The best $3 dollars I ever spent

We have been unusually busy lately. Last week we met with two different pastors on two different nights, and Vince got to go see the TU vs. Boise State game last Wednesday. Friday I got a call at work around lunch time that Ziva had a fever of 101, so I packed up my books and picked her up early. She conked out before I even got her car seat straps on, and then slept for about 2 hours without even eating lunch first. When she woke up she was still burning up, so I gave her some Tylenol and by the time we got to the doctor her fever was gone. It turned out to be an ear infection, so she's on antibiotics for 10 days. Which is where the best $3 I ever spent comes in. I wish I could shake the hand of the man (or maybe mom) who came up with the brilliant idea of adding flavor to kids' medicine. Ziva has always taken medicine pretty well, but this time, other than the very first dose, she just wasn't having it. We tried every thing we could think of--forcing it down her throat, mixing it with yogurt or juice--all things everyone knows you're not suppsoed to do. And they didn't work that well anyway. So yesterday I headed back to Walgreens in desperation and paid $3 to add grape flavoring to the yucky amoxicillin. (no idea how to spell that) Ziva loves grape Tylenol and actually asks for it ("peez!") whenever she sees the bottle. So after we added the grapde flavoring, Vince had the awesome idea to rinse out an old, almost empty bottle of Tylenol and use that dropper to give Ziva her meds. And it worked!!! It takes about 8 droppers worth to give her each dose, but she sucks down all 8 without one bit of protest. Our home is peaceful once again!

Ziva showing us her grill

Showing off Uncle Mitch's hat

Go Hurricanes!

Bedtime story with Daddy

Finding Home

After many, many months of searching, we have finally found a church to call home, and we are EXCITED! Monday night we met with an associate pastor at Discovery Bible Fellowship and did all the "official" business of joining the church: sharing our testimonies, discussing our talents, interests, and spiritual gifts in order to find a place to serve, and signing the church's membership covenant. At some point we'll be introduced to the congregation, but even without that, we feel finally at home. Another pastor emailed us about finding a small group to join, and we're meeting tomorrow night with the youth pastor and his wife to find out if/where/how we can work with the student ministry. Did I say we're EXCITED?

I have to confess, when we moved up here from Florida, finding a church was the last thing I expected to be difficult. And yet, that's been one of the toughest parts of this season for us. We both loved Calvary so much, and were so plugged in there, that the leaving was definitely an up-rooting, and left some painful reverberations in our life. There were some weekends when we didn't even want to visit a new church, because we could never find something as great as Calvary, and wasn't it just so easy to watch Calvary online?

We know that God has many different seasons for us to walk through, and when we're in one we really really love it's hard to move on to the next, but we trust His heart and His plan for us and move forward on our journey. It's been a long (to us) walk in the dim light, not fully seeing why we had to leave what we loved so much, but God in His goodness is giving us more and more glimpses into the "why," and we are feeling more and more settled in our new life, in this season. Of course, the moment we begin to feel settled may be the next time He moves us (like we're finally making some good friends, but found out this week they're moving to Texas. Boo.), but every change draws our eyes back to Him and reminds us that we just don't know. And that's okay. And it's EXCITING. Because only He could plan exactly what we don't even know we need.

(And yes, Ziva pictures will come soon. And maybe some awesome video, if you're lucky. You've got to see her show her "grill". We love our gangta girl!)

Bye-Bye, Bottle

I'm so excited to announce that we have easily, almost magically, even accidentally taken the bottle out of Ziva's life. I had planned on breaking her of the habit over the summer, knowing that she wouldn't need or be able to have one at school this fall. She was already down to just one bottle a day at bedtime, so I didn't think it would be too hard, but then the summer ended being much crazier than we expected, and I've always heard that babies and toddlers can only handle one big change at a time. So between packing, moving, a visit from Grandma, a vacation to Chicago, and starting a new school year that brought several big changes with it, there was never a good time to pack the bottles away. I had heard that if you don't take the bottle away by 18 months, it becomes a hard and fast habit that's much tougher to break. So as 18 months snuck up on us, I was feeling a little worried about how Ziva would handle not getting a bedtime bottle. And then, lo and behold, God in all His wisdom and mercy let Ziva get a cough. Sounds strange, I know, but let me explain....we wanted Ziva to sleep, and since milk always makes her cough worse, toward the end of last week I started offering her a bottle with just water in it. She would drink a tiny bit, and then be ready for bed. We did that for three nights. On the 4th night, she didn't want the bottle of water at all, so I put her straight to bed and she did fine. Slept great, as a matter of fact! And I realized after that night (which was just Monday), that perhaps we had broken the bottle habit without even realizing it! So last night, I didn't offer a bottle at all, and she didn't protest or even seem to notice, and went straight to sleep. Hallelujah! I hope any and all of our future kids are this easy!

18 months!

Ziva is 18 months old as of yesterday! We went to the doctor for her check up today, and she is right on track and, thankfully, perfectly healthy! This week she started saying "I love you," which we are super excited about, since Vince has been trying to get her to say that one for a long time. One of Ziva's new favorite activities is turning on the radio on my alarm clock and then dancing like crazy. We dance like crazy (and probably look crazy) with her, and it is so much fun!

I was able to get her hair in pig tails once last week, so here are the pictures. They were so cute! She really likes standing on her little stool and "brushing her teeth" on her own.

Good weekend

We had a good weekend! It turned into a 3 day weekend for me and Ziva...she wasn't really sick but she had too many diarrhea diapers (TMI, I know, sorry) at school Thursday, and they've got pretty strict rules so we got to play hooky on Friday! Vince was off this weekend so we had fun just hanging out, and Sunday we went to my parents for a birthday lunch for Mitch and Rachel. Here are a few moments from our weekend...

Nap time with Daddy

Not sure why the rotating didn't take on this one, but isn't it sweet?

Okay, and these two crack me up. This is the face she made when I asked her to smile for the camera. Both times!! This is what we call her "mean face". She's usually playing and being funny when she makes it, not actually being mean :)

A Few Pictures

How sweet is she?

Ziva loved climbing on the boxes!

My two "basket heads" :)

We're back!

After a long silence, we are back! Or still here, I guess I should say. We moved in to our new apartment a few weeks ago, just two days before I went back to school. We got it done in record time, and after just a few days we felt like we'd been here quite a while. We finally got our internet back up this week, so we should get back into a pretty good blogging routine. I don't have many pictures of these past few weeks, but now that we're settled hopefully we'll get back to taking lots and lots of pictures.

School is going well; I've got some great groups of kids this year. Ziva is adjusting pretty well to the toddler room. The hardest thing was (well, still is) getting used to just one nap.....she wasn't quite ready for that, but last week they let her move back into her old crib instead of sleeping on a mat, and that has helped. Vince is still loving his job, and we are all happy about that!

So, we're back....check back soon for another update!