Very late updates

The past few weeks have been incredibly busy, so I'm way behind on some fun memories.

The week before last I co-chaired our annual school Book Fair and Kindness Week event.  I didn't really intend to take on as much of the event as I did, but it was quite a bit of fun getting to know some of the teachers better.  The school librarian and I worked with Scholastic to order an enormous selection of books, and then together we transformed the school library into a bookstore for a week!  It was quite a hit with the students, and we hit our target profits, but boy was it a lot of work in the end!  My kids heard be talk about the Book Fair so much, that one day I went upstairs to discover that they had created their own book fair between their rooms, categorizing certain books like holiday, baby, animals, Germonio, etc....and I had to use real coins to purchase the books.  It was hilarious to see, but it always makes me happy to see their imaginations at work.  
 The book fair at home:

 The Book Fair at school:

 Book Fair week was also Kindness Week- a theme that our entire school district is rolling given the times that we are now in with our government.  When I heard our school Counselor bring it up at a PTA meeting, I threw my hand up to help out- I can't imagine a more important message to spread through our school right now.   Each day of the week we had opportunities for the students to create letters to send to local community helpers, to fellow students or to their families.  They could also add a quilt square to our Kindness Quilt, sign our Kindness Pledge, or paint a rock to be distributed around campus and throughout our town to add some color and happiness to all.

 

 Sometime that week I was home with the girls, and all of a sudden Colbie came into the room with a HUGE chunk of her hair missing.  Apparently Addy had had the brilliant idea to give themselves haircuts, but Colbie went wayyyy too far.  These girls have never had a real haircut- it's taken 4.5 years just to get their hair to a length a couple of inches below their shoulders.  They don't like strangers touching them in any way, therefore doctors, dentists, etc are always quite a struggle.  I haven't insisted on a haircut yet (although I bring it up every single month) simply because it will not be worth the extreme scene that will inevitably occur once we get to the salon.  Anyways, once Colbie saw my reaction, she very much regretted her decision.  Basically she gave the right side of her face a bob haircut, and then somehow a good portion of the underlayer of her hair an even shorter cut too.   For a brief five minutes, she decided that she was going to be ok with ME cutting the remainder of her hair to match the length of her new self-cut do.  So, I jumped at the chance, and lifted up the top layer of her hair and cut the rest of the underlayer to match what she had done.  As I began to let down the top layer to give it the matching cut, the enormity of having short hair was just too much and she absolutely refused for me to lay another finger on her head.   So....now, the vast majority of her hair (at least the right side and the most of the back) are cut up to her chin, but the long, stringy top layer is still long.   The only bizarre blessing in all of this, is that the underlayer that has been cut off was very, very curly which created awful knots daily in her hair.   Without the curls, Colbie is actually proud and happy to brush her hair as there are no more knots!   Some day soon in her sleep I will slowly start cutting the top layer bit my bit so that by kindergarten her hair will look somewhat normal, but at this point, I'm leaving it alone!  

 the text I had to send to Josh to warn him:

 Last week the kids and I got to play with Cousin Rachel and her sweet pup Chloe briefly while we picked up our Girl Scout Cookies.  

 We got to Facetime with Tia and Sabrina- she is getting so big and expressive now!

 she loved to see Jake's little face on Facetime- little smiles for him!

 Josh took the kids to the Lego Batman movie as some Dada time before their week off was over.

 Found this Valentine from Jake's classmate to him- I had to put it up here to smile about it later.  Too cute.

 Jake has finished up his two basketball leagues at this point.  Soccer and Baseball all start this week though, so no rest for him!

 Over break, Jake had to complete a Family History project.  Pretty cute. I'm sure that there will be many, many more of these through the years.

 

Road Trip!

The kids have "ski week" vacation this week, and since we are still not prepared to take the family to the snow (the girls still refuse to wear sweatshirts...trying to get them into ski jackets, pants and boots is just not going to happen this year), we opted for a road trip south instead.  I picked San Luis Obispo since it is still not too far, on the coast and a beautiful place to visit.  With Josh's injury we weren't sure how he would feel, and up until Saturday night he was ready for any adventure.  But, Josh got his cast off on Friday, so he was up and about in his walking boot all day on Saturday, not realizing that easing back into walking would probably be a better option.  He went to bed Saturday night extremely sore from the walking (as he literally hadn't put weight on that foot for a month!).  He opted to stay back and rest, rest, rest for his day off.  
So, the kids and I packed up the car on Sunday morning and headed off early before any storms.  We blazed down to SLO in around three hours- no traffic, no rain, and plenty of excitement to push us through the 200 mile drive.  I picked an Embassy Suites, as it had an indoor heated pool, breakfast buffet and two room suites so the kids could have their own room if they wanted it.  It worked out great, as we jumped in the pool multiple times and had plenty of hotel room space to spread out and enjoy.  
Monday was truly packed with fun:   We drove over to the San Luis Obispo Mission first and walked around it's beautiful grounds.  Then we went to the Children's Museum, which truly was the best children's museum I've ever seen.  Afterwards we sat down at one of the most popular brunch spots in SLO and had an amazing brunch (best meal of the trip for sure!) and then had to visit the retro candy shop next door of course.   As the rain stopped, we headed to Pismo Beach, walking through the Butterfly Grove first to see the thousands of Monarch Butterflies.  The beach was gorgeous- we had on our rain boots which was perfect as the storms formed enormous puddles and small ponds that were perfect to wade through for our usual seashell searching.  
Today we headed back home via Highway 1 and stopped into Hearst Castle for our adventure of the day.  The castle is much more rigidly organized since I'd last been when I was in high school.  So we did have to take an official tour which wasn't the best for my kiddos, but walking the grounds on this post-storm day was beautiful!

 

 

 

 (I will explain Colbie's interesting hair in a post coming soon)

The trip home was the only bummer of the trip- due to the awful storms north of SLO on Monday, we had three MAJOR weather related traffic jams on the way home- so our wonderful quick three hour drive turned into 7, yes SEVEN hours of dead stop traffic.   I will forever kick myself for just not staying an extra day, but oh well.  The kids did remarkably well for seven hours in the car.  I now know that they can handle a trip to LA!
Great road trip!  But everyone is happy to be home and to see Dada again!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day Friends and Family!
The anticipation of this favorite family holiday has been escalating for literally weeks.  The kids and I love making the class Valentine's together, and then a few surprises always await once they wake up on the big day.   Jake decided back in December when I was making stuff for the Holiday Store that he was going to make heart soaps as his Valentines this year.  All of the kids colored in handmade cards too- in total over 80 cards for their friends and teachers were made over the last week!

 Tia Erica and Hassan left a stack of Valentine book gifts for us, which the kids opted to open first.  Thank you Tia, Hassan and Baby S!

 Jake's class had a very low key party, which basically entailed exchanging Valentine's, decorating heart cookies and then filling these cute sweetheart candy graphs.  I was at school manning the Book Fair, so I was able to slip out and help out a bit.  The girls didn't have a party, but the kids were encouraged to make cards for all of their classmates.  They were incredibly excited to each bring home a bag filled with notes from their classmates at the end of the day!

 

 Lee Lee was here too, which meant more sweets, treats and fun!

The class Valentine creations: