Birthday Recap

I haven't blogged about the kids' or my birthdays this year, so I thought I'd do a quick overview of them all at once!

Ella's birthday was back in June.  She turned 7!  I can't believe how old my kids are getting.  :(

Ella wanted a ballerina themed birthday and was very specific about how everything needed to be.  First we had to play pin the tiara on the ballerina.  I busted out my drawing skills (sure) and drew a giant ballerina on a leftover piece of packing paper.  I left it empty and let the kids decorate it as part of the activities.

I think they did a pretty good job.

My ballerina with her ballerina.  Isn't she just so cute?

Then on to the game!  Not a single one of us managed to get our crown on the ballerina, not even the kids who cheated.

Next up was musical chairs.  It's pretty hard to play when you only have 4 people and one has to start and stop the music.  That leaves you with 3 people and 2 chairs.  The game goes pretty fast.  Anton took a video or two of the silliness, but I'm too lazy to hook it up right now to upload it.

Then it was present time!  Ella's one and only request was for a Happy Napper.

Thank you television for introducing my children to such fantastic toys.  She also got a ballet tutu (she wanted a whole ballet outfit and was totally bummed about the homemade tutu I gave her), clothes, art stuff, and a jump rope.

She's still working on the jump roping skills.

Then it was time for cake!

Ella requested a strawberry cake with white frosting.

I did all the pink decorations with chocolate.  There were different ballerina silhouettes all around the cake.  I wanted to cover the whole thing with the roses I did on top, but I ran out of frosting.  Those things are frosting hogs!!

It was a tasty cake, but sadly Ella didn't like the strawberry filling I put in it.

The rest of us enjoyed it though.

So that was Ella's 7th birthday!

Next up was Alex's 5th birthday in July.  Can you believe he's starting kindergarten in a week?  Where did my baby go?  We celebrated his birthday in parts since we were travelling and moving right around his birthday.

We gave him one present early so he could have it in the car.

Yes, another Happy Napper.  He loves it.

When we were in Utah we had a whole big family party for everyone, so he got celebrated some more, and then it was off to California.  We actually celebrated his real birthday in the hotel.

I had tried to get all his gifts ahead of time, but ended up having to make a last minute Target run to round out the gifts.

But he was thrilled with his goggles and floaties since we had a pool there at the hotel to swim in.

I didn't want to try and bake a cake in the little hotel kitchen, so I let Alex pick his cake at the grocery store.  And no matter how much I tried to convince him that a nice plain white cake with Happy Birthday on top would be perfect, he insisted in this one:

Yeah.  The kids were pooping green for days.  I couldn't eat it.  But he loved it, and that's what matters, right?  I need to send a picture of it to Cake Wrecks.

And then last, but not least, was my birthday.  We pretty much didn't do anything.  Actually, that's not true.  we house hunted on my birthday.  We went to the open house of the house we're currently living in, and all I wanted for my birthday was this house.  And I got it so all is good.  We also went out for dinner at a super good sushi place, and on my birthday itself went up to see the Oakland temple.

And that about does it for birthdays this year.  I'll probably do a couple other catch-up posts, and one of these days I actually post about our new house!  I was hoping to wait until we are all unpacked, but I don't think that will happen anytime soon.

Ella Update

Ella is doing great!  The girl who ran into my bedroom Thursday morning was so not the girl I left at the hospital Wednesday night.  She gets sleepy now and then from her medicine, and she says her throat hurts, but other than that she seems to be doing fine.  She eats regular food (soft food), though she does take advantage of the pudding and Popsicles we stocked up on before the surgery.  She is definitely milking the invalid status for all its worth.  She's watched LOTS of movies and just lays around on the couch all day, which is what she would do on any regular day if I would let her.  So besides a little throat pain, she's in heaven.  So that's the update for now!

Adenoids and Tonsils and Tubes, Oh My!

So I'm hanging out in the hospital with Ella today.  She had her tonsils and adenoids out this morning and tubes put in her ears.  She's been a total trooper about it.

The first thing she said was to ask for the stuffed bear they gave her before she went into surgery.  Then while she was half asleep she was signing "I love you" to me.  It was so cute.

She threw up a couple times and hasn't said much, but she also says that she's not in any pain, so that's good.

Anton and Alex came and visited her after lunch and brought our little DVD player.  I told her she could watch her movie after Daddy and Alex left, and she started waving goodbye to them.  What a nut!

So now this is how she's been sitting for over an hour:

Puke bowl under the chin, and Barbie on the DVD player.  All is good with the world.  

They're keeping her overnight since she had such an obstructed airway from her adenoids, but I'm going to switch off with Anton for that.  There's no way I'm going to play nursemaid all day tomorrow after having to sleep in a hospital recliner.  No thanks!

So that's the excitement in our little neck of the woods.  We'll keep you all posted on how she's doing!

The Weekend Tourist - San Francisco Edition

Living as "close" as we do to San Francisco (about an hour drive and a $5 bridge toll) and after listening to the kids beg to see the Golden Gate Bridge since they originally heard about it, we decided today to head to the city.  We couldn't just drive in and see the bridge and go home, though, so we planned a couple other stops and made a couple unplanned ones.

First stop, Lombard Street!

Lombard Street is supposedly the windiest street in some geographic region, be it city, state, country, world, etc.  From the top you can see all the way to Coit Tower there in the distance and across to the other side of the bay.  You have to run over a few tourists to be able to actually drive down Lombard Street.  They just stand in the middle of the road snapping pictures, neveryoumind the million cars headed your way.

