New Page

I was told the other day that I need a place to put down some of the cute and funny things my kids say, because I won't remember when they are older.  What a better place to do this than my family blog.  This way I have them down and can look back at them.  So, I created a new page (tab on the top of the blog).  If you wish you can check it out from time to time to see them.  If not that is okay too.   I wanted to point this out mainly to family and close friends that are interested in funny things that specifically my children say.

A Walk in the Woods and more

Joel had off on Saturday.  It is absolutely wonderful when he has a day off, I especially like days off where we really don't have to travel anywhere.  We were both able to sleep in until 8:00am.  Kyper did wake up at 7:30, but we just turned a cartoon on for him and got him an easy breakfast and headed back to bed for a half hour.

Have I bragged about my baby, yet.  No, okay then I will.  (Skip ahead if you could care less.)  She seriously slept through the night on day one.  (I count 4/5 hours stretches through the night at the beginning.)  Well, she has now gotten into the routine of bedtime between 7 and 8 and sleeps until 8 on most days.    She is 75% for height and 50% for weight at about 14 lbs.  She is a very calm baby for the most part and has just recently started really giggling. I love that sound.  Besides a little heartbeat, giggle of a baby has to be one of the best sounds ever.  I don't care who you are, mom or not, dad or not, the giggling of a baby has to make your heart melt just a little. :)  She is a super star nurser, which is a much better experience the 2nd time around. (In my humble opinion it is because I am way less stressed this time and she was able to start way sooner after delivery than Kyper did.)  I'll leave that subject at that.  We just started her on rice cereal and are now increasing it to 2 meals a day and in a few more weeks she will probably get it in the morning as well and get her first taste of fruits and vegetables.

Now, I feel like I maybe should give an update on Kyper too. (again, skip ahead if you could care less, I know sometimes mommy blogs are boring to those not related.)   He is growing up before my eyes.  He now goes to Children's worship during church and Story Hour on Wednesdays during Coffee Break, not nursery which is just free play.  He is getting used to the structure and I hear from the teachers that he does really well, although dropping him off is sometimes another story.  He is going through a little clingy phase--at least I hope it is a phase.  (Joel and I may be doomed though, we were both homebodies.) Once he is there he has fun and he tells me about it afterward.  He actually memorized his first bible verse this week. ("In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" Genesis 1:1)  Now, if he can get over his shyness and say it to the teacher.  They sing Bible songs, but Kyper tells me he just listens.  Although, I'll hear him singing when we are home.  He is almost potty trained--any advice on how to get a 3 year old over the fear of pooping on the potty?  (Again, that is all I'll say on that subject.)  He had a well child check up a few months ago and it is the first time I don't remember him crying at the doctor's...he was so brave and didn't even cry when he got poked.

Ok, I got a little sidetracked.  Like I said, Joel had off yesterday.  He ran errands with Kyper in the morning and did some stuff on the honey-do list (to be fair, he puts things on the honey-do list too.) We also had some time to take the kids for a walk.  We live in the city and there aren't many wooded paths, but Joel found a short one in between two shopping areas that is only like 2 minutes from our house.  So, we took the van and parked by a coney island.  We had taken Kyper's bike along, so he could bike.  It was so great.

3 Phillips strolling through the woods, can you believe this is just 2 minutes from our house and in between two busy shopping areas?!

I do not normally like pictures of myself, but I like this one.  A) I have lost some weight B) I have a cute new haircut that only takes me 5 minutes to do)

Picking some wildflowers

We got a ways ahead daddy aka of the photographer, so I told Kyper to hide behind the tree and shout boo when dad passed.  He didn't quite get the hidden part.

Anja and the wildflowers Kyper and I picked.

Kyper and the ducks.  Those ducks were big and well-fed probably by humans due to the fact we could get quite close...

Just not too close

The wildflowers I picked and the leaves Kyper picked plus his pumpkin.

Our day ended on a good note too--with our small group.  What a great Saturday! 

