Happy 1st Birthday Zoe!

Zoe...Zo, Zoe Girl, Zo-ster, Zo-ster with the Most-er, ZoPo...these are all the names Zoe has accumulated in her first year of life. No matter what we affectionately call her, she is loved by all of us!She entered the world exactly one year ago, March 31 at 9:28 pm after only 4 hours of labor. It is incredible to look back at pictures and see how she has grown. We are amazed at her abundant joy and fun-loving personality. Already we see her showing signs of taking after her mom in being passionate about expressing her feelings. Since she has learned only a few words so far (mama, papa, bah-bah for bye bye) screaming is her most often used technique to get her point across, and being that she is so happy this is often done with a little smirk. :)

Here are a few pictures from her day today.

Bright and early our birthday girl enjoyed breakfast (oatmeal and yogurt) and was eager to show me her cute scrunched up nose grin when she saw the camera...
Outside, enjoying the afternoon sun before naptime...
Satisfied after enjoying her first cupcake after her birthday dinner of Peanut Satay with Veggies and Tofu over Rice. Yes I know they say not to do the peanuts until 3 years old or something but she IS the second born, they get all the neglect :) I'd say she enjoyed the cupcake a lot more than the satay and tofu even though it was tasty...
Opening her present from Malachi that he wrapped by himself (mostly)...
Figuring out her new toy that Malachi picked out for her probably because he has a friend with this toy and wanted it for his own playing enjoyment :)...
Happy Birthday Precious Girl! We love you!!

Air Force One

We went and watched it land at our local airport yesterday...along with a bizillion other people. :) I don't think Zoe was all that impressed...

Feeling Good

Today I joined my two great friends and cousins-in-law on their weekly bike ride to the beach. It felt good to make it there and back and now I am hoping for quick recovery. :) The kids did a fabulous job which is a huge bonus. They fell asleep on the way back, screwing up naptime for the day, but it was worth it! Looking forward to many more rides ladies, thanks for lettin' me join the 'Fit Mama Brigade!' :)

Lenten pretzels

Today Malachi and I made pretzels, the oldest, traditional Christian Lenten bread. The shape is said to represent arms folded in prayer. The three holes represent the Trinity. We used this recipe except altered a little. We used 3 cups whole wheat flour instead of the 4 cups of all-purpose and bread). We chose to top them with a little cinnamon sugar since I did not have coarse salt. They turned out nicely, though I plan on trying the original recipe as well.
oh, and lesson learned...wax paper cannot be substituted for parchment paper. :)

I love my camera!!

my blue-eyed boy...my green?hazel?brown?-eyed girl...beautiful no matter what:)
just another cute picture (her older brother was not interested in me taking another photo)

We're Baaaack!

got a new camera, the Canon PowerShot SD 1100 IS, love it and so glad I can take pics again!

here's one of malachi and our first garden lettuce of the season.

speaking of garden i should get a picture of that. it's pitiful looking really. we have a lot of beautiful lettuce but all the other veggies are barely sprouted, go figure. we'll see how long it takes them to come up. nonetheless we enjoyed the lettuce in our salad last night and very grateful for it. (btw, if you want some lettuce let me know, there is no way we can eat it all.)

and with our other camera out of commission i missed zoe's 11 month update. she is a walking maniac. not so into food. beginning to spend small chunks of time looking at books by herself. loves her brother, though she puts up with a lot of teasing. seems to say "da" for yes,maybe we have some russian in our blood?:). she also says mama, papa and can sign 'all finished'.