What Every Parent Should Know

In our last post, we wrote about how Zachary gets a gumball out of his gumball machine everytime he successfully poops in the potty. Well, here is today's story . . .

Zachary used the potty and put a penny in his gumball machine and got a white gumball. It was almost naptime, and I didn't want to take his gum away, since he just earned it, so I figured he would either throw it away in his room garbage can (which he is quite good at) or swallow it (which he is also good at) before he fell asleep.

I put him down for his nap and a few minutes later I here, "My GUM!!!! My GUUUUMMMMM!" Accompanied by whines and cries. I figure he either swallowed it or dropped it. He goes on to cry for a bit and I finally go into his room and say, "Zachary, you really need to go to sleep."
"But, my gum!"
"Where is your gum?"
"In my nose." And he proceeds to point up in his nose.

Great, I never thought this would happen to me. I get a headlight and look into his nose and, sure enough, there is white gum clear up there. So far up there that I was nervous to use tweezers to get it out. So I did what any mom would do: I called my mom. She told me that I could try giving him a bath to see if the water would dislodge the gum, but she didn't sound so confident that it would work. I hung up with her and called the on-call pediatric office (this happened on a Saturday). They are closed for the day. Ok, I start to look for the InstaCare office's number when my mom calls back. She luckily just happens to be with one of my cousins whose son got a carrot piece stuck up his nose, and this is how the doctor got it out. So without further ado, I will tell all of you parents how to save a co-pay or an ER visit, because chances are, you will probably need this information one day.

#1 - Lay the child down.
#2 - Plug the nostril that is NOT clogged.
#3 - Place your mouth over the child's, like you are giving CPR.
#4 - Puff into the child's mouth until the object flies out of the clogged nostril.

It took three blows, but it came out great and Zachary was laughing while I was doing it. Thank goodness for mothers and cousins.

But seriously, why does a kid insist upon pushing objects up their nose?!?!

Zachary Updates

This is a little old but I had to post it...

Chilling at "This is the Place" park with the goats.

Wow, it seems like Zachary has been non stop growth the last month or so. In the past two weeks Zachary has now become basically potty trained as well as started to sleep in a "normal" bed. Additionally he continues to be as big of a goof as ever. The other day I was putting on deodorant and Zachary found an old thing of deodorant in our garbage in our room. He quickly snatched it out of the garbage and began trying to copy me. Rachel couldn't pass up the opportunity to snap a couple pictures of him.

Also, like I said, Zachary is in the process of mastering potty training. He has been pretty good and hasn't had too many accidents. Part of his motivation was inspired by our sister-in-law Brittany who suggested that we buy a gumball machine to reward Zachary with.

Since we got the gumball machine he has been ecstatic to use the toilet. He loves flushing toilets in stores because they are loud. Also, as you stand outside the bathroom door while he is doing his business you can oft here him say "There it is!". (Yeah, that may gross some of you out but I can't help but laugh...)

Also, the other night Zachary fell out of his crib while climbing out and for the last while he had not been sleeping all that well. We decided that it was time to get him into a normal bed. I started to take apart the crib and when I took off the front panel I realized that we could let him sleep in his crib like that for a while till we can find a twin bed and Rachel can decide what color we will be painting his room.

Also, Zachary has been excited to use his new pillowcase that his Aunt Cheryl made him. Cheryl is basically Zachary's second mom and so she knows how much he loves cars. Thanks Cheryl!

So now each morning we have a little Zachary that drags his pillow and blankets into our room to sleep with us for a bit after he has woken up. I know he won't be like this for long so I just try to soak it up as much as I can for the time being...

This morning Zachary was looking for a pair of socks to wear and he came across a pair of baby girl socks that my mom had given me when I first found out I was pregnant with Zachary, before I found out what gender the baby was, in case it was a girl. This is how the conversation played out.

Z: "Mom, what are these?"
R: "Those are little girl socks."
Z: "Little girl socks?"
R: "Yep."
Z: "Yeah, for when the little girl comes home. She will come home and get her socks."
R: "Oh, where is the little girl?"
Z: "She's just at the temple's house." (Which is the temple. He also calls Macey's grocery store "Macey's house", Smiths grocery store "Smiths house", etc.)
R: "Oh...ok. What is the little girl's name?"
Z: "I don't know. We will have to ask the prophet."

Kids are just so dang interesting to have around.

The Turnows...

You will only appreciate this if you live in Gateway Village....

The Garden

So Summer is coming to a close and our garden has been awesome this year. Rachel absolutely loves having a garden as you all know. This year our garden actually expanded into Rachel's mom's yard and we were able to grow more squash which was in short supply last year. We grew these cool squash called Marina di Choggia that is the one above on the left. They are super cool looking and we are excited to eat them as fall is coming.

