Second Grade!

Somehow summer has come and went and LT is back to school! He is in 2nd grade this year. He is in a 2/3 combo class with lots of his friends, so it is very exciting. The first day was tough going in as he was the last kid to come in (3rd grade starts at 8:15 and 2nd starts at 8:25 and we didn't realize his class was starting at 8:15 because of the combo). The second day he didn't even look back or wave goodbye when the line went in! I think he enjoyed the first 2 days.

Here's the annual picture!


Years past:
First Grade
Kinder

Chicago

I think this will be a picture only post.

Strawberry Pickers

We are very thankful that Grandma A was able to come and spend 2 weeks with us giving DT & LT "Grandma Camp." I think they had a pretty spectacular time. We did manage a few fun activites. We went strawberry picking at a new place, primarily because my employer gave out $20 gift certificates. Yippee! That's a lot of berries, or pie, if you prefer that. (We went with pie.)

Here we are off to the picking. As you look through the pictures you may notice some of us were more serious about picking that others!








And even a group shot! Only with some of our pie, we did take home a whole pie as well.

July 4th

We celebrated our anniversary by heading to Monterey for a night.

Breakfast at our hotel.

Alright, everyone look happy! 

Wave tunnel at the aquarium. Here's the same tunnel 2 years ago.

Pull the horn. Here's that horn 5 month's ago 

  

Go in the fishing basket (like 5 months ago) 

Throw rocks at our "secret" beach, aka "sea kelp round up" beach, aka "eastern egg hunt" beach (and the year before)

Father's Day Kayaking

TT has had a vision of the whole family kayaking together for, well, a long time. Father's day we finally made his dream a reality! We got two inflatable kayaks (for easier transport & storage). We headed out to Elkhorn Slough and set out. It was a beautiful day with lots of wildlife. We saw otters, sea lions, pelicans, seals and more! It was a hard paddle back, but worth it. Happy Father's Day, TT!

Camping

A historic moment took place this weekend. Our very first camping trip with 4 of us. In order to make this work, we had to get a new tent and an air mattress (I insisted on the latter). I would say it was successful. The boys had a really good time and were only slightly crazy. We had sandwiches for lunch, foil packets for dinner, smores (a lot of smores) for dessert and then bacon, eggs, toast & coffee for breakfast. We even got our own personal talk from the park ranger when we were the only ones to show up.

Catching Air

We were lucky enough to have Grandma & Grandpa T visit us over Memorial Day. We had a very nice time picking strawberries, paddle boating, flying a kite, and more. If only summer would come and it would get above 70 degrees!

There were really no strawberries at the patch due to the unseasonable rain we've been having recently. Since there wasn't much to pick (and what there was, DT promptly ate), we had to find other ways to entertain ourselves.





Not bad at all!

We even managed a nice family photo in the front yard with our Memorial Day flag.


More picture of our nice weekend can be found here.

3 Year Old

DT had his birthday last month. Lucky boy had cake twice! An ice cream cake with the family and then a tower of cupcakes at his party. Somehow we didn't take too many pictures either day, but everyone had a good time!



(never mind my gigantic arm! just trying to keep the candles lit!)

Mother's Day

The boys gave me some nice presents for Mother's Day.

DT painted this frame and drew a picture of a "silly mommy."


LT had a made a scroll painting and two great cards. This one was especially fun!


The biggest boy gave me a gift certificate for the spa. Woohoo! Now to find time to go there and relax.

Egg Hunt

It's been a busy time for us. Sunday we went to Monterey for our (second) annual egg hunt there, third annual on the beach (Pismo with cousing JT the first time!). Thursday was DT's 3rd birthday. He stood up on the bed that morning and announced, " I am a Giant, Giant boy." And he is. Saturday we had a party for DT to celebrate!

So I can't catch us up with everything at once, but here are some memories from the beach.

Off hunting

A quite satisfied hunter. He has requested that next year his eggs be more hidden as this year was "too easy"


Here is where I announce we are still missing some eggs and we need to hunt some more

But will someone, or something, find them first?

A cautious hunter

Cataloging their spoils

A quite satisfactory family picture. You may see this again in the Christmas card!


We even managed to catch the Easter bunny at lunch. The boys were actually quite enamoured with him, while I was more on the frightened side.


We finished up with a trip to the aquarium. Always something to see there! The octopus is my favorite and put on a nice show this time.

Happy Spring to all!