Week in Review

The girls have been together a lot the last year and a half, and especially this summer. But this week, Cora had a school activity, and Vi and I got some nice alone time together. 

One of the mornings, it was cooler and cloudy, so we went to Bridgeport to take a walk around the pond and see the ducks.

She found a cattail plant, and tore it up to watch the seeds fly off. 

When we noticed some ducks eating rose petals, she decided to pick more petals for them. 

She wanted to feed them by hand, but was also nervous to do so. 

Meanwhile, Cora spent a few days with her new show choir classmates at a three day summer camp at the school. I'm still blown away to be taking her to high school. 

On the final day of camp, she got to go to a barbecue at one of the family's homes with a beautiful pool. (That's why she's in her swimsuit here...)

On Sunday, we went to the Queen's English car show in the San Fernando Valley. Stace had fun seeing all the gorgeous cars, including this amazing little MGB with an MG trailer. The trailer had been fashioned out of an old MGB - we'd never seen anything like that before!
 

Horse Riding

For Christmas, Grandma and Grandpa gave Violet horse-riding lessons, and on Saturday, we went to Gilchrist Farms for her first one.

It wasn't just the riding - Violet learned how to take care of the horse at the start of the lesson, too.

Here, she is using a hoof-pick for the first time.

She loved her lesson!

We then went to Grandma's house for a bit, and spent more time with Auntie Mel and Eloise. Meanwhile, Stace and Cora watched a movie at home.

On our way back home, Violet and I went to Bridgeport to take a short walk and see the ducks.

On Sunday, Stace, Violet and I took a walk at the Iron Horse Bridge trail. It was pretty, and in the riverbed, we saw a coyote with a squirrel in its mouth!

Grandma took Cora to Magic Mountain for a few hours.

Christmas Break Tidbits

The day after Christmas, we decided to go ice skating. Cora's friend Violet was free and able to join us - yay!

They still had the Christmas music playing, so Stace fit right in with his Santa hat.

We'd had a cold storm in the region, dropping the snow levels low. Our valley was even more beautiful than normal!

We happily received and purchased several board games for Christmas. With the girls getting older, we're hoping for some new family activities we can do together, and we had a lot of fun playing games at Thanksgiving with my Washington family.

With a new Star Wars movie out, we rewatched the 7th and 8th installments at home, and then watched the 9th movie in the theater. We all loved it.

Stace and Violet went on a long bike ride, played tennis, and visited the ducks at Bridgeport.

Cora tested for, and was awarded, her orange belt in karate.

Moving on up! We're proud of you, Cora!

We also took the girls back to MB2 Raceway.

Go, girls, go!

Here was our Winter Break Bucket List - we hit most of them.

Ducks and Dolphins

We returned from Arizona to a short week of school, and all of them were minimum days because of parent-teacher conferences.

Because she is in the GATE program, Cora was in charge her conference with us. Her report card was excellent, and despite her recent frustration with math, she scored as well in math as in language arts, her strong suit.

Violet is doing excellent in first grade, and we didn't have a conference with her teacher.

One day this week was "twin day," and Violet planned out that she and her friend would both wear long-sleeved red shirts and black pants.

After the week of half-days, the kids are now in a two-week Spring Break.

On Saturday, Cora's team won its soccer game, with Stace in charge because the coach was on vacation.

Then we went to Sophie and Norah's birthday party, spending a nice afternoon with Adam, Morgan and other friends.

The next stop was a sleepover birthday party for Sam and Riley, Cora's friends.

After dropping her off, Stace and I took Violet to Bridgeport to take a walk and visit the ducks and turtles.
We brought along Cheerios, and Vi had a great time making new feathered friends.

It was a gorgeous night with awesome company.

The best part of Violet taking a photo of us - we look tall! After Violet was in bed, Stace and I finished off watching the end of season 1 of Poldark, which we loved.

On Sunday, after we picked up Cora from the sleepover, Grandma and Grandpa took them on a whale watch. They had a fantastic time, and saw a half-dozen whales and whole (huge) pod of dolphins. The dolphins swam along the boat, giving the passengers a show.

Grandpa, hurry up and print this! It needs to live in a frame!

Stace and I took advantage of the free time to check out a new brewery in town, just a couple of blocks from his work. Tucked into an industrial building, Pocock Brewery offers loads of brews, but no food. We bought a flight to try different varieties, and borrowed a pack of Uno cards from the stack of board games. It was fun! Then, we went to church and then enjoyed a dinner date.

Week of colds

Sorry it's been a while since the last update; there wasn't a lot to report.
We had a quiet week, as Cora got a cold on Sunday. We skipped Stroller Strides on Monday and Wednesday, and only left the house for the grocery store and a walk around Bridgeport.

These photos are from our lake time, where Cora enjoyed seeing all the semi-wildlife again. We saw at least six turtles and a number of fish - the top photo shows one fish jumping out of the water to eat our bread crusts. (Click on it to blow it up, if you'd like.)

At the doctor's on Wednesday, we were told that Cora did in fact only have a cold. That was a relief - her deep, wet cough didn't signal a more serious infection, and her contagious period was about over.

I was proud of Cora - her last two visits included a good deal of crying because she was worried about shots. This time, she listened as I told her beforehand what the doctor would be doing, and she didn't fuss at all as the doctor looked into her ears and mouth. In fact, this whole week she's been a good girl -her energy's been down, and so she's been less likely to throw tantrums.

On Friday, we had our friends Kelly, and David and Melanie come over for dinner. Then Kelly watched Cinderella with Cora (Cora's favorite) and put her to bed, while the rest of us adults went to see the play "Noises Off" at College of the Canyons. It was hilarious - it's a very funny, laugh-out-loud play, and the actors (including my dear sweet sister) were excellent.

The final two photos: the first shows Cora getting herself a drink. She decided she wanted some milk, so she got her cup and lid out of the drawer, and when I had the fridge open, she grabbed the carton and sat down to do the job. Thankfully she did let me help her with the actual pouring.
The second shows ever-patient Somer, the best friend Cora could ask for.

On Saturday, my friend Allison from my Valley Press days came over for a visit, and she got to see Stace working on our current house project: We're painting the living room! We primed it during the week, and now Stace has two coats of edging up. Hopefully by the time the weekend is over we'll have the color up on the walls and ready to show off.

Unfortunately, I am coming down with Cora's cold. I'm taking lots of vitamin C and drinking orange juice. Hopefully I'll be feeling pretty well by Thursday, when Cora and I get on the airplane for our big trip across the pond!

Finally, a very Happy Mother's Day to all my mommy friends, and particularly to my Mom!