Looking back up the street you just see lots of pretty flowers.

The kids were in roller coaster heaven!  Alex always begs us to put the car in neutral so we can fly down the hills (what he imagines would happen if we actually did that), so cruising Lombard Street was right up his alley.  We actually went around the block and did it again because it was so much fun.

Next stop: the Palace of Fine Arts.  I actually took a History of San Francisco class when I was in college, and it was one of my favoritest classes ever!  (How do you like that great grammar?)  Ever since then I have wanted to see the Palace of Fine Arts in person.  I never imagined it was so HUGE!

Most tourist attractions leave you thinking, "That's it?"  But this place was waaaaay bigger than I ever imagined.  It's beautiful there!

To give you a sense of scale, that's Alex standing in the middle of the dome area where the red arrow is pointing.  So cool!  There's actually a science museum right there too, but we decided to save it for another day.

Next stop: Golden Gate Bridge!

Alex declared after the fact that he didn't like it because it wasn't gold and because we had to walk on it.  We didn't want to pay another bridge toll, and I though it would give us a better sense of the size to walk out on it instead of driving.

It was fairly foggy most of the time we were there so we only caught glimpses of the top of the bridge.

It took me forever to get this picture set up with me all sprawled out on the ground and in everyone's way, only to have the kids making goofy faces!  Argh.

Let me tell you, though, you want to see an interesting cross-section of humanity, go walk the Golden Gate Bridge on a Saturday afternoon.  Wow.  And I just have to say, there have been so many times that I just want to scream out loud: "This is America, people!  We walk on the right side of the street/sidewalk!" And those particular people won't get out of your way for anything.  They'll plow you over if you don't step to the left.  Grrr.  But regardless, the bridge was fun, but I would suggest going on a cold weekday when it's not quite so busy.

After grabbing a quick and expensive lunch at the cafe in the parking lot (note to self, don't be so lazy next time and actually pack a lunch) we drove around the point of the peninsula and down to Ocean Beach.

We only walked out to the water and back since it was chilly and we hadn't planned on making a beach stop.  But the beach was nice and empty, and the sand was really nice.

From there we drove down the Great Highway for a short ways to see the sights, then back over and through the city.  We passed some of the Russian places we had visited when we lived in Monterey and made a note to come back that way again some time.  And then it was back home for naps and recuperation.  Big cities take it out of me.  But then again, I've already made an enormous list of places I want to see next time we go back.  We're kind of thinking about making this a monthly thing.  We'll see!

What We've Been Up To

I've been a bad blogger.  I know.  I'll give a quick rundown of what we've been up to, but the details and photos will have to come later!

In June we moved from Oklahoma to California with a short stop in Utah to see family.  Once in California we spent almost 3 weeks living in 3 different hotels while trying to find a place to live.  The cost of living out here is insane, and a lot of the rental places want to see that you have three times the monthly rent in income, which we don't have at this time.  I finally found the perfect house for us and had to convince the landlady that we were the perfect tenants regardless of our income.  We managed to convince her and got the house.

We moved in two weeks ago and I've been working at unpacking and organizing and getting rid of all the junk that's been sitting in storage for 2 years that I can't believe I packed in the first place.  It's been busy.  So once I have the house looking like I want, I'll post pictures of it.  If you really want to see it in all its messy glory, Anton posted pictures on his facebook.

My brain is not working right now, so I really can't think of anything else to say.  I'm know, I'm boring.  I'll try and be better about posting and even using pictures!  If anyone is out in the Bay Area anytime, drop me a line and we'll get together and play!

Our Weekend

Fun weekend!  Friday night we went and tried a new sushi place.  It was okay.  Not the best we've tried here.  It was pricey too for the quality.  But it was my Mother's Day dinner out, and I'm worth splurging on.  :)

On Saturday we went and visited the Museum of Osteology, or in other words, a bone museum.  It was pretty cool.

There were skeletons of all shapes and sizes.

The biggest was a whale.

There were rhinos and hippos and even human ones!

There was also a scavenger hunt for both the kids and the adults.  I learned all sorts of things.  Did you know the myth of the cyclops originated from the unique shape of elephant skulls?

Look at its one eye!

The kids loved it there, and it was just big enough/small enough to keep their interest.  You could even pick up your own bones in the gift shop.  Want a human skull?  It'll only set you back $1650.  Maybe I'll donate my body for display.

We went to a BBQ that night with the guys from Anton's class.  It's weird to hang out with a bunch of young single guys.  I don't have much to say to them about anything.  Oh well, it was still nice to be out with adults.

This morning for Mother's Day Anton made me Creme Brulee French Toast for breakfast.  It. was. so. good.  Make it.  You can even sub out the whipping cream for fat free half and half and it'll even be almost good for you.  Anton topped it with fresh strawberries, blueberries, and raspberries.  You won't need syrup for this.  It's good all on its own.

Then in a mad rush as we were running out the door for church the kids gave me all their cute homemade gifts and flowers from Anton.

Alex even still has breakfast in his mouth, that's how rushed we were.

Then after church I spent the rest of the day doing whatever I pleased, from reading to playing on the computer.  I wish it could be Mother's Day every day!

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(My sister and I enjoying a free hotel night before going on our cruise!)

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