Let's see what Zeke has been up to for the last single digit year of his life! :)
For his 9th birthday we had a small gathering with friends and family. It was nice low-key birthday which honestly is my favorite kind of party. After all those years of themes, it's been nice to dial it back a bit and just relax!
This year for his 10th birthday we are going somewhere. We've done that for each of the kids 10th birthdays. Zeke really wants to go play mini golf. At first we were just going to go to the mini golf outside the Kent Icicle Arena, but then friends told us about Tower Lanes in Tacoma which has bowling and indoor mini golf. Zeke was wanting to bowl as well so this sounds perfect to us. As of writing this I'm still trying to figure out if they have a party time available that will work for us. If not we'll just head down and do the first come first serve thing.
This boy loves chocolate cake and chocolate frosting...just another thing he has in common with his Daddy!
Shortly after Zeke's birthday we finished up our first year of homeschooling. It's so crazy to think that Zeke only went public school for 2 full years.
3rd grade is over...he's onto to 4th!
Look at all those stars! Each star represents a PACE completed and a gold star means he scored a 100% on the test. Nice work Zekester!
To celebrate the end of the school year we went camping during the first part of June. The weather was a bit schizophrenic, but that's wasn't going to keep the kids out of the pool. Unfortunately this was the first time the pool had been used in over a year and I think they overdid it a bit with the chlorine. All the kids skin ended up irritated and peeling. Oops!
We are going camping again this year, but we decided to go later in June so hopefully the weather will be nicer! Also I'm going to bring Vaseline to slather the kids with after they get out of the pool!
The site where we camp is butted up against 4 tent sites. Those sites are rarely in use whenever we're there so we let the kids use that area as a putting green. Zeke somehow made a one in a lifetime shot and got his golfball stuck in a tree!
The kids love to do egg drop challenges. They got through so much stuff...kleenex, cardboard, plastic bags, straws. You name it...they use it! Zeke was successful!
Zeke is such a goofball. He's great at making silly faces!
How is he only 9 years old here? He looks so little!
In actuality Zeke probably isn't all that smaller than his siblings were, but his siblings have hit their growth spurs so it makes him seem smaller. Also he does fill that baby of the family role very well.
Still a bit unsure about the sparklers...which frankly I don't blame him. They are a bit freaky to me too!
I wasn't sure if Zeke would want to ride Ms. Melinda's horse Sedona, but he didn't seem to mind it. He's so little though his feet can't even reach all the way in the stirrups and she has them as short as they will go.
This year Zeke has been more vocal about not wanting his hair cut as short as we have in the past. When we do cut his hair short it's so blond that he almost looks bald. When his hair is darker brown like it is in the picture above it's really long! His hair is also so bizarre because it plasters itself to his head. Cutting it is a complete nightmare! So I guess it's good he likes it longer!
Once we got the A-OK from Lighthouse Christian Academy that the kids work for the school year was processed we were able to recycle all the PACE's they completed. This was all the work at Zeke did during his 3rd grade year! That's a heavy load!
During our camping trip down at Long Beach last August, Zeke could have spent hours at the beach digging in the sand and chasing seagulls! Also I totally agree with his shirts!
Second year of homeschooling...onto 4th grade!!!
2030 will be here in a flash!
I had thought originally that the kids might move desks every year just to have a change, but they all really like where they sit so I think it's just going to stay the way it is. Zeke has done well during this 4th grade year. He has had a bit of a hard time keeping his focus on his work. Somedays he would be the last kid finished with his work which is really ridiculous since his work isn't all that hard and he doesn't have to do as many pages as his older siblings. Overall grade wise he's done very well though!
Getting the kids ready for out long road trip involved taking a few hikes. Zeke loves to go down by the water and he's all about crossing or jumping over logs.
The night before we left for our road trip Zeke and Ella had a surprise for me with their stuffies.
Their stuffies threw me a Birthday party. It was so cute! They had a sign up for me that said "Love you Mom!"
They even had paper instruments for their stuffies so they could sing Happy Birthday to me.
Also the stuffies had signs to convey their messages to me. So clever and adorable!
Our road trip was so awesome and Zeke great! It was a little hot in Arches and he didn't really like that too much, but the neck fans I bought came in handy.
