Christmas 2010

We spent Christmas eve with our family in our home, had a lot of food, and lots of gifts. We are very lucky and are so thankful for what we have...

Zoe's holiday performance

Here are a few pictures and a short video from Zoe's holiday performance where she sang and danced with her partner.

Christmas 2010 with Cruz family

We were lucky to share part of Christmas day with the Cruz family. We were so happy to see them and spend some time with them.

Halloween continued

We went trick or treating in our neighborhood again. This year we went out for over an hour and the kids got a lot of candy! The streets were full of other kids and it was a lot of fun!

Halloween Parades

Both kids had parades at school. The kids aren't allowed to wear masks to school so Ethan is more of a regular jedi than Plo Koon here. But as you can see, he still had fun with his fellow Star Wars friends!

Zoe is "Belle" from Beauty and the Beast. Here is her friend Ava (aka Snow White).

Halloween 2010 - carving pumpkins

This year, the kids chose 1 pumpkin each and we decided to go to a small local pumpkin patch with no big slides or rides or attractions. We kept it simple and looked for some good shaped pumpkins for carving.

Zoe and Ethan helping Daddy clean out the guts of the pumpkins:

Ethan...trying to make the same face as his pumpkin:
Zoe's pumpkin with big eyes like her:

Zoe's new hair cut

Last week, Zoe finally convinced me to let her cut her hair. She wanted to have a "Dora" haircut instead of a "princess" haircut. Here are some before and after pictures. We love it - its super cute!

Ethan's silly dance

Ethan is such a silly kid. He is very witty and has a great sense of humor. Here is a short video of him making a funny face, probably a face he sees me or John make, while doin a little dance too.

Zoe, the mermaid

Zoe has been taking swim lessons for several months and LOVES it. Her teacher calls her a "fish" although she likes to be called a "mermaid"!

Zoe's 4th birthday party

Zoe celebrated her fourth birthday with her friends at Pump It Up Jr. She invited about 16 kids to bouce, jump, and slide! She chose to have a Backyardigans theme so we had decorations, masks and goodie bags too!

Jason and Sam's visit

We had a ton of visitors in the month of Sept. It started with Dad and Tita Aida coming in early September. Then in the middle of the month, Elaine and Tim came for a visit. And just in time for Zoe's 4th birthday, Jason and Samantha came to visit us. We did a lot of celebrating with Zoe's classroom and her buddies and even had a little party at home with family. But we also went to Carmel where we visited Pebble Beach and relaxed at Carmel Beach which is a beautiful white sand beach. Here are a few pictures from Jason and Samantha's visit. Once Elaine and Dad send me pictures, I'll upload those as well.

Zoe is 4 years old!

A little snack at the Pebble Beach. We couldn't afford to eat the Lodge...

This is one of the other beaches we found while on the infamous 17 mile drive. This wasn't the white sand beach that I fell in love with.

Here are a few pictures from Carmel Beach:

Seafood dinner in a little area called Carmel by the Sea.

Jedi Training Academy aka Ethan's 6th birthday

On Sat, August 14, we hosted a Jedi Training Academy where we invited 16 young padawans to come and train with Anakin, a real Jedi. We decorated the garage, made Jedi Robes for the kids, and ordered lightsabers. After Anakin trained the young jedis how to use their lightsabers, we had a Jedi Academy graduation ceremony and handed out the graduation certificates. It was a lot of work but the kids, especially Ethan, enjoyed it! It was totally worth it.

Jedi robes for the whole family...

A friend of mine taught me how to sew these jedi robes - all 18 of them...

Jedi themed cookies...made by yours truly...

I even made "lightsaber" pretzel rods...

Cupcakes topped with little lightsabers...

Anakin tested each kid for their Mitaclorian count. Ethan's count was 11,000 which we were told was higher than Mace Windu's and Obi Wan's!!! Ethan got a kick out of that!

Learning some new moves...

Getting ready to battle...and try out those new moves

Zoe got into the training too...

Even though she is tough, she is really sweet too :)

Ethan, though, he does not mess around! He is here to learn!

Ethan is receiving his training certificate for his stellar performance during the training academy.

The kids received Jedi Academy Training Certificates after they completed the jedi training.


Ethan and his best buds from school...