We have been having some issues this year however with produce being eaten before it is ready. We think we have identified the culprit and got some pictures the other day....

Yes, Zachary has been pilfering stuff long before it is ready to pick and eating it. The pictures above are of the 2nd pepper he picked and came in the house eating. In all three peppers have fallen victim. It is hard to get mad at him cause he loves the garden too. So he gets off kind of easy and mom and dad sit him down and talk to him about letting things GROW before we pick them.

This brings us to another new veggie in our garden this year: Mexican Sour Gherkins. I found these at Thanksgiving Point and told Rachel I would forego my Lemon Cucumbers this year to try these out. As you can see they are pretty small and they basically taste like a little (somewhat sour) cucumber. Zachary has taken a liking to them as well and has now cleared the entire plant bottom of anything resembling a gherkin. He also loves the TINY gherkins that are not ever close to being ready to pick. In fact, now he will not really eat the bigger gherkins, just the tiny ones.

Zachary out gherkin hunting...

Realizing he has been caught!

Showing off his food. He smelled like Gherkins he had eaten so many of them!

Anyhow, we are sad to see the garden season slowly coming to an end. Luckily we have been going to the Farmers Market and stocking up on the stuff we do not have enough of. Zachary just eats all of the corn samples he can get.......

-Daniel

Ice cream...there it is!

We had the McCormack's over the other night for dinner and I decided that it would be fun to break out some liquid nitrogen and make ice cream. I had never done it before but figured it wouldn't be too difficult and really it was not! Just make up an ice cream base and add your toppings and slosh some liquid nitrogen over it and stir (careful not to freeze yourself in the process!).

It was all sorts of fun and Zachary loved it, maybe as much as he loved Mark. When he woke up this morning he asked me if Mark and Michelle are coming over. He loves goofing around with Mark and telling Mark who each of the "Cars" characters is. Mark, luckily, plays along. I am sure that he will be an awesome dad when little Brea comes around.

Check out the video and listen to Zachary's voice. It makes me crack up every time I listen to this clip.

Here are some more pictures:

No, he is not touching it....

Mmmmm, tasty!

Even the women would eat it!

The Passing of a Legend....

So any of you that know us know that we have long had a VERY special 1991 Honda Civic Wagon since Rachel's last car was tragically killed in an accident.

The wagon has served us well for at least 80,000 miles and the clutch had started to get a little iffy. That and sme other stuff was coming to terms and there was definitely some repairs coming up. With this in mind Rachel and I decided that we were done throwing money at the wagon and in the midst of this decision I came across a Civic GX on eBay.

For those of you who do not know what a Civic GX is, it is a natural gas powered car (hence the little plug in the lower right of our blog now). It doesn't run on gasoline like so many other cars out there. We looked at getting one a year ago when gas prices were $4 but the prices were ridiculous at that point.

It is a little different, but it has its perks. First off, gas is only $0.95 a gallon. Yeah, I like that. Second, I got a Utah state tax credit for buying it. Third, I get to go in the carpool lane by myself. So basically we bit the bullet and bid on a car on eBay and won! It took a while for us to get the car here from New York but now we have it and love it so far. The flip side is that we sold the mighty wagon. Yes, it was a sad day. Rachel somehow will have to get over it.

Anyhow, here are some sweet pictures of the wagon in all of its glory.

Potato Bug Summer

Call them what you like. Pill bugs, rolly pollys . . . but in our house they are known as potato bugs, and they are absorbing a good portion of our summer mornings. Without fail, the first thing Zachary wants to do in the morning is look outside for potato bugs. And believe me, we have plenty. Actually, that is an understatement. We have more of an infestation of sorts. In an hour's time we can find well over a hundred bugs on our back patio. Which is why I don't mind when he gathers them all up in a jar and accidentally leaves them in the sun to dry out. There have been some days when he has spent 2+ hours out in our little strip of a "backyard" looking for these bugs. He occasionally breaks to play with his diggers and dump trucks, but he always goes back to the potato bugs.

Dads, in Case You're Wondering . . .

Yes, they really do watch and imitate EVERYTHING you do. Zachary is super into his dad right now, and wants to do and help him with the things that he does. I am pretty sad that I didn't have my camera at Home Depot the other night (but really, who thinks to take their camera there?), because Zachary was having the time of his life riding around in the special carts that you can put wood and bigger stuff into, all while Daniel was pushing it around and buying things for yet another shelf building project. Zachary had fun just hanging out with Dad in the garage as the shelves were being built. Here are some other things he has been helping out with.

Mowing the lawn. Zachary pushes while Daniel pushes. It takes longer, but he loves it.

Here is Zachary helping Daniel check the Mazda for the cause of whatever is making this weird noise. Here he is in the beginning with his Handy Manny tools . . .

