Lucky Number 7!

I'm not sure if 7 is really a lucky number or not, but people seem to think so. I figure its a good title for this blog post as Kai was pretty stoked on turning 7. He bid goodbye to 6 two nights before with his first real stomach flu so I guess 7 was lucky b/c he was all finished throwing up by the time he was 7!

He mustered Teia-levels of excitement when he arrived in our room early in the morning to proclaim that he had turned 7. Then he went through a list of all of his body parts that had grown in the night, tangible proof of his seven-ness. 

For our loyal blog following (that's you mom....and Shannon), you might remember that Kai has a sneaky little habit of changing favorite things right before his birthday. Last year we were scrambling to turn a trolley party into a train party at the last minute and ended up with a bit of a mixture. This year followed suite. Kai's favorite thing in the whole world changed from school buses to ferry boats as April 27th drew near. I was anticipating this a little bit so held off on too much party planning until the last minute (much as it stressed my planning-self all out). It was easier to do this year, seeing as Kai only invited 3 friends to his party. Its much easier to last minute plan a party for a few kids, rather than the full class-load we had last year. So this year we had a school bus/ferry boat party. No one seemed to mind. Kai loved his giant school bus photo stand. It is amazing how much school bus stuff one can purchase on the internet. I had no idea they were such a popular interest for kids. Ferry boats, not so much, apparently. 

Okay, one more school bus picture:

But we did find a BC Ferries toy if you can believe it. We are taking a trip to the Pac NW this summer which will involve a ride on one of these "super boats" as Kai likes to call them and he is really smitten with the idea. 

There are no waits for this ferry. Captain Kai fits ALL the cars on!

Kai's friends arrived and the trampolining commenced. I love this picture. Just so much unbridled energy!

Kai's birthday party usually marks the first swim of the year. But I think it was actually the second this year; its been a warm "winter." 

Kai's cake was decorated to reflect our duo-theme. We couldn't find any ferry boats to put on his cake so we made do with pictures of BC Ferries on toothpicks (7 of them, as requested). He was pretty pleased. I always love watching his face as he sees his cake for the first time. I think it is the birthday moment he gets most excited about. 

Ferry pinatas were equally hard to come by so we improvised. 

You didn't want to be this pinata. One of Kai's little friends hit it so hard that some of the toys inside broke. Really hoping the pinata thing gets old soon. I can remember maybe only one birthday party growing up with a pinata. Here in San Diego, EVERY birthday party has one and all the kids just expect them. I find them annoying on several levels and look forward to our first pinata-free birthday. 

But complaints aside, Kai had a great birthday. He was thrilled to be another year older, and we loved having a chance to celebrate him. 

Seems like just yesterday he looked like this:

Easter

April is such a crazy month for our family, for many reasons. So I am determined to document our Easter adventure before the next big thing is upon us. (And its a big one; someone is turning 7).

I'm kind of ambivalent about how to celebrate Easter seeing as we're not particularly religious and I don't even know the story behind the egg-layin' Easter bunny that a secular Easter seems to embrace. (Every year I say I'll look it up; has yet to happen so if anyone knows, I'd be obliged....) This year I decided to at least attempt to tell the kids the original Easter story (the child's version w/o the terrifying parts, of course), so they'd have some sense of it. Teia was having trouble saying "Jesus" so she changed his name to George and then asked me if "George" and the Easter bunny knew each other. I don't think I did such a good job. Maybe I'll let Greg give it a shot next year.

Regardless of the meaning of the holiday, the kids were excited, Teia in particular. She was peering out the door for days before thinking she spotted an Easter egg. Usually it was just a leaf or an orange peel. When Easter morning finally arrived she was up early and spying eggs in the backyard. We were pretty groggy, having laid all those plastic eggs at 5 am. It was torture for her to wait for her brother to wake up and as soon as he was up she was out there and had about 7 eggs in her bucket before we even noticed she was outside. She's ninja like that when it comes to Easter eggs. We pretty much had to hold her down so Kai could catch up. If there was an Olympics for Easter egg hunts, Teia would be national team, if not gold medal-quality I'm sure. Kai went about his hunt in his usual thoughtful way, more of a tortoise than a hare. He really enjoyed it but wanted to open each egg to see what was inside before moving on for more. We had to prod him along lest he only end up with three to his sister's 30.

