California Christmas

 On Saturday, after packing for our trip to England, we had family and friends over for our California Christmas celebration.

We hosted Uncle Bill and Aunt Patty, cousins William and Elizabeth (and Jerry of course!), Grandma and Grandpa and Auntie Mel, and the Roberts. Patty made a giant lasagna and sausages, Genia brought salad and Mel made garlic bread. 

Here, Uncle Bill plays bingo with Johnny.

 The five children had their own gift exchange game, where they passed around presents while John played music. When the music stopped, each child unwrapped one layer of wrapping paper from the gft s/he was holding. There were five layers of paper, and therefore five rounds of gift-passing.

 Dear Genia - best neighbors we could hope for!

 After dinner, we opened crackers...

 ...before we opened gifts. Cora was very pleased with her own version of Annie, one of Ave's very favorite movies. Here, Johnny is bursting into the photo to show off his new Transformers mask.

 Then the grownups played a White Elephant gift exchange game, filled with lots of laughter.

Beautiful cousins.
Our night was so much fun, and we owe lots of thanks to everyone who came and helped cook and clean up! We love you all and Merry Christmas!

Christmas fun

 The weeks leading up to Christmas have been full of Christmas fun.

On Saturday evening, after a Christmas  party at Colleen and Rigo's, we got together with my parents, Melanie and Nick. Since Nick was flying out to his family on the East Coast in the week, we met up early to look at Christmas lights and to exchange presents.

Here, the girls try out their new animal hats, courtesy of Grandma and Grandpa.

 A group shot while looking at pretty Christmas lights, one of our favorite family traditions.

 Later in the week, William flew down from Washington to visit Uncle Bill and Aunt Patty. Since he's been at college, far from the Rosen's old neighborhood, we haven't been able to see him much.

 So, I took the girls up to visit on Wednesday after school. Cora, Will and Uncle Bill went on a nice walk around the neighborhood and to the beach, so Cora could use her new roller skates. These were a present from me and Stace.










We also made Christmas ornaments and candies. It was a lot of fun!

 That night, we had Pioneer Club, and here are Owen an Violet dancing and singing along with the big kids on stage.

(Owen has a cast because he fractured a bone in his wrist during our Cookies with Santa event.)

 On Friday, Cora's class decorated gingerbread houses. Every student needed an adult helper, and Grandma was able to come and help for a little while before she went off to Magic Mountain to pose as Mrs. Claus.

Here, Cora poses with her classmate Gabe and his little sister Sarah.

Cora has many plates of candy in front of her, because she was the very last student to finish her house. She had a plan, and she was very careful in what candy went where. 

After school, we all went to the park for lunch and playtime.

Now, we have three weeks off from school! What will we do with ourselves? I know! We'll fly to England!

A good week

 Here are some odds and ends from our week...
On Sunday morning after church, Stace paid the local gardeners $2 each to rake the leaves on the patio.
(Where we live, yes, the leaves fall in December. Or at least the ones in our yard do...)

Ave and Cora worked hard for their money. Violet enjoyed sweeping too, though she doesn't quite get the concept of aiming the leaves toward the growing pile.

 On Tuesday afternoon, we visited Juliana, Maya and Natalia for lunch. We had a great time catching up, as always.

The girls got along so well - even the toddlers! Violet and Natalia had a great time together, were happy to see each other and avoided getting into squabbles.

As you can see, the big girls spent some time beautifying themselves, with nail polish, dresses and makeup. I'm really not sure where Cora gets this particular pose from, but she does do it a lot.

Whoa, Nellie, they were made up!

On the way home, Cora told me that she doesn't like dressing up like a princess anymore, but this was different, because these were beautiful fancy dresses. (She did add, though, that she still likes wearing her Ariel dress.)

On Thursday, Violet's class held a Christmas party. Here, Liana and Violet enjoyed the feasting - cookies and oranges, two of the four food groups for us lately!

This class marked the end of the fall session, so here Violet poses with Ms. Diane. I'm happy that Violet loves her as much as Cora did (and I do!).

 On Friday, Genia and the kids came over after lunch to watch Christmas movies and make some goodies.

Spencer got a lot of love. Sebastian stayed quietly hidden in our bedroom, as he tends to do when the house fills with noisy children.

 OK, this should be an interesting candid photo of the girls dipping pretzel rods into white chocolate and candies.

Or, it should be a happy shot of them smiling, while doing the same.

But Violet did something to annoy Cora as I snapped the pic, and this one just makes me laugh. Sisters!

 On Saturday, after Cora's final soccer class of the year, we four went out to lunch together and then braved the masses at Target for some Christmas shopping.

Here, the girls were helping pick out presents for a few of their friends.

And here, Violet said she found the perfect gift for her best mate Owen. Owen would look smashing in a sparkly turquoise top, don't you think?

