He finished!

Friends were down from Portland last month and recommended this book for Thomas.  Their son is a year older and had really enjoyed the book.  Thomas was excited to read this but apparently it's a popular choice so we had to put it on hold at the library and wait.  It was returned, he checked it out, and yesterday he finished!  It's a big book for a 6 year old.  Later this week we'll go to the library and check out the book that follows.  He's excited to start that one!

the cheerleader

Before I knew which weekend the Cub Scouts would be camping, I had contacted the La Jolla Half Marathon event director inquiring about volunteer opportunities.  It's something I've always wanted to do and since I hadn't planned to run the event this year, I figured now was a good time.  However, later I learned the race was happening the same weekend as Thomas' camping weekend so I had to pass.  I decided we should still cheer for our friends running.  This morning Meredith and I stood along the course (in two different locations) and cheered for the runners.  We saw my friends, we got lots of attention and cheers and we had a lot of fun.  Greta came, too, making it a girls' morning for us!  Meredith shook her pom poms, cheered and received a high five.  I had printed out a Bingo card (spaces are things like: runner in a tutu, barefoot runner, excessively hairy runner, etc.) that I taped to the back of our sign.  It gave us something to do and things to look for towards the end when her interest was waning.  Overall, a very enjoyable morning!  It was fun to be on the sidelines looking in.

Cub Scouts: camping!

the tent is up at Camp Balboa (BSA camp within Balboa Park, San Diego)

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This weekend was Thomas' first camping trip!  Neither Mike nor I are big camping fans so, as a result, we simply hadn't taken the kids.  But the camping weekends are a very big deal for the Cub Scouts and this is something Thomas has been looking forward to.  The weekend turned out to be a great weather weekend for it.  It gets quite cold in the evenings, but the days were warm and beautiful.  I took the kids down Friday night with some of the camping gear to get Thomas signed in and some things set up.  Mike came a little bit later to swap places since this was a "Fun With Son" event and not a family camping weekend.  Meredith and I went home, missing the male members of our family, and talking about when our whole family will go camping.  Yes, she wants to go.  And we will go because the kids' excitement and enthusiasm is simply infectious!

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Friday night dinner ~ sound asleep Sunday morning

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  what he looked forward to most: bb guns ~ all his hits were on the paper!

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organized hike with a tour guide ~ archery practice, he did great!

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wild bird show ~ w/school friend and Den pal, Isaiah (future chemical engineer)

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 roasting s'mores, of course ~ climbing trees and being silly

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learning to use a scroll saw! ~ water balloon toss, one of several games

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enjoying a little down time with a Dr. Pepper (his first!) and book



Girl Scouts

Since our old neighbor was a Daisy/Girl Scout and Thomas is now in Cub Scouts, Meredith is anxiously waiting for her turn to participate.  Daisies start in Kindergarten so she'll have the opportunity to join very soon.  A friend invited us to join them in a short 4-week series, a sort of "Intro to Girl Scouts".  Unfortunately only one of those four weekends worked for us so I passed on the series.  But, lucky for us, today's meeting was the one that worked and today's meeting was also "Bring a Buddy" day.  Her friend, Coral, invited Meredith to join her.  Tracy picked up Meredith and took the girls to the meeting this afternoon, giving me almost 2 hours to myself.  Meredith had a great time and really enjoyed the activities so we'll definitely sign her up in the Fall.  It won't be long now until she's a Daisy!

Uncle Earl

It's been nice having Mike's youngest brother, Earl, living close to us.  The kids think he's great and really enjoy having some family nearby.  Last weekend we visited him at his new apartment in (downtown) San Diego and walked to dinner.  This afternoon he stopped by after work with a birthday gift for Meredith and to wish her a belated birthday.  For someone without kids or really any familiarity with 5 year old girls for that matter, he picked a perfect gift.  There's nothing this girl loves more than princesses and lip gloss!

the start of a skater girl?