It was fun getting to go out to eat every night for dinner on our vacation. We don't go out to eat all that often at home. It was fun to see what the kids would order. Zeke's most commonly ordered foods were a corn dog, chicken nuggets/strips or mac n' cheese.
He's still most definitely my pickiest eater. He will try thing, but if he doesn't like it he quite frequently just refuses to finish dinner. It is what it is and one day he'll realize that food is good!
The Grand Canyon was most definitely a highlight of our trip! In regards to Zeke though I felt like we were constantly trying to keep him alive! He's not super aware of where he is most of the time and so when we were walking where there wasn't railings it was a bit nerve-wracking .
For the trip we gave each of the kids $50 to spend on trinkets. Of course Zeke chose another stuffie...a deer...he named it Dawn.
When we were trying to watch the sunset I practically had to sit down and hog tie Zeke. We were sitting on a huge rock to get a nice view. There was ground down below us and it extended for a bit. We weren't on the edge of a cliff or anything, but if he did fall he would have had a good chance of rolling or bouncing and that would have been really bad. So we forced him to sit on the rock and not get down. He was cold since we weren't letting him move around so he decided to tuck himself into his coat.
In Las Vegas the kids had so much fun in the pool at our condo.
I'm late to the fun video skills game. I just recently started doing the hyper lapse and the slow motion. It was fun capturing this slow-mo video of Zeke and Ella jumping through the waterfall!
Sweet Zeke boy is so skinny that he usually ends up getting out the pool because he's freezing. Cutie doesn't have an ounce of fat on him!
The most fun I had with Zeke on our trip was the Tree Top Tahoe course we did in the North Lake Tahoe area. It was a Zipline / Arial Course with 10 different runs. Zeke stayed with me for the first bit and we had so much fun together.
I was sure he was going to be a little scared, but he wasn't at all. He did so great! I would go back to Lake Tahoe just to do this course again!
During dinner at The Black Bear Diner, I think we must have started talking about Zeke's homemade snow globe where he purposefully put a Made In China sticker on his snowman....because he ended up writing Made In China on the napkin. Either that or we were referencing Covid! :)
Taking the boat across Shasta Lake to see the Caverns!
Zeke and Owen are the two kids that wear coats almost all the time. They are also the two skinniest kids in the family so that makes sense.
For the most part you weren't able to touch the formations we saw in the caverns because the oils for your skin can mess them up. There was this one section though that you could touch...I don't even remember why now...but of course Zeke just had to touch it!
When you're at Tillamook Cheese Factory you eat Mac 'n Cheese! Or if you're Zeke you order Mac 'n Cheese and then don't eat it because it doesn't taste like Kraft Macaroni & Cheese! This kid!
Zeke had the best time on the beach in Seaside for the last little bit of our trip! He ran around collecting crab parts and then assemble them into a whole crab. He actually did so good he fooled the seagulls into thinking they had lucked out and gotten lunch. It was so hilarious!
Time to say goodbye to the Power Wheels. Zeke did fine when it was time to sell them. Now that he's riding his bike he's fine having that as an option. Actually if he had to choose he'd probably still prefer to ride on his scooter most of the time.
Papa & Ms. Ruth came over for dinner one night and I snapped this picture of them and Zeke. It's one of my favorite pictures!
I always tell the kids they can have a pumpkin as long as they can carry it. If it's too heavy they have to put it back. Zeke was testing out pumpkin, but in the end he went with a white one instead of a traditional orange one.
This is how he felt about scraping out the guts though. There was NO WAY that was happening. In fact he ended up paying Ella to do it for him.
That's a good looking pumpkin!
Zeke had so much fun designing and making his homemade Halloween costume. He was his own made up character called Dark Arrow....it's a bad guy if you're wondering. In his words....he was a super villain!
Zeke loves his new bed under Owen's. His new favorite thing to do right now is to climb up in Owen's bed so he can lean over and hug me. Then I can sing to him and scratch his back. He's always asking for more back scratches! Just the other day he told me he can't wait until Owen moves into the other room and then he's gonna move into Owen's bed.
Saying goodbye to Lightning McQueen!