The Guitar Challenge

For my birthday last year, my Mum and Dad gave me a book on how to maintain and fix electric guitars. This got me thinking, "I wonder if I could build my own guitar?"

I found a website that sold all the parts for a multitude of guitar styles, but soon realised the body, neck, electronics and hardware would all add up to quite a sum of money. The main cost was the body and electric pick-ups. If I was going to do this, I would have to make my own body. (Anyway, buying all the parts would simply be an assembly project. That seemed far too easy.)

After some great ideas from Dean and the encouraging words of my Dad - "You'll never do that. I bet you 20 quid (pounds) you can't make a guitar that works" - I was up for the challenge to build my own guitar. I would design and build the body and buy all the other parts. At best, I would end up with a new instrument and 20 quid; at worst, I'd have an interesting ornament.

Question: Which style would be the easiest set-up to make at home, with a few simple wood-working tools and no guitar-making knowledge? The answer came after spending time with our good friends the Phelans. Rob just happens to have a custom-made Telecaster. I played it for a while and decided it would be the model.
One night I started to design a body shape that I could incorporate the Telecaster bridge and pick-ups into. I like the look of the sound holes on violins and cellos, so I included these into my guitar design.

Next I moved on to the wood and was shocked to find out how much a blank to build a body would cost. It was time for a trip to the local guitar wood specialist: The Home Depot.
None of the materials available were wide or thick enough for my body design. There in the shop I had the idea to bond three pieces of wood together to get to the width I needed. I would make the guitar in sections with a top, a centre section, and a bottom. Hmmm...maybe this would have been easier and cheaper to buy a body. Oh well, timber in hand I headed home to try to figure out how to make this work.

I bought three large clamps and some quality wood glue and one night, after the girls were down, I started to bond the sections together. I now had a top, center inlay and bottom. I then made a cardboard template of the outer shape.

I had measured and recorded all the dimensions from Rob's guitar for the bridge, pick-up positions, neck position and the overall distance of the neck nut to the bridge where the strings go through the body. I drew these dimensions onto the template.

I wanted the violin-type sound holes, so the body would have to have hollow sections. I drew these onto the template, and then made a wooden templates for the different sections.

The template cut-outs and dimensions were then drawn onto the three body sections.
Using my router, I cut out the pockets in the top, centre and bottom sections to form the hollow body.

Cora and I then painted the inside of the pockets jet black.

Next, I routed out of the holes for the two pick-ups, the wire passages and the neck pocket.
It was now time to bond all three sections together to form the hollow body.
After several days of curing, I removed the clamps, and using the wooden template as a guide, I cut the outside shape of the guitar body.




I then routed around the template to give the final body contour, and then hand-filed and sanded to get the shape just right.

I cut out the sound holes in the front of the guitar and routed out the pocket on the back for the switch and control knobs. Cora then painted the inside of this pocket black.

The next week or so I was busy sanding. Lots and lots of sanding, not all of it worthwhile.
I first stained the body a very light blue. Didn't like it. Sanded it down to bare wood. I stained it a natural colour to let the grain of the wood come through. I then applied several coats of varnish with a brush. Didn't like that either. Sanded it down to bare wood again. I stained it a natural colour again, this time I applied the final varnish with a spray can. Finally I had a finish I liked. And a very smooth finish it was, what with all the sanding.

I ordered the parts I needed and when they arrived, I began the final assembly of the
guitar. I then made a cover plate, for the electronics that I soldered and installed, to finish the body project.


After installing the tuning heads to the top of the neck, it was time to string up the guitar for the very first time and see if it would actually play.

The next weekend when we went on Skype to see my family, I had fun showing Dad, Mum, Dean and Jenny the guitar, especially when I turned it on a played it.

It works and sounds good. I built my own guitar.

I will never try to figure out how much this little challenge project cost. With all the additional tools and materials I had to buy, along with the guitar hardware, it must have cost a pretty penny. But I have to say, looking at it gives me more pride than owning a guitar bought from a shop.

When all was said and done, I have an instrument, and an ornament. I won't say what happened to the 20 quid.

Cookies with Santa

My Mom2Mom group put on a fantastic "Cookies and Cocoa with Santa" event Sunday evening, with Mr. Claus making the long trip from the North Pole to visit with our children.

 Here, he greets the girls by complimenting them on their dresses and asking them about what they're hoping to receive this Christmas.

We were curious how Violet would react to Santa, since she cried a lot last year, and didn't do great earlier this month. But, using sweets to bribe Miss Mae (as Cora sometimes calls her) works wonders...

 ...as you can see here!

 Our official family photographer came, and got a few nice family shots after the Santa pictures. Thanks, Dad.

 

Violet cracks me up in this one.

 

 Since Violet (and Cora, of course) did so well with the photos, they could eat as much hot chocolate and cookies as they could stand.

