August-September-October

Hummm.............I don't know where those months went! How about a quick low-down on some highlights?
My sister and I drove to LA in September to "pick up my dad". Oh and while we were down there visited the Happiest Place on Earth, saw some of our favorites relatives and managed to survive a record breaking heat wave! 112 degrees in LA.
Evan is an official member of the Cunha school surf team and is now swimming with Mavericks swim club at the High School.
Ian has just finished his 2nd race of this series. Finishing a respectable 8th and 10th place.
I am now serving on the board of HMBHS's PAC- Parent Advisory Council. We had our annual fundraiser in September, it was not only a financial success but fun as hell too.
Wayne continues to find work, totally amazing. He is also dabbling with his cars and running the boys all over the place!
I guess I would be remiss if I didn't mention the Giants winning the World Series! And how excited Wayne was about this!

Evan's new smile

Can you say Thrilled! Because that's what Evan is, He is absolutely thrilled about his new smile and he even got them off before starting 7th grade! What could be better that that? Congratulations Evan!

July 4x12

OK, So this is not my favorite picture by far but it's the only on I have of the four of us taken in July. This is at a lake in the Forest Hill area near Auburn, CA. It was a dirt bike trip with a couple of other families, the riding was terrible but the kids loved the lake! It reminded me of upstate NY. Lots of beautiful trees and the smell of pine!

4x12 June 2010

Well, Here my "snapshot" for June. We were literally running out the door to go to our friends for dinner (obviously a casual dinner) when I got the idea to get this shot. Ian was gone all last week and left again today for 4 days, so I thought I should take advantage of the fact that we were all together. Everyone is laughing because I just yelled that Evan was standing on my foot just seconds before the timer on the camera went off!

Busy Month O' June

*Ian and Grandma

*Grandpa and Evan

*RUDY

*Wayne and I in Big sur on our way to Paso Robles
June has a been filled with all kinds of fun! A new addition to our family in the form of a Yorkshire Terrier, My dad's 80th birthday, a visit from my brother, and Ian's birthday too! Oh! And Wayne and I even managed to get away overnight for our anniversary to Paso Robles, what a great place! So were do I begin? The puppy was a cast off from a lady that didn't want him. He's a year old and I think he has a pretty good temperament. I had a friend come over and give me some tips on how to take care of him (it's been 15 years since we've had a dog) and I feel much more confident working with him. Oh, his name is Rudy.
My sister and I planned an 80th birthday party for my dad with the help of my mom and brother. We had about 25 people over for a luau. We made much of the food and bought a few specialty items that we could'nt make ourselves, including a beautiful lilikoi cake from a Japanese lady. The weather was perfect and we were able to sit outside an eat. It was a special day.
Ian also celebrated his 15th birthday this past Friday. He was excited to find out he is going to a motocross camp for his birthday present, it's 4 days of safety training and riding at two different tracks.
And today is Father's Day. Wayne is at the movies watching Karate Kid with Evan and we'll be going to some friends for a barbecue later today.
Ian is off at 4-H camp for a week. He is a manager this year and will be in charge of a cabin full of kids! I know he'll do a great job!

4x12 May 2010

I have such a short memory these days that I almost forgot about my 4x12 photo project. Here is a picture of us taken by My mother-in-law, at her house on May 23rd, 2010 at about 6:00PM.

Time........

Time keeps on tickin',tickin',tickin' into the future.........That song comes to mind frequently these days. It's hard to believe this school year is almost over and the crush of end of the school year "stuff" is taking it's tole on many. Ian will have finals the last week of school, much different than the elementary years when the teaches were just trying to keep the kids busy with movies and walks to the park, I even remember the kids going to school in their pajamas and having a reading day. I've been getting frantic calls from friends needing help with the all the different special activities planned for the end of the school year. Not to mention all of the different board positions that need to be filled for next year. It's amazing how much work people have created for themselves with all these boards and committees. I don't think a generation ago people were concerned with making sure the kids had everything and honestly, I'm not sure the kids even appreciate it? I hope I'm wrong. But nonetheless, it's all happening and I'm trying hard to pick and choose where I want to spend my extra time. Sometimes I get so overwhelmed with the requests that I just want to runaway!

