This morning, as we were all waking up and I'm heading out the door to work, the kids hear the Garbage truck approaching outside. For some reason, Ryder has been enthralled by the Garbage truck from the 1st day he saw one.

Anyway, our neighborhood has 2 different Garbage service providers: AAA and American.

So, this morning the American truck comes by and the kids rush to the window to watch. Zoe notices that the truck didn't stop at our house and asked why? Kia says something to the affect of "that company doesn't do our garbage, another company does". To which Zoe responds with confusion because she reads the huge writing on the truck "AMERICAN": "But, we're American".

Both Kia and I laugh out loud and Zoe is still staring out the window at the truck pondering why mommy and daddy laughed at such a simple comment.

Zoe came home from school singing Firework by Katy Perry.

Ryder is now monitoring "bad words". If he hears us using a bad word he says "why you say that bad word Daddy?".

I'm hanging with Ryder outside and I ask him: "where is your football?" He responds: "uh, I don't know, maybe its upstairs". His vocab/grammar is improving!

For the past few months, i've been singing "Raspberry Beret" to Ryder before bed time. I did the same thing with Zoe when she was a baby.

With Zoe, when I finally got around to playing the actual song on the radio, she got this huge smile on her face because she recognized the song. If i'm not mistaken, there is video on this blog of her singing the song.

Anyway, today when I picked Ryder up from daycare, I played the song for him to see if he'd recognize it... When I started playing the song, he started dancing (as he always does) and then when the lyrics kicked in, it took a few bars for him to recognize it, but when he did, he started singing along! It was awesome. He says "outdoor, outdoor!" And of course the chorus, "Raspberry Beret"

Very cute moment.

Current Events:
Last night, President Obama announced that Osama Bin Laden was killed by US Navy Seals:



Link to News Article



To Zoe and Ryder,

The magnitude of this announcement brings me back to the events of 9/11. You two weren’t even a “twinkle in our eyes”. One day, you guys may wonder where mom and dad were and what was our reaction to the events of 9/11.

So, I’m going to tell you here:

We were not yet married, in fact our wedding was 11 days later on Sept. 22nd. We lived in the lower level of this house
on Alma Place in Oakland, CA. I was 29 and mommy was 28. Mommy was a high-powered prosecutor for the San Francisco District Attorneys office. I had recently gotten a new job with an Engineering Company named MACTEC in Oakland, CA. I think I had been there only a few weeks. So, Sept 11th 2001 was a regular work day, just like any. Your mom and I were asleep. At around 5:30am, I was woken up by a phone call from Uncle Rob. All he said was “Turn on the news”. I said OK and hung up, knowing that something pretty big must have happened… So I turned on the news and saw the live footage of a city building burning from the inside. Considering I just woke up, it took me some time to make sense out of what I was seeing. Smoke coming from inside of one of the World Trade Center buildings. Reading the scroll, I saw the word “airplane” I thought, “wow, looks like a small plane must have accidentally flown into the World Trade Center”. Then I listened to the reporting and understood that this was no small plane, nor was it an accident. I woke your mother up.

We watched together as another airplane flew into the 2nd tower. I think my reaction was something to the affect of: “Holy f’n s$#T”. I remember my heart was pounding! We continued to watch the news footage as at this point it was impossible to take your eyes off of the TV (it would stay that way for days to come). So, we’re thinking, man, those poor people. I remember wondering how in the hell they would fix the damage done to the buildings. That concern became moot as your mom and I watched in shock and disturbed awe the 2 World Trade Center buildings collapse, killing over 3000 people and setting off a string of events that would lead to 2 wars, hundreds of thousands of lives lost and a 10 year hunt for Osama Bin Laden.

Writing this and remember back actually gives me a lump in my throat. It was a very emotional time. It was also frustrating as you wanted to “do something” but there really was nothing that you could do. I remember thinking that were I in New York, I’d go help with the clean-up / recovery effort. But I was in California, so that wasn’t really an option. In hindsight, many of the 1st responders to the World Trade Center disaster are now suffering physical ailments related to their time spent around “Ground Zero”.