Post-hunt they examined their spoils with eggs and wrappers all over the floor. Then we moved on to the in-house hunt. Growing up, I don't remember an egg hunt outside but I do remember our indoor hunts where my parents always left crafty notes that we had to decipher to find out where our Easter chocolate was hiding. We loved these hunts, long after we learned to recognize our parents' writing and knew there was no Easter bunny. We do something similar for the kidlets. 

Bunnies across the wall and ceiling led them to the secret hiding places for their Easter baskets. 

I admit, even the hiding place was inspired by one of my childhood hunts.

The rest of the morning was pretty exciting for Teia while Daddy built her "jungle bed." We became the unexpected owners of a full size bed from some friends over the weekend. This was perfect b/c Teia had been sleeping on the floor on a mattress for the past few months. She's pretty happy with her new bed, complete with its jungle canopy (pics to come). 

After lunch we took a ride on the ferry over to Coronado island. Kai is a ferry man these days and the smile tells the story. He enjoyed himself :-)

Once over on Coronado we rented a 4 person bike where Greg and I got competitive and made sure we overtook every other family out there riding. We didn't have much choice; Teia was steadily mushing us from her perch at the front. 

And here's our girl in a lovely Easter dress that was perfect for the occasion. We're alot more into dresses these days. 

At the end of the day Greg showed me a note that Teia had dictated to him and placed in the mailbox, thanking the Easter bunny for a dress (different one) that was in her Easter basket. 

I'm sure the Easter bunny, wherever s/he is, appreciated the note. Kai told us the bunny goes back to his cage post-egg layin'. That's probably a good place for a giant, egg-layin' bunny to hide out. Oh, and the kids said they weren't scared of the wascally wabbit. But they did sleep with their doors closed the night before Easter and have kept them open every night before and every night since. I don't think they fancied the idea of a large rodent peeking on them while they were sleeping.

The Great Catch Up of 2014.

This has definitely been the slowest start to a blogging year since we started keeping this blog in 2008. What is that about more free time once the babies grow up a bit?????

I'm not really sure what to blame for my blogging absence. I guess we've just been super busy. Seems we've had our share of colds and fevers and there always seems to be something pressing to get done. Oh, and trying to maintain an active blog with photographs on a circa 2008 computer also has something to do with it. When the blog goes silent again, it'll be b/c I've run out of memory for photos on the old machine yet again.

So now we're a full third of the way into 2014 and I have only blogged about NYE. I had so many stories and photos about our visit with Shannon, Kip, Piper and Harry in December and January....but sadly, that seems such a long time ago now. Here are a few of my favorites nonetheless....

We spent alot of time at the beach. So much so that Teia, my sand crab, turned into a water and wave lover! She also discovered that she loved sand tobogganing. That Kip sure was lots of fun! 

Winter Solstice celebration at OB.

And another opportunity to sled in the sand, even if just on a piece of cardboard. 

So good to be together! (maybe we should have stood somewhere other than the kids' arts and crafts display wall!)

Christmas Day.

Move night. 

We spent a wonderful few hours hiking at Mt. Laguna. The kids were amazing, knocking out a 3+ mile hike with no complaints. This was taken near the end and they still had big smiles on their faces!

The girls. 5 weeks apart in age, just like their moms. 

This picture is just so classic: Teia pulling a face, Harry laughing, Piper turned the wrong way and Kai not looking. Doesn't get better than that!

Cuddly, snuggly girls. 

Just to prove Teia really does go in the ocean now. 

So much more to catch up on. We have a beautiful new nephew. Mike & Mom just spent spring break with us. I had another birthday (they seem to be coming fast and furious these days). We took a short trip to Pasadena. And we got a ...... trampoline! The blog is back in action :-)

Happy New Year!

Just like last year, we had so many adventures over the Christmas break and so little time to document them. I will try to get a few posts done, before memory fails me.

This year, for the first time in a loooong while, we went out to celebrate New Year's Eve. Neither Greg nor I are big New Year's people (meaning that going to bed before midnight really doesn't bother us much at all), but despite that, we found ourselves strangely excited as we drove down to our friends' rental near the beach. Funny that we were excited to be heading out for NYs knowing full well that we'd be home by about 8 pm!

We had a little party-get together at Shannon and Kip's place where we were joined by a couple of other families with small children who are good friends of theirs. We started off with a short trip to the beach to catch the sunset that wasn't. The clouds actually rolled in and it was quite misty for probably the only evening the entire time that Shannon and Kip were in town. So we didn't get a spectacular sunset finale to the year 2013. The kids didn't mind. They thought the mist was kinda cool.