On a lighter note: We celebrated two family birthdays this past weekend. For my sister (pictured below), we had a family dinner at home with cake and a walk to the beach. And in Sonora we attended a "surprise" 50Th birthday celebration for Wayne's Brother Joe.

A close to Perfect Mother's Day

I only say that because a perfect mother's day would be if Wayne took the boys somewhere for the day and left me to watch girlie movies and read books! So this was a runner up perfect Mother's Day which consisted of some of my favorite people (Mother included) coming over for the day. My wonderful sister made all sorts of goodies, a beautiful tomato tart, a quiche and a delicious fruit salad. We had a special blend of Hawaiian coffee and fresh strawberry short cakes for dessert. A very special gift of Mochi from a good friend who knows me too well. A walk to the beach to watch Evan boogie board and ended the night with some take out from the Mexican taqueria, sitting around the table enjoying each others company. I'm just not one to go out on a holiday. It's too busy and all those poor moms that waitress. What a drag for them!

The picture below has a funny story: I told my dad we needed some pictures for the memorial. He just about fell off the cliff laughing. I do think it's a keeper.

Ride for Life 2010

I need to find out more about how this amazing event got started 9 years ago. I know it was started by some local acquaintances of ours, the Bruces', but I just don't know all the details. We have been invited each year but have always had something else going on. Last year it poured rain on them and go figure, when they got up there on the Wednesday before the weekend it was snowing! Susan Bruce said she was really glad they rented a trailer this year. Can you believe they were in a tent last year! Amazing people! The weather cleared by the time we got there at it was 80 degrees by Sunday. Everyone had a great time as I'm sure you can tell by how dirty the kids were! I'm already looking forward to next years Ride For Life.
Above picture; Ian, Wayne and Evan
Kids: These were just the ones in our group.

Next on the Agenda

Geesh, I feel like I have been going non-stop this whole month. An 8 day driving trip and family reunion, then came home to have my friend Mimi who stayed with me for 2 weeks, during which I had the middle school book fair and I had to fill in at work for my co-worker who was on vacation. And now I am shopping and packing the camper for a trip to the mountains this weekend. This trip is a fundraiser called "Ride for life" and it benefits the Ronald McDonald house in Palo Alto. Most of our friends have done this ride before, it's our first time. It should be fun, did I mention that this is Dirt bike ride? Yes, It should be fun! I'm sure I will have a story or two to tell when we return.

Half Moon Bay and Beyond

My Friend Mimi is visiting me for a couple of weeks and we have been all over. She lived here on the coast for 12 years before moving to her home town of Moscow, Idaho and now lives in Colorado for the past 10 years. Coming back to the coast is a real treat for her, living at 7000ft the air is dry and she just loves the damp beach air here. Like I said, we have been all over from Santa Cruz to Healdsburg, where the above picture was taken. Tomorrow we are heading to San Francisco for some Dim Sum and city culture. Not only do I love the company, I love having someone to drag around to places you only seem to get to when someone is visiting!

Spring Break Adventure

When I found out that my cousin was planning a "Yamane family" reunion in Los Angles for the the second weekend in April, I realized that it was at the end of our spring break and that it might be a perfect opportunity to take a road trip. I never considered a "road trip" with the boys for obvious reasons and crossed my fingers that they would not only enjoy, but appreciate the trip. I had BIG plans at first. Death Valley, Los Vegas, Hoover Dam and the Grand Canyon all before heading to LA where we would go to Universal Studios and Hollywood and finally the reunion weekend with our family. After some consideration I decided that The Grand Canyon was too grand an idea and cut it from the itinerary. We did add the Shelby Factory and The Los Vegas Speedway in Los Vegas and we also stopped at the Gamble House in Pasadena. The boys did great with the driving and we have some great memories from everywhere we went. But I think the best part of our trip was reconnecting with our relatives at the reunion. We had family come from as far as New York and Hawaii. We now have plans for another family reunion in 2012. This time on Kauai. And we have plans to bring my dad back down to LA so he can attend a gathering of his Kauai friends that have been getting together the last weekend in September for years.

Hello, My name is Jill and............

