Ballet Love

For months and months Avery has been asking for ballet classes. Our dear friend's daughter Anna has taken local rec ballet classes and the teacher was so highly recommended by them. I was so excited that she could finally sign up, the classes finally start at age 3. We went to the shoe store to buy some ballet shoes and literally as soon as she put them on she started "dancing" around. At the first class she was so good, she got right into the mix and really participated so much more than I thought she would. She loved it and I couldn't wipe the smile off my face for the entire 45 minutes. In fact hours after the class when she was talking about it she said "you were smiling at me" and I said "yes I was, I was so proud of you". The pictures don't do it justice but it really was so much fun. There are 9 classes and parents are only allowed at the first and last class, so there won't be more ballet pix until the end of August. Teacher Angie was just great with the girls, she is very fun but also makes them mind her. Getting 10 3-4year olds into a straight line behind her requires great patience. I am sure they will have it all figured out in a week or 2.

Movie Night

This weekend we decided to let Avery stay up late so that we could have a movie night at home. We watched Toy Story 2 which came highly recommended to us and Avery loved it. She had to go potty twice but she wouldn't budge until the movie was paused. We had popcorn and M & M's and Avery really liked Woody. We are planning to take her to the theater the weekend of her birthday to see Toy Story 3. **note: I had no idea just how much pink there is in our living room until I saw this picture and now I look around and all I see is pink. When did this happen?

Grandpa and NanaLin Came to Visit

We had the great pleasure of seeing Grandpa and NanaLin over this past week. They were on a whirlwind Southwest trip and we were lucky to have them come through LA twice during their trip. They had the privilege of going to Friday at the US Open at Pebble Beach and spent the surrounding days, including Father's Day, with us. We went to the Getty, Yogurtland, La Grande Orange and Venice Beach and Jon and I got a date night too! We had tons of fun. There are not many pictures but here are 2 from the Getty. We love any time we get to spend with these 2 special people in our lives.

Goodbye Oskar

After much talk over the past year or so, our neighbors have taken the plunge and moved out of their place and to Chicago to give the city a good try for a year. Oskar recently had a little brother, Lukas, so the 4 of them are off to Germany for the summer and then back to Chicago. We are going to miss them all so much and really hope this adventure leads only to good things for everyone. They are coming back in January so we will look forward to seeing them then. Their last interaction was so great, with lots of laughter. We watched the truck out our window and went into their apartment when it was nearly empty to help Avery understand that they were leaving for good. I thought she understood but then I stopped in there a few days later to check on something for Marisa and Avery was in the hallway in her stroller and she said "I want to see Oskar." :(
Included are some of my favorite pix of them from the past 3 years. They have grown up so much!

August 2009

April 2009

November 2008

July 2008

Elmo Live Again

Last May we went to Elmo Live with our dear friends, Deirdre, Ella and Charlotte. This time we brought along Daddy, which was most definitely a mistake. He will now compare funerals, religious services, and traffic jams to whether or not they were worse than Elmo live. He is not a fan of elmo live but Avery did enjoy it. And we enjoyed being with our friends immensely.

Our Little Shutterbug

Avery has recently learned how to take pictures with our camera. I am not sure always how good of an idea this was. Especially when it ends up on some funky setting that I don't know how to get out of. But here are a few of her samples. She especially loves to take pictures of Quincy.

Happy Birthday Calvin

We had the pleasure of spending Mother's Day morning with our dear friends, The Browns, to celebrate Calvin's 2nd birthday. We went to the aquarium and then to Outback. Mijin had made the most delicious carrot cake cupcakes. Avery loved sitting next to little Sylvie at the big table and Calvin was such a happy little birthday boy. Click here for a group picture, yes we forgot to tell Mijin to wear green.

I love airplanes

As we were taking the red-eye home we had one last full day to enjoy beach time, fish sandwiches, shave ice and to pick up a lei for Avery. She loved her lei. The plane ride was, hmmm, miserable. I was so hot the whole time and Avery was lying on my lap not really sleeping. It ranks with some of the longest hours of my life. The plane landed at LAX sometime before 5 am and as everyone is groggily waking from restless sleep, Avery blurts out "I love airplanes!!" She is a good sport and she really does love to fly.

