max still crying.

8:00 - Arrive at hospital. Max stops crying, but is hoarse from all the strain.

8:10 - a woman checks us in and Max turns on the charm. He proceeds to flirt with the nurses and make jokes with the doctor.

8:50 - Max goes into surgery.

9:20 - The nurses and Dr. come out and tell me everything went great. Max had a great time putting on a show of how deeply he could breath in and out and then playing hide and seek with the blanket they gave him. The surgery went really well and they would come get me when he started to come to. I breathed a sigh of relief and relaxed.

9:45 - The nurse comes and gets me and says, "He's really mad." I turn the corner and three nurses are trying to restrain him. He is going insane. He's got blood coming out of both nostrils, two scratches on his face, he's trying to rip out his IV, his eyes keep rolling back and he's pleading with them to let him get down (btw, he can't stand on his own and the floor is concrete).

You can imagine my horror. So they give him to me and for the next 15 minutes I try to restrain him and bring him back to reality. I was crying the whole time. It was just so horrible. When he was finally able to stand on his own we took him by each hand and brought him out to the carpeted waiting room so that he would be in a different place. We let go of him and he stopped thrashing. Then he just stood there and yelled his frustrations out. I stood there with his coat and just let him come over to me when he was ready. The nurse left to get some papers and he finally came over and sat on my lap and hugged me. Two popsicles later he was ready to go.

10:30 - We get in the car and he falls asleep.

1:00 - He is happily watching movies. They said he could eat whatever solids he wanted, but probably wouldn't want to for a couple of days. The important thing is to get him to keep drinking. By 1:00 he had had 2 cups of juice, 5 popsicles, a bowl of ice cream and a small McDonald's french fry. He tried to eat the chicken nuggets but couldn't quite do it, so he just chewed each one up and then spit it out instead.

1:30 - Nurse Cheryl calls to see how Max is doing. "It was an unusual recovery and we just want to make sure he's okay." Unusual, yes.

I'm just grateful it's over and he seems to be having a good recovery now. Thank goodness for tylenol with codine. He did just tell me that his "voice hurts," but hopefully things will only get better from here.

We Just Ordered 20 lbs of Chocolate

2009-01-15T19:14:00.000-05:00

Have you ever seen a more joyful face? It was a beautiful evening folks. In fact, I'm not sure I've had this much fun in years. Abram agrees, but insists it was because of the sugar high. It may have also had to do with the Newlywed game questions we asked each other afterward. We had a few more insights into one another's relationships than we may care to know, but anything for a few laughs, right?

Here's a photo of Lisa removing the chocolate fountain once she deemed Shawn "disgusting."

And here we all are enjoying Lisa's disgust.

By the way, strawberries will always be my favorite fondue staple, but we tried pretzels dipped in peanut butter and then dipped in the fondue and it was superb.

And the results are in...

2009-01-15T14:56:00.003-05:00

Aviva has been coveting Ashlyn Elder's doll and stroller for months now. So for Christmas that's what we got her. Much to my surprise, she hardly touches the stroller, but the pack and play that came along with the set is her new favorite place to gather all her toys (and a little snack if she can sneak it into the family room) and sit down and take a load off.

We were also a little surprised at Max's obvious favorite gift. The little stuffed dog that came along with his pajamas as a free gift. His name is fast doggy and he hasn't left Max's tight grip for three weeks.

Kids Say the Darndest Things

2009-01-04T20:03:00.005-05:00

This is one of those posts I've debated about writing because again I would be exposing my poor parenting skills to the world. But I hate to keep a good story a secret...

The other night we were at Shawn and Lisa's playing Mario Kart. All the kids and adults were gathered around watching and taking turns. I let my competitive juices get flowing even though I am brand new at the game. Bad decision, since I'm no good. I finally got so frustrated I threw my controller on the ground and yelled, "I hate this crap!" Not missing a beat, Max responded, "I hate this crap too mama!"

Not my proudest moment, but it still makes me laugh.

Not All Pajamas Are Created Equal

2009-01-04T19:56:00.007-05:00

I'll just come right out with it. Max is notorious for sticking his hands down his pants. I am constantly yelling out, "hands up Max!"

We all got matching pajamas for Christmas. Abram's were a little different in that the pants have a button in the front of the pants for easy access - I assume for going to the bathroom. When Max noticed the difference in Abram's pants, this was their conversation:

M: Daddy, your pants have a button.
A: Yup.
M: (enviously) That keep your fingers warm!

