Today was a Ziva day.  She was at Mimi’s house yesterday, which, often means copious amounts (and I mean COPIOUS amounts) of blueberries and other fruits.  So, after struggling through morning sickness while changing her first nasty diaper this morning I had to spirit her off the changing table and let her run around in her diaper while I had another session with my face in the toilet.  It’s exhausting throwing up, so I figured the kids would be OK running around in just thier diapers/undies for a little while so I could “re group” and hopefully get some more food down my throat in the hopes that something would stay.  I set myself up on the couch to relax (we’ve had a busy week, so I’m sore all over too) and shortly there after Vienna comes RUNNING down the hall screaming “MAMA…ZIVA’S GOT POOPIE IN HER BUTT CRACK!!!!” What!?!?!  I get up expecting to see a flow of “blueberry revenge” up Ziva’s back, which is often what happens after she consumes her body weight in the “they’re so good for you” fruit.  Noooooo such luck!  As I reach my bedroom (where the changing table is) I see Ziva… 10 wipes strewn about her, rear end COVERED in black blueberry crusties… COVERED! and not a diaper in sight!  I get her cleaned up, get a diaper on, get some pants and a shirt on (in the hopes she can’t get those off as easily as her diaper) and start the hunt for the diaper.  I hunt, and hunt, and hunt… worried that my nose is going to find it before my eyes do and that it’s going to start another round of toilet facing!  After an HOUR I gave up… but when the girls and I started some Mac & Cheese lunch for the girls I found that she’d left her diaper, complete with ginormous “gift” neatly deposited in the trashcan   ahhh… Thank the Good Lord that she’s got some of her father’s “tidy” tenancies!

This isn’t the first time Ziva’s tried to take care of her diaper herself. Lately I’ve been finding her about once a week.  She climbs up on the changing table and takes her diaper off and starts wiping… this is just the first time she’s done it with a “messy” diaper.  Thankfully with Vienna’s example she’s potty training quite well right now… so hopefully before baby #3 arrives I can have her in panties during the day… oh, wouldn’t that be something!!!

But, the day moves on.  I get my tummy calmed down and decide to Facebook the above event of the day.  But since the computer makes me a bit sea sick at times I decided to walk away and take a potty break myself.  I guess leaving these kids alone in a room for too long is not so very safe!!!

My girls and I like to cook together, and today they both helped me make Mac & Cheese.  Usually Ziva is relegated to just watching because I don’t always trust her to not burn herself (she’s VERY good at grabbing at hot stuff) but today I thought I’d let her give stirring (with a VERY long wooden spoon) a try. She did a great job.  Well, while I was back in the bathroom she apparently got a hankering for some of her favorite food… eggs… She got in the fridge, opened the egg carton and started making herself an omelet… SANS BOWL, SANS PAN.  I’m happy to report that the eggs have been cleaned up, the stove is nice and sparkly and there’s only about 15 minutes until nap time!!!

I shall survive this day

Sam remains the best husband in the whole world, and the love of my life! 



He’s done a fabulous job of working hard at siteCoffee and building PixelCliff, I’m so proud of him!  He’s been getting more involved with the men’s ministry at our church by joining David’s Men and the Men’s Ministry Team.  It’s been great for him to feel like he’s starting back in ministry again, but it’s a far cry from being in ministry full tim for him or being in leadership… but one step at a time!  Vienna’s doctor asked for EKG’s from all of our family and when Sam had his done they confirmed that he indeed still has the hole in his heart that he was born with.  We’re still in process for followign through with testing with a specialist with him, but it’s not something that we are terribly concerned with at this time. But apparently he hasn’t fully filled it with Jesus yet (LOL ha ha ha… bad joke, but I just had to!)

Our girls are growing up so fast and are getting so smart and are the greatest joy in our lives!  We’ve had some special times livign with my parents and sharing our girls with them, what a blessing to see them get close to them.





