Santa!

Zach saw Santa for the first time last Thursday at St. Mark's Hospital. To be honest, I expected tears. But, Zach went right up to Santa for the picture and stared at him in awe. Then Santa gave him a little stuffed Rudolf Raindeer and a Barbershop Quartet sang "Rudolf" to him. He loved it.

Birthday/Attic Girl

My birthday present from Darryl finally arrived! He has been giving me clues for the last 6 weeks. He told me that it was "one of a kind" & "my collage roommates would like it". What?!

So what arrives? A personalized license plate. It stands for "Attic Girl". When Darryl and I met I lived in this tiny, quirky apartment called "The Attic". I was the tallest one living there at the time and I hit my head on the slanted ceilings all the time. But, we loved and took great pride in being Attic Girls! Thanks Darryl! I love it!

(Just had to add this picture because the kid is cute!)

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had high hopes that Zach might actually eat this Thanksgiving. But, no luck! He enjoyed a lovely meal of goldfish crackers dipped in ranch dressing. Yum! He then went down for a nap so his parents could actually eat. Zach wandered downstairs on his own 20 minutes later carrying his baby monitor. Thanks!

(Half) American Ninja

Zach was a Ninja for Halloween courtesy of Old Navy. His extended Halloween started on Thursday when he attended a party at his pre-school. He made a ghost out of a sucker and drew a spider and here he is frosting a cookie with Mommy.

On Friday night, we went to Trunk-or-Treat and had dinner and some homemade root-beer in the cultural hall while we waited for it to get dark enough outside. We tried to get Zach to wander and play with the other kids, but he just wanted to hang with Mom and Dad.

Grandma and Grandpa Zentner came after dinner to take Zach around to all the cars. He was a bit sceptical at first...

...but caught on fast once the candy started coming. His first stop he got a KitKat and then was offered another KitKat at his second stop so, being the good boy he is, he offered his first KitKat in exchange and was very confused when he got to keep both. 

The confusion didn't last long as he soon figured out that he was cute enough to take whatever he wanted. By the end of the night his "Trick or Treat" was even mostly intelligible!

Soccer?

For the last three weeks, Zach has been going to soccer lessons at the local rec center. I can count on one hand the number of times he's actually kicked a ball in the class! Don't get me wrong, he loves the class, but only for the cones! His favorite thing to do is to try and stack all the cones that the other kids are using in their drills while we stand on the sidelines and urge him to kick a ball like all the other kids. He still got a long way to go before he's the next Beckham!

Shoes and Socks

I think that Zach's bizarre infatuation with shoes and socks is another expression of his main goal in life: to make it to adulthood by age three. He will do anything and everything that makes him feel like he is a grown-up, without regard for the generally accepted norms of behavior (for example, not using sweaty socks as gloves!). As a father, this is rather wonderful as it provides years worth of material to hold over his head when he actually begins to approach adulthood! Behold the latest examples of the shoes and socks fascination:

Pretty baby!

Lately in Zach's speech therapy they have worked on encouraging Zach to mimic, either sounds or actions. Zach has gotten pretty good at it! He mimics cleaning, cooking, even putting on makeup just like mommy!

Nebraska!

This summer we took a trip to Nebraska to visit Darryl's family. We were nervous about a 10 hour car trip with Zach, but we made it without bloodshed. It was nice to spend some time with Darryl's grandparents as well who were visiting from Texas.

Lookin' Good

I finally gave in and took Zach to a professional for a haircut. It's not that I don't know how to cut his hair, he just won't let me! So I took him to Cookie Cutters, which is a hair salon that caters specifically to children.

When we walked in Zach immediately went for the slide they have by the entrance. Then he got to pick a movie to watch. We went with Thomas the Tank Engine. Next he had his choice of vehicles to sit in while his hair was cut. He chose the airplane. The stylist was able to cut his hair in just 10 minutes! There were minimal tears and he walked away with a balloon and a lollypop!

With that treatment he might even look forward to his next haircut. I know I will!

Big Boy Bed

The day we left for Saint George, I converted Zach's bed to a toddler bed in hopes that being gone on vacation for a week would ease the transition to a different bed for Zach. I hear horror stories all the time at work about transitioning kids out of their cribs so we we're prepared for the worst, but it never materialized! In addition to changing the bed, we blocked the light switches and baby proofed the inside door knob so he can't get out of his room once we put him in there for the night or his nap. The first night back, we set him in his bed, told him goodnight and walked out the door. He hit the door right behind us as soon as we closed it and cried for about five minutes and then was quiet. When we went in to check on him before we went to bed, he was curled up with his blankets on his bed, sound asleep.



On Wednesday, we put him down for his nap and he didn't even fuss at all, he just played for a few minutes and again we found him in his bed asleep. He seems really happy with his bed and has yet to make a major fuss or fallen asleep anywhere but his bed!

Saint George

We packed up the car last week and headed down to Saint George for Brooke's family vacation. We left right before Zach's nap time in hope that he would take his nap in the car and be asleep for most of the drive. Of course he napped for 15 minutes and was awake for the rest of the trip. He really upset and loud the last hour or so of the trip but eventually we got there. The house we stayed in was great, it had a really nice pool and tons of space for Zach to explore.