I am an addict. That's right, I'm addicted to a word game on my Iphone. It's called "Words with Friends" and It's, Well, It's addicting. The Ironery about this is that I am the absolute worst speller in the world and I usually hate word games like Scrabble, It's so humiliating to get beat by an 8 year old! But, I guess I can blame my new obsession over word games on my sister. She gave us a word game for Christmas called "Bananagrams". It's quite fun and I like "Bananagrams" because you work independently on your own crossword using the tiles provided. I've recently been playing this game on my Iphone as well and you can play "Live" games against other people out in cyber space (when you get creamed, no one has to know but you), Oh my! Then the other day my hairdresser told me about "Words with Friends" and how she and her husband are addicted to it. Well, I just had to try it out! So now, I'm addicted and I don't care. No 12 steps for me thank you. I'm becoming a better person ,I mean speller because of it! Join me if you want, My user name is Jane67.

In other news, we are going on a driving trip over spring break. Look out for news that could read something like this:
Mother jumps into the Hoover Dam after (stupidly) agreeing to a driving trip with her family.
Or I like this one:
Mother runs for her life out into the barren desert in Death Valley, It was her only hope for sanity after (stupidly) agreeing to a driving trip..........blah,blah,blah! Wish me luck!

Birthday Boys

Evan and his Uncle Mike have birthday's just days apart, so we usually end up with a "family" celebration, it's become a tradition. We haven't had Evan's party yet, he wants to invite a group of friends to his favorite trampoline place some time soon. But for now I have a couple of pictures to show off.
Below are from 2009.......Above are from 2010

4x12 for February

I finally did it and it only took a tsunami to make it happen! I'd been wanting to take another family picture at the beach for my 4x12 photo project and between the rain and everyone running in different directions it just wasn't happening. With only 2 days left of our short month o' February I had almost given up hope. I really wanted to take it in the same spot each month but I figured I'll just take what I can get and I think it turned out OK. We actually had gone down to the beach to watch for the Tsunami that was suppose to reach our coastline after hitting Hawaii a bit earlier, an after effect from the horrible earthquake in Chile today. It was expected to hit us around 2:00pm and have a 2ft. swell . I was really hoping for a dramatic effect but alas nothing really came of it, except for my desired 4x12 picture!

Old Pictures

Continuing on with my theme for this month, I love looking at old pictures. Not that these are particularly old, they just do what all pictures do. Bring you back to a certain time. And I loved this time in my life, we were living in a 950 sq ft duplex. I could stand practically anywhere in the place and see the boys. It was perfect for us, I loved being so close to them. The boys were so much fun at this age. And I can't help but think back to how lucky we were that on any given day we could just go off to the beach or the zoo or the park or the rope swing across the street, we could bake cookies and pretzels or play in the rain and jump in mud puddles. Whatever we wanted to we did all because I was lucky enough to stay home with them. I don't think I squandered a minute of time with them, I loved it so much. In these pictures we had just hand made these pretzels, They were so excited and I think these pictures are priceless!

How are you going to top this?

I said "Seriously honey, How are you going to top this one"? Here are the before and after pictures of my "family" room officially finished today, Valentine's Day. You can see I haven't even put anything on the shelves yet. When we built the house almost 8 years ago we had no idea what to do with this space and it started out as more of a "living room" (because no one ever went in there) as the kids have gotten older we have started using it more. The TV in the corner on the end table was in the loft upstairs and the boys would use it to play games on and watch occasionally TV. Then on New Years Eve 2008 we decided to bring it downstairs for people to play the wii or Karaoke for the party we were having. But the TV is so heavy that it never got moved back upstairs and we started watching it more and more. Well you can see by the before picture that the room was just plan and ugly. So Wayne designed and built these cabinets over the last couple of weeks and they are gorgeous! I Love that man and not just because he build these beautiful cabinets for me! :) Happy Valentine's Day 2010

And these two too

Solid as a rock, steadfast and loyal, these two are the bomb! 49 years and counting. They still take care of me! Thank you!

Love these two

These two are full of life! So fun to be around, generous to a fault and "game" for anything! Happy Valentines to Grandma Di and Grampa Bert!

I Love Food!

