Visit with Nana

Today Gina went with Nana for a two day visit in Sacramento. She was SO excited to be going. Of course she couldn't resist rubbing it in to Andrew that she got to go and Andrew was too little. Andrew was not happy with being left behind. I left for a little while to get my tire fixed and when I came back, Gina had her sleeping bag in the hallway and was busy packing her two backpacks. I think she took half her wardrobe with her.

I called my mom later and she said Gina was having a lot of fun. But she wouldn't talk to me on the phone. She's funny like that sometimes. It was strange just having the two boys around and definitely quieter. Without Gina, Andrew could play with his toys without interruption and there was no one to pester in the car.

Andrew's Party

Andrew had his birthday party this past weekend at a local park. The weather was perfect and we were able to get the picnic tables in the shade. The big kids had fun running around. Andrew brought his balloon rockets and the kids enjoyed taking turns blowing up the balloons. Andrew opened his presents at the beginning and then convinced me that he should be able to play with them at the park. All the kids had fun playing with his new matchbox car playset. Amazingly, none of the pieces were lost.


I didn't have time to make a cake so we settled for cupcakes from Icing on the Cake, always a big hit. We had both chocolate and lemon cupcakes (Chocolate was Andrews' choice and the lemon was mine).

Dylan and Katrina sat on the blankets in the shade. Dylan was much more interested in the toys that Katrina had. Dylan is showing interest in starting to crawl but he's not there yet. It won't be long though before we have to keep all the little parts from all the big kids toys out of reach.

Swim Class

This week Dylan and Andrew had their first swim class of the season at Water Babies. It took a bit of coaxing to get Andrew into the pool and then he was hanging on for dear life with Dylan holding tight on the other side. Neither kid was crazy about putting their face in the pool. Dylan was happy with Teacher Gina until he got dipped then he started crying. Andrew tolerated it a few times and then told Gina "No more dip". I think it will take a few classes for him to warm up to the idea of swimming. He spent the entire play time sitting on the steps, watching Emily swim like a fish.

Gina spent the time sitting at the table drawing and talking with Spencer, the owner's son. She hadn't wanted to take swim classes at Water Babies and though she had a great two weeks swimming at the Y, she has once again decided that she doesn't like swimming.

Big Boys

This week Andrew turned 3 and Dylan reached 8 months. Dylan is sitting up really well now, he only occasionally falls backwards and he is showing interest in learning how to crawl, though he has a long ways to go. This week he also got his first bath in the big bathtub. He wasn't too sure about all that water at first, but once he started splashing the water with his hands, he had a grand time.

Andrew was so excited about having his birthday. Every time we went to the toy store recently he would point out everything that he wanted for his birthday. This mostly included rockets, space ships, airplanes and cars. I asked him if he wanted cupcakes or popsicles for his birthday at preschool. Lucky for me, he wanted lime popsicles (I don't know when I would have made cupcakes since I had a class the night before). I stopped by his preschool room for snack time and he was patiently waiting for that popsicle. The teacher said that normally he sits on his mat for awhile after he wakes up, but today he hopped up and put his blanket away and was ready for snack. Once he finally got one, he proceeded to eat it (while the other kids were slowly licking theirs) and he was done in just a few minutes.

For dinner we went to the kids favorite restaurant, Flames. Dylan got to sit in a highchair for the first time and you can barely see the red marks on his forehead from where he hit the edge of the table (4 times) when he bent forward too far. Andrew was way too energetic and couldn't sit still so he and Nana walked around outside for awhile.

After dinner he was excited about the cake. He couldn't resist the giant piece of chocolate cake with green frosting and chocolate chips on the outside. Gina of course had the chocolate cake with pink frosting. They each ate about 2 bites from their gigantic pieces of cake (while mama almost finished hers).

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Up a Creek

San Gregorio Creek that is. Today we went to my boss's house in San Gregorio for a party. It was sunny when we left our house, but the fog was in once we passed Skyline. Despite the fog, the temperature wasn't too cold.

David's house is very interesting. Outside among the various trees and plants are large sculptures from Zimbabwe. The house itself is a nice looking farmhouse. Inside are more sculptures, various items from around the world and lots of paintings. One painting, a very dark piece showing a woman visiting a someone who is sick, takes up an entire wall. It is huge.

The food was Ethiopian. My friend Seble made one dish, a red hummus like dish and the rest came from a local restaurant. The food consisted of various meat and vegetable dishes with spicy sauces. It is then eaten with a thin spongy bread that comes in rolls. The bread is used to pick up the food so no utensils are needed. It is very good. Dylan liked the bread too, though Gina was less enthusiastic about it. Andrew liked the non-Ethiopian tortilla chips. My favorite part though was the chocolate rum cake from Prolific Oven, yum!

The highlight of the trip which the kids were excited about was the creek walk. The last time we visited David (before kids), there had been a flood and the creek was easily visited from the house. Now we had to climb down a sandy bank to the creek and then walk along and through the creek. With the dry winter, the creek was low but we still got pretty wet.

I went down to the creek carrying Dylan in the sling with the intention of just seeing the creek but after climbing down the bank, I decided to go on the walk as well. I didn't have real water shoes but it worked out okay. With a curious almost 3 year old, it was slow going, we brought up the rear. Andrew had fun picking up rocks and then tossing them back into the creek. At one point neither Gina nor Andrew wanted to continue in the water and so Vic ended up carrying Gina on his back and Andrew on his front for a short time.

On the ride home, all three kids were fast asleep. Of course taking a nap in the car meant that the kids were wide awake when they were supposed to be going to bed.

Happy 4th of July

Today was Independence Day. Nana and I decided to take the kids to the local morning celebration at a small park which we went to last year. They have a band, balloons, speeches and a parade at the end with ice cream for the kids.

Things got off to a great start with Andrew not wanting to leave his binky and duck behind. Then he wouldn't smile for a photo with all three kids on the porch.

Gina took her scooter and Andrew took the trike with Dylan in the stroller. A block from the house though Andrew was having a tough time with the trike so we ended up carrying the trike for the rest of the way. Once we got to the park, Gina started to whine and complain about listening to the band (a clue we should have left right away) but after seeing all the balloons, she seemed happier.

There were quite a few people there, mostly sitting in the sun on the grass. The one drawback of the park is that it has very little shade. Gina went off to play on the swings for awhile and Andrew was happy with a pinwheel.

After about an hour though, we were all hot and decided to skip the parade and have ice cream at home. The kids though were not happy about riding back. They wanted to go home, just not walk or ride. Gina didn't want to ride her scooter and Andrew still didn't want to ride the trike. So Gina rode the trike even though she is way too big for it and I dragged the scooter along with Nana pushing Dylan in the stroller. It seemed to take forever to go just a few blocks, with Gina complaining the whole way.

The day improved a little later with a visit from Uncle Steve. Nana got to escape the kids for a little while, going with Steve to get coffee and once they returned, the kids had a grand time playing with him.

With the heat, I decided not to cook and instead, we had pizza on the front lawn. Once we were done, they kids had fun running through the sprinklers until they turned blue from being cold. After all that running around after dinner, they went to sleep easily for once, listening to the fireworks going off in the distance. Maybe next year they will get to see the fireworks.