That is pretty much it, in a nutshell. Hopefully, by the time you guys are old enough to read and understand this, terrorism will be a thing of the past and the American economy and job market are once again flourishing…

Last Friday, my job had a "Bring your child to work" Day. I decided I'd take Zoe.
It turned out to be a really good day and she had a lot of fun.

She took the bus and metro in with me.

She met "The Crime Dog" McGruff:

She got to see and pet a drug sniffing dog... no pics of this. However during the drug sniffing dog exhibit, my colleagues daughter, Raven, took Zoe under her wing and they were inseparable for the rest of the day. Raven is super sweet and loved Zoe to death. She is now Zoes hero:


Here is Zoe at my desk:

Prior to Easter, Zoe wanted to get her hair straightened. Here is the sequence of pics:





And, finally, the finished product:



The day before Easter, we took the kids to see the Easter Bunny @ Tysons Corner. Here is their picture:

On Easter, Kia made brunch (with Mimosas) and Grandma and Grandpa came over to watch the kids do their Easter Egg Hunt. Good times were had...

So... Mama is out of town partying it up with Auntie TT and Auntie Andrea.

Its just me and the kids.

WE LOVE AND MISS YOU MAMA!!!

Here is a video for mama:

Getting kids ready for bed tonight; Zoe gets mad @ me and screams "I'm not your princess anymore!". 20 min later Ryder screams @ me "I'm not your friend!". Ugh.

Last night, we took Zoe out to a special dinner with just Mommy and Daddy.

The occasion was to celebrate the fact that she no longer uses/needs PullUps!

Kia told her a while back that if she can go 5 straight days without peeing in her pullup that we'd take her out to dinner.

So, congrats sweetheart! We are super proud of you.

Here are a few pics:


Thanks to Uncle Ray and Aunt Leah for watching Ryder while we were out. He had a blast as well.

When we get in the car, Ryder insists on buckling his own seat belt.

Ryder likes to give hugs when I leave for work and before bed. He says: "big squeeze. Big squeeze yellow" which means "other side".

Ryder likes to give hugs when I leave for work and before bed. He says: "big squeeze. Big squeeze yellow" which means "other side".

This past Sunday, Ryder and Zoe were playing in Zoes room. Ryder got ahold of Zoes hairspray bottle and proceeded to spray it all over the floor. Because of the product included, it was extra slippery.
So, Zoe goes running across the floor and slips on the slick area and falls and lands on her princess tiara. It poked her pretty badly in the back. She let out a blood curdling scream. Both Kia and I sprinted up to see what happened.

She was fine, for the most part. She just has a pretty bad bruise on her back. It scared Kia and I half to friggin death. Somehow in my panic, on the way up the stairs, I managed to rip the skin off of the tip of my middle finger.

Our nerves were shot for the rest of the day.

Ryders speaking is improving immensely. We can actually have mini-coversations. This is a poor example but I find it very cute: I'll ask "why did u do that?" And he'll say "because".

Kids in tub playing with soap. I tell them not to eat it : Zoe asks me if I ever ate soap as a kid. I say yes. She says, "For real? What did it taste like?"

So... today was Ryders 2nd Birthday. Because its been a hectic week, we didn't have time to plan anything, so we just had a mini-celebration. He had ice cream cake; which Zoe picked out.

We got him some helium balloons (which are his favorite things ever) and a fire engine truck. Zoe had a small fit of jealousy because Ryder was getting all the attention and we wouldn't let her play with Ryders truck.

Here is a photo representation of the meltdown (Notice Ryder in the background not giving a crap):




Anyway, I can't believe that he's 2. On the 1 hand it seems like its been 5 years since he was born; that's most likely due to how much we've been through in the past 2 years... On the other hand, him turning 2 is bittersweet. He's not our baby anymore, but now a big boy. Being a parent is a constant emotional struggle between wanting your kids to develop and grow up and trying to hold on to those precious moments when they are babies.

Here are pictures of Zoe at two and Ryder at two:

Well... its been a wild ride... Its been 2 years to the day that little man (Ryder) was born.

Here is his last "Monthly" photo (even though I've missed the last couple months.

Happy Birthday Ryder James Birdsong. We love you sooo much: