Brady's Birthday & the Walls Visit

Last Sunday was Brady's third birthday. Before I get into that, I'll backtrack a day to Sabbath. Calleigh had told us a few weeks ago that she had been interviewed in her Sabbath School class on the topic of marriage. We didn't really know what she was talking about and didn't pay too much attention to it but when the youth pastor got up to do a sermon on marriage and started showing a video of kids talking about marriage, it all came together. Sure enough, there was Calleigh and her friend Lindsey being asked some questions (they just showed quick snippets so it all happened fast). The first one was what marriage was and Lindsey answered that it was when people kissed...Calleigh was silent at this point. Then later, she was asked if she was going to get married. Lindsey said "yes" and Calleigh said, "no!" They switched to someone else and then came back to Calleigh who had the last line of the video which was "Are you kidding me??!" which I assume went along with her "no!" answer. Considering that Calleigh has discussed in the past who she is going to marry, this answer came as a surprise to me. Later, she and Aubree both told me that they were going to live with me forever. At any rate, all the kids were pretty cute and Calleigh seemed proud of being
on a video shown to the whole church.

Birthday chair at Sabbath School

Trying to get some pictures of me with the kids since I'm not in the picture that often. Kind of hard to get something good.

A little better.

Saturday night the Walls arrived from Texas. This is my cousin Jonathan (David's brother, for those who know David), wife Marcela, and daughters Zasha (3) and Luccia (2). Jonathan is chair of the music department and other stuff at Southwestern Adventist University and thus has a good chunk of the summer off. They decided to drive here for a week and then head up to New England for a few weeks. The kids were very excited about spending time with them and naturally kept asking every ten minutes, "When are they going to get here?" We let them stay up until about 9:15 for the big arrival and we could tell right away that they were all going to have a good time. We hadn't seen them in a year and a half so obviously the kids were much bigger than the last time we crossed paths.

Waiting on the front porch.

Sunday morning, birthday morning, we had Brady's little motorcycle, which has a gas pedal, waiting for him at the bottom of the stairs. I had gotten it at a yard sale on Friday for $5. Miraculously I was able to get it into the car without him seeing it. I'm sure it's meant for someone younger than three but I guess it sometimes pays off to be small for your age. As expected, the motorcycle was a big hit. Since I don't particularly like throwing birthday parties, I was happy to keep things small with just family and the Bergherms (Isidros were in Denver). Brady doesn't care that it isn't some big orchestrated bash. We had subs, cake, and opened presents. He got a bunch of great stuff...much of which the girls quickly took over. In fact, Calleigh started saying she wanted boy toys from now on.

The new motorized motorcycle. It was still pretty early in the morning hence the lack of major excitement on his face.

Brady requested a chocolate airplane cake from Jennifer and that is what he got.

I love his expressions!

About to open presents.

It wasn't a remote control one but he'll take it!

Girls trying on some of his new dress up stuff.

Colby is ready to take the motorcycle for a spin.

Monday we just hung around the house while the kids all played. Tuesday was picture day at JCPenney. Calaubra were getting their birthday pictures taken. I decided to forego any individual pictures of Colby since I'd just wait until he was one. I did attempt to get a group picture and by some miracle got a really good one. I also marveled at how good Brady was. I remember him being difficult turning two with his pictures but this time he was totally hamming it up for the camera. Thank goodness. On the way to the mall for pictures, I was talking to the kids about how many days we had until campmeeting (a topic we discuss pretty much every day) and this was what happened with Brady:

Me: "It will be great to be at camp meeting because we'll get to see John, Mike, and Mary." (names have been changed to protect the innocent.)
Brady: "Mary? I don't like that name...(thinking for a few seconds)..."Ohhh, that will make Jesus cry."

Wednesday the Walls went to Disney World which we did not do, much to the kids disappointment. Instead, I went into the hospital to turn in my badge and to say hello to some friends/former co-workers. As soon as we got off the elevator into the basement, my old place of work, Brady stated "I don't like this place. It's yucky." Well, yeah, it is kind of dank when you step off the elevator I must admit. But we forged on. There are only a dozen or so folks that I still know working there now but I had a great time seeing everyone again...it had been at least 1.5 years since I had been in to see people. One person I had to say hello to was Bertha who is 92 and still working in Accounts Payable. Just crazy! I was talking to another lady who was excited to see the kids and since I knew her son had gotten married in the last two years, I commented, "So how about you? Any grandkids?" She got a look on her face and whispered to me, "They got divorced." AWKWARD! It was kind of sad to turn in the badge, knowing it's really all over but honestly, that whole thing seems like a life time ago and I'm certainly more excited about my current job than my old one. Once of the reasons I haven't gone in for so long is that it's a good 30-minute drive and I know Colby will probably fall asleep on the way home. Sure enough, it didn't take long. I had to pull over, get him out for a few minutes to get him awake, put him back in his car seat and continue on. I've actually done this a few times this week and fortunately it's worked.