(Well, not really, but Stace and I were having fun chatting with our friends, so I'm not sure we were keeping a close eye.)

The children also colored pictures and wrote out letters to Santa. Cora's read as follows:
"Dear Santa,
I would like a Nail polish set
also a Fairyhous And
Nutcracker And a cotton candy maker.
Love, Cora"

The nail polish set is already "in the bag," and we've gone ahead and bought the cotton candy maker. This is because she's seen one in action at Maya's house at birthday parties. At least we have storage in the garage!

Saturday fun with the Phelans

 As strange as it may seem for a December Saturday, we found ourselves with a free afternoon, so we contacted our friends Rob, Michelle and Brooke.
Turns out they had some free time too, so we went to visit them in their new town of Camarillo, about an hour away.
After admiring their lovely new home, we went to a Christmas fair at a nearby park, where we played, shopped and exercised on these neat contraptions you see in these photos.

 

We also got to play with their 9-week old puppy, a yellow lab they named Auger. He was exactly what 9-week-old puppies are: ADORABLE, playful, and teething. Thanks, Phelans, for a great Saturday! 

Fun with friends, some of whom are boys

Over the last month or so, our little quiet street has come alive with children playing after school. There's Cora, Ave and Johnny, two neighbor boys on the other side of Genia's house, and two boys who are at their 

grandparents' house every day, next door to us.

In the above photo, we had Alexyss and Marley over to play, and all the kids are enjoying frozen yogurt tubes for dessert.

Genia and I have been having picnic lunches at the park after we pick up our kindergartners. The weather has been perfect.

These two! They are such good friends. We had Owen over for dinner the other night on his own, when Genia took Cora and her her older two to a concert by John's high school jazz band students. Owen was a hoot. He's growing up so much, and really had us laughing.

When we were leaving the park, it was drizzling so Cora gave Johnny a leaf hat to block the rain. She was quite serious about this, and Johnny's a good sport.

On a recent Saturday, we took a picnic lunch to Placerita Canyon for a little hike/walk. Hiking won't happen without a back carrier for Violet, who tends to meander at a snail's pace.

It was very pretty, with fall colors and local wildlife (woodpeckers, scrub jays and chipmunks).






In this photo, you can see the sand village the girls made with Stace, with some help from a couple of other neighbor boys.

One of those boys happened to be the one Cora likes, from her class. Let's call him Joey - the name is changed to protect the youngster.
On Thursday, Cora delivered some news that stunned her parents: She and Joey played together all through recess, and they were holding hands. Normally the kindergartners and first-graders have separate recess times, but on Thursday Cora's whole class went out at one time, giving Cora and Joey playtime together.

Cora told me that all the kids saw them, and she and the young boy didn't mind that at all, even though one of the girls said it "looked like they were getting married."
(This is one of the levels of weirdness for me; boys never liked me in school, and if I actually liked a boy, I'd have been horrified if anyone found out.)

I asked Cora if they were allowed to hold hands at school, and her answer was: "Yeah! We can do everything. Except the monkey bars, because a boy broke his leg."
She didn't want me to tell Stacey about the hand-holding, and at dinner, she told Stace she played with Joey during recess, but then stopped. "Mom, don't tell Daddy the rest!" After Stace protested, Cora said, "I'm not telling you what else I did with Joey!'
After that statement, simple hand-holding came as something of a relief (though still shocking to poor Stace, who needed some time on his own after dinner).

I know parents are never ready for their children to grow up, but really, I never expected Cora to start liking boys at age 5. And he likes her too! We have told Cora she is way too young to kiss boys or think of the word "boyfriend." Not sure what to tell her about hand-holding. Hmmmm...

A Good Weekend

On Saturday morning, we had a great time at Stacey's work's facility tour and family Christmas party.

Stace has been at his current job nearly eight years, and for those years, what happens beyond the lobby doors has been a mystery to us all. I mean, we know Daddy works and he works hard, but we didn't even know what his office looks like. We three girls were very happy to finally visit Stace at work and check out his office and the big machinery.

Then, the party continued a couple of blocks away at the Ice Station. For a nominal fee, we all had lunch, ice skating and a gift from Santa. Such a great day!

Cora was very excited about the skating - she hadn't bee on the ice since February. She used the practice bars at first, to hold onto while she got her bearings. But then she was off on her own, doing quite well.

Part of the rink was sectioned off, and there was snow for playing with and throwing at friends (and enemies).

Violet wasn't thrilled about meeting Mr. Claus. She did like her gift, however: a plush Minnie Mouse doll. Cora received a Disney princess light-up wand.

We spent the rest of the weekend preparing our home for Christmas, with lights and the indoor decor.
On Sunday evening, we walked down to the annual Christmas Tree lighting event at the hospital with Genia and her children.

After admiring the lights and playing in the leaves, we all had chili at Genia and John's. It was a great weekend.