Now, I am trying to enjoy a relaxing Sunday.  (It was a little crazy at church since our small group was in charge of cookies and coffee), but now both kids are napping and I have some peace.  Joel is at work.  I also get to go to ALIVE (our church's middle school group) tonight, so that will be fun.

Happy Campers!

The campsite

Happy campers

Joel set up the tent in the backyard.  It took a few days, but he finally got a day off, so he and Kyper camped in our backyard.  We even had a campfire.  Kyper was so excited!  He actually went to bed super well in the tent--maybe we should set it up in his room and it will solve all our bedtime drama?  ha.

Recent Happenings

Joel has been rotating through the Neuro ICU.  Most months when Joel has short call during the week, which means that wen he is on-call on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday, he is only at work until 9:00pm and then can come home.  If he is on-call Friday or Saturday, he is on-call overnight.  That is super nice, because it means I will get to see him every week day even on call days.  The reason they do this, is due to how they organize nights.  Joel will have to do four weeks (2-2 week blocks) on night-shift this coming year.  All that to say, Neuro ICU is a little different--he is on-call overnight every 4 to 5 days.  I have to day, I don't like not having him home to help with bedtime, but it is pretty nice to have him around early afternoon.  He is normally able to sleep at the hospital for a few hours when he is on-call, so he only sleeps a few hours in the morning/early afternoon.  Since, this means he has been around some weekday afternoons we have had the opportunity to do some fun things with the kids.

First up, the zoo.  This trip we took Kyper' best friend, Frank, along.  The kids had a lot of fun.

Frank and Kyper popping up in the Prairie Dog exhibit.

Kyper talking to a prairie dog

Posing with the turtle statue after seeing all the reptiles.

Watching the gorillas

The polar bear swam while we were there!

Second up, the village.  There isn't to much to say about the Village.  We rode the train and the carousal.  We also watched the glass blowers make a glass bowl.

Anja and I

Kyper and Daddy

 Another fun thing we did was go to Eastern Market.  We did this on a Saturday when Joel had off and my parents came out to visit for the weekend.  We have lived in Detroit for a total of 6 years and just did this.  I think we will go back; it was fun.

Kyper and the big pumpkin

Kyper and Grandpa Herk

Clean House and Cuteness

I had a huge work project at the end of August, so I was at the project site for 5 days straight for about 11-12 hours the majority of those days.  And, well Joel is a 2nd year neuro resident, so he has crazy hours too.  Needless to say, our house was a disaster.  I was home this past week, so I motivated myself (and Joel helped when he was home) to clean!  Our entire house from basement up is now clean.  I know it won't stay that way with two little ones in the house, but man it feels so good.  Kyper helped us clean too--he helped spray the windex on the windows, he loves to help put the "bubbles" in the dishwasher and washing machine, and he loves to wash the table.

As we were cleaning our upstairs, I realized I had never posted pictures to show my readers our office space and bedroom.  (I know--only over a year late.)  So, here you go:

Office Area--we love the built in shelving. The door leads to some attic space (we have a little attic on each side of the room).

Bedroom--the verse above our bed is "He will quiet you with his love" Zeph. 3:17

Dresser

Closet

To end, I just needed to post this...isn't she the cutest?!

Playing

Labor Day Swim

We found something cool at the lake today.  Listen to the narrative as we let "Snapper" go.

PS: Aren and JP, "I caught a turtle once."

Young

So a few weeks ago, I had a free weekend, and it happened to be the last weekend of the annual 2 week trip to Young State Park in Boyne City.  My family has been camping there for close to 25 years; this is the first year our small Phillips family of 4 could make it.  The last time Julie and I spent the night up there was 2007, and there were no kids.  It was our last vacation before plunging into medical school.  We had circumnavigated Lake Michigan, and this was our southern leg heading back towards Iowa.

 This time around, we had 2 kids.  I have been wanting to introduce Kyper to this tradition since he was born, but we could never get away.  Now, both kids have experienced Young and both are great campers (I think its genetic).