A picture of my badge for memory's sake.

He actually let Treva hold him for quite a long time.

Thursday was another quiet day at home, especially since Zasha started showing some signs of illness in the afternoon. She had a fever and threw up. The fever continued into Friday (cancelling a trip to the beach for them) but thankfully was gone by Sabbath and nobody else got sick. We stayed away on Friday morning but doing our usual yard sale circuit although it started raining at about 11:15 so we sought refuge at Target. Target has been putting out fantastic coupons the last few months (probably because of the data breach fiasco last year) so I was able to get a bunch of hair and body washes for Duncan for $0.50 each. I would say about 75% of the time I use the great Target coupons at Publix (since they take Target coupons) so their strategy doesn't always pay off to get me to shop there but this time it did. Since we aren't too far off from our camp meeting trip, I let the kids pick out a few crafty items that they'll take on the plane with them. This always excites them greatly. I told them they couldn't use it yet but they like to just look at the stuff. Even today, Calleigh wanted me to get it out just so she could look and I guess dream about the future fun.

Friday at 5:00 we had our appointment at Haverty's to see their recommendations from their interior design visit. We were happy with their suggestions on an area rug for the living room and a painting for the dining room but didn't pull the trigger on a few other things including some art for the "brick wall" in the movie room. They showed us some Paris themed pictures and that's just now what we were going for. Duncan is now motivated to do some things himself which I'm excited about. While we watched the little "presentation" the kids were kept busy sitting on a white sectional watching a DVD (this is where the lady had them go). After awhile, Duncan and I were walking around looking at stuff and Calleigh came and informed me that Brady had a deuce (I had already changed a deuce from Colby so it was a little annoying to have another one). When I got over to him, Brady was engrossed in a movie and says to me "Just change it here." That's right, on a white sectional in the middle of a furniture store! Nice.

Our new dining room art. Miraculously he was able to use the same hooks from the flowers we had hanging up. What a break.

This morning the Walls departed for the next leg of their journey and we were sad to see them go. You forget how cute little girls are. Zasha said in a prayer one night "Thank you that we get to live upstairs." They live in a one story home and apparently the fact that we had an upstairs was very exciting for them. Jonathan and Marcela spoiled us by cooking a couple of nights and made some delicious food which I'm actually thinking about right now (there is some leftover) but I suppose it's not appropriate to eat at 11:30 at night. It was so nice spending some time with them and I told them that they'll have to come again in two summers (every other summer they go overseas since Marcela is from the Czech Republic). The good news is that we will see them at camp meeting in a few weeks.

Saying goodbye.

Earlier in the week...looking at some pictures.

Both Colby and Luccia love playing in the fridge.

Brady talking to Marcela's sister's son who is about the same age.

Luccia loves to suck on lemons and we discovered that Colby does too.

Taking some pictures after church.

Jonathan and Ricky helped make Sabbath lunch.

Marcela is an amazing artist. She loves to sketch people and is really good at it. Here she is sketching Brady. Wish I had thought to take a picture of the final product. I will for next time!

Sabbath afternoon walk down at the dock.

Lots of grasshoppers out and about.

Jonathan got me these gorgeous roses. I was so preoccupied with the kids that I didn't even notice them sitting on the island until Marcela pointed them out to me a few hours later!

Today was, of course, Father's Day. We celebrated by going to Ron and Elaine's for brunch and spending some time in the pool. On that front, I'm pretty discouraged with Aubree and her swimming or I should say, lack of swimming. She was doing so great last summer but it's like she never swam it all and we're back to square one. She doesn't want to take her life jacket off. I tried to do some one-on-one with her today but she was a mess. Part of the problem is that the water is still a little chilly and her teeth were chattering. I think if I could just spend a few hours with her, like I did when we were at the condo last August, I could get her back to where she was but who knows when that's going to happen. Almost forgot, while we were there, the kids were playing on the swing set when all of a sudden, Brady started crying. Turns out some hornets had made a nest on part of the swing and Brady unfortunately stirred them up with his swinging. It resulted in two stings on his left hand. He was bawling and bawling but a binky and some bug bite spray greatly helped the situation. Unfortunately, this will probably set Calleigh back like five years. She's already overly paranoid about bees and wasps and this is sure to make it worse.

Reading his Father's Day cards.

Ron and Elaine got kayaks. They do plan to take them out on actual bodies of water.

Ouch!

On the Colby front, he has some things he's working on. First of all, he appears to at last be getting a tooth or some teeth. No white is showing yet but his gums are swollen and he's drooling a bunch so I think something is imminent. Secondly, he's started to walk around while pushing on things and Duncan has had him standing up a few times without holding on to anything. Does this mean he'll be walking before age one as the doctor predicted? I have no idea!