Vienna started her year with follow ups for her surgery to correct her bladder reflux issue.  I’m happy to report she’s had not ONE Urinary Tract Infection since the surgery!  On the 5th we’ll return to Dornbeckers for her next follow up exam which I believe if all is well will be her last! Wahoo!  Her cardiologist did explain about her prolonged QT interval and we will have another appointment in March to check in on that situation, but over all it seems that watching what medications she takes is all we hav to worry about there… She’s such a precousious three and a  half year o 
ld!  She’s already started to recognize words and sound out letters. She’s not completely interested in learning to read, so getting her to do it is a challenge, but she can sit down and sound out words and recognizes words like Pool and Cake! LOL  Every day she amazes me with what she knows and with her love for people. A favorite memory this year was at her first time seeing the Nutcracker.  She was sooo concerned for the Mouse King who  “got hurt and his friends dragged him off to the hospital” that throughout the rest of the performance she kept asking me “Is the Mouse King feeling better yet??”.  Then, durring the arabian dance, the dancers came out with girls in belly shirts and the man shirtless.. my little gem stood right up, pointed accusingly at the stage, stomped her foot and shouted “INAPPROPRIATE!”  THAT’S MY GIRL!!!! I was so proud (thankfully it was a performance for homeschool childern so it wasn’t so mortifying having her 
shout out in the middle of everything!) She’s currently learning to ride her scooter and sings all the day long. So fun.  She also got to ride on a float in the 4th of July parade. oohh that was sooo exciting and great fun for her…. it was sooo hot that day! Ziva and I enjoyed watching for her
 



 
 


Ziva, wow, she’s learned to run from one end of the house to the other, she’s quick. Turn your back for a moment and she’s climbed onto the counter and started cooking for you, or has gathered up all the coasters in the house and is distributing them into every room.  She’s cutting the last of her teeth (I’ll be sooo glad when that’s over) and my little mountain goat is starting to try to climb out of her crib (she’s already mastered the Pack and Play! There’s no containing her) She has a giggle to melt any heart and the best smile ever.  She had so many firsts including her first Ambulance ride and stay at Dornbecker Children’s Hospital.  Another first was that she and I were flown to Colorado to see my good friend Jen. We had a blast and Ziva flew VERY well and stole EVERY attendant’s heart!!

 




Thankfully it was nothing more than a virus that was attacking her bone marrow (the dr’s did do some testing to rule out Leukimia, which was scary).  She’s finally starting to actually talk (she doesn’t need to most of the time, with 4 adults in the house to cater to her, and her sister who…well, doesn’t leave much quiet space).  It’s so fun.  She said her first “sentance” the other day at the dinner table when I was trying to get her to take a bite “NO WAY!” ahh… just like her sister taught her! ***rolling my eyes*** But she never misses a chance to raise her hands for “Hallelujah!” after our prayer’s “Amen!”

I did start to be a part of our churches Radiant girls ministry which has been fun… we had a big dessert night for the girls in December which I had a blast helping decorate for.  The biggest change for me this year was that I started a new hobby. Cake making!  It’s been great fun and I’m thinking that Esther needs to move home from Ukraine and open a bakery with me She’s been enjoying making and decorating cakes too.  Hummm… I meant to upload a picture of one of my cakes, but it doesn’t seem I did (and I can’t add any more this month cause I added too many already) but they are all on my Facebook account if anyone wants to check them out

   .

Here’s actually the fist attempt. She wanted to sing you “Angels Watching”… because she sings it all the time… but when it came time to sing… well… she had a new song on her mind… lets see if you recognize it

Incase you didn’t recognize it… that was “Step In Time” from Marry Poppins!

And then she decided to sing one more… but she got a little distracted for a bit there! She is my daughter after all!