Using Squeeze to make sure the bolt is tight. As you can see, he is pretty serious about his work.

Forget the plastic tools, just give him the real stuff.

He was way into the ratchet set. He is such his father's son.

So much to talk about....

So here we are, half way through summer and we have posted virtually nothing. Sad I know. I guess that is what happens when you get busy. Anyhow. We have definitely had fun this summer. In June we took a trip out to San Diego with Rachel's mom. It was a great time and we enjoyed taking Zachary to Sea World, the San Diego Zoo and the Wild Animal Park. He absolutely loved the zoo and Sea World. Grandma Sharee bought him a little Shamu stuffed whale that he called "Shampoo" for some time after the trip. Even now he still sleeps with it every night.

We loved the trip and had tons of fun.

So Zachary also turned two in July. It is really crazy just how fast he is growing up now. We had a little party for him during singing time on his birthday and that night we had family over for cake and swimming. Unfortunately the weather did not cooperate so we scratched swimming and just did cake. Rachel made this AWESOME "Cars" cake as Zachary is currently loving the movie. Thanks Cheryl for generously donating your Cars characters to help out with the cake. It seriously turned out awesome and Rachel was up till 1:00AM finishing it up to perfection.

It is crazy just how fast Zachary is growing up now. It is so fun to see him learn new things and play and interact in different ways now. It is strange to look at him and think just how much he has developed in the past two years!

Other than all of the forementioned stuff, we have just been having fun this summer and playing as much as we can. We will try and keep updating the blog where possible and let you know what is new in our lives!

Hanging out at the Cabin!

Alright.....I am off to bed!

-Daniel

I'm not dead yet....

Close, but not quite. Daniel will have to keep it alive....

Couple's Tag

I want to make our blog into a bound book one day, since I have no desire/patience/interest in scrapbooking. I thought this would be a good thing to have in there.

What are your middle names? Daniel's is Thomas after his dad and mine is Mather (maiden name)

How long have you been together? Dated for 6 months, Daniel's mission for 2 years (no, I didn't "wait", but I was here when he got home), dated for 6 more months, been married for almost 6 years.

How long did you know each other before you started dating? From 3rd grade to 3 months after high school graduation, so you do the math.

Who asked who out? Well, Daniel said on Heritage Tours that he was going to take me out to Applebee's, but I actually called him to "get it over with". I don't know if he ever would have called, so I take credit for our marriage.

Whose siblings do you see the most? Humm, pretty equal.

Do you have any children together? Yes. One little dude named Zachary. What did we ever do without him? Life was pointless.

What about pets? Daniel's 2 remote control airplanes. And Zachary has tons of potato bugs in the backyard. But that number is diminishing since he likes to eat them.

Did you go to the same school? Elementary, Jr. High, High School, and BYU.

Who is the most sensitive? Daniel is always the first one to want to resolve things after a disagreement, I am too stubborn to say "I'm sorry" first.

Where do you eat out most as a couple? Cafe Rio and Rumbi Grill. We love sweet potato fries.

Where is the furthest you two have traveled together as a couple? Victoria, Canada

Who has the craziest exes? Definitely Daniel. He dated some weird chicks.

Who has the worst temper? Tied.

Who does the cooking? Me. But Daniel is a good cook when he makes something.

Who is more social? Daniel is more outgoing from the beginning, I take a while to warm up to people. But we both like to be "social".

Who is the neat freak? Neither, but we are not slobs either. Our house is "comfortably clean".

Who is the most stubborn? Me, me and me. It's a wonder Daniel puts up with it.

Who hogs the bed? Daniel, but he is not too bad.

Who wakes up earlier? Daniel, he is a dedicated Gold's Gym frequent worker-outer.

Where was your first date? Applebee's and watching "What Lies Beneath" at Jordan Commons.

Who has the bigger family? Me - 15 kids.

Do you get flowers often? Probably more often that most people, but not often enough to make them not a novelty.

Who eats more? Daniel, because I put more food on his plate and he learned on his mission that you eat whatever is placed before you.

Who sings better? Probably me. But Zachary likes Dad to sing to him a lot.

Who does the laundry? Me.

Who’s better with the computer? Daniel by a mile. I don't even bother to progress my computer knowledge, because if I have a computer question I (and every one else we know) just call Daniel. He fixes everything.

Who drives when you are together? Daniel. Unless we are in my sweet '91 Honda. I like to drive it.

Who picks where you go to dinner? Mutual agreement. We oddly crave the same restaurants at the same time. It works out great.

Who is the first one to admit when they’re wrong? Daniel. I am no good at that.

Who wears the pants in the relationship? Hummm. . .

Who has more tattoos? No tattoos for either of us. That's a random question.