Zach really enjoyed swimming this year and was really adventurous in the pool. He would swim with anyone and wasn't clingy at all.


He found a kitchen play-set downstairs and loved putting things in the little fridge and then moving them to the oven and then repeating that process twenty times over. He also loved climbing on the really high bar stools which made Grandma and Grandpa really nervous!



It was a fun trip but we're glad to be back in our own baby proofed home!

An apple a day...

Having hit the 24 month milestone, Zach had a date with the Doctor for his 24 month check-up. Now that we're in Salt Lake, we had to say goodbye to Doctor Savage in Provo, who has been Brooke's Doctor since she started at BYU, delivered Zach and who we've been 100% happy with as a Doctor (I'm rarely 100% happy with anything). Fortunatly, as we elected to have Zach's Hep B booster at 18 months, this was a 'no shot' visit so Zach put on his best strappy heels and was as happy as a clam to go to the Doctor.


Zach was really good and liked his new Doctor, although he wasn't thrilled about having his ears or his mouth checked out. He got a clean bill of health which he has promptly responded to by throwing up for three days straight.

We were also advised to end the crib years as he's perfectly capable of climbing out if he puts his mind to it. Zach really hasn't figured out the old rule: it's not the fall that gets you, its the sudden stop at the bottom! Our plan is to put his toddler bed together the morning we leave on vacation and he'll start sleeping in it when we get back. Hopefully, after having slept in a strange vacation house for a long weekend, he'll be in the mood for change when we get back. I'm sure that will result in another Blog post, one way or the other.

His new particulars are: 31 lb's 8 oz and 37.2 in. which are 84% and 95% respectivly. He's essentially the size of an average three year old, which we didn't really need to pay a co-pay to figure out as he's been in 3-T clothing for at least a few months!

Bathtime!

The highlight of Zach's day (every other day or so) is bathtime. He loves being in the water and loves to splash around. He's always liked to bathe except for two months last year when he went through a bath hating phase. He newest trick is to strike the George Costanza pose shown below as the water drains out to extend his bath enjoyment until the last drop is gone down the drain.


Our favorite part of the event is when he's all wrapped up in his giraffe towel, smelling like clean baby!

Birthday - Take Two

Last week's Birthday events shown below were actually a week premature because that was the best time for Brooke's family to get together, which meant we get Zach to ourselves (for better or worse) for his actual Birthday this week. We started at the Aquarium where Zach was interested in everything except the fish. The most interest he showed in fish, were the ones on the desktop of the computer station!


After about 35 minutes, Zach decided he was done with walking around and spent the next 10 minutes trying to climb into every stroller he could find, much to the chagrin of their respective owners.

After carrying him kicking and screaming to car (he didn't want to stay, but he didn't want to leave either), and getting him home, we moved on the the messy portion of the program. Brooke made him that great cake you see below last week, so we went with a simple cupcake this week with equally happy results from Zach. He was in piggy heaven as he got to not only eat the cupcake, but even better, he got to hold the cupcake himself!

Cake?

So, after the zoo we headed home to eat birthday cake. Now, last year Zach had birthday cake on three separate occasions. Each time he would look at the cake, poke it, then be disgusted by the sticky frosting on his finger. So, for this year, we had no idea what Zach would do.

Here goes the first poke and taste.

Yum! An now an actual bite!!

Whoa! Slow down there!

Guess we like cake this year.

Birthday Animal

Today we went to the zoo to celebrate Zach's birthday.

It started out well.

Zach was interested.

Having fun with Dad.

Having fun with Mom.

But, pretty soon it was obvious that Zach was not very interested in seeing the animals. He wanted to push the stroller.

Eat snacks.

Walk up and immediately back down the same set of stairs without stopping to look at anything.


And, just mostly looking cool in his new sunglasses.

Oh well, he seemed to have fun. And who knows, maybe next year he'll even care about the animals!

Daddy's Shoes

We've moved and Zach is enjoying all the extra space. He now has access to our coat closet and we often find him clomping around in our shoes!

Discovery

We took Zach to the Discovery Gateway Children's Museum. He had so much fun! He played the huge xylophone, splashed in water, put together puzzles, and saw a real helicopter.

All-Star

Zach has outgrown another pair of shoes.

Here are his brand new Converse All-Stars! His first pair of lace-up shoes!

Too Cool

Last summer Zach refused to wear his sunglasses eventhough they were so cute. Looks like he might be ready for the cool crowd now!

Breakfast of Champions

This morning Zach refused all of his normal breakfast favorites. In desparation I offered him more of the garlic-rosemary bread he had gobbled up last night. He wouldn't even eat that! So, Zach likes to eat some weird things. So I dipped the bread in balsamic vinegar (hey, I like it!). He still wouldn't touch it. But, some vinegar got on his Cheerios. He ate them . . . and loved them! Balsamic vinegar Cheerios have comprised breakfast, lunch, and dinner today. Yummy!