Sad Times.........

So, I don't know whats wrong with me in the posting department lately, it's not that I don't have anything to write about, I mean we've had A major earthquake and Tsunami in Japan, followed by the battered Fukushima nuclear power plant reactor at near melt down and radiation now showing up in food and milk supplies. Maybe It's just too depressing to think about, let alone write about. I think thats why the everyday little things that happen make me so happy, like the beautiful cowl that I knitted with some yarn I found in a box, It's beautiful and I made it and I love it. I had lunch with a wonderful friend today, and made a super delicious dinner for my family, that they devoured, as we all sat around the table together. Right now, it's the small things that make me happy and the small things I will think about, because if I only think about the thousands and thousands of people whose lives will never be the same and what will become of the nuclear power plant, I couldn't and wouldn't be much good for anything or anybody.

Happy Birthday!!

Happy Birthday to Evan!

Black Belt

Evan had his Black Belt promotion on January 31, 2011. It coincided with the Grand Master's seminar as the Grand Master is the one who promotes them. Unfortunately, I didn't get any family pictures with Evan that night but all the grandparents came, as well as Auntie Rae and Uncle Mike. We celebrated later that night at the pizza parlor with the other Black Belt promote (Jack) and his family. I cried and Evan was all smiles!

Happy 50th Anniversary

Oh, come on now!


That's more like it!
Happy Anniversary to my Parents, Ray and Jean!

1/11/11

Humm.........I don't really have anything to post tonight. I just wanted to acknowledge the 11th day of January 2011. Or 1/11/11. I can't believe we're 11 days into 2011! So far so good :)

Low key weekend

This weekend was suppose to be our final Christmas with the Impink family in Sonora, unfortunately Grandma Di caught the flu on her recent trip Arizona and had to cancel, ugh. I Hope she feels better soon! Because we weren't leaving town we were able to go to a friends 40th surprise birthday party, she was really surprised, especially since we told her we would be gone this weekend. We had a great time seeing some of our friends that we hadn't seen for a while. The rest of the weekend we really didn't do much of anything which is not all that common for us. Ian and Wayne worked on Ian's dirt bike and Evan had surf practice and worked on something for Kuk Sool Won in preparation for his Black belt promotion at the end of this month. And finally at sunset on Sunday, we walked to the beach to see the boat that had washed ashore after the crew had fallen asleep, they had been out for three days and had a hull full of Dungeness crab,apparently all the crab had escaped!

My not so hidden treasure

I've had this funny egg head for quite a while, maybe 20 years. I got when a friend of mine was moving from her childhood home. Her mother had passed and I'm assuming it belonged to her. I've always liked this guy, it's quirky and different and I've never seen another one like it. For years I never thought anything of it, just that I liked it. Then about 6 or 7 years ago I thought about looking it up on the internet but had no luck finding anything about it. Then on New Years Eve, my brother in law Mike asked me about it. I told him I really didn't know where it came from or what it was but that it was signed and dated. He suggested I take another shot at looking it up which I did and got a couple of hits mostly from auction type sites of people wanting to sell theirs. It's still hard to tell what it is worth, but the information I got was that the Southern California artist LaGardo Tackett designed these in the late 1950's (mine is dated 1959).They were advertised in Playboy Magazine as a "condom holder", it is hollow, and had a handled cork stopper with access underneath. Mine doesn't have the cork any more. So there you go, I have proudly displayed my condom holding egg head for years and I will continue to do so until I, A) Need money or B) it falls off the shelf in an earthquake.

High Tide

I After the last few weeks of rain and cold I couldn't resist getting out today, the weather was incredibly beautiful and warm and the waves were crashing over the rocks. So with dog and "new" camera in tow we headed out for a walk. I didn't have to go far, just down the street before I started dodging the waves coming over onto the road. Further down the road I took this shot which I think is sort of iconic.
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Photo mishap

I set out this morning with my new camera in hand to photograph a bit with my sister, who is a very good photographer, I was thinking a could learn a thing or two from her about aperture and lighting and whatever else I could grasp. Unfortunately I forgot to put the SD card back into the camera and the only shot I got today was this one taken with my Iphone! It isn't this blurry but didn't transfer well for some reason. I'll have to work on that.

1/1/11

Happy New Year!
With the exception of the loss of our sweet Cleo, My sisters beautiful greyhound dog. I would have to say that 2010 was a pretty fantastic year. We all came through basically unscathed as did most of our extended families and for that I am truly grateful. Christmas came and went with a bang leaving me with the addition of not only a brand new laptop computer from my Mom and Dad to"us", but also a Canon Rebel T1i from Wayne for Christmas. I'm SO spoiled! And I can't wait to document 2011 and to use my blog to keep you all up to date. Not that Facebook doesn't already do that, but one can never have too many places to put things out there virally, right? So stay tuned and best wishes for a healthy and prosperous 2011!

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.