summer

The day after school got out, we drove up to San Jose for Katie's "Wicked" birthday. As part of that visit, we started off summer with a visit to Mission Santa Clara. Katie was already thinking ahead to 4th grade, which will include a big Mission project, and was interested in seeing some missions in person.


Back in Southern California, the girls each did a week-long half-day camp with Holy Family's first grade teacher. Julianna's camp focused on getting ready for first grade, while Katie's camp focused on making sock monkeys (as well as clothes and a pet for the sock monkey). The kids also had friends over to swim and play, making June a fun kickoff to summer!

One day while Katie was at the camp, Julianna, Nick and I drove down to Irvine to visit my friend Susan and her cute kids. They are ages 4.5 and 3. The kids all had a ball together, and mine keep talking about visiting them again. I'm looking forward to doing just that, since I absolutely loved spending time with Susan!






The girls also did a week of Girl Scout day camp (and will do another week in August), which had a "Time Travelers" theme. Each day was a different era: pioneer, Egypt, '60's, renaissance, and ancient Greece. Both girls had a great time. At pickup on the first day, Katie said, "we did so many amazing, unbelievable, awesome things that I can't believe it was only one day!"

Meanwhile, Nick had an outing with some of his friends at our closest Audubon Center. Here are a couple of cute photos of him with his buddy Sean:




The Fourth of July is a big day in South Pasadena. Donna joined us for the fun. We started off the day by walking down to watch the parade, and later on co-hosted a party with our neighbors. We had lots of kids swimming in our pool and jump in the bounce house in the neighbors' back yard. After lots of food and playing, we all gathered together and watched the city fireworks show right over head! I think everyone had a great time!

Here we are starting out our day:


I didn't manage any party pictures, but here are a few from the parade. I took quite a few of the parade, including several vintage cars, but I just thought this teeny garbage truck was so funny that I had to share it here!

end of school

I really can't believe that another school year has come to a close! This year brought some big changes in our routine, because Julianna started Kindergarten at Holy Family and Nick started preschool! Julianna went from preschool 3 mornings a week to Kindergarten 5 mornings a week, for four hours instead of 2-and-a-half. Academically, Kindergarten was not challenging for our early reader, but socially she really enjoyed herself this year. Best of all, with afternoons free she was able to spend many, many afternoons having playdates with Alyssa!

Nick being in preschool three mornings a week meant that for the first time in my career as a mom, I had a few hours to myself! Going into it, I envisioned myself finally being able to go shopping for a new wardrobe (shoes, too!)... And maybe buying some things for the house... Shopping errands have just been too hard since I have always had at least one precious child with me every single minute of every single day. BUT, it turned out that there was no budget for shopping of any kind, so I didn't do ANY of that this year. Instead, I spent all of my alone time volunteering at Holy Family or going to the gym, both of which I did really enjoy. I got to the gym about twice a week, which was certainly new for me. At the end of the school year, I guess I would have to conclude that apparently I need to work out more than that...

Our schedule for next year remains the same, except for a few minor differences. Julianna will be in first grade, so she will be at school all day now. Nick and I will have lots of one-on-one time! I am now allowing Nick to give up naps, the daily routine for the two of us will be quite different. Nick and his friends will now have the same preschool schedule, which will allow us to do more outings and playdates with them, thank goodness! Lastly, I will be the Room Parent for first grade, which will probably keep me quite busy!


The first end-of-the-year event was Julianna's Kindergarten Graduation. The Kindergarten gets out of school over a week before the rest of the school! The Kindergarteners prepared several songs and the teacher said nice things about each child as they came up to get their diploma and medal. Katie and other older siblings got to come out of class for the ceremony.

Here is Julianna on the morning of her last day of Kindergarten: (click here for her first day)


Here are Kindergarten graduates Alyssa and Julianna:


The following week, Katie and Nick had their last day of school.

Here is Katie, done with third grade! (click here for her first day)


And here is Nick, who brought Monkey with him on his last day in Room Seven: (click here for his first day)


Nick and his friends did lots of playing on their last day,


as well as dancing with scarves.


