My book

The book that I have 2 quilts in came out in book stores last Tuesday May 5th. Craig and I stopped by Barnes and Noble on Friday night to see if they were carrying it...and there it was!!!! How cool! If you have a Barnes and Noble (It is probably in other bookstores that carry Lark Books also) go check it out. It is a how-to book of 20 baby quilts. Some of them are amazing! I feel honored to be a part of this project. It is at least worth thumbing through just to see some of these amazing artists.

"Quilts, Baby!"

I am a proud husband. The book Laura's quilts are in is now in stores. "Quilts, Baby!" should now be in most Barnes and Noble stores as well as many others. We'd love to hear if it's in a bookstore near you. I was so excited to have Laura's work in our local Barnes and Noble that I took 3 or 4 pix. Imagine that! Craig taking pictures! Way to go Laura! Many years of hard work have gone into this. This is a very cool accomplishment. AND...Happy Mother's Day!

Meeting Zamara Video

Referral-versay!

Last Saturday was the anniversary of our referral. That is when we learned who Zamara was for the first time. We got her picture, name, and all of her information. It was such a great day for us. I have been working on this video for a while and I have finally finished it and thought it would be fun to show it here. It was the day we met Zamara in Ethiopia for the first time. I am also including a couple pictures of Zamara--the first is her referral picture and the other one is her 1 year later. Pretty amazing, huh?

Time Out

A couple weeks ago I was at a friend's house for a mommy's night out. Beth's daughter, Lily, is about 18 months old. Lily was acting up and she put her into time out. She actually stayed there for about 2 minutes. I was totally amazed! I didn't know when to start doing time-outs with Zamara (or as the Supernanny would say, sitting on the naughty spot). Beth started doing time-out with her several months ago. Craig and I figured that now was probably the right time to start working on it.

Zamara has been starting to exert her independence lately. Her big thing is walking in the wrong direction as us on purpose and hitting. She does both of those things to get us angry at her and to be defiant.

A few days ago Zamara kept hitting me and wouldn't stop. It wasn't hard, but I had said "no!" several times. I told her that the next time she hit me she would go to time out. She looked me right in the eye and then hit me. So we put her in time out for the first time. We sat her down right by the couch. I had no confidence that she would actually sit there, but she did! She burst into tears and threw quite a little fit on the floor, but she sat there for well over 30 seconds--which is a pretty long time for a 13 month old. It was so cute (and kinda funny) to watch her sitting there wailing her heart out when we were just a few steps away. Total crocodile tears, of course! Then we got her up and asked her to say sorry (which she can't really say yet), gave her hugs and kisses, and told her why she was put into time out. She was in a bad mood for the rest of the night, though. We have not had to really discipline her that much, so I don't think she knew how do deal with it.

We had to do time out again while we were in Phoenix because she kept hitting me again. It worked just as well and she bounced back much quicker. It's been really hard to do but we feel it is the right time to get things started on the "discipline front". That first time was especially rough! Please keep our little family in your prayers that we would make wise, godly decisions that will bring Zamara up to be a girl who loves God with all of her heart, soul, mind and strength and loves her neighbor as herself.

Weekend in Phoenix

Each year as part of our jobs, we get a weekend off to visit another church in order to see how church is "done" in a different place. So we decided to check out a great church in Phoenix called Scottsdale Bible Church. We decided to spend several days down in Phoenix. We went to the World Wildlife Zoo, swam, and ate at a few good restaurants.

This was our fist trip at a hotel for multiple nights, so we were wondering how Zamara would do. She did great--she didn't sleep through the night at all--but it was pretty good for being in the same room as us and in a different environment.

Here are some things we found out on this trip:

• 1. Zamara loves petting zoos
• 2. Zamara hates to eat at PF Chang's (we are not sure why, she just gets grumpy)
• 3. Zamara loves to swim and play in the water
• 4. Zamara is afraid of feeding giraffes (I mean have you ever been inches away from a 20 foot tall animal? It's pretty freaky!)
• 5. Zamara called every animal at the zoo a "cat"
• 6. Zamara loves Greek food, spaghetti at "The Spaghetti Factory" as well as the chicken nachos at "Cantina Laredo" (the best nachos ever)!

We really had a great time in Phoenix. The weather was beautiful. The Zoo was great. I would recommend it to anyone. All the exhibits were close together and there wasn't that much walking. The coolest part is feeding the giraffes. We will definitely take Zizi back there when she's older. The new aquarium there wasn't our favorite. We'd have to rank Monterrey Bay as #1, Newport, OR as #2 and Wildlife World Zoo as #3.

We also spent some time at an outdoor mall (Desert Ridge- if you want to take your little one there too) where Zamara could play in the fountains. We put her new little bikini on her. She looks so funny in it with her diaper--it doesn't really cover up her booty very well.

In the picture with Zamara on Craig's shoulders, there is a monkey in the left bottom of the screen. I thought I would point it out since it's hard to see him.

It's Sunday night now and we are getting everything unpacked and back in it's place. We will be heading to Illinois and Indiana at the end of May, so this was a great test run for that big trip.

Seriously, you have got to have the chicken nachos at Cantina Laredo! Go now!

Have a great week everyone!

Craig and Laura

YAHOO!

8 full nights of sleep in a row...let's make it 9!