Then we went back to the house for our evening of dinner and dancing. Really, we did have a little dance party in the living room. The kids absolutely loved dancing around with the grown ups and really throwing it down. Sometimes their dance moves looked more like running around the perimeter of the furniture as fast as they could, but whatevah, it was dancing.

We cracked open the bubbly (and the children's version) at about 8 pm to celebrate a Halifax NYE. We didn't even watch the ball drop b/c that would have meant staying up for New York and that was just way too much past the kids' bedtimes. The kids really got into the countdown. And seeing as our countdown didn't correspond with any particular time on the clock, no one really knew when to get started until Kai decided he had waited enough and started us off with an assertive "TEN, NINE, EIGHT...." Then it was cheersing and kisses all round and some pretty lousy attempts at auld lang sine. (I vow to learn the words for next year).

The kids made a fantastic sign to welcome 2014 which Harry kindly held up for a photo while I snuggle-posed with my best girls.

Wish I had something really profound to say to start off the New Year but for now, I'll just wish everyone a happy, peaceful 2014 with lots of time with the people you love! 

Christmas Chaos

Greg and I sit, exhausted and sugared up, thinking back on the events of the day: our 7th Christmas day as parents. Last night we reminisced about our first Christmas with two kids, back in 2009. Teia was only 2 months old and Kai was 2. We shook our heads remembering that crazy day as we cooked a turkey and tried to do all the things we wanted to do to celebrate Christmas and were so busy we didn't even sit to exchange gifts until 10 o clock that night. Things have gotten a little bit easier since then.

Our first Christmas gift today was our blessed little angels sleeping until past 7 am. This was really quite a surprise as they've been pretty excited. Teia in particular has been all about Christmas and has been wearing Christmas headgear pretty much all of December.

Teia woke first, in bed with us as has been her habit of late. She wanted to know if Santa had arrived, scampered to the living room and returned with the proof: an empty plate of cookies and one piece of nibbled on carrot. Somehow the fat stockings and piles of presents under the tree had escaped her notice. A few minutes later Kai arrived in our room and the excitement level went waaaaay up, particularly since Teia had declared that we'd be opening presents "as a fam-i-ly" which meant she was happy Kai was not going to be keeping her waiting with one of his legendary sleep ins.

We did stockings first and the kids were thrilled to find new jammies stuffed in there and promptly changed into them. 

Then the rip and tear began. Kai was really hoping for a lego airplane set and was reading labels on all the boxes large enough to possibly contain his gift. About 2 gifts in, he was in luck. He immediately opened the box and started to pull out the bags of Lego and began to open those, spewing some of the 658 pieces on the floor. His plan, to build that Lego airplane, right then and there. Somehow we were able to distract him and get him to back to opening gifts. Teia had a strong lead and we were worried she'd be finished about 3 days before Kai, as usual. Luckily she got distracted by the assembly of her My Little Pony palace and Kai was able to make up some ground.

The kids were solidly spoiled as usual by family, friends and Santa. Teia's stuffed animal collection multiplied. Santa brought her a leash and a comfy pet bed and she spent the next hour leashing and dragging her dinosaurs, cats, dogs, seals and anything else with a plush neck that could be leashed around the living room, then putting them down to nap in the comfy little bed. She even tried it out for herself but found she was a little too large. Kai's airplane collection also expanded and he got a good start on his new Magic School bus DVD and book collection. Santa didn't forget mom and dad either, the dear fellow.

It was a summery day in San Diego so we spent a quick hour at the beach. It seemed like just any other day at the beach except for the couple of people surfing in Santa hats and two wahine surfers wearing mu'u mu'us wrapped in tinsel over their wetsuits. And this guy....

Post beach-time we prepped Christmas dinner and then spent a lovely evening with our dear Haligonian friends who are visiting (this refers to people from Halifax, not people suffering from chronic onion breath as the name might otherwise suggest - especially if you spell it Hali-g-onion). There was another mad flurry of gift opening and a delicious dinner that the parents eventually sat down to after begging, threatening, negotiating, and strong arming some dinner into the kids (except for Harry who does a very impressive Fred Flintstone at the dinner table and can really wield a turkey leg - I'm a little disappointed I didn't get a photo of that).

