The Lost Christmas Photo

I finally have the cutest picture of Dax and his Papa in the blizzard on Christmas Day building their snowman.

Funny Dax

Dax is such a funny little guy. At the dinner table this past week he got a head start on his dinner before we said a blessing. So when it was time to pray Rene told him jokingly that he should keep his mouth open so we could bless the food that he had already eaten. I barely made it through the prayer without laughing because Dax had kept his mouth wide open from the start to the amen.
Another funny thing that happened this past week and it just made my day. I put Riley down for her morning nap, and told Dax to be good and quiet so Riley doesn't wake up. Well, a while later I got out of the shower and heard Riley giggling and nothing from Dax. I walk into the kid's room, and it was like a white cloud in there. I could only see Riley standing up in her crib and bouncing up and down, and laughing. Her skin and hair was so white. Then I saw Dax sitting down in her crib with the big bottle of baby powder. He had shaken about half the bottle of powder all over her and rubbed it into her hair. Then he said the cutest thing, "I am making her so beautiful," as he rubbed her head and a puff of white powder floated up into the air. Days like that one just make it so easy to remember how funny and innocent litte children are.

Stand Up like a Big Girl

I don't have a picture for this yet, but Riley is starting to stand up all by herself. She has not taken any steps yet, but I'm sure that she will get to that soon. Instead, she stands up and balances there for a while, then raised both arms in the air and does a body slam on the floor. It is the cutest, yet scariest thing in the world. Every time she does this I worry that she will not catch herself and just nose-plant it right onto the hard wood floor. Well, I guess if she does do that she will learn. I will try to get a video or something to show everyone what I am talking about.

Moving back to Cedar

These are pictures of Dax and Riley playing out in the snow in Delta right before we moved to Cedar.
On January 9th, we moved our family back to Cedar City. We were just getting accustomed to and liking Delta, when we found out that we were going to move back to Cedar. We always knew that Delta was just a stepping stone for us, and that we would not be there for too long, but we never thought that we would move out after just a year. I had so much fun coaching volleyball and getting to know so many people in the town. I also found a great group of women that I would run with training for the St. George Half Marathon. One of my best friends, Shannon and I, would go on our long runs on Fridays in the very early mornings sometimes at 5:00 am. She would drive from Deseret into Delta and we would go run around Delta, mostly on the 40 acre farm roads. I remember one of the first long runs that I went on with her I had no idea of how cold it was going to be so I just wore Jeremy's snowboarding pants and a ton of layers. I finished the ten miles and vowed never to wear those pants again. Another run we went on was about -8 or -9 degrees, and my eyelashes froze, and every time I blinked they stuck together. Even in the cold, I still had fun.
After we moved to our second home in Delta, and finished out the volleyball season, I finished unpacking our boxes and got the rest of the pictures on the wall. Then about two months later at the beginning of December we recieved an email saying that our landlords were needing to move back to their home that we were renting, and that we needed to find another place to live. We were a bit stressed out, but three days later Jeremy's boss called and told him that they were going to move us back to Cedar City. So all in all everything worked out just fine. We are staying with Rene and Teresa until we find a place to buy. They are so great, and so patient with us. Dax and Riley really like living here with them too. We are excited to be back in Cedar. We love the town, and we love being so close to McCall, Jared, and Ryan. We hope to play a lot with them.

Christmas 2008

Christmas was so much fun this year. Our little family packed our bags and Santa's bag, and got in the Pathfinder and drove to Salt Lake on Christmas Eve. We made it just in time to go bowling with my whole family and Justin and John Park. Dax did quite well, taking turns with Jeremy and I. His attention span was stunted by all of the shiny and flashing lights of the arcade room on the other end of the building. He kept darting down to drive the race car game. I think that he has become too comfortable going off by himself here in Delta. I don't worry too much about him when we go out somewhere here, but when he takes off by himself in stores, or bowling alleys in this case, I do get more stressed. When we move to Cedar next week I will have to teach him a bit better to stay close.
For the first time in a long time I have not gotten sick on Christmas Eve. I always find myself hugging the toilet seat around the holidays. Jeremy thinks that I get too excited about the presents, but I'm not so sure about that. As a matter of fact, everyone was healthy this year.
Dax, Grandma, Bree, Ann, and I made some sugar cookies for Santa after dinner. It was so much fun because Dax understood exactly what he had to do for Santa; leave him a plate of cookies and a carrot for his reindeer. He loved using the cutters and did a great job frosting too, but his favorite part was the sprinkles.
After Dax and Riley went to bed Jeremy and I started wrapping all the gifts from Santa. We forgot our wrapping paper, so we used the newspaper. That was okay because when I was younger Santa always ran out of wrapping paper when he got to our house, so he used the newspaper too. I bet that Dax would make a comment about it, and sure enough he said "this is not wrapping paper," but he wasn't disappointed.
Andrea was so cute with Dax on Christmas Eve. She asked him if he would want to sleep in her room for the night. She made him a little bed and let him borrow her build-a-bear tiger since he left his at home. When we were all living at home, before we got married, we would always sleep in the same room together, and sneak and take a peak at our gifts. With Dax there Andrea kept that tradition alive. She said that Dax woke up at 4:00 am asking if it was time to open presents. I was shocked when she told him no. I thought that she would have gone up with him in a heartbeat, but she told him no, and they went back to sleep.
For the first time in the Zollinger home the parents were up before the children. Jeremy and I, my Mom and Dad were up at 7:30 am, and everyone else didn't get up until 8:00 am. Dax knew exactly what presants were his because on one of them I taped a big picture of Po from Kung Fu Panda on the front of one of his gifts. He wasted no time, and didn't wait for everyone to get to the living room. Luckily, Jeremy had the video camera out, and I had my camera to catch the first gifts being opened. We had such a great time watching Dax open all of the gifts for him and for everyone else. To say the least, Santa found our family and spoiled us. Dax got some snowpants, a jacket, hat and gloves. As soon as he could he got my dad to go out into the blizzard and build a snowman, and to shovel the snow. That will always be a classic memory of mine.
After we got Dax and my Dad out of the storm we convinced Dax to take a nap and then go over to Krissy and Dave's home to see Grandma and Grandpa Andrews, and maybe open some more gifts. He was okay with that, but did not like the idea of leaving my parents. When we got to Krissy's, Jason was out in the road with a shovel, trying to dig a spot out for us to park in. What an awesome guy! We went inside, and is was Christmas all over again. Dax did not hesitate opening the gifts that Teresa kept piling in front of him. It was so fun to watch. He even helped everyone else open a few of their presents. We got spoiled, again. After a while, we helped get a delicious dinner ready for that evening. We had a great time visiting with our family, then we had to get back and try to wrestle our kids to bed because they were so wound up from all of the festivities of the day.

Dax's Birthday, and Thanksgiving

Well, a lot has happened in the past two months. Dax had his third birthday on November 1st. We celebrated down in Cedar City with the Andrews, as well as in SLC with the Zollinger family. He had a great time. He told Grandma Teresa that he wanted a monster cake, and that is just what he got. Right after he blew out the candles he licked the frosting. I thought that was so cute. Of course that is the piece that he got.
After that we celebrated Thanksgiving with the Bass side of the family in Hunting Utah. It was so much fun. I was looking foreward to running around the farm, but it was too muddy, so I ran along the highway. I loved that because I was running on hills. We have only one hill in Delta, and it is not that big, so when my wole run was on a hill I wasn't sure how to handle it. All in all, I had to work a lot harder. Thanksgiving dinner/lunch was so good I think that I ate enough, and then some more. Dax had a lot of fun playing with cousin Matt's kids, and uncle Mike's kids, and Riley just tried to stay away from Kendra, who kept whalloping on her. After spending some time in Huntington, we traveled to Cedar to spend time with Rene and Teresa, and to get some Christmas shopping done. When I had a Walmart I didn't like it much, and now that I don't have one I still don't like it, but I appreciate it a lot more. Then we went home back to Delta, and put up our Christmas tree and other decorations. Dax and Riley had a lot of fun setting everything up. I think that Dax had the most fun setting up his and Riley's very own tree in their room.
A lot more has happened since then, and I will catch up with that later when I have more time.

Beautiful Riley

Riley just turned nine months last week, but I went to get her pictures taken when she was eight months old. I got them back and now I am posting them so you can see how cute she is.

Halloween, and State VB

This year we were at my parents home in South Jordan for Halloween. I was not able to be there for all of the dress up, or trick-or-treating because I was at UVU coaching volleyball at the State Tournament. Jeremy said that Dax and Riley had a lot of fun. They went to visit their cousin Ed, who dressed up as the cutest wookiee ever. Dax was a cowboy, and Riley was a bumble bee. Dax had been looking forward to Halloween for quite some time, and didn't have to collect much of anything besides a shirt and a horse. He already had boots, Wranglers, guns and holsters, badge, and hat. You see, all of these are common items in Delta, UT for little boys. Ha Ha.