She's a Carnivore

2009-01-04T12:09:00.004-05:00

Aviva never would eat baby food. She still won't eat vegetables, but she sure did go to town on these ribs Abram made for my birthday.

New Year's Eve 2008

2009-01-04T11:42:00.011-05:00

I really don't like New Year's Eve. In fact, I don't think I've been awake to ring in the new year in at least 4 years. However, Abram convinced me that we have to own this holiday. So we threw a rockin' New Year's Eve Game Night party.

Dan Richards stole the show by working everyone in the board game rotation and then when we played the newlywed game he went up with Janie since both of them were spouseless and they still got one question right (which is more than I can say for some couples... you know who you are).

For Christmas Abram bought me a chocolate fountain (fondue) and I think it's safe to say it was the hit of the party. Shawn for one admitted to standing by the table all by himself, seeing how many strawberries he could down before someone came along and he had to make conversation. He has requested that we have it again, just the four of us, covered in plastic bags so he doesn't have to worry about stuffing his face and looking uncouth. (apparently he doesn't care was Abram, Lisa and I think of him).

Christmas Eve

2009-01-04T11:41:00.000-05:00

We convinced Ryan and Amy to drive their family up to Michigan for the holidays. The day they drove up Max started puking, having diarrhea, getting a temperature, being generally cranky, and it didn't stop until Christmas Eve.

Shawn and Lisa were gracious enough to open up their home for Ryan and Amy, but it didn't stop Andrew from catching the dreaded virus, so he and Ryan came over to the quarantined house and spent the next couple of days with us. It was a miserable 10 days, but by some miracle, Christmas Eve and Christmas day were the only two days everyone was healthy and happy. Here are a few photos of the holiday:

The Wise Men
Mary and the unhappy donkey

We always have a talent show for the cousins after the nativity scene. Aviva's talent was high fiving and kissing. This is me trying to help her show off her kissing talent. Ben tried to steal the show so everyone would know he was much better at both talents.

Merry Christmas

2009-01-03T08:00:00.003-05:00

Our family has never sent out a family Christmas card. I've never been quite on top of it enough to accomplish that particular Christmas tradition. But that's not that bad, right? I mean, what would you rather get - our Christmas card, or our christmas candy? I figure I have to give one up for the other and you know candy is always going to win out.

Ben and Aviva

2009-01-03T07:51:00.006-05:00

When he's not shoving her down and she's not setting him up, they're really cute together.

Let it Snow

2009-01-03T07:40:00.004-05:00

We were happy to have a white Christmas this year. One night we got 10 inches. Lisa was in Utah so Shawn came over with the kids for a snow day. I sort of pressured him into it, and he was not happy when he got stuck at the bottom of the driveway with half of his car in the road. But a little snow shoveling never hurt anyone, right Shawn?

This was the best hill they had. Not much, but it served their purposes:

This was the happiest picture of Vivi I could get. She was insistent that she play in the snow, but hated every minute of it.
And Ben. Snow or no snow, it's no reason not to have a ball in hand.

Thanksgiving 2008

2009-01-03T07:29:00.004-05:00

I have become a terrible picture taker. I just don't have that same, "I have to catch this moment for the blog" urgency I used to have. So I have no pictures of Thanksgiving. We went to Maryland and stayed with Mimi and Grandpa Walt and Dan and Misty's family. This is always a good time for several reasons:

Grandpa Walt always has some new contraption the grandkids go wild about. This year it was a huge air hockey disc with which they played soccer.
The big screen TV and the biggest couch you have ever seen. My favorite movie this year was Kung Fu Panda. Not because of the movie itself, but because their friends were there with their 5 or 6 year old daughter and I swear I have never seen a person watch a movie with as much pure excitement as this child. She would jump up and down in antcipation, laugh hysterically, and was completely oblivious to the world around her. It was the best thing I've ever seen.
And of course, lots of game playing and catching up with family.

Scandal

2008-12-17T09:29:00.002-05:00

Some people like to spread cheer during the holiday season. I like to spread fear and discontentment.

Let me back up. My sister has been dating a guy named Joe. She went to Australia for Christmas and was in a rush before she left, so she asked me to drop off a little gift for him that she bought.

Yesterday afternoon I went to his house and knocked on the door. A very pleasant, 30ish blond woman comes to the door. Immediately I think, "Oh no, is this is ex-wife, here watching the kids? This could be really awkward." In fact, I tried to think of something I could say so I wouldn't have to leave the gift, but I'm just not that quick. So here's how the conversation went:

Me: Hi, is Joe here?

Ms. Pleasant: No, he's not.

Me: Okay. My sister wanted me to drop this off for him. Would you give it to him?