The camera shut off just a half a second too fast!! What she’s saying in the end there is that she wants to go to McDonnalds! She’s a little obsessed with “chicken patio’s and fries” LOL (that’s Chicken nuggets and french fries) oh yeah, with milk! We used to cut up breaded chicken patties for her, so she calls nuggets chicken patio’s LOL it’s so funny. She recognizes McD’s and Burger King wherever we go! She even asked her daddy to make more money so she could have more McD’s! I swear we haven’t gone there THAT often!! (but we usually stop there when we go to the dr’s office for the girls, and we have been doing that a bit more often of late… hopefully that will stop soon!)

So there you go! Enjoy Grandma Bible! (Auntie Es and Pris and Sarah too, cause I know you’ll love watching as well!

Much love to you all…. we sure do miss you!

It’s been a while!! yes, yes, many of you have been telling me, and telling me, and… complaining   OK OK but it’s been an INSANE three months or so for us! Let me catch you up… (get your coffee and take a potty break… cause this is gonna take a while!!!)

Right before Thanksgiving we decided that with the economy effecting Real Estate the way it is, the best thing for the family was for us and the kids to move in with my parents.  We have been renting a house that their company owns, and they are selling that company and we are going to share expenses with them until they get through this little RE crisis going on.  With the Lords help, they will be able to keep the office building they own along with their home.  Since we don’t own anything it was a “no brainer” decision as Sam says.

We had been planning on taking a vacation right before Christmas to the Oregon Cost, and since Sam had been working so hard we decided that even though we were moving suddenly, we were still going to try to make the trip.  We found an incredible deal on a house (off season and slow economy are to thank), so we took mom and dad with us and spent 4 days at the coast.  It was crazy!!  Just two days before we left the Vally got a huge storm-front come through where we got lots of snow (well, lots for here)! Ziva’s first snow!




So the day we left, there was snow every where!  We made it through the Van Duzer Corridor and out to the coast.  I’d never seen snow at the coast before, but we had a nice little snow storm for part of a day.  We also took the girls to the Oregon Coast Aquarium! It was fantastic!  Vienna loved the touch pool they have there, we touched little stingrays, sharks, starfish, sea urchins, sea-slug, annenamies (sp?), then there was walking through the glass tunnels where sharks and other fish are swimming all around you… so many things…  and there was hardly anyone there since it was the off season! It was a great family day!

Our return however, well… the Van Duzer’s were closed due to the snow and ice (lots of trees that fell across the road) so we had to take the LONG LONG LONG way home!  (South to Newport, out through Philometh, and back up through Salem!)  There was so much snow in the Vally that we had to drive very very slow (and I stopped counting tire chains laying on the road, broken, at like thirty six if I recall).  It was an exhausting drive… but Sam did a great job, and so did my dad, and we all made it home safe  and sound!!

So, before vacation we had begun packing quickly and began living here after our pre-Christmas vacation.  ( Sam wanted Christmas to be as special as possible during the upheaval, so we raced to get in so at least the girls would be settled for Christmas).  We had  a great time celebrating Ziva’s first Christmas!

The packing was much like moving over seas since much of our stuff would go to long term storage (we’re thinking 2 years here) some to Good Will and the rest has to fit into two rooms (and a bit in the kitchen/garage) here.  We finally moved our stuff in the middle of February, and just this weekend I unpacked the last box in our bedroom! so we are officially in!! (there’s lots of re-organizing to do, but I’ve found a way to make everything fit!! NO small task!!)   We are still praying for a buyer or renter for our house and a renter for the unused half of their office building (any prayers for those things would be MUCH appreciated, the lack of a renter for the business office has really been a burden).

Ever tried packing with a two year old in the room!?!?!?

Vienna “helps” pack a box!

As if we weren’t insane enough moving so quickly with an active two year old and a five month old who’s not sleeping through the night… at the end of January we decided to head to Canada (Victoria BC) to help Sam’s father at Missions Fest Vancouver.  Thankfully my mom came to help with the girls. Poor mom was stuck in a hotel room most of the time with the girls!! But her being there meant that I was able to help man the exhibit for Wildfire World while Dad Bible and Kostya (one of our office “family” members from Ukraine) taught and attended classes.  It was a great trip.  It was the first time Grandpa Bible was able to meet Ziva!

(Poor Grandma Bible hasn’t had her chance yet, but hopefully soon!)  It was so precious to be able to introduce our littlest one to her grandfather finally! And for Vienna to have a chance to see Gandpa Bible too (we have a photo magnet of G&G Bible on our fridge and occasionally she will go up and give it kisses).  And as always, it was just great to get to spend time with Dad too.  (And to introduce Uncle Kostya to our babies too! He’s worked in the office with the family for something like ten years, so he’s like family!)


We’ve had a few milestones since I’ve written last.  Mainly, Ziva milestones. Not only is she sitting up, but on the day she turned seven months, she took her first crawl across the room!  (this video is a week later)

Ziva’s pulling herself up on things all the time now, and I constantly find her crawling to get into anything she is not supposed to… you’d think she was a puppy because her favorite thing to do is to chew on my computer cord!!! She exhausts her momma and herself as she gets about the house now!

Ziva also had her first non-milk meal. I’ll let the photo’s speak for themselves:

Yippee REAL food!!!!

What the stink IS that stuff!?!?!?

Uhhhhkkkk… that’s NASTY!!!!

Huuhhggg… Can’t stand this stuff!

How could you do that to me!?!

As for the Mucus and the Mayhem….
For the past TWO weeks I’ve been calling this place “the house of Ill” as everyone has been sick.

Ziva got our families first ear infection, both girls had this flu/cold thing going around, so eventually Sam and I got that as well as Mimi & Poppie (my parents).  Even Uncle Matthew was down with it so badly that he didn’t go to Canada as scheduled (he was going to help with another Missions Fest).   We are finally getting over the illnesses, but much mayhem still has transpired in this house… see… not terribly long ago my parents had a flood in their house… long story short, they got bran new beautiful carpet and hardwood floors… LIGHT TAN CARPETS!!!! yeah, not for long! I’m concerned by the time we leave here, they’ll be needing yet another remodel!!  So far, we’ve made several dents, scratches or other mars to the hardwoods… and Thursday Ziva had a major blow out and pooped all over the floor!!! I of course PANIC!!!!  I can’t find the carpet cleaner, I can’t just scrub it up… mom is at Curves working out… so i called there (yes, now I am the laughing stock of town!! oh well, the carpets not stained!!!).  I should have just kept the carpet cleaner out, as today Ziva pulled herself up on the coffee table and grabbed my full cup of coffee down to the floor… Praise the Lord it wasn’t HOT!!!!!  so, I spent much of today rearranging furniture and Bisseling the living room carpet!! Oh, I forgot to mention that I also chose today as the day to sort through all the 3-6 month clothes all the way through the 12-18 month clothes for the girls to lighten up… at present well.. the house is… lets just say, I’m terrified mom and dad will get back early tomorrow!!!!  I just might be pulling an all nighter!

So, there you go, for those of you who have been unhappy with the lack of posts… now you have my “excuse”

More later   We’ve still got Build-a-Bear and Buddies to talk about soon, hopefully… but, you know how life gets

Happy Days to you all

Now I have to start thinking through costumes for next year!!   Oh what shall we do!?!? 

Have a Safe and Happy Fall Everyone!!

Thursday night we read the “scrap book” that the hospital gave us… all about surgery and what happens to us and the people we’d see and such. It was really a great little booklet.  We played “surgery” and Vienna used a plastic cup to put everyone in the house to sleep. We were hoping this would help with the surgery day… we looked at all the pictures and she remembered getting an IV before and was asking if they were going to fix her owie at the hospital. I told her only after she was asleep and it wouldn’t really hurt.  We all actually got a decent nights sleep, despite the fact that my milk had dropped off the last two days (stress I’m sure) so Ziva had been feeding every two hours!!  I was able to pump and get her 5 oz and Sam fed that to her right before bed (thank you mom bible for raising such a helpful wonderful husband for me!! or do I thank the sisters for the training!?!  ha ha ha)