I was told Riley was missing me, and was being pretty fussy and clingy. Then Stephanie and Jordan came over, and Riley took to Steph as if she were me. We do look alike in some ways, but the resemblance must have been enough to fool Riley. Steph ended up as my impersonator for the evening, taking the kids around trick-or-treating so Jeremy could get them on camera. Thanks for the help Steph.


Here is a picture of Riley and her cousin Ryan. Two little black cats crawling all over the place.

Kokopelli Triathlon

On Sept 20th we went down to St. George to compete in the Kokopelli Triathlon. My Dad, Jeremy, and I had been training long and hard for this race. Last year I did the Summer Games triathlon, and convinced my Dad and Jeremy to do another one with me this year. It had to be later in the summer because I had to get back in shape after Riley was born.
Race morning finally came. It seemed like we had been training forever. We made sure that our bike tires were pumped up, set up our transition area, picked up our timing chips, and put on our wetsuits. Then we just waited to start. I think that was the worst part. All of the training that we did came down to this morning. There were about 800 athletes competing, so they started everyone out in different waves, Intermediate and Relay groups went first, starting at 7:50 am. Then they started the Sprint divisions after that. Around 8:00 am I gave my Dad a hug and wished him good luck. He made his way down to the dock and they started his group. Then I gave Jeremy a hug before he went down to the dock. They started his group soon after my Dad's, and then it was my turn. As I waited in the water with all of the other million pink caps, which seemed like forever, the race director said that our wave was going to be delayed because they had to pick up two men out of the water that were not going to finish the race and bring them back to the dock. The first thing that went through my mind was, "oh no, please don't let it be Jeremy or my Dad". They were both so worried about the swim leg of the race, I hoped that they didn't freeze up and not want to finish. Luckily it was some guy that dislocated his shoulder and some other guy. I was so relieved Jeremy and my Dad were out there somewhere still swimming. Then they gave us one minute heads-up before they blew the horn to start my group. We all started situating ourselves to get a place to start. Some place themselves in the very front, and some try to stay back and avoid the kicking and hitting of the swim start. I placed myself right behind the competitive ladies in the front. I knew I was not the fastest swimmer in the group, but I knew I wanted to get a good spot. They blew the horn and everyone was scrambling to get a spot to swim. People getting kicked and hit left and right just to get an edge on the other racers. I loved it. It didn't take me more than 50 m to get my own spot.
I guess Jeremy's experience was not so great. He made sure that he had a good easy spot to start with so he didn't have to fight for position. A few minutes into the swim he started to sight, or make sure that he was swimming in the right direction, and then out of no where...wham! Some guy kicked Jeremy right in the neck, just under his jaw. Jeremy was struggling for air, swallowing more water than he would like. One of the guys in a kayak noticed Jeremy struggling came over and let him hold on and recover. Jeremy held on for a few minutes just dry heaving. After a few minutes Jeremy decided that all of his hard work training all spring and summer would not be wasted, and he finished the swim. As you can see in the pictures he was elated to be done with the swim leg.
After we finished the swim we had to run up the ramp into the transition area and get ready for the bike leg of the race. I don't think that any of us had too much trouble on the bike, except for my Dad.
There were a few sharp turns on the course where there would be volunteers telling us to slow down for the turn. My Dad acknowledged the warning and thought he was going slow enough, but he still flew off of the race course...twice. Once on the way out, and once on the way back to the transition area. Both times he avoided falling and getting road rash. Good thing they decided to go with tape to block off the course instead of cement barriers.
There was one part of the bike that was tough to get through. It is almost a mile long and 6% grade. The great thing about going up a huge steep hill in an out-and-back course is that you get to go down it too. On the way down the hill I looked at my bike computer and I was cruising at over 40 mph! That was so fun, and the crazy thing about it, there were some people going faster than I was.
After we got back to the transition area, we had to get ready for the final leg of the race, the run. The race directors decided to change the run from the paved road to an off road, sandy run. We agreed that this part of the race was one of the hardest because we didn't train on sand, so our times were all a few minutes slower that what we were predicting. At the finish line, a bunch of our family were there cheering us on. For me, that helped out a lot.
We all did a great job in the race. I took 102nd out of 527 total racers, 22nd out of 235 women, and 10th out of 52 women in my age division. My total time was 1:31:12.9.
Jeremy took 201st out of 527 total racers, 139th out of 281 men, and 27th out of 59 men in his age division. Jeremy's total time was 1:40:09.6.
My Dad placed 168th out of 527 total racers, 125 out of 231 men, and 7th out of 14 in his age division. His total time was 1:37:14.5.
I hope my Dad and Jeremy were not too upset that they got beat by a girl.
After the race was all over Jeremy and I knew that we wanted to do more races next season. My Dad wanted to give himself a day or so to decide weather or not he had that much fun to do more. About a week after the race we were all talking about how much fun the race was and doing another triathlon next year.

