A Day at the Zoo

... more like a few short hours at the zoo, but nonetheless...
Sunday afternoon was so beautiful that we decided to make the first use of our annual zoo membership at the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore. I think that anyone we've ever known who's ever been to the Baltimore Zoo has had their picture taken on this lion statue.... everyone that is, except for Mackinzie - who refused to sit on the famous photo-spot. Instead she opted to have mommy hold her and stand next to it.

She did really like the little monkey statues though and relished the chance to have her picture taken hugging it.
It might be a little hard to see in the photo, but we were able to get right up close to the crocodile. A little too close for Kinzie.

The rhino in the background had just finished taking a tremendous pee before we took this picture. Its amazing, the things you can see at the zoo!

Mommy joined Mackinzie for another picture at the Monkey statue.
This was probably our favorite photo from the day. We were able to get really close to this giraffe - almost close enough to touch. Kinzie and I turned around to get our picture taken and this guy popped his head over Kinzie's shoulder to get in the shot too!
All in all, our short zoo visit was very cool. If my memory suits me well, the zoo isn't nearly as great as it was when I was a kid, but its still worth a visit now and then and I'm sure we'll be taking full advantage of our annual membership this year. Kinzie and Laura are already going back on Saturday with some of Kinzie's friends!

Two Down, One to Go....

Just like that: the next baby has arrived! Less than a week apart from Anna Bibo. Lucas Ryan Taylor was born yesterday to our good friends, Sharon & Rob Taylor, at GBMC.(I borrowed these pictures from Erin Robinson'sand Mrs Robin Pauley's Facebook albums)
Here is Rob pushing Lucas around like he's in a shopping cart.
.... and mother and son.
While I was in class at Towson University last night, Laura went to visit the new family.
I just returned to work from visiting Lucas myself while on my lunchbreak. It was very cool to hold a baby who was less than a whole day old! I think that is probably the youngest baby I've ever held... that I can think of.
Hopefully the next few weeks will fly by quickly for Laura and me and Mackinzie. We are getting very excited and very anxious to have our little Maeby here with us!

One Down, ... Two to Go!

The 2009 Abbott Church baby-boom welcomed its first member over the weekend.
Here are Kristen Bibo, Sharon Taylor, and our own Laura Rode back in November of 2008.
Here they are just over a week ago...

... and here are Kristen and Tim welcoming little Anna Bibo into the world on Saturday, March 7th.

She looks beautiful and we're very excited to meet her in person soon!
Congratulations to Tim & Kristen - especially Kristen, who endured 21 hours of natural labor! Very impressive!
With the birth of Anna, it leaves Sharon and Laura next in line. Sharon is due at the end of March with a little boy, and our Maeby is due to arrive on April 25th.

Also, not pictured, but worth mentioning is the addition of two more expecting mothers in our congregation: Vicky Roland (expecting a girl) and Samantha Smith (expecting a boy, Jackson).

2009 is definitely looking to be an exciting year at Abbott!

Fantasy Football Banquet

OK, so we're going to go a little backwards in time - before the Peg Perego Skate was purchased and review our 2008 Beltway Fantasy Football Championship Banquet.

Each year, the league owners gather for a luncheon to celebrate a successful season and award our champion.
This year, Michael Motorcycle won their second consecutive (and third overall) championship. Owner, Mike McNeive was awarded the newly-engraved league trophy, newly embroidered gold league blazer and $400 cash.
Along with the regular season champion awards, several other owners went home with BFF Pro-Bowler recognitions....
My team, the Camo Pirates, had two pro-bowlers in our conference.
Will's team, Will Power, had their quarterback, Drew Brees, representing the conference.
The Estonian Rebels and owner, Mike Maiste had their first ever pro-bowl selection with running back, Michael Turner.
Despite a disappointing 2008 season, the Berrywood Bombers and owner, Dustin Pfeifer, had a great wide receiver in Anquan Boldin.
Chris Walbert and The Squeakers were the surprise team of 2008 and had the most players resepented from a team.
Justin Smith and the Fleetwood Macks came to the banquet not expecting any awards, but were happy to have two selections.
Everyone had a good time and a great lunch at By The Docks that Sunday afternoon (although one or two of our guests experienced some awful food poisoning symptoms the next day). We had to owners go home without any awards:
Jared Pfeifer and the Glenoak Block Party rounded out a disappointing 2008 with no awards.
Greg Armstrong was all smiles, despite having none of his Strong Arm players selected to the BFF Pro-Bowl. His team has yet to have any Pro-Bowl players in the history of the league.
Next on the BFF agenda is the 2009 Winter Owners Meeting which will lead into the 2009 Draft/Auction to be held in September of this year.

Maeby's Stroller

Last weekend, our family trekked to Gaithersburg, Maryland to the Great Beginnings store. It was the closest store we could find that carried the Peg Perego Skate stroller. This was Laura's "dream" stroller and it was worth the drive. When we got home, we opened the box and began the assembly.It looked complicated at first, but it really wasn't that bad. The next part was learning all the different positions the stroller can be put in and taking picturs of them.
.... the carriage....

... the standard stroller...
... another carriage position - outdoors....
... notice the handy cup holder....
... standard stroller - outdoors...
... stroller featuring the boot...
.... from another angle...
The stroller easily detaches so if the baby falls asleep in the bassinet, you carry her in without waking her up. Genious!!
If there is any downside to the Skate its that this (above) is how small it collapses. Considering that Laura and I both has pretty large vehicles, it isn't a big deal - but if Laura still drove her old Hyundai Tiburon and I still was a Neon man, then this stroller probably wouldn't have been for us.
.... this is me carrying it.

So that's Maeby's stroller. She's gonna be a Skate-Girl!

The Rescuers

We recently joined the Disney Movie Club to help build Mackinzie's (and soon Maeby's) ever-growing collection of Disney movies on dvd. One of the first movies we received was 1977's "The Rescuers" - featuring the voices of Bob Newhart and Ava Gabor. I put it on for Kinzie this morning....

... and considering that she hasn't moved from this position for almost 30 minutes, I'd say she likes it.
I just thought this would make a funny picture to share.

.... back to work!!
-Bert

Bounce Party

About a week ago, Mackinzie went to a birthday party for her friend, Ava, from ballet and gymnastics. Ava was turning 4 years old and her party was held at Bounce Party N' Play in White Marsh.
Here are Kinzie and Ava sitting together in the giant inflatable birthday throne.
The place was pretty incredible! It was basically a large warehouse, painted in bright colors and filled with all different kinds of inflatable moon-bounces.

The best part was that the parents were allowed to join in on the fun!

My favorite was the giant slide! It was so big that Kinzie and I were able to go down together.

Also for the adults (mostly) was a large boxing ring with oversized boxing gloves. Our good friend, Tom challenged me to a match.

It turned out to be a draw with each of us being knocked down once.... although I think I could have beaten him fair and square if he hadn't been giggling so much the entire time. (Tom and Laura's daughter, Sophia is good friends with Kinzie and Ava).

I know, it looks like I had more fun at this four year old birthday party than Kinzie...

The girls all had a blast and ended the evening with chicken nuggets and some Ariel cake. Here are Kinzie and Sophia posing for the camera before we headed home.
All in all it was a great time and it was really fun to spend that time climbing, jumping and bouncing with my daughter.

Poor Laura... Baby Maeby wouldn't let her enjoy the jumping and bouncing so much. She tried getting into one moon-bounce when we first arrived, but the motion made her pregnant belly upset.
And the party was held on the 22nd... her 27th birthday, of all days! At least she got her picture taken in the big birthday throne! :)
-Bert