Friday we went to the hospital good and early. My mom came with us to help with Ziva so we could focus on Vienna.  Soooo helpful to have my mom there!!  We checked in at 9am, and very soon went back to Vienna’s room (which was really just a curtained off area in the pre-op room around the nurses station).  Vienna did great. With so many strangers coming in and out (thankfully they were all used to working with kids).  Her nurse Ms. Twila let her push the buttons on the blood pressure machine (Vienna hates it, she says it hurts her, and I don’t doubt it, cause it hurts me sometimes too).  We were hoping to not pre-sedate her with Versed because I thought I remembered my grandmother flipping out on it (It can sometimes make you get very upset and combative) and I heard of another mom who’s daughter (who had the same surgery) had a bad reaction to it.  I was afraid Vienna might too since I don’t do well on pain medications.  But she did fabulous.  She just acted a little sleepy and very drunk   She was a little rag doll and she spoke soooo slowly, if I wasn’t her mom I probably would have laughed like crazy, but it still isn’t fun to see your baby in this state either, though Sam and I did get a few laughs out of it. 

Taking her back to say good by was horrid.  Nothing worse than turning your baby over to someone else and walking away (At least the Lord doesn’t ask us to walk away right away when we turn our kids over to Him, he gives us a nice slow process!! Thanks!)  the waiting was horrible.  It was only about 35-45 minutes before the doctor came out to get us to tell us everything went well.  Vienna was still back in post-op/recovery and they’d call us when she started waking up. 

An hour passed… a nurse came over the nurses station speaker “can we have a ?!!??! for a two year old?” I have no idea what they asked for, but when they still didn’t come to get us to take us to Vienna I started getting very antsy!!  Finally Dr Duty (the Ped Urologist’s assistant dr) came by and he went to check on her, right about the time that the nurse came and took us back to the recovery room to get her.  As we went through the doors I could see Vienna’s crib and she was on her tummy trying to sit up screaming her head off for me. Ok, she was just crying and saying “mommy” but, I ran to her none the less!! What a horrible feeling!!  They let me pick her up to help calm her down and I just held her and cried as I prayed a thanks that she was ok   Poor Sam, I just made him stand there looking on… I probably should have shared more we walked her back to her “room” and had to wait for her to drink, eat and pee before we could leave. They gave her a Popsicle, and it was so funny, yet sad, watching her try to eat it… she loved it! But she had a hard time of it because she was still so groggy.

Soon they let us go home (she pee’d right away!) it took forever for them to come take out her IV!!  She did not like having that in!!  They gave us a prescription for children’s Tylenol with Codine, but we didn’t fill it right away. We were home be 2pm   she doesn’t seem to have any pain at all from the surgery, just a bit of a sore throat, and even that is minimal.  She’s not complained at all this afternoon after cold juice this morning.  So I think she’s very much mended    It is so traumatic on a parent, even when you know that the surgery is a “nothing” surgery.  Basically she’s getting  a shot near her bladder, that’s it! it’s just she has to be so still that they have to put her to sleep.  Sam confessed it was much more traumatic for him than he expected, I actually didn’t feel as traumatized as I expected, so that was good cause he didn’t have to worry so much about me while he was stressing about Vienna!!  But we’re back to normal today!

This morning Vienna has already “earned” two candy corn for using the potty chair   So, it’s all good! I’m off to give her a bath!  We were all too tired to give her a bath last night.  She loves her baths thankfully, so it should be enjoyable (If Ziva will stay sleeping!! she’s still wanting to eat every two hours! but hopefully that will start to change as things come back to normal ) Happy day to you all!  Thanks for all who prayed for my little Vienna (and for all of us).

Vienna remembered she wanted to see the doggy before we left… she was still a bit groggy from the meds and couldn’t stand very well, but was upset that daddin’ made her hold his hand the whole time! the last photo is of her with her mask, that she is still playing with today as they let her take it home!