Moving

I forgot to mention that we moved into a new home here in Delta. Good rentals are far and few between here, so when we had the opportunity to move into this nice place we jumped right on it. Some of our good friends, the Brians, told us that they were moving out to Southerland. They knew that we were trying to find some other place to live, and they asked us if we were interested in moving into their home (which is actually their brother's home). We moved between our Lake Powell trips back in August. Thanks to Rene and Teresa we were all moved in a day. Our new home is only .4 mi. from our old home, and it is so much bigger and nicer! I am grateful for our friends who are always looking out for us.

Lake Powell II

We had the opportunity to go to Lake Powell again at the end of August. We had a lot of fun. The temperatures were much cooler than the first trip, but we were not able to ski much at all. Jeremy and Jared skied once, and that was about it. Instead, we went to see the Indian ruins one day, and we went down to Iceberg Canyon for another day trip. Besides that we just hung out on the boat and in the water having fun.








Our little family had an exciting time because Dax must have caught a bug, or got food poisoning the second night. He was up all night barfing his little guts out every half hour. After that night he just was not his normal excited, go go go self. He just laid on the couch and slept all the next day. The last few days were better. He wanted to go swim, play in the sand, build a fire, and even go off of the slide. We had to call our trip off a day early so I could get back to Delta to coach. As always, all good things come to an end. We are already excited for the trip next year!

Running Millard County 5k's

This picture has nothing to do with this entry, I just like it. This summer my Dad, Jeremy and I have been training for a triathlon in Sept. As part of our training, Jeremy and I have entered into some of the local races in Millard County. Our first race was in Hinkley, where Jeremy and I both took 2nd place in our age divisions. The second race was the Millard County fair race in Delta. Jeremy took 2nd again in his age division and I won the overall women's division, and they race director said that I was only 4 seconds off from breaking the womens record. That sounds pretty cool to be the overall winner, but this race was a lot smaller than the others that we have raced in. Still, on that day I was the fastest woman in Delta, UT. The last race of the summer was Saturday in Oak City. It was all down hill out of the canyon, so Jeremy and I are still hobbling. Jeremy wasn't feeling very well, and he ran it in 24:12. That was my fastest 5K race time ever. I ran it in 23:29. I did have an advantage. I was pushing Dax and Riley in the stroller, or I should say that they were pulling me down the mountain. I did not try to hold back and slow down, I just let my legs go, and I flew down the mountain. I had a lot of fun.

Coaching Volleyball

I recently had the opportunity to take a position as an assistant volleyball coach at Delta High School. I have always wanted to coach on the High School level, and now I finally get the chance to. At first I was not sure if I could juggle work and kids, but I was assured by Deb, the head coach, that everything will work out. She has got lots of connections with a lot of girls that are more than willing to help watch Dax and Riley. So far it is going very well. Last week we had tryouts, and now we are starting practice. Next week is our first game, and I am anxious to see which team I end up coaching. I will either be with the JV, or the Freshmen. I never thought that I would ever say this, but... GO RABBITS!

Two Teeth, and Sitting Up.

Just after we got back from vacation Riley got two brand new teeth. On Sunday the 10th I was checking her gums because they had been bothering her and sure enough there were two little teeth poking through her little red gums. After they had broke through she was so much happier.
The next day on the 11th, Riley was sitting up all by herself. She does a great job of correcting herself when she starts to tip over. She has a bit of a round bottom still and tips over a little bit now and then, but she has gotten better every day.