Who eats more sweets? Me for sure.

I tag my sisters Cheryl and Genene, since they haven't posted anything on their blogs for a while :)

baby number two.....

Look how cute I am!!!

NO, NOT WHAT YOU ARE THINKING!!! So our good friends Blake and Mandi  recently had their second anniversary and asked us if we could watch their 6 month old son Browen overnight while they got away together.  Truth be told, we absolutely love Browen to death and so does Zachary so really this wasn't that much to ask of us.

Roughhousing on the floor together

Zachary loved hanging out with "baby Browen" (This is what Zachary calls him) and was constantly asking to hold him and talking to him.  Zachary was also constantly trying to give Browen his stuffed bear and make him happy.  

Zachary "holding" Browen

Browen amazed us with his awesome sleeping skills and only woke up once in the night for a 2:30 AM bottle.  It really is funny how things change in your mind from baby number one.  I remember when Zachary was 6 months I still felt like a deer in the headlights when he would wake up for his nightly feedings, this time I just smiled and went and got the little guy, made a bottle for him and Rachel fed him.  Basically the whole time he was over here he was pretty much content as can be.

The Martins hooked us up with a second stroller so we could all go out on a walk together.   THANKS GUYS!

We had a great time together and loved watching Browen and Zachary loved having a sibling for a day.  I guess Browen will have to come and hang out with us more often!

The Obsession Continues & Spreads

This past Christmas Daniel got a remote control airplane from Zachary. As many of you probably know Daniel quickly became obsessed with flying it. He has made sure that he takes Zachary with him (and me too, since I have to make sure Zachary doesn't run into the road while Daniel is flying) every chance he can get. He has liked it so much that he went on to a bigger and better plane.

The Bigger and Better Plane - but not the greatest picture of it.

I have never seen Daniel enjoy a hobby so much before. You better believe that if it is a day without wind he will talk about going out and flying the plane. And you also better believe that little boys LOVE to imitate their daddies because now when Daniel comes home the first thing Zachary says to him is "Daddy, fly the airplane!" And we hear these questions at least 30 times a day: "Where's the big airplane?" "Where's the little airplane?" Wow, airplane infections are contagious among the male population.

So Daniel felt bad that we could not go out and fly the airplane every time Zachary asked, so he rigged up a flying station in our living room. He attached string to the "little airplane" and stuck it in the ceiling. Zachary loved it, despite the mishaps that occurred when it would get tangled up. It really is fun to watch these two guys together. They have a lot of fun with this new hobby they have found.

Jon Schmidt

We got an email earlier tonight with a link to a new video and song done by Jon Schmidt.  It is a cool arrangement, so if you have a second take a look at it...

Feel free to pass along the link to it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0v3d6SFcDys

Also, if you want to support Jon you can drop by his website (jonschmidt.com) and download this song among others.  

No we are not getting paid for this, we just enjoy his music!

-Daniel

By the Pricking of My Thumb . . .

Ever since I can remember I have loved to go to performances on stage, whether it be musicals, plays, dance, etc. I love them all. So for Cheryl's birthday Andrea, Cheryl and I went to BYU to see Macbeth. You have to love Shakespeare because his plays can be set in any time period, and BYU has always done a great job at pulling this off. However, I wasn't so sure about this one. They set it in Book of Mormon times and changed the names of the characters to names of people in the Book of Mormon. It kind of worked, but I liked previous plays I have seen better. But Lady Macbeth was super good.

Something Wicked this Way Comes!

And then there is my super-cool husband and sister who gave me a ticket to Wicked for my birthday. I went with Cheryl and my mom. We went on opening night and it was awesome. I was worried that it wouldn't measure up to the time I saw it in California, but it did not disappoint! Elphaba was incredible, and the rest of the cast did an amazing job. And the music itself is so good. I'm pretty sure I could see this every weekend and not get sick of it. If anyone has any tickets they are dying to get rid of, let me know :)

Helping Dad

Battery is charged and ready to go!

So we have been meaning to put some shelves into our storage closet downstairs so we can actually organize all of our food storage stuff. Rachel took it upon herself to clear everything out the other day and let me know that I needed to get them done that night (Hey, I need a good push now and then to get things done...)


So anyhow, luckily some family members hooked us up with some tools and I broke out the old framing toolbelt and after a quick run to the Home Depot we were all ready to go. Zachary just couldn't stand by and watch so he had mom track down his Black and Decker toy drill and Bob the Builder saw and he "helped daddy". It was all sorts of cute watching him drill the shelves and copy me as I put things together.


Now all we need is a cool car to work on and a garage big enough to work in!

Putting a screw on the drill for me

In his pajamas with his sweet Black and Decker toy drill

Double checking Dad's work