Christmas 2013--part VI

The boys' annual Christmas picture in front of the tree with their ornaments.

Our final Christmas celebration actually happened in 2014 with the Leonard family. Jill and Mark and the girls came up for a long weekend, and we had a blast catching up with each other and opening presents.

We are blessed beyond belief to have wonderful families full of people with whom we love to spend time!  Although it is spring break, a belated Merry Christmas and New Year's blessings to each of you who read this blog!

Thanks, Mark Leonard Imaging, for capturing our family's picture this fall!

Spring Break 2014

Dad and Vicki visited the second half of our spring break. In our annual tradition we spent a couple days in Palm Springs with them and spent time with the cousins by the pool and exploring around the hotel.

Enjoying ice cream from the Rite Aid across the street

Bubbles!

Kenzie chose a mask as her special treat

Easter Egg Hunt 2014 (I know it is a bit early since Easter is a couple weeks away yet, but we do this every year so tradition holds!):

Ready to go

Even though it was a little bit "chilly" this year, we had a fantastic and relaxing time!

Basketball Hoop

The boys have been wanting a basketball hoop for a while so we finally got one.  Paul and the boys excitedly worked on putting it together. Well, the boys went off to play after the first hour of assembly while Paul worked for a few more hours to get it just right.

Thankfully, the work paid off, and the boys have been shooting hoops almost daily.

Brian and Whitney!

Brian and Whitney were here for a quick visit. We packed a lot into our weekend and had such a wonderful visit!

Walking down by the Midway after they landed:

Visiting the beach and having dinner on the pier at Ruby's.

Spending a day at Sea World:

Thanks for a fun visit!

Special Moments

The boys have always loved baking with me, and now they (and I) are determined to learn how to cook some of their own things. Isaac was up first and decided to make eggs and bacon.  He cooked everything and set the table. He even added some special touches like names at each person's seat. Here is a picture of my spot:

The boys absolutely love music class at school. They are constantly in competition in class to earn smart cookies when they win the game of the day. When they win enough smart cookies, they earn a pizza cookie which our music teacher makes as a reward for knowing their musical terms. Caleb won the first one for our house in February and was pretty pumped!

Also in February the boys celebrated the 100th day of school as "old" people.

 

Pumpkin carving 2013

We carved our pumpkins earlier in the week. The boys helped clean out the pumpkins; however, Paul and I got the joy of doing the actual carving. 

Caleb was not a fan of the gunky stuff. Here is the process of cleaning out his pumpkin from Bate's Nut Farm.

Cleaning his hands

Caleb chose football as his theme with the Packers (thanks, KV!) on one side and the Chargers bolt on the other.

Isaac kept with his Halloween costume theme and chose Darth Vader.

Bad Guys

The boys were both bad guys for Halloween. Isaac was Darth Vader.  Caleb was a storm trooper (think Blue Man style since we did not have a real storm trooper costume).  

We started by trick or treating where Uncle Dave and Aunt Sandy were.

We then moved on to Miss M. and Miss Termaat. (They have graduated from being called "auntie" since the boys are both in school now.)

We spent the rest of the evening with friends and their neighbors enjoying dinner followed by trick or treating in their neighborhood.

Mr. Henry finding his dark side

Glow in the dark glasses

We finished the evening stopping at Mr. K. and Miss B.'s place, but I forgot to get a picture of the our very tired boys.  (They actually turned down candy from the neighbor who offered them candy on the way back to the car.)

Final Days of Summer

We spent a lot of time during August in our classrooms preparing for the new school year. To break up the monotony of the work (for all of us but especially the boys), Paul and I decided to plan a few fun activities as a surprise for the boys before school started.

Their first surprise was an afternoon at the movies. We watched Planes and thoroughly enjoyed it.

We took in one more Padres game before the end of summer.  The game did not end well, but we had a wonderful time.

Through the Jr. Padres program the boys had free tickets. They also got a free bag and got a chance to throw a few balls in the game zone.

The clown noses in the boys' bags

We took the boys for breakfast at Mama Kat's, our favorite breakfast place.

We did a lot of baking and cooking together. The boys got a Star Wars cookbook from the library so we made a few of the recipes from it including Han Burgers, Jedi Juice Bars, Skywalker Smoothies, and our version of Wookie Cookies.

Enjoying Skywalker Smoothies

And on our final Friday of summer we had one last super slumber movie party complete with dinner, chocolate popcorn and a movie in the living room.

It was such a wonderful and relaxed summer. Now that we are two months into the school year, I look back at these pictures with fondness (and a little bit of wistfulness to be back on vacation ;-).  Things are a little busier now which explains why this post sat in my drafts folder since September 3!