Our children feel entirely differently about dessert though. We served our usual Christmas day dessert fare of chocolate mousse. After polishing off his portion, Kai asked "who wants more dessert?" This was an entirely rhetorical question he was asking himself in the hopes that someone would provide him with another bowl of mousse. The mousse was yummy and served with fresh whipped cream this year instead of canned whipped cream. This was my idea as I'm trying to get as many preservatives out of our diet as possible. Greg loves his whipped cream. Like really loves it. So he wanted to make sure it was perfect and even chilled the mixers and mixing bowl before preparing it. He grumbled about all the effort but I think even he agreed, it tasted better in the end.

Bedtime wasn't without its challenges, not too surprising after such a sugar and excitement filled day. But the kids were pretty tickled with their new alarm clocks that projected pictures and the time onto their ceilings. I asked each of them what was their favorite part of the day. Kai said he liked receiving his Lego airplane best of all. Teia chose her alarm clock, sleeping in bed with Mommy and Daddy and "the fam-i-ly" as her favorite parts of the day. Awwwww.....I love Christmas....now that clean up that awaits us in a week or so, not so much. But we won't think about that quite yet.

Merry Christmas to All and to All a Good Night!

Little Runners

We have some friends in town: Shannon and Kip and their little ones, Harry & Piper (tho I've petitioned to officially change her name to "Pipes", its way more SoCal).   They're hanging out in San Diego for about a month on sabbatical.  While I always thought sabbaticals were just times for professors (of which Shannon is one) to ponder great things related to their field of study, apparently they're also a time to kick-it LARGE in Sunny San Diego while their hometown of Halifax does its best to single-handedly counter global warming.

(by way of comparison, yesterday, I provided a brief to about 400 surly shipyard workers on why they shouldn't drink & drive while the Sabbaticalites explored tidepools and beaches.  I'm in the wrong business, apparently).

Its been great to catch up with them and see the kids bond.  5 days prior to their arrival, Teia had already declared Pipes her new BFF.  (she neglected to inform her former BFF, Ale, so Louise & I foresee a storm a-brewin' in room 20, Kate Sessions Preschool.  Stay tuned).  Pipes also shares Teia's propensity to spontaneously declare herself a different animal/machine/geographic feature every 30min.  First, both T and P are puppies.  Then one is a puppy and the other a cat (they still get along during this phase shift, thankfully).  Then both are cats.  Then one becomes a crocodile and the other a sand dune.  Then the sand dune wallops Harry and chaos ensues.  Meanwhile, the parents inch their way further & further away from the shape-shifting Battle Royale to catch up on old times.   Life is good!

This weekend had planned a fun-run & parade in Pacific Beach.  A one-mile fun run out & back along Garnet Ave (the main bar/taco stand/tattoo parlor strip in PB).  We headed out with great hopes for our younglings to enjoy the run along the strip and sit through a short parade.  Amazingly, things pretty much went to plan!!

Harry & Pipes decided to sit this one out (a wise financial decision, it would turn out) and initially only Teia agreed to sign up.  But one look at his intrepid little sister, suited up and ready to take on the world, and Kai was not about to let himself get one-upped!!

The only downside was the entry fee.  The race advertised $20/person.  No problem, kids races are ALWAYS cheaper.  Sometimes free!  

Except.In.Pacific.Beach.

So $40 later, we lined up at the end of the group, warming up to some dance music.  With a "Ready!  Set!  Go!!" we were off!  And..... kept going!!!   The last running race we had done (on Wolfe Island), we spent the better part of 200m cajoling/pleading/prodding/pushing our little runners along.  The bar was set pretty low for a race that was 8x's longer, so Louise and I already planned to cut the course whenever was convenient.  But as we cruised past 400m with hardly a break in stride for either, we started to wonder: are they going to make it the whole way???
























Yes, yes they are!!  Kai took a short walking break (his first official timed fartlek), but after I broke out the "wings", he found a second wind and screamed home.

T's shorter legs needed just a few more seconds of rest and she rocketed in right after.  Both received their prizes with reserved humility, thanking their parents profusely, the crowds for their support, and their corporate sponsor, Nutella.


We cruised down to the beach then back for the PB parade.  Unfortunately, I spent the majority of it in a sandwich shop called "Which Wich?"   A better name might be "When Wich?" because I was beginning to wonder when the hell I was ever going to get something Louise & I could eat.    The parade was an eclectic blend of marching bands, convertibles with Miss Teen riding onboard, and what I can only guess were 'bandits': local flora & fauna who randomly inserted themselves into the parade and everyone figures "Well, they're probably too stoned to cause trouble and too slow to suddenly run anyone over".  This included a minivan covered with buildings, a motorcycle gang of 60-somethings, and a couple preschools (only the parents were stoned for that one.  I think).