Be still my heart! Look at this handsome guy!
Although I was so super sad that we couldn't have pictures with Starr last year, I was super happy with the few I took at home!
This silly guy likes to tuck his legs inside his coat. This particular time it looked like he had a body builders chest and no legs!
His hair is so long here it almost looks like a toupee! :)
See how blond he looks when we cut his hair! It's so crazy!
My sweet Christmas boy wanted a picture next to the fun old truck! The kids always love getting pictures of old cars for Pa to see!
The last time it snowed it was so nice because all I had to do was get out all the snow gear and then help a couple of kids with their gloves. It was so nice to not have to help each kiddo get fully dressed.
So proud of his KiwiCo creations! I will say if we do KiwiCo again I will sign Zeke up for the next crate...it's called the Tinker Crate. It's a little more STEM focused where the Doodle Crate that he gets now is a bit more craft orientated. He has been enjoying them though.
Zeke was such a sweet help when we were getting Ella's room all ready. He helped me clean and polish Peepaw's old dresser for her.
Zeke was such an amazing helper when we were at church stuffing the Easter Eggs and then again at the actually Easter Adventure when he was putting the eggs back together.
Zeke is the most creative kid I know! He loves when we get shipments from Amazon or when Michael comes home with big sheets of paper. He's always using things like toilet paper rolls or tissue boxes. The kids honestly doesn't need many presents he needs rolls and rolls of masking tape and scotch tape. I'm always finding little bits of cardboard remnants from his creations. In the above picture he made a cowboy costume for my old teddy bear. My Brown Bear is over 40 years old. He loves to use the large pieces of paper to invent his own board games. These are usually hilarious board games that you most likely will never win. They always have spots where you land on them and go all the way back to start. It can be maddening and hilarious all at the same time. :)
Right now we are in the midst of a difficult time with trying to change a very ingrained, learned habit. The habit of baby talk. I did it when I was younger and I remember it being hard to stop. Owen struggled with it and so did Ella. I'm sure it has something to do with the fact that Zeke is the baby of the family. We have tried a bunch of different things....saying we can't understand him and having him repeat what he said & telling him to speak in his big boy voice. It's really been frustrating for him and us. So the latest effort..which I hope will work...is taking away one of his stuffies when he talk in baby talk. The stuffies get put on top of the refrigerator and then every Sunday he gets them back. Oh man this is killing Zeke, but we've actually seen an improvement because those stuffies are important to him. Here's hoping that new habits will be developed and this will be a distant memory that we'll all laugh about one day!
My sweet Zeke Man...
I can't believe you're ten years old. A whole decade since our family was made complete by you! You were honestly the most planned for kid. Yes, we planned and tried for Owen for YEARS before being blessed, but with you we talked and strategized about all possibilities. I had been on anti-depressants that I couldn't take while pregnant so we had to coordinate switching which ones I was on or going off them completely I can't honestly remember it's been so long. We also had a trip coming up the next year to Wyoming so we had to think...do we want to be traveling with a small infant? Do we want to wait and travel when I'm big and pregnant? Those all were factors in our decision to add to our family. Ultimately, we decided to defy my doctors orders and not wait until October to try because then we would have been traveling with a tiny baby and I would have still not felt 100% following my C-Section. I remember it so clearly, I told Daddy that either we got pregnant in September or he wasn't going to even touch until after the new year. So September it was and we were blessed to get pregnant with you in what we thought was our timing, but ultimately it was God's!
God knew we needed a Zeke Russell Martin in our lives and I'm so happy he gave us you! I remember my whole pregnancy going back and forth between wanting a boy and then wanting a girl. I did the very same thing on the operating table while they were getting you out. I want a boy, I want girl....I want a boy, I want a girl. Back and forth and then at the last second I said...I hope it's a boy! Then Daddy got to say....IT'S A BOY!!! What joy!
My sweet boy, I love you so much and I'm so thankfully for you...for your sweet smiles and giggles, for your gentle spirit, your kindness, compassion and concern for others. You are such a treasure! I pray that you will know the purpose that God has for you at an early age. That He will show you the Way and that you will follow Him all the days of your life.
