Fabulous Fourth!

This Week in Pictures

Valentine's Day

I know it's a little late, but I couldn't resist these cute pictures. Mitchell was in charge of holding the Jell-o treats on our way to a Valentine's brunch. He was concentrating hard and holding on tight so none of the heart shapes would slip off the plate.

The valentines that Madison made for her class. I think they turned out super cute!

The kids were dressed up for Valentine's day on Sunday.

I love it when they get along. What a great valentine for mom!

Rainy days with a chance of sun

The other week we had rain and a lot of it. Afterall, it is wintertime. Eliot says we may have gotten our yearly allotment in that one week. The kids loved getting out their rain gear and I loved it too!

Between puddle jumps and sloshing around we sipped on tea and hot chocolate indoors. It was a nice change from the perpetual sunshine. I probably appreciated the rain so much because it was such a novelty. I knew the sunshine would be back shortly.

Sure enough, the first sunbeam came through the clouds on the Sunday following the rain. The first sunbeam was my future Sunbeam. I can't believe this little guy will be a Sunbeam in one more week. Since then the has rain ceased and it has been sunny and warm ever since.

Side note: Mitchell had an astronaut visit his preschool. I think that was the first astronaut I had ever seen in real life. He made a fun space hat for the occasion which he is modeling here.

The Nutcracker

Before the performance...

Backstage waiting to go on. Madison was a Magical Ornament in a production of The Nutcracker.

Practicing looking surprised and scared. During the production, rats come and whisk the "Magical Ornaments" away.

Getting ready to go on stage for the finale.

Beautiful ballerina.

Lyle Jack Ward

November 7, 2009

Halloween

First off, my sisters came into town for a girls' trip. We had a great time! One of the highlights and actual motivation for the trip was attending Michael Jackson's "This Is It" movie together. You see, we grew up dancing to Michael Jackson music together. We got matching MJ t-shirts for the event. See above. And it was so fun watching the movie with people who I know love and appreciate MJ's talent and music like I do. It is a must see, if you like MJ. At the end of the movie we sang Michael Jackson's songs together. It was great!! Thanks to Nat and Jennie for a great week. (Another highlight was seeing The Lion King together at Broadway San Diego. Thanks for the surprise!)

Carving pumpkins just before Halloween night. You can kind of see the bow that was planned for this Jack-o-Lantern. That was of course Maddie's idea.

This is Mitchell's "scary" pirate face. He also had a pretty scary "Argh."

Just before trick-or-treating... the beautiful Monarch butterfly and the "scary" pirate. Both kids picked what they wanted to be for Halloween and had a lot of fun trick-or-treating. Overall, Halloween was a success... the kids were happy!