Zander Snorkels in Belize

After weeks of swim lessons with Alex, who is a great swim instructor, and snorkel practice with dad in the pool, we headed for Belize. I have to admit he was the best dressed little snorkeler there. Upon arriving in Belize Jake and I each took Z for a little shore snorkeling and he did good, but there was not a lot to see, so he lasted about 15 minutes each time. Jake arranged for a snorkel boat ride out to Hol Chan Marine Reserve, and it was a perfect place to put his skills to the test.
We started out in water that was only about 4 feet deep and started our swim, Zander kept his face straight down not moving a bit, holding dads hand on one side and moms on the other. After about 10 minutes he started to wave at the fish, we had to move his chin for him to realize he could look around a little bit. Then we swam over a Green Moray Eel and his grip got even tighter, still his head did not come out of the water. After seeing some Barracuda and some schools of fish we got to about 30 feet of water and he finally stopped, I think we both thought he was scared, he only stopped to tell us he saw an Eel. We continued for another 25 minutes and saw crabs, coral, Parrot fish and more. Upon arriving at the boat he said "We can't stop I did not see a turtle yet". So the the grasses we went to find the turtle, sure enough he saw his first turtle.
From that site we headed to SharkRay alley, as soon as the boat stopped there where 4 nurse sharks and lots of Rays right at the boat, Z wanted to watch safely from the boat. The divemaster was awesome, he brought one of each up close for Z to touch, however he was fine with just looking.
What a great family memory we had in the waters of Belize, we look forward to many more.

3 Years Later on the same Beach in Belize

We are back at Ramons Village in San Pedro, Belize. I remembered this photo of Z that we took of him on the beach when we were here last time, so of course we needed to do a current version. Wow, he has changed a lot in 3 years, however Belize has not changed so much.

Lovin' the Beach, originally uploaded by The Zouns.

Zander turns 4

We had Zander's birthday at MyGym and they put on one great party.

It was non-stop activity, ball pitts, slides, climbing walls, bubbles, zip lines and more. The kids were having such a great time they stopped long enough to blow out the candles and have a bite or two of cake and they were right back to playing on the gym.

Thanks to all of you who joined us, it was a Fantastic Celebration!

Jake's 250 - SOLD

Before:

After Jake took over:

A few months back my dad & Collette gave Jake Collette's motorcycle. Jake quickly started in chopin' the bike to fit his style. He greatly enjoys working on the bikes and making them his own. After finishing the bike he decided to sell it so he could concentrate more on his latest project, the 750. After parking it at work for only 4 days the bike was sold and for more than my dad bought it for 10 years ago. The following are photos of the final bike:

February 2010

Zander is always filling our house with lots of laughter

We are a little low on photos for the month of February, we had a great Valentines date with some long time friends at Red Lobster. Zander had seen me getting dressed up and insisted that he needed to dress up, we had recently bought him a vest and tie outfit so he quickly picked that to wear on our date. Dad was surprised to see how we got ready for him and he quickly joined us.

January 2010

WoW! January went really fast.

For New Years we had Rielly, Tiff, and Keegan over for a small celebration, it was fun and low key for the kids. Zander could not wait to do his poppers out the front door at Midnight.


Zander heard the commercial for Monster Truck on the radio, and he did not stop talking about them. He even made a picture of Dad, Mom, Zander, and Bella watching the monster trucks with his finger paints.



We had a great family night at the Monster trucks, we had fantastic seats in the lower bowl so the action was right in front of us. It was a fun night and Zander LOVED the smashing of the school bus and cars.Zander would not even take his eyes off the show for the family photo.


We have not had much snow in the valley at all this year which has been a little disappointing, so we have to play in the crusty snow that has not melted yet.

As for Jake, he is back to working on his bike. He moved it to his parents so he could work on it in the garage so I don't get to see the progress as much and also no photos for an update. He has so much fun, chopping the bikes and creating his own.

December 2009

It has been brought to my attention that this blog is greatly neglected, so for 2010 I will try and do better. I am going to start by doing a monthly video; we will see how that goes.
December was a great and busy month for us. The best part was how much time we got to spend with family.
Jake took the month off from the bike project, and built Zander a great chopped "Jake Style wagon". His creativity did not get a lot of rest we put him to work on helping us build a Gingerbread house. It was fun to see how both boys got very involved.
Lori had a busy month, with Neptune and Candles, and to top it off this year she started selling Miche purses as well.
Zander grew a couple of inches it seems in just one month, his pants that have been dragging for months are fitting and almost short on him. He loved all the parties and being able to wrestle with more than just mom and dad.
The holidays seemed very spread out this year. We started by celebrating with the Cornwall side of the family on the 23rd, since Bruce and Collette where heading to Montana for an adventure of their own. Christmas Eve was spent at our home with the Zouns, Nikole & Antonio, and Tibby & Iuliana. It was a very fun night, too much food and lots of entertainment provided by Kris. Everyone took a chance at learning to play DJ Hero and a little Tony Hawk skateboarding.
Christmas morning we had family time with the 3 of us, it was a great relaxed morning, Zander knew Santa had come, but he wanted to just lay with mom and dad for a little while. Once we finally went to see what Santa had left, he was very cute, he would not open a box until ALL the paper was off the package so needless to say it took a little while. Luckily there was not snow for Jake, who had to go find his gift of a new rolling tool box out in the car. We topped off Christmas day by spending the afternoon at Opa & LuLu's playing a little more DJ Hero.
It was a great holiday, and we are all grateful for the family and friends we have around us.