Super Reader

Thomas has always been a very sweet and kind boy.  He's this way to everyone and I think that's why kids like him, esp. girls.  This afternoon at the library he was sitting in the Book Club area waiting for it to begin when a little girl sat down next to him with a book.  She couldn't have been more than 16 or 18 months old.  She handed the book to Thomas but didn't say anything.  He shrugged, opened it and began reading the book to the little girl.  She smiled at him the whole time.  It was the sweetest thing.  You could tell her mom thought it was the cutest thing, too, and she looked surprised by how kind Thomas was.  Afterwards I asked him what he read to her and he laughed, "It was a potty book, mom!"   

Disneyland Celebration!

This year we decided to skip the birthday bash with invited friends for a family celebration.  I'd say it was a "simple, no-nonsense family celebration" but the day was spent at Disneyland and California Adventure so really not simple or no-nonsense.  It was, however, all about FUN.

Today was totally Meredith's day!  She got to choose which rides we rode, which shows we saw, etc.  Special treats throughout the day, an opportunity to spend some birthday cash in the Disney store, dinner at the park and the magical Disneyland parade to top it all off.  It was a special day and we all agreed afterwards that it was a memorable and fun way to celebrate Meredith's 5th birthday. 

Most of today was spent in Disneyland.  I suspect when we return in a few weeks to celebrate Thomas' birthday much of our day will be spent inside California Adventure.  We're all looking forward to that already!   

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Last night the kids each received a lanyard and 5 pins from our friend, Sofie.  She and her boys stayed the night at our house and joined us for a few hours of Disneyland fun today.  These lanyards and pins were perfect.  We hadn't participating in the pin exchange before but both kids were loving it.  You can purchase these lanyards and pins in the Disney stores and online.  While at the park, employees wear pins that anyone can then exchange a pin for.  The pins start at $8 each and the limited edition ones can be pretty spendy.  By the end of the day, one employee had given them each a pin (maybe because they were so cute?), Meredith had purchased one for herself, and they had each exchanged probably 4 pins.  They came home with some pretty cool ones.  We'll see what they do in a few weeks when we return for Thomas' birthday! 

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FIVE

Yesterday afternoon a girlfriend from college (she lives in LA) came over for dinner and then stayed the night with us.  Her boys are 5 and 3 years old and her baby girl is 11 months.  The kids all have such a great time together.  There's always a lot of excitement leading up to seeing each other and then they talk about it for weeks afterwards.  This visit was no different and they had a BLAST.

Since we were spending today at Disneyland all day, I decided to do the cake last night after dinner.  Mike was unable to be there (he got home soon after) so it was nice to have some friends to share that with.  Meredith, of course, loved being the center of attention and having us all sing to her. 

So, cake last night and presents this morning.  It isn't the conventional birthday celebration, but sometimes you just have to do things however best they happen to work.  Before heading off to Disneyland this morning (we were on the road by 9:15am), Meredith opened her gifts.  She had a great time oohing and aahing over everything and giving out lots of Thank You hugs.  It was a nice way to start this special day! 

the day before her birthday

 special birthday recognition at preschool today

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fun afternoon playdate with school pal, Janaya

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helping me with her birthday shirt

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the carefully chosen birthday cake

video game party

This afternoon Thomas attended his friend Michael's 7th birthday party -- a Game Truck party!  He and the other 11 boys, of course, loved it.  They were thrilled to spend 2 hours inside this long trailer sitting on leather sofas playing wii and xbox games.  A couple boys came out once or twice for a snack or drink, but most stayed in the trailer the whole time.  Thomas was no exception.  He actually didn't move at all from the spot where he is in this photo.  Sometimes he sat, sometimes he stood, but he did not move from this location.  When he did finally emerge (only because the truck was closing down and the party was gearing up for cupcakes), he looked tired, hungry and ready for a bathroom break.  Again, another fun "boys' party" today!