Zeke's Birthday pictures were taken on May 21st, the day before he turned 10 years old.
He's getting so big!
For his item this year, he brought my teddy bear! His name is Brown Bear and I believe I got him when I was 2 or 3 years old. So that means this bear is almost 40 years old. Zeke loves to make things out of paper so he made Brown Bear a wild west sheriff outfit complete with a sheriff star and belt buckle! He's so creative!
A while back, a lady from church named Gail asked if I'd be willing to model my wedding dress at the upcoming ladies tea. At first I said no because my dress was sealed and I didn't want to take it out of the box. Then I saw my friend Christina have her kids try on her wedding dress and it just kind of hit me. Why am I just letting that thing stay in a box? Do I really honestly think that Ella will actually wear it? Also if she does it's going to need to be cleaned anyway so why not!
It happened to be family night when Ella asked about my dress and I said...let's go get it! It still looked all pretty in the box except some the sequins had yellowed over time.
Here's my sweet girl in my dress!
I remember I was her age when I tried on my grandma's wedding dress. She almost filled it out except she's a little bit smaller in the chest area.
Then it was my turn to try on my dress....with the help of my mom of course!
I could not believe that I could actually fit into my wedding dress after almost 23 years. That's crazy to me. I've had 4 kids!!!!
I remember being in the Renton Bridal Boutique looking for a dress when my Dad asked me to try this one on. It honestly look hideous on the hanger. I hated it! But....I knew I had to appease him so I tried it on. I came out of that dressing room with tears in my eyes....this was THE dress. My father picked out my wedding dress. How special is that!
The detailing is so beautiful and I actually like that the sequins yellowed a bit. they stand out better and give the dress a more antique look.
After trying on that one I tried on my Mom's wedding dress. My grandma made it for her. It used to be floor length, but after Mom and Dad had been married for a few years she altered it to be a maternity dress. All I think about when I look at this picture is the camel with the wrinkly knees from Raggedy Ann and Andy!
Fast forward to the Women's Tea at church on Saturday May 7th.
Miss Ellen just happened to be in town for so many fun things....the Choir Performance, the Ladies Tea and Mother's Day. It was so fun having her here!
Nancy played the harp like she usually does for Christmas. She's so talented!
The theme for the event was The Bride being ready....the church being the bride of Christ. Gail had asked quite a few ladies if they'd wear their wedding dresses. There ended up being 5 of us. 3 wore our wedding dresses, 1 wore someone else's dress because she couldn't fit in it anymore and the last lady wore a dress that she bought that looks like a wedding dress.
Katie who is such a beautiful women got all of us brides these bouquets. The flowers are actually made out of wood. It's amazing....and we got to keep them!
As we were coming down the aisle and getting up on the stage Gail was reading a little bit about our dress. I figured it was only fitting if my Dad wrote something instead of me. Here's what he wrote!
EARLY in 1999, Lyndsay was shopping for: A Wedding Dress, and a little concerned about the COST.. SHE and Michael had been engaged for more than 8 months, some money had already been spent on Invitations and other things.. BUT, the time had come to get: A Dress!! At The Renton Bridal Boutique, Lyndsay, with Her Mom looking on, checked out a few: “PLANE JANE Dresses”, as Gail described them to Duke.. DUKE decided to show UP, there at The Renton Bridal Boutique, at the very next opportunity..
While Lyndsay continued to look at, and contemplate, a few modestly priced dresses.. Duke looked at slightly more expensive ones.. All At ONCE, HE Found ONE, HE LIKED!! And he quietly told Gail: “IF I recommend this dress to Lyndsay, SHE won’t like it, BUT, it’s TOO NICE, to NOT Mention it..”
Sure ENOUGH, Lyndsay’s First Reaction was: “OH!! NO!! I don’t like that dress..” Both Duke & Gail said: “PLEASE, just try it on..” THEN: THIS LYNDSAY, THIS BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTER, Walked out of the Dressing Room, In THAT Dress, LOOKING LIKE: A PRINCESS!! AND THREE PEOPLE, Had TEARS In Their EYES!! Unashamedly!!
Because: T H E W E D D I N G D R E S S , had been FOUND!!