I especially love the kind of food that's messy to eat and isn't always pretty. Fancy food is just lost on me. Maybe one day I will come to appreciate it, but for now I like things I can stand over the sink and eat, like a juicy orange or a left over piece of cold pizza. I also like things I can eat without utensils, things like hamburgers and burritos or this new recipe from my friend Lynn. Pork with Tzatziki sauce, wrapped in flat bread! I think I made it twice in one week and I tried it with chicken breast too! The recipe is so easy to make. Just cube a pork tenderloin (or chicken breast)and marinate in olive oil, red wine vinegar, red onion, garlic and lemon juice over night. Pan fry or put onto skewers and barbecue. I buy the flat bread and Tzatziki at Trader Joe's and serve with a Greek salad. It's so flavorful, you can eat it with your hands and the whole family loves it!

Little Blossoms

I love these tiny little pink blossoms. They are on the flowering plum tree in my front yard. This poor tree has no idea that it's only February and that another storm is coming in today. At least I can enjoy them for the time being.

I Love this idea 4x12

So after the last post (which was totally lame I know) I thought I should try and redeem myself with something more meaningful for my month of "Things I love". I saw this idea on my friend Lisa's blog lisadamrosch.typepad.com and It's basically a candid (stop what your doing and come here) photo of her and her family. One a month for a year, 3x12. So last night I picked a spot, the couch and set up the camera, programmed the timer on it and rallied the troops. What a mess, not only was the spot not good, lighting, back round etc, but the boys wouldn't sit still, they made funny faces wrestled on the floor in between shots and I was exhausted after running back and forth to look and reset the camera after every shot. I'm going to post some of them just to spite the boys! And because of my epic failure last night I decided to to post a picture from December (because I like it) and call it January then try again for a good shot for February. Maybe I'll try to get one at the same spot on the beach, I love it there! So here you go, 4x12.
.

Amore #1

As promised, I will dedicate this month to the things that I love. And as you will soon find out these "Things", that I love will be in no particular order. I do not love my central vacuum more than I love my family. But while on the subject of central vacuum systems, mine rocks! Now I know there are many things that I love that I could write about, but I do love my central vac so it's as good a place as any to start. I'm sure most of you know what a central vacuum is, If not here is a brief description for you. "A central vacuum system consists of a power unit installed out of sight in a basement or utility room, and easy to store and use hose and attachments". The best part about the vacuum system is that the canister is outside in the garage so it's not only quieter inside the house but there is no dust or odor from the vacuum either, all of the "veins" or tubes are built into the walls of the house with receptacles through out the different rooms. You just have to plug-in your hose and it turns on automatically. They even have little jackets you can buy for your hoses so they don't mess up the corners of your walls. What solidified my love for my vacuum was when I decided to help out at my MIL's and had to drag her HEAVY, STINKY, and RIDICULOUSLY AWKWARD Hover around her very large, multi-surfaced (for lack of better description) house. All I was thinking as I was dragging this stupid thing around and sweating my a** off was "Thank god she doesn't have stairs"! Now this is no Oprah show, I won't be doling out vacuum systems today, but I can, with certainty say that I don't want to live anywhere that doesn't have a central vac! Call me shallow I don't care!

Miss Puddin' Tater

Seriously, Our cat "Puddin" loves to lay upside down and last night she had two of her favorite things. A nice hot fire and Evan to lay next to. For some reason she migrates toward Evan, probably because he's allergic to her!
A cabinet update: I went to the shop today and took some pictures of the work in progress. I'm so excited they look great. Wayne is doing an awesome job! I can't wait to show the before and after!

Way to go!!

Evan was for nominated for Student of the week by his 6th grade social studies teacher Mr. Rippberger who wrote, " Evan is nice to his class mates and participates well in discussions. His work shows attention to detail and organization." I was so happy for him and he was as proud as can be! In addition to getting the "Award", he also had it announced over the load speaker at school and wait for the best part...........he gets a front of the line pass for a week! How cool is that? This morning he said, "Mom, Can I have a dollar to buy something at school"? I mean why not take advantage of an advantage right? Good job Evan!

Before and After

A while ago Wayne decided that the back door and porch of our house needed a cover. We use it as our main entry into the house and It's a south-west facing door so it gets wet when it rains. Putting a cover over it was a great idea and it looks beautiful. I'm so happy that he choose to do this while he was in between jobs! He's currently working on some built-in bookshelves and TV stand for our family room. I'll post before and after shots when he's done. And yes, that does mean he's in between jobs!

