Sydney

Here's my little Sydney at Old Navy:

An Inspirational Principal

I'm starting to find little things that make me like Lauryn's elementary school more and more. First the principal called me herself a couple of weeks before classes started to introduce herself and to see if I had any questions.

Then during orientation, I spied this sitting on the teacher's bookshelf. I thought it was such a thoughtful and inspirational gesture.

1st Day of Kindergarten

Lauryn had a great time on her first day of school. I thought I'd be really emotional, but I think having her go to preschool and camp 5 days a week during the summer made the transition not so hard. In fact, preschool was about 30 minutes longer than Kindergarten. So the time flew by! What did Sydney and I do after taking Lauryn to Kindergarten? Old Navy!

Jer & Marilyn's Wedding

One Last Getaway

Our last getaway before Lauryn starts Kindergarten was to.....where else? The Happiest Place on Earth! And our au-pair joined us before she's off to study abroad in Australia so that made for an extra nice trip for us.

We stayed with our good friends in So. Cal and went swimming in the community pool. Their house is seriously a haven for all of their friends and relatives. This trip they had a total of 12 people staying at one time.

I got to hit the nearby Costco to pick up a few items that we No. Cals don't get in our Costco. We had Korean BBQ to satify a 3 month long craving and it was yummo! At night, after the kids were in bed, we all watched with surprising attention to a documentary that Christina recorded on raising Pandas in China. Did you know baby pandas are blind and have no hair and are the size of skinny mini bananas when they're born - kinda like a mole rat? And they need help to potty themselves?

At the end of our trip, we met up with our Bay Area friends at Disneyland and that made the trip even more fun!

Some food indulgences at the park:
Jen: 3 churros in one day, and another churro the day before, cherry ice-e
John: turkey leg & churro
Me: chili cheese dog & churro
Lauryn: giant pickle, popcorn, sour watermelon ice-e
Sydney: popcorn

Lauryn got to ride on her 1st grown-up ride: Soarin' Over California and she LOVED it!

Marissa & Josh's Birthdays

There was jumping and bouncing, rock climbing, a rope ladder, swinging into a huge pit of foam blocks, all the makings of a fun time!

Lauryn's 5!

Lauryn had her 5th Birthday Party at the PJCC. The facilities were great! It was really windy that day, and we had WAY too much food (Hawaiian- yum!), but the birthday girl had a great time with her friends.

Night out in 3D

John and I got to enjoy a rare double date night with our friends Loc and Christina while they were visiting from LA. We went to watch Superman Returns at the IMAX theater in SF in 3D! Check us out!

Final Swimming Lesson

Lauryn and her friend Ashlyn just finished their last swimming lesson for the summer. I have to admit that before we started I didn't think Lauryn would be able to swim at all by the end of her lessons. If she was ok putting her face in the water by the end of 10 lessons I would've been happy. But this is something Christine and I never ever expected.

This is what they did on their last day of swimming class:


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What to do with all those peanuts?

During one of Sydney's OT sessions, she got to sit in a big box of packaging peanuts. She loved it so much she wouldn't get out. It looked like so much fun that Lauryn found another box of peanuts that we had and climbed in.

One Lazy Afternoon....

Lauryn and I made a rocketship from some cardboard boxes. There's a hole in the bottom for her to stand in. As a girl of the new millenium, she added the flipdown computer screen, paint and decorations. I added some "flames". When John got home, he decided to add the wings and cargo bays. It's become a very versatile play structure in our home. Lauryn takes her dolls on trips to space. And Sydney has taken to climbing in and sitting contentedly surveying and contemplating the world. Some days when I'm too tired to put toys away in their rightful place, I throw everything from the floor into the rocketship.

Bets are on as to which will win out for Lauryn's costume this Halloween: Rocketship or Princess Belle.
She wanted to do a mad face....

Lauryn's latest hobby

Photography is Lauryn's latest passion. She's been taking pictures everywhere we go. She doesn't quite understand the idea of focusing yet. But she has a keen eye for placing objects. Or maybe she just enjoys finding things to take pictures of.

Here are some of her first shots:

She also took these when we went to visit Nathan and Daniel at the hospital:

South Shore

We had a great time in Tahoe with our friends Herbie, Grace, Kaitlyn and Johanna. They invited us to use their timeshare's bonus week and we gladly took them up on their offer! We stayed at the Tahoe Season's Resort many, many years ago when we had attended the CBM Career Retreat there.

