happy new year!!

yet again year flown by and i'm even shocked that i have not posted in half a year! shame on me and shame on time for passing so quickly!!

let's see if i can sum up the second half of 2010 for you...

august

my mom came and stayed with us for a month or so to help us out because august/september is both jason and i's busiest months at work, so it was wonderful to have mom here with us. we tried getting her to make it a permanent gig, but no such luck! ha...kidding! thanks ma!!

september

we celebrated jason's birthday with dinner at striphouse early in the month and then went to charleston the weekend of the 24th for our friends molly and craig's wedding. it was a beautiful affair and 10 of us rented a house right on the water, so we had a great time! thank you yie yie and ni ni for watching the kiddos so we could enjoy an adult only affair! :)

october

mom came back again mid-month since jason and i were gearing up for our big trip to hong kong and bali for 11 days at the end of the month. ingrid and darren were married october 23rd in hong kong and then eight of us (four couples, including the newlyweds) went to bali for five nights and had an incredible time.

we came back the night of halloween, so no costumes this year, only pj's. (thanks ni ni!)

november

it took us some time to get back into the swing of things, mom left and then we were tasked with finding a new nanny. fortunately it didn't take long and we are thrilled to have mandy with us now. zach and zoe really like her, which is most important.

we had a nice thanksgiving in houston with jason's family and started gearing up for the holidays.

the babies also participated in their first official race...a full 25m!! :)

december

i had a nice low key birthday, molly's annual cookie exchange, dawn came in town for a visit, jason went on his annual hunting trip and then we headed to vegas for a week for the holidays (mom lives there, so yes, valid reason!). oh...and i mustn't forget our first visit with santa claus! (or ta ta as the kids refer to him). we were home just in time for new year's eve and had a nice evening with jason's sister jennifer and her husband jimbo.

happy new year!! hope 2011 is a year full of love, laughter and joy!!

birthday parties!

zach and zoe had quite the weekend with ethan's 3rd birthday saturday and then cousin lucas's 5th on sunday. ethan's birthday was quite the party...when we pulled up to the party it was as if the fair was in town!! :) we had facepainters, balloon makers, waterslides and pools...gotta love the wilbert's!

jenn was in town with the kids so we celebrated lucas's 5th sunday afternoon. the weather wasn't as cooperative, so the bouncy house didn't get as much play as hoped. bouncy house or not, the kids all had a great time!

children's museum

i've been wanting to take the kids to the houston children's museum for quite some time now and jason and i finally got around to doing it this weekend. i'm not sure what i was expecting, but it far exceeded my expectations. there was a so much for all ages to do, but the best part was upstairs in an area designated for kids 3 and under. perfect for us, since zach could crawl around and zoe could run around to her little heart's desire!

i see a lot of the children's museum in our future...

pics from my phone.

happy canada day and the 4th of july!

still a proud canadian at heart, but living here in the states, the beginning of july is nothing but patriotism in our house. i still vividly remember going to canatara park every july 1st with all the international food booths and people everywhere. my parents (namely dad) would always be cooking and selling at the chinese booth and we'd venture off, stuff our bellies, play games and be beachside until the evening when we go to centennial park for fireworks. oh the good 'ol days!!

i had the z's sporting their roots shirts on canada day, but this was all i got. :( it was during the week (obviously not a holiday here), and for whatever reason they were GROUCHY when i got home from work that night!

and for the 4th this year, we went to a pool party over at our friends allison and sean's new house. zach and zoe had a great time with cate and could not get enough of the water! summer is undoubtedly here!!

mommy and daddy's sonoma getaway

jason proposed in napa in 2005 and at the time, we had said we were going to make it an annual trip. well, year after year it seemed we talked about it amongst ourselves, with friends and year after year, it was all talk and no action. so this year, as soon as it came up again, i was all action and no talk. thanks to jason's parents for agreeing to watch the z's, we went for four nights. we flew in and out of san fran, so spent one night there and then the other three nights in healdsburg. i HIGHLY recommend that little town. it's in sonoma and we stayed at a bed and breakfast that was just far enough away from the center of town that you felt like you weren't in the hub bub, but also close enough where we could walk to and from town.

we had two full days of wine tastings and squeezed in almost nine wineries i believe.

day -1: leisurely drive from san fran to healdsburg...stopped at girl and fig for lunch and then to gundlach bundschu for our first official tasting. made it just in time for wine hour at the b&b (what luck!). cleaned ourselves up and went to cyrus for cocktails and dry creek kitchen for dinner...DELISH!!

day 2...attempted to sleep in, went for a nice run, french toast for breakfast at the inn, then started on our wine touring. hit ridge lytton springs (really enjoyed their wines and got a lot of recommendations), preston (very enjoyable...small town feel, rather honey with cats running around, but different), picked up a baguette, some cheese and cured meats at the dry creek country store to snack on along our trek, ferrari-carrano (GORGEOUS grounds), pappapietro-perry (nice pinot noirs, but not a great ambiance since in a "stripmall" like environment with other wineries), and ended at quivira (our fave...became members here...all organic)

after all the tasting, we still managed to enjoy wine hour at the inn, then to willi's seafood for cocktails and hors d'ouevres and dinner at scopa...yum!

day 3...good run, breakfast and off to the wineries once again. headed south this time and managed to squeeze in Martinelli (okay), woodenhead (nice pinot noirs and zins), ironhorse (awesome outdoor tasting...good sparkling), mazzocco (not bad at all), came back to the inn, went for a late lunch at healdsburg bar and grill, then walked to seghesio for our very last tasting.

again, made it back in time for wine hour for a couple of hours and had a late dinner at a new restaurant baci cafe.


day 4...since we were heading out around 10ish, rather than go for a run, i walked into town to visit a bakery that was highlighted on food tv that i couldn't miss out on before leaving (downtown bakery and creamery for their doughnut muffins) and also the bakery that our inn shopped at which was amazing (costeaux) for a couple of last minute take home treats! :)

what a great little trip...must do it again!! :0-)

san antonio

we took a road trip memorial day weekend to san antonio to visit our friends charles and amy. they have two children (ava 5 and charlie 3) and #3 on the way. it had been quite some time since we'd taken zach and zoe on a road trip, so we were a little nervous of how they the weekend would go. much to our surprise, a great weekend was had by all...we had no major meltdowns, broken bones or broken housewares...success! once again, always good to live by the motto "expect the worst and hope for the best!"

it was good fun just hanging around the house, but we did do a little sightseeing/shopping around town as well. jason and i have always loved san antonio, and this time we experienced it more as locals rather than tourists with the truan's.

charles and amy were such gracious and hosptiable hosts...thank you!! lots of good eating and drinking and zach and zoe had a ball! we also had two firsts this weekend for the z's...first time swimming and first time brushing their teeth (should i be admitting that?) it took some time for them to warm up to the pool, but then it took everything to get them out! i'd say zoe was a little more comfortable than zachary, but i think we have two water bugs in the making!

easter 2010

we brought the babies to the neighborhood park for an easter egg hunt this year. i can't say they did a lot of hunting - zachary chose to just sit in the same spot with his friend jack, while zoe had a ball just watching everyone and enjoying the freedom of running around!

we spent easter sunday with jason's family. between our two and jennifer's three kids, it made for a lot of chaos! lucas and knox had quite the easter egg hunt going on, while the other three did their own thing. i'm thinking next year will probably be quite a bit different.