After such a day, we'd normally call it success to simply make it home and crash; T on the couch watching TV, Kai playing with planes, and Louise and I commencing our nightly russian roulette of "What will the kids actually f*#&*ing eat tonight?"  But there were bigger plans afoot:  Teia was having her first dance recital!!  

She has been going to dance class for the last few months, practicing a routine for the Nutcracker.  Specifically, the Dance of the Reeds.  Kai wasn't interested in the opening sister-less acts so we explored the darkened alleyways of a high-school while T & L watched other kids dance.  During T's routine, Kai was the very supportive bigger brother, cheering and clapping his little Peachy sister dance, tap, and twirl like she had parents who could actually dance, tap & twirl (without a white-man's overbite, to boot)!!  She did fantastic, tho her flexibility was called into question when she lined up next to an unfamiliar girl for the 'twirling-pair' portion of the dance.  Instead of grabbing that girl's hands, T grabbed her friend Edie's hands instead, leaving the other girl a little confused as T & Edie spun around longer & faster than anyone else.

 We gave our proud dancer a rose, befitting for a beautiful performance!

All were beyond tired by the time we got home at around 8pm.  A few bowls of cereal, milk & books later and both kids were sound asleep while the proud parents got thru a few more holiday-routines to get ready for the week.  Exhausting but well worth the efforts for all!

Idle in Idyllwild

We escaped the big city this year for Thanksgiving. We thought it would be nice to enjoy some pine trees and cooler weather. So we packed up the mini-van with our Littles, some woolies and even an organic turkey (in a cooler). We didn't exactly escape the Thanksgiving traffic, but we did escape the congestion and same old, same old weather.

Our 2+ hour drive took us from sea level to 6000 feet and from chaparral to pine trees. It is cool to watch the landscape transform so much over such a short distance. By mountain town standards there isn't too much to do in Idyllwild with no ski hill, but there are plenty of hiking trails in the San Jacinto mountains, cute restaurants and shops, and an amazing playground.

This was the kids' favorite hang out at 6000 feet. The concrete slab in front of the playground made for hours of scootering. The kids favorite game (when they weren't pretending to be planes from the disney movie) was catch Daddy. At least Greg got in some altitude training. 

On our one rainy day we tried out a paint your own pottery studio where Teia painted a puppy and Kai created a plane on a plate :-)  They were such focused little artists. 

We also let the kids drink way too much hot chocolate. I guess we got carried away with the novelty of the cold weather. 

We did a little hiking where Greg found some snacks along the trail.

Our Thanksgiving dinner turned out pretty well, all things considered. We baked our pumpkin pie for twice as long as normal and peeled the butternut squash with a cheese shredder; but kitchen challenges aside, it was still yummy. And the kids actually ate turkey yet again. But first of all they subjected us to the usual refrain of "I don't like that, and that, and that....." Holiday meals for them consist of a little turkey, fizzy juice (aka apple cider), pumpkin pie, whipped cream and peanut butter on toast. 

Because Idyllwild is such a cute little town, we had to do some window shopping. It quickly turned into real shopping when Teia the Determined absolutely had to have a pair of fuzzy slippers. We agreed, thinking that we'd be able to pick some up for $10. Apparently not in Idyllwild. The only two pair we could find were $30 and that was after checking out just about every store. Greg declared Kai "husband material" as he patiently followed little sis and Mommy in and out of every store. She did end up with a very nice pair of slippers. 

Probably the most remarkable part of our weekend was Kai and Teia sleeping in the same bed. Our little cabin had 2 bedrooms, each with a queen bed. We decided to give the kid co-sleeping thing a try, fully expecting 3 nights of musical beds. We were pleasantly surprised. Each night we'd listen to some chatting and some giggling and then nothing...the sweet sound of babes asleep. Each morning we'd hear the same, chatting and giggling and then little feet walking around the cabin. It seems we solved the problem of the Teia alarm clock - put her in bed with her brother. Unfortunately, then he loses out on his beauty sleep. So now that we're home she is back in her own bed, sleeping solo, and we're back to enjoying our 4 year old human alarm clock. 

Traveling with kids is never relaxing. I read somewhere that you should never refer to a trip with children as a "vacation." It is always just a "trip." Agreed on that one but there is something refreshing and rejuvenating regardless about "getting away from it all."