Happy 39th to me!

Today was my 39th birthday....I guess I could say it was the first time that I turned 39!! It was a fun day. The girls were so excited that morning to treat me to a yummy breakfast after my long run at the gym. I had a good day at work and a complete surprise visit from Gary and the girls around 3pm complete with cupcakes from Muddy's for my whole department! That was such a fun surprise and the girls love coming to my work. I enjoyed the day and can't believe I am that close to be the big
4-0!!

STEM Quest

Instead of having the standard open house at school, this year Harding tried something new. It was called STEM Quest. STEM stands for science, technology, engineering and math. Of course this is right up Anna's alley and my dad was really excited about coming as well. Every classroom had a theme and this started in Jr. K through 6th grade. Caroline's class studied hibernation and what do animals do throughout the year to adapt. She learned all about hibernation. She even brought one of her teddy bears to school to hibernate in the bear cave they made, but after 3 days she cried and wanted him to come home and out of hibernation. She was not the only one! Anna's class studied rockets and different ways to make a rocket launch and the type of energy utilized in the process. Anna did not want to get paired up with certain "yucky boys" in her class so she decided to do her project as a research project and present on her own. Some groups had live/working models, some had research and pictures and others had non-working models.

We toured all the classrooms in the kindergarten building as well as Anna's elementary building.  It took quite a while to get through everything but the kids had worked so hard on the projects. What I loved best was that the projects were done exclusively at school and that they were done by the students themselves. No over the top parent projects and nothing that a crafty mom could turn in with her child's name on it. The kids received a stamp on their "STEM Passport" for each class they visited and received a prize the next day. Caroline just had to turn in her book while Anna had to answer some questions before she could earn a reward.

I enjoyed seeing the different topics explored and the way the kids creatively presented their findings. It was a good way to make Open House even more enjoyable.

Anna's research project on rockets. She was super proud of all her hard work and typing up all the findings.

One of Caroline's pictures. She works on her handwriting so hard. It is painful to help with handwriting homework, but at least the finished product is good!
 

 

Caroline contributed the large lizard in the middle to the area of reptiles. Of course she wanted it back immediately after the open house!

Caroline made this in her computer class.

The girls at dinner afterwards. Gary was in Denver for the week so we enjoyed a quick visit to Chili's.

Fitness Update

Thought I would do a brief update on what's going on fitness wise in the Zyriek house. Unfortunately it is great news for me but not so great news for my better half. Not too long after the St. Jude Marathon, in which I ran and Gary served as the race crew and ran further than me that day, Gary started to have some pain in his knee. He thought maybe it was a fluke and tried to run a few other times. Gary really is in tune with his body and knew something was wrong. He went to the doctor and she thought he had tweaked it and gave him some anti-inflammatory meds and suggested he try running a short distance again soon. That flopped, so off to the MRI he went. Turns out he had a small vertical tear in his miniscus in his knee....the same knee he had miniscus surgery on before the kids were born. Not Gary's favorite memory and not the news he wanted to hear!! Gary needed to stay off of his knee for 4-6 weeks to hopefully allow it time to heal on its own. Gary swam at first but was advised by his mom during her visit at New Year's to stay completely off the knee and allow the swelling to go away. This was a hard thing for Gary to digest. My constantly active and competitive husband was banned from running, biking and swimming!!

So, what did I do? Sign up for a half marathon in Birmingham, AL the weekend of President's Day. Gary joked that I needed some long training runs to escape the insanity of him not being able to work out!! My training was going to be short...just 6 weeks but I really wanted a chance at a cold weather half marathon since Memphis turned out to be super warm and I was slower than I wanted to be. So I amped up my training shooting for a PR in Birmingham on February 17th. Stay tuned for results!!

New Years Vitals

New Year's Day 2013....

 Anna
Age: 9 years old
Height: 4 foot 11 inches....and counting!!
Shoe size: 7 (almost in my shoes!)
Favorite subject: Math
Favorite toy: Ipad mini
Favorite food: Pizza
What she wants to be: CEO of a fashion magazine
Favorite sport: Basketball
Favorite place: Beach

Caroline
Age: 6 years old
Height: 3 foot 11 inches
Shoe size: 13
Favorite subject: Math
Favorite toy: American Girl dolls
Favorite food: Lenny's
What she wants to be: Teacher
Favorite sport: Soccer
Favorite place: South Dakota

Grizzlies fun

For a little family fun over the holidays we took the girls to a Grizzlies game on Friday night. We had great seats thanks to a discount offer from First TN bank. It was Grizz girls night which means that everyone got a free poster of the Grizzlies Girls....not sure we needed that but the girls thought it was fun. The best part of the night, besides the fact that they won was that we ALL got on the dance cam. Gary was so embarrassed....I thought it was fun and the girls were beside themselves with joy. It was a little surreal to see yourself on the big jumbotron dancing away but all in all so much fun. Our phones were lighting up with messages from friends that saw us. Go Grizz!!

proud of their grizz girls posters

gary and the girls ready for the game to start!

Christmas Wrap Up

We had a different kind of Christmas this year. This was the first year that I would not see my dad or any siblings for the holidays. Kind of strange and different but it was still a great time for the Zyrieks. My dad and stepmother made the trip to Dallas for Christmas. I love that they were able to spend Christmas with my brother and his kids. That was the first time they have enjoyed that. They stayed for 10-12 days which was a fun visit for them.

The kids were in school through the 21st of December. Sounds late, but for working parents it was great.  We enjoyed the weekend before Christmas and then the kids were so excited they could not wait!

We had my mom and stepdad over for Christmas Eve dinner. We enjoyed the Candlelight service at Hope together and then came home and let the kids make their cookies for Santa. It was an enjoyable evening. Gary and I watched Christmas Story while waiting for the kids to go to sleep. Santa finished up about midnight at our house and the kids were up bright and early at 6am!! We were tired to say the least.

The kids had a great Christmas morning. Anna got an ipad mini and many things to redecorate her room once we get the new paint she will be ready to go. Caroline got a new bike as well as the "Caroline" American Girl doll. The girls were thrilled and were having fun at home for quite a while. We headed over to mom's house for most of the rest of the day.  The girls favorite present over there were skates! They skated for hours inside and outside (small amounts at a time since it was so cold!!). They even acted like the girls at Sonic on skates taking our drink orders before dinner.

We enjoyed brunch at mom's and a lazy afternoon. We came home and had dinner with the family and my parents came over so they could see all the girls haul from Santa and us. All in all a very fun and good day. Both Gary and I were off work the next day so we definitely enjoyed sleeping in and enjoying our very messy house!!

the happy bakers on christmas eve

last shot of the girls with all the presents actually wrapped!

caroline with her caroline doll

anna with her ipad mini....she was over the moon!

caroline with her new bike

gary with his new harding cap and auburn shirt

crazy sweaty girls after roller skating all afternoon

roller derby queen

sweet skater

Enchanted Forest/Festival of Trees

I cannot tell you how many time I have been to the Enchanted Forest. We used to go every year growing up and I remember that it was at Goldsmith's downtown. Such fun. I laugh because the characters are the same and they just keep getting older and older looking, but the kids still enjoy it. The Pink Palace is a good host for it and incorporates it into their Festival of Trees and their two Imax films that are related to Christmas. The girls always want to go and do the scavenger hunt and pick their favorite tree. We had a good family evening there and took in an Imax movie as well.

Anna with her favorite "Peace Sign" tree

Caroline with her favorite, the tree was made to look like a snowman

my favorite, the Charlie Brown tree

the girls on their scavenger hunt

our favorite gingerbread house from those submitted for judging