I wish someone had gotten a picture of my Dad and Al who were both at the bottom of the stage. They were helping the lady's get on the stage without tripping on their dress. It was so fun to see my Dad's face as I walked down the aisle for the second time. The crazy thing was it was exact 23 years after I had walked down the aisle the first time. We were married on May 8th...the day before Mother's Day. Of course this year the date of our anniversary landed on Mother's Day, but this was the actual day of the year when we were married.
All of us ladies in our beautiful dresses!
They called the younger girls to come up and join us ladies and they each were given a flower of their own. It was so precious!
And maybe just maybe one day this beautiful girl will wear that dress down the aisle as well. It's totally okay if she doesn't though. We'll have blast find her very own dress if that's what she wants!
Since I was going up on stage and needed to squeeze into my dress I did not want to risk it and eat too much. So after the fashion show portion was over I was finally able to enjoy the food.
Last winter Christina was telling us all about the homeschool choir her kids were in. I wanted to check them out before signing the kids up so we attended the winter choir performance on Dec 17th. It was amazing. We were blown away!!
Right after that I signed up Jack and Ella to be apart of the Cantate I Choir. Choir practice was every Friday from 1:15 - 2:30 for 16 weeks at Family Life Community Church in Federal Way. All the kids came along so Owen and Zeke just hung out in the lobby with all the other kids that weren't in that particular choir. It was a great opportunity for the Owen and Zeke to make friends. They would usually bring books or a board or card game and play with others. They also would sometimes play games on one of the boys laptops. There was only one time...I believe our first choir practice where they had to actually do school work. After that they were pretty motivated to get all their work finished up before leaving for choir.
While Jack and Ella were in choir practice I would either sit and visit with friends or watch them. It was so wonderful to see how much they progressed over the weeks. The best part was they were having a lot of fun doing it!
The Choir Director had really wanted us to be able to perform at an Elderly Assisted Living Home, but Covid restrictions did not make that possible this year. So instead we all met at NorthPointe Community Center in Tacoma to have a dress rehearsal outside at the park. It ended up being a beautiful day outside!
They all look so good in their blue choir shirts!
I believe their was over 100 kids in the choir this session. There are actually 4 different choirs. The Jubilate choir is for the younger kids age 4 - 8. Cantate I is for ages 7 - 13. Cantate II is for ages 12 - 19 and lastly there is an Ensemble Choir that you have to be in Cantate II to try out for to see if you can join it.
The choirs performance was on May 3rd at Gospel Russian Baptist Church in Des Moines.
Their dress code was black pants or skirts and black shoes. I ended up having to buy these for the kids since they didn't have anything nice like this. They look so good! Ella had me French braid her hair a couple days before so she took it out the day of the performance. Her curls looked glorious!
Every choir performance they have a program of the show. The kids get to create artwork and Ms. Mangle the Choir Director chooses a few of the drawings to be on the front of the program. Jack and Ella drew pictures, but neither of theirs were chosen. She did have all the drawings on display in the foyer of the church so everyone could see them. She had asked that they draw pictures that coincided with one of the songs they were singing. Jack drew Edelweiss up on the mountains because they were singing the song Edelweiss. He drew it on the page in the portrait position thinking they'd know to flip it around...oops! It should have been mounted on the board 1/4 of a turn to the left. Ella choose to draw a church steeple with a bell which they sang about in the song So Long Farwell. I was so proud of them entering the competition!
We had to be at the church for practice at 4pm. The show didn't start until 6:30pm. It was a lot of standing and a lot of singing.
It was super nice for our family because Ella and Jack were standing right next to each the whole performance. We invited a bunch of people to come hear the kids. Ga-Ga & Pa, Miss Ellen, Papa & Miss Ruth all came. The church was packed with people.
Here's the Youtube video with the whole performance!
The kids did fabulously! There was about a 30 minute piano recital right at the beginning and then they go into the choir singing. The music was wonderful, the kids voices with joyful, the message was meaningful!
We can't wait to sign up and join again for the next session. I believe Zeke is going to give it a try too. Ella and Zeke will both be in Cantate I and Jack will be moving up to Cantate II so we'll be at choir for even longer this next time.
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