We left after work Friday afternoon, and drove through traffic, then through rain all the way up.  It took us 6 hours to get there, but that was because of when we left.  Its always a bad idea to leave Detroit on a Friday night to go up north; everybody else is doing the same thing.  We had sent a tent up with my parents, so when we got there, they had it already set up.  I can't imagine trying to set up a tent in the dark at 11PM with 2 small, tired children.  That pre-planning really helped.  

My parents recently bought the Camping Van--a full size sprinter van converted into a camper, complete with all the amenities--after finally getting rid of our 30 year old pop-up camper.  This became our base for the weekend.  It is so nice to have a potty right on the site, when you have a three year old.  All four of us slept comfortably in the tent with no major issues.  The first morning, Anja woke Kyper up at 5, so I took them both down to the water and we were swimming by 6AM. What a true Phillips, you can never start the beach day too soon!

David and Cara were camping with their parents that weekend as well.  Cara is a great friend from my church growing up, and her family had been doing Young for several years as well.  They had their three kids up; Kyper enjoyed playing in the sand with Zeke and Lex.  Caedence is only 9 months old, and was pulling herself up on everything.  Maybe she will be good friends with Anja some day.

David and Cara, among other things, have gotten into photography.  They typically do senior pictures and weddings.  When I heard they were coming up for the weekend, I asked for a short session on the beach, so we could finally get some professional pictures of Anja, and Kyper had not had any recent photo session either.  They were happy to oblige.  Julie insisted on family pictures as well; they turned out amazing.  We got some pictures with blue water in the background, others in the dunes among the beach cherry, and some great ones in the cedars.  You should check their website out at awakenedimages.blogspot.com.  Julie may post some of our session later on.

I got a great sail in with my mom on Saturday afternoon.  The wind was nice and steady, and the waves were just perfect, a few becoming white caps.  Mom enjoyed getting out on the water, since Dad had the boat most of the week, taking as many people out on the water as he could.  Julie and I had some good Kayak rides, with of course diving off the kayak into the crystal blue waters of the north.  

There was a great sunset, and Kyper got to get ice cream from the general store--that was the highlight of his day.  He got "plain chocolate".  The campfire was great, but nothing like we remembered from growing up.  In years past, there had been enough people camping together that there would be an adult fire and a kids fire...typically 20 adults and 30 kids.  The adults traditionally tended to be the louder group.  Probably because us Phillips boys kept the kids fire busy with our pyrotechnic displays (burning milk jugs, nondairy creamer, heating up rocks to boil water...).  So the fire this year was quite subdued.  There were only 7 others...my mom and our friends' parents from church.  It didn't matter anyway; we were in bed by 10:30--completely exhausted from playing with the kids all day.

Going to bed early meant we missed another great Young tradition.  That is, watching the meteor shower on the beach.  This tradition usually involves being real quiet, so the rangers don't find you and kick you off.  Julie got to see some pretty neat stars when she woke up in the middle of the night, though.  Our sleep was definitely more important at that point.  Maybe next year.

On Sunday, Dad and I had a great sail.  Good, steady wind, and whitecaps.  It was wilder than the sail on Saturday with Mom.  Unfortunately, this was the sail to the the boat launch, traditionally, the saddest sail of the year, as we have to say good-bye to Lake Charlevoix.  We were sailing great, on an awesome tack over towards the launch.  The color of the water changed as we sailed over to the shallow side of the drop off.  I warned Dad to watch the centerboard.  It was a good thing we were watching that.  It popped up and we were in 6 inches of water!  We ran out of lake before we were done sailing.  We ended up having to walk it in from the launch.  Oh well, it was fun while it lasted.

We got the kids packed, and drove home.  It took a lot less time to get there, as people stagger their times to get back from up north on Sundays.  Anyway, here are a few of the pictures from the short weekend.  Maybe next year we will take a whole week.