A rockin' night for us

That's right, no big surprise from us right? We do go to our share of concerts but this one was a little different. It was a benefit concert to raise money for the family of guy named Buffalo Norton, a blues harmonica player who had cancer and died, he was a friend to all the people that played and his wife was there too. They had a silent auction and Wavy Gravy was the MC for the night. It was a brilliant idea, held in the newly renovated Fox Theater in Oakland CA a gorgeous site and not a bad seat in the house. The concert was 5 hours long and included sets by The Doobie Brothers, Bonnie Raitt, and The Steve Miller Band. Special guests included, George Thorogood, Charlie Musselwhite, Roy Rodgers and Elvin Bishop. I'd never seen any of these bands/people so it was a real treat and they all rocked their a**'s off. Before the concert, Wayne and I and Rae and Mike met up with our friend Randy, then drove to one of his favorite restaurants in Emeryville called "Rudy's Can't Fail Cafe. One of the guys from Greenday is part owner and It's going to be on Food Network tonight at 10:00 (Jan. 25th)! Wayne's brother Keith and his wife Holly met up with us there, Keith was excited to see the concert because he and Randy did the concert poster which turned out great and we had a surprise when we got there and saw they had used the art to make t-shirts with too. Wayne bought one :)
You probably noticed I changed my page graphics again. I'm thinking I might try to post about "Things I love" during February. There are so many things after all! Until then.........

Stormy Weather

The storm they have been promising has finally arrived, at 3:00AM to be exact. I know this because the lighting and thunder not only shook the house but completely freaked out my cat! She was actually crying. I had to pick her up and hold her finally bringing her into bed with us. Her little heart was pounding so hard I though she would have a heart attack! The boys on the other hand didn't hear a thing. Nada-nothing! At least they'll be rested for school.
I managed to make it to the gym today, I have new motivation as I've put on a couple of pounds. Probably due to my new addiction to a game my sister bought us for Christmas, it's called Bananagrams. Now I have the application for my Iphone and once I start playing It's hard to stop. It's fun if you crossword puzzles or Scrabble. The other motivation I have is that Wayne's cholesterol test came back a bit high. 231 I think. Not good for someone who has heart disease in his family. So I'm counting fat calories and adjusting our food a bit. The problem is we eat pretty good at home and his "good" cholesterol is high, but so is his bad. Anyway, it leads me to think his diet isn't all that bad and he can probably lower it by just a few changes. We'll see what happens.

Happy Two Thousand Ten

I was informed that the proper way to say "2010" is not twenty ten, but rather two thousand ten. Why is this important? It's not, just thought I''d mention it. It's a distraction from the more pressing matters in my life. Like putting the Christmas boxes up in the attic and cleaning the kitchen floor. Every year about this time I swear I'm just going to go to Hawaii for Christmas. A girl can dream right? We were gone during Thanksgiving two years ago on a cruise and I have to say it was great not having a traditional Thanksgiving. You already know how I feel about cruising! Not for me please. But the whole being gone for the holiday thing I could get used to.
I was going to send out Happy New Year cards this year, I did send out some Christmas cards, but now I'm starting to think there's a statue of limitations for New Years Cards. Would you agree? If this is true, it officially gets me off the hook. Maybe I'll do the cards next year, or not.
This year one of the things I'm going to try and find out is if you have to pay more for quality? Have you noticed that some of the household items you use just don't hold up? Recently, a gift I got for Christmas last year broke, I use it every morning and actually it started to fall apart little by little. First the little rubber feet came off the bottom causing it to slid all over while in use. I have to set it onto a kitchen towel to keep it from vibrating off the counter (which is what happened this morning because I forgot the towel) and it says in the instruction manual that the motor will not run unless the attachment is inserted. That's bull, It continues to run until you unplug it. So I know that this thing is mass produced and sold at every Costco and Bed, bath and beyond in America. And I'm sure there is one in every household in America (American's are so gullible)I for one like the product in the limited capacity that I use it. And it wasn't inexpensive. But really, can't it last longer than a year? Is this part of the manufacturers plan, to get you hooked on their product then when it breaks you run out and buy another one? Or are they too dumb for that. Maybe they just sell as many as they can and make as much money as they can and walk away. I think that's more like it. I just want things that are quality and that last. Is that too much to ask for? We'll see? For now, I need to put a Bullet in this product, A Magic Bullet.