Jamin didn't have to start work yet today, as he has most Sundays this summer, so we had some nice family time. Zaria enjoyed some extra "papa time."
We also had Dan and Gwendolyn over to help fill a few boxes. Gwendolyn wanted me to take a picture of her-- I told her to pose and this was the result. The thinking 3-year-old.
I did ask permission before taking a picture of my sleeping husband. (= Jamin's work schedule has been so unpredictable that he's not always home sleeping anymore. It's been a little hard on me as I get bigger and it becomes harder for me to do things around the house. Tonight he was home for dinner and we even enjoyed a cheap movie together while my mom watched Zaria. We saw "Iron Man," which I really enjoyed. Robert Downey Jr. was one of my favorite actors in the early 90's, and then I hadn't seen him for a long time (I think he was just in movies that I didn't see or even hear of) until recently I saw him in "Good Night and Good Luck."
A beautiful day for grilling, and Jamin was able to swallow things today, so we celebrated by having pork chops, one of his favorites.
So, not only did Jamin have to work on his birthday, we ended up taking him to the ER for Fathers' Day. He got a piece of broccoli lodged towards the bottom of his esophagus and for a while he couldn't even swallow his own spit without it getting stuck. After some attempts at medicinal treatments, he still had trouble, but could at least swallow liquids. We were a little late, then, for Gwendolyn's third birthday party, and he had to watch me eat pizza and cake while he was only able to get a glass of Yo-J down. Still, we had fun spending time with family, and we even got Zaria in a swing for about 2 minutes to take a picture of the three cousins, Elena Zaria and Gwendolyn. Gwen was trying out her new tricycle and Zaria would not let go of this little doll.
Zaria wanted to sit on the potty today and started pulling magazines to read while she sat (apparently she's noticed that we do this). I thought it was especially amusing that she wanted to read a Marriage Today magazine.
Sort of last minute, we hosted Friday Night Group at our house and had some cake for Jamin's birthday, which is tomorrow. It was a nice small group, perfect for our limited space, and we even worked in a game of Bocce ball. It's hard to see in the above photo, but I arranged the candles into the number 32. The wax was melting pretty well by the time Jamin held the cake, so he had to blow the candles out quickly.
I made some cookies today for a girls' night taste test night-- we're bringing some food item with both generic and name-brand ingredients to see if there really is a difference. So I made chocolate chip cookies with both Cub brand chips and Hershey's. Zaria was pretty ill today and only joined me for a little while in between naps. Hopefully all her sleeping today will mean she'll be much better tomorrow.
Jamin's been working on a sci-fi novel for some time now. He has quite a bit done, but really got back into it today after not writing much for some weeks.
Dan, Naomi and Gwendolyn came over to visit us today and eat pizza and play Catan. A fun time was had by all-- they were happy to visit and get a break from staying with Naomi's mom in her 2-bedroom apartment, I think. They'll be moving into their new house in a few weeks but needed a temporary residence until then. The girls were waking up from naps in the shot above, and had fun looking at books in Zaria's room. Zaria enjoyed watching her cousin Gwennie read and warmed up to her uncle Dan in the process. Then she was off to wake up her dad from his nap in the picture below. He did wake up, but didn't respond right away.
Zaria was having fun playing with Jamin's hat, beard and coat while we all got ready to go to the library this evening. I had a copy of a "Fiddler on the Roof" DVD waiting for me, and Jamin needed some new audiobooks to listen to in his truck. Zaria had a great time wandering around the kid's section, pushing her stroller.
It was a tradition in Jamin's family to eat tuna fish sandwiches on Sundays. We don't do it every week, but pretty frequently. He wore his new lumberjack shirt to church today, too. I dressed up a little more and thought we looked an odd couple, but I ended up spending time with the 2-year-olds during service today anyway.
Yes, we do feel free to use the dictionary while playing Scrabble, or in this case Upwords. I feel it's more educational if you get to learn new words, although it's taken some practice for Jamin to recognize the value of using normal words in Upwords so that it's easier to build up from them.
Sure enough, Jamin got sick this morning. We also had a major winter storm that made the roads very treacherous, so the Christmas get-together we had planned at my dad's is officially postponed. I was feeling much better, so Zaria and I had fun playing and hanging out. Notice where her hands are in the photo--she found out she could stand up and poke them through. 
It runs in Jamin's family that everyone loves to read, and so appropriately, Zaria was enjoying reading her own book while we read tonight. It was very cute. She was feeling much better today, but was a little crabbier than usual.
We joined Cassie, Derek and Dave up at Cassie's timeshare condo for a fun late weekend of games, hot tubbing, and relaxing. I learned this new game they're playing in the photo, Tripoley, which is pretty fun. It's like a mix of poker and Michigan Rummy. Zaria did pretty well, but she didn't like to be ignored for real long.
Jamin played his french horn at church today, the first time he's performed for some years. I didn't catch him during the performance because I was up working the soundboard today. I found out that's a terrible place to take pictures from for lighting, and Zaria didn't help much by trying to grab the camera from me. I'm lucky I got this shot while they were practicing for the Christmas show.
We took a little walk just as the moon was rising, which is insanely early these days. It was a beautiful big moon, but it looks so small when you actually take a picture of it. Jamin got more of the sky's color in his shot of me.
A nice close-up of Jamin's new eyeglasses.
Zaria's got a tooth coming out, so we gave her a carrot to chew on while she jumped in the jumper. If she gets some extra vitamin A, so much the better.
