Lions Go ROAR!!

So what do Kasia and I do when the temperature in mid-January gets into the upper 60’s? Why, we go to the zoo of course. After all, we did pay for a membership and it would just be folly for us to let it sit around and go to waste.
This trip was slightly different than all our others. We were making our rounds down to the zebra (after having to tear her away from the big water globe that’s at the entrance) when I spotted something off in the distance. It was a lion. An awake lion. Then I saw another one. Two awake lions?! Amazing. I told Kasia the elephants had to wait because if we didn’t go immediately, we’d never see this again as long as we lived. I’m not sure she appreciated the gravity of the situation.
By the time we got over to the viewing area, we became witness to four awake lions. The Norfolk Zoo was blessed in October to have two lion cubs be born. Now they are letting the little ones out and run around the exhibit for all to see. Kids being kids, they are very exciting and full of energy, and this means that neither mom or dad is allowed to sleep. Much of the time we were watching them, all we saw was the kids getting into trouble and mom having to chase them down.
After watching all the excitement for a few minutes, things began to calm down and the four lions all found comfortable places to rest and eventually fall asleep.
To see the lions in action, or the elephants, visit the Virginia Zoo’s animal cam here and see what’s going on with the little guys.

Merry Christmas: Part Two

After months of waiting, Christmas morning finally arrived. At last, I was able to leap into the pile of presents and swim through them like Scrooge McDuck in his money bin. The only problem was that all the presents these days are for the kids. That’s what really stinks about growing up. Your Christmas gifts get to be fewer and fewer, and when you shake a wrapped book, it makes no noise.
By the time the Southern Branch of the Gruetzmacher family awoke, everyone else was already downstairs opening their stockings (which were in fact hung by the chimney with care). It was awesome, or so Alex told me. Santa came. He left presents and ate the cookies which my mother was so kind to leave out since the kids forgot to.
Kasia was apprehensive about opening her stocking at first. I’d pull something out for her, and she’d put it right back in. After a little cajoling, she finally got the idea that the toys inside were for her and it was ok if she wanted to take them out and play.
The rest of the opening of the gifts went much the same way. Everyone had their own strategy for opening presents. Alex tore them open as fast as he could get a hold of them. Noah opened them whenever he was given a new one. Kasia opened one, and didn’t want another one until she had satisfactorily played with the toy she had just opened. And Rick, he just kind of hid all of his presents so that when everyone else was done, he could feel special by having a ton of unopened gifts.
All in all, everyone had a great time.
The friday after Christmas gave us a special treat. It snowed. Oh my, however did it snow. Finally we were in a winter wonderland as this mini-blizzard came pouring down upon us. Kara and I went out to do some quick shopping, and we had a great time having a snowball fight out in the parking lot. It was that amazingly great snow that sticks well and is perfect for snowball fights.
The next day, we went up to Milwaukee, where they got even more snow than we did. For the first time in, well, maybe forever, the grandchildren of Ray Schumacher all got together under one roof. That alone is worthy of a party.
We decided to head back home on January 30th because we didn’t want to be driving on New Year’s Eve. The drive was very uneventful, until we got to Pennsylvania. Somewhere in the mountains we ran into a blizzard. So there we were, driving in a blizzard in the mountains in the middle of the night. The weather could not have gotten any worse. When we couldn’t see the road because of the blizzard, it was the fog or the rain. Whatever it was, there was something trying to keep us from getting home.
But we did get home. It took 16 hours, but we got home. We managed to sleep for a few hours, and then when we woke up, we brought Kasia over to her Granny’s house to spend the night. Kara and I spent New Year’s Eve at home, and we caught up on our sleep. It was the best possible way to start off 2008.