Hertz bus back to the airport :(

Last Dinner and Gifts

We chose a restaurant for our last dinner, Bouchons Hanalei, that ended up being our worst dinner, but we made up for it by finding a few little trinkets to take home and by ordering 2 lava cakes from Postcards to go to end on a positive note. Avery loves chocolate lava cake, just like her mommy. The last little shop we went in had a bracelet that Jon wanted to get for Avery and she found a little wooden dolphin she loved. We went to pay the lady working at the shop and she insisted that we take the two gifts for free. The picture is of her enjoying the gifts on the way to pick up our chocolate cakes.

Shave Ice

We hardly went a day during our vacation without venturing out for shave ice. Yum-city! Toward the end of the trip we stopped sharing 1 or 2 big ones and each got our own. Avery loved to have rainbow shave ice and at the Wishing Well they include a gummy worm to make it all the more fun. If you look closely you can see it.

Hideaways

The last couple of days were so pretty. We hiked down a semi-precarious, rope lined path to a beautiful beach called Hideaways Beach just below our condo. It would have been nearly impossible had the ground still been wet from the rain so I was glad we waited until it was dry and sunny to give it a try. The first day Jon carried Avery and I was the Sherpa carrying the boat, a beach chair, a backpack, straw mat and more. The second time we left the boat and chair at home and I lost the mat on the way up the first day so we didn't bring that either. It was definitely quiet and there was shade for when it got too hot. There were lots of snorkelers out and about.

Postcards Cafe

Our favorite nice dinner we had in Kauai was at Postcards Cafe in Hanalei. Kauai is known for friendliness and much like we remembered from our honeymoon it has a small town feel. We had the same waitress for breakfast that morning. We had no idea she worked at Postcards but when we sat down I made the connection. She was a pretty girl with 2 sons around Avery's age. She works 2 days a week, mornings at the Wake Up Cafe (breakfast not so good) and nights at Postcards, then she is off the other 5 days a wk to be with her sons. She gave us good recommendations of things to do with Avery. The food was really tasty, yummy wine and the most decadent chocolate volcano cake.

Lydgate Park Beach

We had heard great things about a beach a little bit south of Princeville that is good for kids because it is an enclosed area ringed by large lava rocks which is perfectly calm. Our condo had a cute little toddler boat that we brought with us. Avery ended up loving the boat because she could sit on her own and she loved to be spun around and bounced up and down. There were beautiful schools of fish that kept swimming around us. Avery could have stayed out there all day. We brought a nice picnic and then went for a walk just south of that area where we took a bunch of photos. They also had a really cool playground with handcarved wooden features. It was a very memorable day.

Our Little Beach Bum

Ke'e and Rainbows

One day after nap time we ventured up to the northernmost beach that is reachable by car, Ke'e beach. It was pretty late so we decided not to bring bathing suits. This ended up a mistake. As soon as our toes touched the sand Avery was grabbing her shirt and trying to take it off so she could go in the water. We ended up having her swim in her birthday suit. She had a blast. It was so warm and nice out.


On the drive back to Princeville we saw a 180 degree beautiful rainbow. It reminded me of all the rainbows we saw on our honeymoon 6 years ago. We stopped to take a few pictures of the rainbow but none of them did it justice. We stopped at the Dolphin Restaurant in Hanalei which was amongst our least favorite meals, not terrible just not as good as some other places we went.

'breaking in' for fun

As I already said, our condo was located just before the St Regis in Princeville. We heard they had a nice beach with tidepools and such so we decided to venture into their territory and pretend like we belonged. I think we did a good job negotiating several elevators and misleading signs :) Our striped towels probably almost gave us away but as long as you didn't ask for towel/food/drink service at the pool they didn't care to ask you your name and room number. The pool was super nice, we did humpty dumpty about 50 times, and the beach was pretty nice too, just a little rocky. It rained a little on us in the pool but that didn't stop the fun.