More on Lake Powell

We had so much fun, and did so much at Lake Powell that I wasn't able to finish everything that I wanted to write about.
Everyone was able to make it except for Jared. He was was still in Minnesota for work, but we are excited to see him at the next Powell trip at the end of the month.
Dax loved hunting lizards with McCall. I think he would hunt all day with McCall if she would let him. They took water guns and sprayed the lizard when they found them. When the lizard was stunned is when they were able to grab the lizard and put it in their bucket. They found and caught a few lizards and they gave them names.
He also loved hiking with Jordan and looking for firewood with him. He was very excited about making a fire for dinner.
We had a few days of afternoon thunderstorms. We would all get out of the water and out of the rain, but Dax did not care that we were calling him inside to get out of the storm. He just stayed in the lake and enjoyed the raindrops, until he knew he was going to get into trouble.



Jeremy and I are very grateful for Dax and Riley's aunts, uncles, and grandparents. I don't know if we would have survived the trip if they were not so willing to help us watch, hold, feed, change, and play with Dax and Riley.

Lake Powell

There has been a good reason that I have not been keeping up on the blog. We have been at Lake Powell with my family. Every year in the last week of July and first part of August we all go to Lake Powell to get away from everything back at home. This year we drove down to Halls instead of parking it in Bullfrog. I think that Powell is so beautiful, I consider it my heaven here on earth.
This year was much different than those in the past. We had three little ones to look after and to keep cool. Dax was looking forward to this vacation months in advance, almost every day he would ask if it was our turn to go on Papa Mark's boat, and he was so excited when we were finally there on the lake. He did not stop for one minute for the first two days. He had no fear of the water, which is a good thing and at the same time a bad thing. On the back of the houseboat there is a water slide that has about a five foot drop to the water from the end of the slide. I thought that maybe by the end of the trip he could go off of it with us, but he asked Jeremy if he would go with him the very first day. I thought for sure he would be a little afraid or shocked when he came up, but before he could wipe his face or take another breath he said, "Let's go again!" He also tried slaloming, wake boarding, wake skating, and tubing but his favorite was jumping off of the back deck of the houseboat with his arms spread out and eyes wide, yelling, "To infinity and beyond!" Andrea found a Spiderman fishing pole and Dax imediatly took claim to it and wanted to fish every minute of that day, and the next.
I must say, it was a challenge trying to keep Riley, and her chubby cheeked cousin, Ryan cool. Almost every hour we had the two little girls in the water. The two little girls loved kicking around in their little yellow tubes, and the only place that they took a real nap was on the ski boat. Everywhere else was too hot for them to sleep. It seemed as soon as the engine started up their eyes became heavy, and were shut until everyone was done taking their turns on the skis, or wake boards.
Jeremy is getting so good on the ski. Before the trip he had been reading some tips online that would he could use to help him cut harder. I must say that those tips helped because he skied a lot harder, and he looked so good...almost as good as my Dad.
This year was my first year back that I wasn't pregnant, so I tried to wake board again. It was like riding a bike. I got up just fine, and had a fun time with it. I can't do anything awesome like McCall, so I just go out and have a good time. On the last day I decided that I needed to learn how to ski because I was the only one who didn't know how to do both, wake board and ski. I got up just fine, but I was pretty scared once I got going, I screamed a lot. I tried it again, and felt a lot better. I will keep trying to get better. I just love being out on the lake.
Well, all good things come to an end, and we had to clean up and hand the houseboat over to the next family. We were sad to go back home, but at the same time we were looking forward to the next Lake Powell trip in September.

Rollie Pollie Riley

On Saturday the 12th Riley started rolling over from her back to her tummy. Now she can practically get to whatever she wants. It is great that she is developing and learning new things, but that means she is growing up. I just hope that she doesn't grow up too fast on us.

The Ponderosas

Last weekend we went camping up by Oak City with some of our friends, the Stanworths and the Bryans, in a place called the Ponderosas. The kids had so much fun. The moment we got there Dax was digging in the dirt, and playing down by the creek with Madeline, Hyat, Anna, Seth and Ian. At first it was a challenge trying to establish boundaries for the kids. They all kept running away and getting too close to the fire or the stream, but after a while they understood what they could and couldn't do. Dax loved throwing rocks into the stream, finding sticks for the fire, and eating the camp food. Jeremy and I were so impressed with how well Dax ate while we were up there because usually when he is having so much fun he wont stop to eat anything, but he sat down with the rest of the kids and ate dinner and breakfast. One of the cutest things that he did was he and Madeline pulled their chairs over by the bank of the creek and just sat there and watched and talked. When it was time to go all of the kids were so tired and didn't want to leave. Dax and the other kids cried when we were taking down the tents and loading up our cars. I guess we will just have to go camping up there again. I wouldn't mind one bit.