Then, just like every other day during the year, they ran around on the grass for a while after their mommies picked them up! It was a tradition for the Room Seven boys this year!

Katie's 9th birthday!

In April, Katie started thinking about what she wanted to do for her birthday. She thought about having a slumber party, or a pool party, or staying at the Disneyland Hotel with just our family, and then settled on going to see Wicked. It wasn't in LA anymore, but San Francisco would work. She said, "instead of a party, I just want to go to San Francisco and see Wicked."

Somehow, she wound up with several birthday celebrations anyway!

Her first was when Catherine spent the night at our house the Friday before Katie's birthday. Catherine and I planned to surprise Katie with ice cream sundae fixin's after dinner! They then stayed up late watching "High School Musical 3." (Daddy and Julianna were on Catalina Island that weekend.)


The very next night, we had Emma over for dinner and ice cream sundaes as well!


Monday was Katie's birthday, and she asked me to bring her In-N-Out for her special lunch at school.




The third grade has a nice birthday tradition: every classmate takes a paper star and writes something they like about the birthday kid. Then the teachers add their own, and bind all of the stars together on a ring for the birthday kid to take home and keep! Very nice.

At home on the evening of the birthday, we made Katie's favorites for dinner and (as she requested) got her an ice cream cake (cookies and cream with white cake - her second choice after vanilla with white cake). She also got to open her presents. She wore her birthday present from Noni that day, of course. She had asked for roller blades, which Julianna and Nick gave her. Mommy and Daddy totally shocked her by giving her Felicity, a second American Girl doll to go with her doll Elizabeth. She even got some new outfits for the dolls! She got lots of exciting gifts this year, including the ipod shuffle she bought herself with money from her brand new savings account!










The day after school got out, we drove up to San Jose to stay with Noni for our big Wicked weekend! Eric, Nick, and Julianna stayed in San Jose and went to see the movie "Up" while Noni, Katie, and I had a nice dinner and then went to the theater. What an amazing time we all had! Katie absolutely loved the show, the performers, the songs and staging, and the experience of live theater itself! She still floats on air when she just thinks about it!

Photo bonanza!

Some photos I took during the last month or so:

Julianna, and the other two Kindergarteners in the reading group, did the morning announcements one week in May:


On our 12th wedding anniversary, we decided on the spur of the moment to walk over to the metro line and ride it down to Olvera Street and Chinatown. This image of my husband hand-in-hand with our son, with his cap and backpack, made me weak in the knees:


We bought the kids Sno-Cones and watched the dancers in the plaza at Olvera Street.


Here we are at the Chinatown station, waiting for the train home. Katie took a photo of the anniversary couple:


Katie's Brownie troop bridged to Junior Girl Scouts at the end of May. Here they are taking a silly picture on the bridge: (next time they pose for a photo, they'll be wearing green...)


Eric and Julianna went to Catalina Island with their Indian Princess tribe. Eric forgot to take pictures until the last day. With all the kayaking and hiking, I guess he was just too busy!


Katie's class did a big ocean unit at the end of the year. She wrote a report about the California sea otter and made a diorama (with my assistance).


The third graders also took a field trip to the tide pools. Nick and I tagged along, but we couldn't keep up with them, so we had our own day together at the tide pools!

For Daddy

Hi Daddy! We miss you, but we hope you are having a good time! Sorry about all the rain!

She's here! She's here!

Noa Louisa Kaopuiki-Delaney

Wednesday, May 20, 2009
10:46 am
8 lbs, 10 oz
22 in
Good Samaritan Hospital, Portland, Oregon

Congratulations to Shannon, Cory, and big sister Malia!

Everyone here is so excited about our new niece/cousin! We can't wait to meet her in Portland this July, and to see our sweet Malia again!

Backyard metamorphosis

What we're focusing on is the bed along the garage wall...

here's how it looked before we moved in (bushes were torn out during escrow to make repairs to the garage wall)...