Merry Christmas: Part 1

It’s hard to believe that the holidays are over. As I keep putting away our Christmas decorations, it seems to me like it was only last week when we were pulling them out and putting them up. Maybe this is why people are beginning to put up Christmas decorations in October.
Our Christmas was wonderful. We drove up to Chicago to see my family and hopefully see some snow. We got snow as soon as we hit West Virginia. It was only a light dusting, but it was everywhere. The trees were coated in a glaze of white, and with the mountains in the background, it made for a very picturesque drive. The rest of the drive was very uneventful. Though we could have driven straight through, we decided to stop for the night just outside of Indianapolis. I know, I know, we’re getting old, right? I mean, we can’t even make a simple 16 hour drive anymore? Well, our thinking was that if we drove all the way through, we wouldn’t have gotten to my parents’ house until after one in the morning. With Kasia having been asleep for awhile, she would been wired and awake once we got there and wouldn’t want to go down. Then by the time we did get her to go to sleep, Alex and Noah would be waking up. So instead of just ruining everyone’s Saturday, we decided to suck it up and get a hotel for the night. As it was, it still took us awhile to get Kasia to sleep. And besides, I was feeling a little unintelligent that day, and so I needed to stay at a Holiday Inn Express to recharge my brain.
Once in Chicago, we were greeted by a lot less snow than we were expecting, but a lot more enthusiasm from Alex and Noah than we had anticipated. Apparently they had foregone their naps because they were just too excited about Kasia coming. It was nice to be surrounded by family that we don’t get to see very often during the holiday season. The weather outside was frigid, and snow was in the forecast. Christmas was coming.
On Sunday we got a special surprise from Santa Claus. Kasia was having a hard time taking a nap, so she was rather tired and grumpy when he came by (how dare Santa interrupt her nap?!). She eventually got over it and learned to enjoy her My Little Pony toy that Santa had for her. In a surprise move, Santa also had gifts for all us big kids too. The guys received little bottles of good booze the girls got... well, stuff that wasn’t as nice. Santa knows. Bro’s before... well, you know the saying.
Christmas Eve was a rather mellow day. We were going to Church in the late afternoon, but aside from that, there was nothing planned. It was really nice. At church, I was amazed at how long Kasia made it through the service before we had to run off to the nursery and have her run it off. It was nice, because in the nursery, I bumped into an old friend of mine whom I hadn’t seen since high school. I’m sure glad that he remembered me, because he had changed so much that I didn’t even recognize him anymore.
On Christmas Eve, we played a game that I think was designed by my mother. It was rolling dice for presents. She had a bunch of wrapped presents, some really nice, some not, and they were the prizes for a dice rolling game. If you roll doubles, you get to pick a present. You can pick from the pile, or you can steal somebody else’s. Then after all the gifts are gone, and the time limit expires, you open whatever gifts you have left. Alex really dominated this game and in the end, everyone came out with the appropriate gifts. I’d like to tip my had to Kara, who won the grand prize, which was a gift card to Barnes and Noble. I had quite a collection of gifts to open, until a last minute rally by my opponents saw them all taken from me. I never told anyone, but I cried for hours that night because I lost all those gifts.

Making Christmas Plans

Christmas is soon approaching and there’s almost no chocolate left in the Countdown To Christmas Calendar. I never thought I’d hear myself say this, but I think we need to celebrate Christmas like they do in Puerto Rico. We just party all the way until January 6th. Then, just for laughs, we tack on an extra eight days of Christmas just so we can have an excuse to keep the festive spirit alive. It would also put off having to take down the tree and lights.
As the week comes to a close, we’re prepping for our big journey up to snow country. The thought of spending 18 hours in the car is not an especially pleasant one, but fortunately the ends justify the means. It’ll be great to have the whole family together for Christmas, and hopefully there will be plenty of snow for all of us kids to go and play in. Kasia has her snow suit and she’s just dying to try it on... and God knows that she won’t be using it around here anytime soon.
And speaking of Christmas in the great state of North Carolina, and I highly recommend the Christmas ballad “Christmas in Carolina” by the Squirrel Nut Zippers. It’s just the thing to help swing in the holiday season.

Merry Christmas!