Ms. Pleasant: Sure. (with just a hint of a question mark at the end of "sure")

So I immediately go home and email my sister so that she knows his ex is currently reading her card.

Of course she immediately emails him and asks, "Is there any chance your ex was at your house today watching the kids?" And he responds....

"No, but it is a funny story. Your sis got the wrong house but just happened to go to a neighbor's house whose husband is also named Joe.

The poor lady thought her husband was having an affair and that your gift was from a mistress. She finally figured it out after she got herself off the floor."

A few notes from Daddy

2008-12-14T11:46:00.006-05:00

Two weeks away from Christmas, these are the happenings in the lives of my kids (at least as I see them):

Max is in partial potty-training mode. He likes to wear big boy underwear, and is happy to use the toilet when we ask him, but really the only thing that motivates him to use the toillet himself is #2. Apparently he's happy to sit in his own pee, but not his own poo.
Aviva loves peanut-butter and jelly sandwiches, corned beef, and candy. It makes me happy because no one else will eat PB&Js or Reubens with me.
Max wants LOTS of presents under the tree because that's how Christmas Trees look in the cartoon movies he's been watching. Thanks Disney. Thanks a lot. I know that really it's my fault that I let him watch TV, but still. I tried to turn the occasion into a teaching opportunity and really the only take-away was Max learning that he can trust his dad but not santa. I don't know how it happened except that I was free-lancing. Hopefully with Aviva I'll be a little better prepared.
Aviva can cry and/or scream for an infinite period of time with little or no provocation. Most recently (as in immediately before this post), she cried for 30 straight minutes as I first made a PB&J and then showered. The crying started and stopped like a light-switch, with the only respite occurring while she shared the PB&J. There is no ramp-up time and she has only two settings: quiet or full-throttle, "I'm really TO'd." (Currently, she's screaming from the top of the stairs where Max and Keely were last seen playing; not sure if she wants me to rescue her or if she's waiting for Max and Keely to come back.)
I'd forgotten how cold Michigan gets.
Kristin has started making Christmas candy. Is there anything better in this world than a wife that is devoted to carrying on the traditions of her mother? Didn't think so. Not when the mother is DBQ.
Max and I went out on the pond in the back a little while ago because it had frozen through. Max loved it and it reminded me that sometimes all it takes to make a kid happy is to show them something novel.
Max and Aviva have lots of tender moments, especially in the morning and at night, right before bed. A few nights ago, Max and Aviva hugged for a good 10 minutes. And no one can make Aviva laugh like Max can. I have come realize why my own parents wanted so much for us kids to be friends. It's the best thing in the world to see your kids love each other and play with each other.
It's going to be hard for Uncle Travis to be Aviva's favorite uncle at Christmas. Background: every time we see Travis he does his best to win over the hearts of all his nieces and nephews until he is undisputedly the favorite uncle; it usually works. Well Aviva has a fever, and the only cure is more Uncle Shawn. Let's see what tricks you've go up your sleeve this year, Uncle Travis. It's on.
Aviva likes when Kristin combs her hair. I'm pretty sure it's an inherited preference, as Mimi Ellis LOVES to have her hair brushed.

Toofers

2008-12-07T22:00:00.005-05:00

Aviva finally cut her other front tooth. For about 3 months now we've been enjoying her one tooth smile. It never fails to make me laugh. I can't help but think she looks like a little cartoon character. (It should be noted however, that mostly she's crying like in the picture in above).

She is the feistiest little thing ever. She gets super jealous in two situations.

When Max is upset and wants me to hold him. She throws her hands up in the air, screams at the top of her lungs, and hits my knees over and over until I pick her up too.
When Abram kisses me or hugs me. She screams until he pulls away and then she stares me down for a good 30 seconds, as if to say, "don't mess with my man." So sometimes when Abram wants to kiss me I tell him he'll have to wait until his girlfriend isn't around.

Jesus' Birthday

2008-12-07T21:44:00.002-05:00

We decorated our tree before we left for Maryland so when we got back we'd be all set for Christmas. It was so much fun with Max because he is SO excited for Christmas. It's all he talks about. Whenever he plays with friends he tells that that we're going to have Christmas at our house (like it's a special Ellis Family event).

Well, the other day I was trying to take advantage of a teaching moment and I told him that Christmas is Jesus' birthday. Instead of the interested reaction I had hoped for, he burst into tears because he thought I was saying that only baby Jesus was going to be getting presents for Christmas. Nice. I have a feeling getting across the true meaning of Christmas might be a little tougher than I originally thought.