Scout Fair

Today was the annual Scout Fair for all the troops in the area.  I noticed troops from Imperial and Riverside Counties so it wasn't just limited to those in San Diego County.  The Scout Fair is held annually at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego.  There are lots of troops who exhibit their activities with booths, food booths and all kinds of informational booths for the boys.  But the highlight for many of these younger scouts is the opportunity to earn a handful of belt loops in a single day.  Belt loops are earned when the scout has sucessfully completed several items, usually it is an experience or specific knowledge about something.  There is a belt loop for just about anything you can imagine.  Today, Thomas earned belt loops for Astronomy, Geography and Computers, bringing his total to 15 belt loops earned.     

spring photos

Thomas came home from school today with his spring photo proofs.  I didn't even know they were taking them until the girl we carpool with told me during our drive to school that morning.  Somehow I totally missed that memo in our weekly packet of information.  Had I been aware, Thomas would have worn a different shirt to school that day.  Regardless of what he's wearing he's always a cute little guy and these photos are no different! 

two goals

Towards the end of soccer today the kids played a short game.  There were only 4 goals made (total) and TWO of those were by Miss Meredith.  I think it's a combination of great running speed and the awesome coordination she's been blessed with that often has her doing things well ahead of her peers.  Together, she was running circles around her teammates and opponents.  She's also pretty competitive so sports are good for her.  Today she took the ball twice down the length of their field and straight into the goal.  Yay Meredith! 

nose bump

First came the fall...

...then came the bumps.

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Meredith and her pal, Daphne, were having such a great time this afternoon until the terrible fall that led to a couple small bruises on Meredith's nose.  And then again before meeting a girlfriend for dinner tonight she fell and scraped both arms. I think it's part of her recent growth spurt.  This teeny tiny girl has been eating A LOT.  Something must be growing and throwing off her coordination.  Poor thing!   

morning hike

Last week the weather was pretty nice for the kids' Spring Break but this week is going to be even more beautiful and warm.  I love how blue the sky can be, esp. against the red-orange of the earth.

Is that Thomas?

First thing this morning I received a text with this photo attached.  A friend was at Target and walked past this product in the toy department, stopped and took a second look.  At first glance, she thought it was Thomas.  He does resemble Thomas in some ways, don't you think?  She hadn't seen him in awhile but we saw her Friday evening at a mutual friend's birthday party so from those couple of hours she thought this boy looked a lot like Thomas.  When the text came through the photo was very small and my first thought was who is sending me a photo of Thomas??  Of course, Thomas is much cuter than this boy!

more butterflies

It's simply amazing to watch this process.  We've seen it before but to watch so many caterpillars transform into butterflies has been incredible.  Five butterflies are in this small container now! 

our hula hoop girl

Meredith loves to hula hoop. She doesn't pick it up and give it a whirl once or twice. She will do it for quite some time, often counting how long she can do it before it hits the floor and/or challenging Thomas to join her. This afternoon the neighbor kids were out and all four kids had their own hula hoop and they were all doing it together out in the driveway. You'd think there was some sort of dance party going on! Meredith can out hula hoop the neighbor kids (5yo twins, boy and girl) and her brother. She's asked me for hula hoop lessons and even about hula hoop competitions. This girl is good!

New Children's Museum

Our membership to the New Children's Museum in San Diego expires this month.  Since we were picking up Mike from the aiport in the early afternoon, I thought it was the perfect opportunity for us to get one more short visit in before the membership expires.  There is always some fun interactive things for the kids to explore here.

Below: The kids are gathering for a short presentation before a workshop begins.  All the kids wanted to sit in these "bowls" so, as you can imagine, there was a lot of spinning and knocking into one another as they waited for it to begin!

strawberries

This morning we stopped at the local strawberry fields to pick a bucket of fresh, sweet strawberries.  We did this four years ago when we first moved here.  The kids had a great time but I just remember them being covered in mud and strawberry stains.  And they were quite a bit younger (Meredith was just starting to walk).  It wasn't much fun for me so I haven't wanted to go back.  But the strawberries are really tasty and I thought it would be a fun way to end Spring Break so we went!

The strawberries are sold in our local stores and are actually on sale this week for a great price.  Knowing that made purchasing this bucket seem even more expensive.  I encouraged the kids to eat as many strawberries as they wanted and we were very selective with the strawberries that went into our bucket.  And we filled that bucket until it could not be filled any higher and actually began to spill out.  We also left with our tummies full of sweet strawberries.

By the time we had gotten home, cleaned up and homemade biscuits (for strawberry shortcake) were coming out of the oven, the storm arrived.  We were so lucky to get out when we did and enjoy the last day of Spring Break because these rains included thunder, lightning, hail and gusty winds.  They are still wreaking havoc tonight!