For a long time it looked like this, although I knew what I wanted to do with the space:


here it is last July (1.5 years after we moved in), when I finally found an arbor...


then, thanks to my mom, I finally got the climbing roses I'd been meaning to put there (this April)...


then we stained and sealed the arbor ... and last weekend, another new development - trellises so the climbing roses will have lots of space to spread out and grow! Won't it be pretty when they are covering the arbor and trellises?


Upcoming on the agenda:
Small flowers to fill in spots between roses
A bench inside the arbor
Some sort of wall decoration inside the arbor


Thanks for the roses, Mom!

Talent Show

Holy Family School has its Talent Show every other year (alternating with the Science Fair). In first grade, Katie joined a group of Kindergarteners dancing to the theme from "Veggie Tales." Very cute.

This year, she wanted to do a dance with Julianna. When we found my trick top hat (given to me when I was a young teen by my dance teacher -- we don't know how old it is, and it is very special to me) at my parents' house this Christmas, the girls really wanted to come up with some way to use it in their dance.

We started working on the dance when Grandma was visiting us in March.


Katie wanted to dance to Harry Connick, Jr.'s "A Wink and a Smile" from the Sleepless in Seattle soundtrack, remembering when she and Grandma danced to it at Grandma's birthday party. Grandma and Katie listened to a bunch of song options, and Katie ended up going with her original idea.

We thought up a "story" for the dance, with Grandma's assistance. The story was:
Two girls are performing a dance. One is wearing a top hat. The other is jealous of it and steals it off her head during the dance. They continue doing their dance, and then the first girl steals it back. They dance some more, and then they have a tug-of-war over the hat. It falls to the ground, and they both scramble to grab it, falling on the floor on top if it, and it gets flattened! Oh no! They do a bit more of their dance, and then they try to figure out how to un-flatten it. All of a suddent, it pops up, back into shape! The girls are so happy that they decide to share it, holding it together and strolling off stage.

We quickly choreographed the steps, showed it to the organizers at the auditions, and then during the weeks leading up to the talent show, we practiced it nearly every night in the kitchen. Nick was very involved in the rehearsals, singing along with the music and helping me say "step, kick, step step ..." Noni came to visit us for a few days at the beginning of May, and she got to see the girls rehearsing.


While she was here, I also got started whipping together some costumes. My sewing skills leave much to be desired... I'm no Grandma. I make a lot of mistakes and have to go back and re-do things. (For example, Julianna's skirt was too long, so I shortened it. Then it was too short, and I had to go back and add fabric along the hem.) I do think they came out really cute, though!

I just love the talent show. The hall is packed for the performance, and the students in the audience cheer and applaud enthusiastically for every performer, no matter if it's their friend or not, no matter what grade they're in, no matter if they mess up on the piano and start over. Even the eighth graders! Especially the eighth graders! They're so supportive, and it makes me glad my kids go to school there.

The girls were the second-to-last act before Intermission. They were great! They had huge smiles on their faces (something they had trouble remembering to do in our practices). Everyone remarked that they looked like they were enjoying themselves up there. I know that they were SO nervous, especially Julianna. They did a terrific job, though!

May Crowning

One of the traditions at Holy Family School is May Crowning, which is a celebration of Mary and Mother's Day. It is the Third Grade's Mass. The Third Graders wear their First Communion clothes and conduct the ceremony.

It begins outside, at the Mary statue. The priest and third graders lead the prayers, and Mary is crowned with flowers. Also, each grade brings a basket of flowers up to the statue, which is placed at her feet.


After crowning Mary, the school processes around the church saying the Rosary, then enters the church through the front doors. 8th grade first, and on down to Kindergarten. Last are the third graders and the priest and altar servers.

Inside the church, the school celebrates Mass. The third graders do the readings and, after the homily, conduct a tribute to their mothers: a few of the third graders are chosen to each read something he or she wrote about their mother.

After Mass, the Third Graders have a retreat. After enjoying refreshments, they and their parents reflect on the significance of the day.

Milestone

We've hit another milestone.

Check it out:


Nick's in a booster seat! All of my kids are in booster seats!

Oh my. I am a mom of big kids, huh?

But wait... what's this?

I guess I can't let go completely.