Wow, has it really been a whole month since the last time I wrote in my journal? Where does the time go. In that time we went to the Outerbanks for the twins’ birthday party. We celebrated Thanksgiving. We decorated for Christmas. And we painted our guest room to a color other than blue. Yep, a lot sure has happened.
Going down to Salvo to visit Karlie, Bryan and the girls was a great time as always. I really love their house. I’ve always said, if you can’t stand a house with solid construction, built out of quality material, then you’ll probably hate their place. Everything in that house just feels so solid that it makes me feel like my house is going to blow away is a strong wind comes through. We’d like to thank the Philips’ clan for having us and giving us such a wonderful time. The highlight of the trip: Brad ate seafood. I keep trying to tell people that it’s not that I haven’t tried it, but I just don’t care for it. I ate some smoked wahu that Bryan was cooking up, and it was ok. At first it was pretty good with a nice smokey flavor, but then the fishy taste comes out and that’s what I didn’t care for.
Thanksgiving was also another wonderful feast. Kay and Mama Bea had us all up to their place where we feasted on turkey and stuffing and sweet potato casserole. I was particularly proud of myself for not over doing it and actually leaving room for dessert. Normally I just get so stuffed on turkey that I skip the dessert part. We then went to visit Judy and Darrell for dessert and they had a first class spread of sweets. Judy did not hold back in her pie baking and they were all tremendously delicious. I have to admit though that I did stuff myself on dessert.
The day after Thanksgiving was spent putting up Christmas decorations. This year it was a lot easier for us to fit our 9’ tall tree into our house since our ceilings go well about 9’. We didn’t have to do the engineering miracles from last year just to get our tree to fit. We also put up some of the Christmas villages that Kara had. Though, since we have a toddler running around the house, the places where we could put them were somewhat limited.
Now we’re getting ready for Christmas, but I’ve got to tell you that it’s hard to get into the Christmas spirit when it’s 75 degrees outside. I find it strange to be wearing shorts and tapping my sandals as I’m singing Let It Snow. Fortunately, for Christmas we will be heading up to Chicago and hopefully they will still have some of the snow that they are currently blessed with. If you pray at night, please keep us in your thoughts and pray that we get snow for Christmas. Kasia would really love it. It has nothing to do with Kara or I wanting snow, but it’s all for Kasia. That’s the kind of selfless parents we are.
Oh, and we did get our guest room painted. It’s now a color called “Peanut Butter.” That’s kind of the fancy name for brown. It looks really good though, and once we get everything cleaned up in there, I’ll post some pictures.
Merry Christmas and a have a happy New Year!

At Trip to the Zoo

We are definitely getting our money’s worth out of our zoo membership that we got back in August. Already it has more than paid for itself, and Kasia is becoming an expert in identifying all the animals. She has gotten so into the zoo state of mind, that often she is found saying things like, “Where’s the lion? Are you sure there’s a lion in there? Because I can’t see anything.” Ahhh, how I yearn for the old days at the zoo where it was just an animal in a cage. You didn’t have to spend 20 minutes searching the “natural habitat” only to realize that the animal you’re looking for is actually asleep under a log and all you can see is the tail. But I digress.
November 4 was the Kylie and Kinzlie Philips’ second birthday, and as a special birthday treat, the whole family made a trip to the zoo. And since everyone knows how much Kasia and I enjoy going, we were invited along for the ride. It was fun just to watch all the girls play together and have a great time. The trip ended on a climatic note as all the girls went completely crazy all at the same time outside the monkey cage. You can see it for yourself in the “Movie” section of the website

Backyardigan Addiction Revealed

Kasia was never one for watching much television. She would occasionally sit down long enough to watch ten minutes of the Lord of the Rings, but other than that she had better things to. That was until her Granny introduced her to the Backyardigans.
Suddenly, she’s mesmerized by the TV. She can’t get enough of it. In the mornings, she’ll sit on the couch, clutching her Backyardigans DVD while screaming until we turn it on. But what is it about the Backyardigans? Was it the colorful characters? The catchy songs? The fun little dances? Maybe it was a combination of all three.
Or so we thought, until Kara observed something in the end credits. Who is that doing lighting? Kasia Cieryt? Did our daughter know that another girl shares her name was working on the show? Possibly.
So now she knows that while her name be different than a lot of others, it’s not like we just made it up. There are Kasias out there... the challenge is trying to find them.