The weather was perfect and the girls got to swim everyday. One of our favorite activities was playing in the arcade at Harrah's and Harvey's. The concierge at the timeshare had coupons for free tokens and we made good use of them. The girls played games to win tickets which they got to redeem for prizes. One of our favorite games was Fishin' Time. I almost got addicted to that game. Once I got about 175 tickets from one game! John played a different game and got the bonus for 176 tickets. One afternoon, we went to a small amusement park nearby.

Another day we played at the beach. The girls went swimming and also carved a big hole in the sand.
Other days we just walked downtown and went to the bookstore or to get sandwiches. The girls found lots of bears around town and loved taking pictures with them.

The timeshare had a raffle one morning and we won a free sunset dinner cruise and Herbie and Grace won a free dinner at the seafood buffet as well as a voucher for 2 for 1 horseback riding. So we took turns babysitting for each other so that each couple had a date night.

We had such a relaxing time in Tahoe that we almost bought a timeshare at the Marriott's Timber Lodge! It was gorgeous! But we regained our senses and walked away with our $100 incentive and had a great dinner at Tep's Villa Roma Restaurant.

Then again, John and I both agreed that if we ever DID buy a timeshare, we'd want to do it through a hotel chain like the Marriott, so.......

Summer Activities

I think I broke the bank enrolling Lauryn in classes this summer. I guess I'm all for allowing my daughter to experiment with new things, especially if she's the one who requests it. And often times, I have to admit, I'm the one who signs her up even when she doesn't request it.

When I was growing up, both of my parents worked all day and my brother and I never really had many opportunities to join afterschool activities. We'd walk home afterschool and watch tv all day. It wasn't until junior high that I got to participate in afterschool activities b/c by then I guess I was old enough to do it on my own. I think it helped that we lived in Iowa at the time and I could walk to and from school by myself without my parents worrying about me getting kidnapped. I really enjoyed being in the choir, taking part in our school musical each year, and working on the stage crew as well as participating in student government. It was an enriching experience.

So with that in mind, our schedule the past couple of months has been somewhat busy. I even had to create excel spreadsheets for the girls' activities to help me keep things straight. One for each week and in intervals of 15 minutes. One tuesday after I had picked Lauryn up from preschool, I rushed her home to get dressed for her ballet/tap class and pack a lunch for Sydney. We raced over to Beresford Rec just in time. But when we got there, there was no one in her class, which I thought odd. I looked around a bit more only to remember that her gymnastics class which she takes on wednesdays, is the one we usually have to rush to at 1:30, and ballet's not until 3:10. I took it as a sign that we're trying to do too much. I think in the fall we're going to scale back a bit. =) How in the world did I become a soccer mom yet no one in our family plays any soccer?

Soakin' Up The Sun

One of our favorite songs that Lauryn and I often sing in the car is Sheryl Crow's "Soak Up The Sun". That's what we did last week when it hit 99 degrees in San Mateo. I'm not sure if it was a record, but it was one of those days that makes us glad we installed AC, if only upstairs.

We spent the better part of the afternoon trying to figure out how to turn on daddy's air compressor so mommy wouldn't turn blue in the face trying to blow all the pieces of the pool up herself. Good thing daddy decided to come home early to find us the right hose for the compressor. Then everything came together in a jiffy!

Lauryn's favorite part was jumping and making a splash into the smaller pool. She also liked running through the sprinkler attachment. Sydney loved sitting in the warm water and drinking her juice. We used to think that Sydney was totally fair-skinned, but after a day in the sun, we discovered that she really is a Wang. Boy can she tan!

Legomania

We went to the mall last weekend and there happened to be a Lego building event going on. We contributed our "bricks" to the giant piece they were building. The lady that was building that day put our bricks on the tail part of the giant alligator. I'll post pictures of the finished product next time we stop at the mall.

Spring Gymnastics

Lauryn, Ashlyn and Marissa just finished their gymnastics class from the spring. I think Lauryn had more fun just being in the same class as her friends than getting to jump around and swing from the bars.

1st Ballet/Tap Class

Another new thing that Lauryn's doing this summer is ballet/tap class. I only got pictures from behind, but if you look closely, you'll see Lauryn and my reflections in the mirror.