Halloween

2008-11-21T10:35:00.003-05:00

I know, I know, It's November 21st. Here are Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm (Aviva and Ben) and an Angel and Spiderman (Keely and Max). Thanks to Elizabeth E. for the smashing Flinstones costumes (including Bamm-Bamm's adorable hat). She just keeps amazing me everytime I turn around.

First Snow

2008-11-16T10:10:00.009-05:00

Since Kristin only has time for posts on her food blog -- and yes, it is that important -- then I will post pictures for Ann Arbor's first fallen snow. Yes, it is only mid-November.

Watching Max eat the snow reminded me of being a kid and reminded me how I've become my dad.

Me: "Max, don't eat the snow, it's yucky."

Max: "It not yucky, daddy, it yummy."

Me: "No it's yucky. It will give you yucky poopoo."

Max: "No it not. I be careful. I show you."

And then he showed me. We'll see who's right.

UPDATE:

Indeed Max's poop was yucky. But, it's hard to tell what caused it. I think we'll call it a draw.

"Dah???"

2008-11-09T09:06:00.003-05:00

Aviva can't quite say Max's name. At all. Instead, she calls him "Dah." When Aviva awoke this morning, the first thing she said (still from inside her crib) was "Dah?" -- as in, where's Max? I told her, Max is still asleep, but she didn't seem to understand.

So after a bottle, what did she say? "Dah?" Where's Max.

After playing for a while with the toy door and some other toys, Aviva heard a thump from upstairs. "Dah!" she exclaimed as she ran for the stairs. Sure enough, there was her Dah. She was so happy she started screaming (her happy scream) and ran up to meet him.

I'm really glad Aviva likes Dah. It makes me real happy.

Good news . . . or Great news?

2008-11-04T13:00:00.002-05:00

First, the good news. I passed the Michigan Bar. It helps that I can keep my job and pay the bills. It was an uncertain outcome because I did not leave a lot of time to study for the bar -- only about 10 days. Plus, I hadn't been in school for several years, and let's face it, even while in school I wasn't that studious. So all things considered, this is quite the blessing.

Also, if you'll recall, I passed my first bar in 2005 and told recipients of the then-titled Ellis Family Newsletter (or EFN) that I had passed in a November 20, 2005 communique. In that very same newsletter, Kristin touted my support for one Barrack Obama. Yes, that's right, before there was a bandwagon, there was me. Here's an excerpt:

"Abram had previously asked Kristin for only one christmas present - the domain name, www.mormonsforobama.com. With their encouragement, Abram is already strategizing how to get in touch with fellow Obamamites."

Over the following few months, my adoration of Obama continued and finally, for the first time in my life, it looks like (and I really shouldn't post this out of fear of jinxing the outcome) I will have supported the eventual winner of the presidential election. That's right, I (like Ben Affleck, if you watched SNL) have always supported the losing candidate. Here's how it went:

1992 -- I supported Bush 41. I know, it's unexplainable really, except that I can only applaud the brainwashing efforts of my parents (kidding) and the pulpit (kind of kidding). I also liked Ross Perot, but that didn't really help either.
1996 -- I was on a mission and was really just mourning the death of former French president Francois Mitterrand.
2000 -- supported Gore as I finally embraced my Blueishness
2004 -- half-heartedly supported Kerry

We will see what happens tonight, but I am very excited about the prospects.

The Tour

2008-10-26T21:33:00.004-04:00

For our birthdays, Shauri gave Abram and I tickets to the So You Think ou Can Dance tour and a night at the Westin. It was sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo great. I can't even tell you how much I needed this. I feel refreshed and patient and happy. And did I mention that I love Joshua?

A Little Catch Up

2008-10-26T20:33:00.006-04:00

Larissa and Beck came to visit us. It's not often my friends from college end up in the midwest, so I get crazy excited every time we get so see them.

We went to Erwin Orchad and ate the best donuts I have ever had in my life. I know you all think I'm a little prone to hyperbole, but trust me on this one. Here are some pictures of the kids. Oh, and I should just mention to the world that Lisa refused to share a bag with me because she is certain that her family will eat an entire peck of apples this week. I'll let you know when they DON'T. But I'm not bitter.

Collin, apparently yelling at the driver to get a move on.

Super Models

Abram came home from work early on Friday with two huge pumpkins ready to be carved. Here are Max and Emmanuel getting their jack-o-lantern on.

Overflowing Heart

2008-10-25T10:07:00.004-04:00

Most of you know that I am a fantastic murmurer. Probably the best I know. You give me any situation, and I will find the negative, speak eloquently and provactively of that negative, and never let it go.

Well today I'm trying to use my powers for good and find some positives in my life, since there are so very many. A few are listed/described below.

Nighttime with the kids -- since moving to AA, I now get daddy time at night in stead of the morning. What a difference it makes. At night, Max and I can play hide and seek with flashlights, put together puzzles by firelight, and cuddle in bed while Max falls asleep. I love playing hide and seek with Max -- he's fairly predictable (as am I) in his hiding spots, but he always loves being found. Aviva also loves when I come home. So I immediately pick her up and my little "tumor" stays with me until bed time (except for when I visit the bathroom -- then she just stands at the door screaming until I'm done).
Nighttime with Kristin -- even though we sleep in separate rooms, and even though she devotes as much attention to the computer as she does to me, I love that Kristin becomes a new woman after 7. It's like the inverse Cindarella effect: instead of turning into a pumpkin, she turns into a princess. She's a great story teller that keeps me posted of all the days events, she is a great thinker and we have had some great conversations about the turmoil our country is now in, and she doesn't mind that I exercise really loudly while watching some of our favorite shows.
Cousins -- Keely and Ben play such a special role in my kids lives and in mine. I love that they make for good playfellows for Max and Aviva, that they live right down the street, and that little Keely is alternately the easiest person to tease and the most brilliant little child ever. I wish Max and Aviva had more time with all their cousins!
Grandparents -- I don't get to see them enough, but I feel their presence on an almost daily basis.
When Max and Aviva play together. This morning, they played "I'll throw cheerios at you while you run around the kitchen." Max took the role of cheerios-thrower and Aviva the role of runner. It was so worth the extra cleanup when Max turned and said, "Daddy look, I play Awweewa and she happy!" And it was true. Aviva of course loves to play with Max, and she's very good at helping me find him when playing hide and seek and at holding puzzle pieces while Max and I work on puzzles.
Puzzles -- Generally, I hate puzzles. Oma tried to teach me the beauty and I never learned. Kristin and Garret like to puzzle. But I hated it. Until now. That's because Max is a puzzling fool. He'll puzzle anything. And he's really good. He can see dimensions and shapes better than I can and it's pretty amazing to see how it works. Nice to know that he got some of Kristin's genes.
Kisses from Aviva -- she only knows how to soul-kiss, which is a little troubling. I figure I can teach her to close her mouth later. But for now, some times she just dives at your mouth, snot/saliva/tongue all mingled together in one giant open-mouthed kiss. Pretty disgusting. Except that it's possibly the cutest thing she does.
Aviva hates to see me rough-house with Max. At first I thought she didn't like the violence. Turns out, she just wants in on the action. The other day she tried to get involved by body slamming me while I lay on the ground after a particularly intense rough-house with Max. And that was it. She just threw her body on me and laid there. Apparently she thinks she's Andre the Giant and thinks one body-slam will be enough to subdue any opponent.
Aviva is FOCUSED. Nothing deters her ever. I've never seen such determination in anything not named the Little Engine That Could. It makes me so proud.

My Other Blog

2008-10-17T06:47:00.004-04:00

I've had a few people ask when my recipe blog would be up. I've made a few references here before, but I suppose it wasn't completely clear that I had already started it. So here is my shameless self promotion: Click HERE to go visit You Got Served, my recipe blog. As an added bonus, Janie is the Guest Chef this week, so you won't want to miss out.

Spooky Spiders

2008-10-17T06:18:00.002-04:00

Joannah came over for Family Home Evening this week and made sparkly feather boa spiders with the kids. How cool is that? Never did I think such craftiness could take place in my house.

Jo-jo and I used to work together and one of the highlights of moving back to Ann Arbor has been getting back in touch with her.

2008-10-06T20:23:00.002-04:00

Last Sunday night Keely & Co. were over for dinner. Afterward the kids wanted us to turn on the music and they started dancing. We, of course, were egging them on. At one point Keely was sweating so Lisa took her sweater vest off. Max then insisted that we remove his shirt. He really loosened up after that which got a big laugh from the group. Keely wanted to milk that reaction for all it was worth, so she pulled Max behind the wall, and when they reappeared, Max had taken his shorts off too.

We started laughing and cheering, and I kid you not, he sets his feet more than shoulder width apart, puts each hand on the things that secure his diaper, and rips his diaper off. All the while dancing like his life depended on it. Oh. My. Gosh. We almost died we were laughing so hard. I mean, what in the world? It was shocking. Really. But so very funny.