Catching up + our first visitor!

Julie came to visit!

Her husband surprised her with a plane ticket for her birthday and she got to have her first solo trip.  She was ready to leave dreary Michigan and come soak up the sun in California!  Her only request for the visit was to be outside as much as possible.  We went on a few runs together and a hike at Point Mugu state park.

We did some shopping and got several treats along the way.

Julie wanted to help with a house project, so we decided to tackle the most daunting one; laying new contact paper in the kitchen.  While the house has several updates, the cabinets are clearly original to the house and the shelves were disgusting.  This project was the most frustrating/infuriating thing I've ever done, yet left us laughing hysterically.  I would have quit if it hadn't been for Julie helping me laugh through it.  Sadly the job isn't done...anyone want to come help me finish???

Julie visiting also meant that I navigated the way to the LA airport twice!  Let's just say, this move has me wondering every day how I lived without an iPhone.

After Julie's visit:

I met a new friend for a hike; she lives in our neighborhood and is a fellow Navy wife.  Ironically, her name is Laurel.  I seem to have a thing with Laurels.  She moved here in October and witnessed the fires right by our house.  This hike is 5 minutes from our neighborhood and part of it was closed because of the fire damage.

Our house is just on the other side of that mountain

The kids and I explored downtown Camarillo.  We tried Mister Softee and it was the best ice cream we've ever had!

I had just started cooking dinner when Colin popped his head in the kitchen.  "Momma," he says," Is there anything I can help you with?"

I think I just stood there staring at him for a minute, trying to savor the preciousness of the moment and prayed that it wouldn't be the last time I heard these words.

I said yes, I absolutely needed lots of help and he helped me cook every single dish for dinner.

He chopped all those veggies himself!

Colin had his first soccer game!  He was so excited to be playing that he couldn't sleep the night before.

"Mom!  Do you KNOW what tomorrow is?!?!"

With only one, 45 minute practice beforehand, it was equally entertaining and impressive.

Colin is the tallest on his team, which makes Alison happy to not be alone in the "taller than everyone" club.

Afterward, we went to Mama Hummus for lunch.  This random picture is my favorite:

2nd grade catch up

I feel like there is a big jump from 1st to 2nd grade.  Expectations and work are raised; lessons go from letter sounds to writing sentences and spelling tests.  Perhaps the hardest lesson is realizing that days aren't just coloring anymore.  Eli has handled it like a champ, although he happily joins Colin on some of his coloring some times.

For second grade, Eli is doing Saxon Math 3 (and completely rocking it), First Language Lessons, Spelling, Printing Power (handwriting without tears), History (Story of the World, Early Modern Times) and Science (Sonlight, Biology).

Taking art outside, to draw the sky.

His reading has taking off this year and he's even been helping Colin work on his reading lessons.

Other highlights of Second grade so far;

He played basketball on base.

and Upwards soccer with bff Jon

We took a trip to the beach.

His favorite past time is building legos (sorry for the sideways picture...I'm trying to fix it)

He has amazing building skills and is equally as good at puzzles.

Daddy has persuaded him to love Chili Peppers and not a week goes by that they don't get a little treat from there.

We went to Lego Land!

And Sea World.  Eli rode his first roller coaster and loved it!

He sewed himself two decoration pillows for his bed (also worth noting that he still LOVES pj's and stuffed animals).

Pj's and Legos might be the theme of Eli's life right now...

He's also taking piano lessons and learning to type.  He typed this himself:

my favorite thing about school is coloring. 

A full week

My empty calendar didn't stay empty very long.  We started easing back into school last week and have jumped into several activities in an effort to meet people and plug into life in California.

To start off, Colin has been asking about playing soccer for months and months.  I kept telling him, "When we move...".  I lost track of how many times we told the kids that.  Anyway, I finally got around to checking into it and caught it just in the nick of time!  I literally signed him up an hour before registration closed.  The next day he had evaluations and practice starts this week!

And now to brag on Alison.  She has taught herself flexibility moves over the last several years.  With no prompting from anyone else, she researched and practiced all on her own.  She also has been asking to find a class to take (Yuma had zero options for anything along these lines) and we discovered a studio just down the street offers an acrobatics class.  We went to check it out and they let Alison take a trial class.  The teacher warned her that it was intermediate class and she may need to just watch, but it would give her an idea of what the class is like.  Well, I was sitting outside about to have a heart attack because she rocked the class!  She's never taken anything like an acrobatics class, but because of what she taught herself, she was able to do every single thing they did without assistance.  

Soccer...check.

Acrobatics...check.

(Eli is waiting for basketball that starts in March)

This week we met a new friend from church at the park and went to the dentist.

We also have been participating in a homeschool group for military families.  They meet Tuesday's at the park to play for the afternoon and then on Friday's and rotate through art, PE and field trips.  It is just my cup of tea.  It's low key, yet really well organized and we've met some really nice people.  

This week we had art class and went on a field trip to Trader Joe's.  After art, we met Ben for lunch and then went hiking at Point Mugu State park. 

Beautiful is an understatement.

When we finished the hike, Ben took the kids to run some errands and I sat on the beach for awhile.  It was pure bliss.

Something about sitting here for just a few minutes completely clears my head.

I'm new to the Trader Joe's club, but this tour only made me fall in love with the store more.  The manager did a wonderful job teaching the kids about the store and I think they actually learned a lot.  Plus they all got a grocery bag full of free food, so it was fun to have lunch taken care of that day.

On top of all these things, I went to the outlet mall twice and we started playing tennis!

Tennis courts are right across the street from our neighborhood and Ben surprised me last week with new racquets.  We went over one evening to see if we remembered how to play and it was the most fun I've had in a very long time.  It also made me the most sore I've been in a very long time.

The kids could not stand not being a part of the fun, so we had to get them racquets too.  We joked that Colin would be a natural at it and we were right.  2 seconds after he had a racket in his hand he was serving the ball:

I need to study up on how to teach kids how to play...or fly my dad out here to teach them :).  They all loved it until Colin got hit in the head with a ball and then he was ready to go home, but has asked to go back every day since.

Eli is growing like a weed and outgrew his tennis shoes this week.  Poor guy had to hike and play tennis in crocs.  Looks like another trip to the outlets is on our calendar.

Smashburger for the win on an evening when life is busy.

The outlet mall still has the Christmas Tree up...naturally that means you have to run around it.

I am quickly falling in love with the California life.  I can see life becoming very rich and full and I love that daily life entails hikes and the ocean.  

New Year's

I was excited to have a not exciting New Year's.  It's time to find our new normal, so we intentionally made a not very big deal about this holiday.  

New Year's Eve, Ben smoked ribs (which were his best yet!) and we played games.

New Year's day was cold and extremely windy, but we put our brave pants on and went to the Leo Carrillo tide pools.  The calendar said this was the best day of the month to go, so we decided it was the perfect way to kick off school. 

Any day by the ocean is a good day in my books.

The only exciting thing we saw was a star fish, but it was a great intro into the tide pools.  I know there will be many more tide pool posts coming in the next 3 years, so I'm not worried.

After cleaning up from all the sand that had blown on us, Alison and I made kielke.  I really need to make this more than once a year because I was rusty on those noodles.  Good thing the kids don't care what noodles look like and still devoured dinner.

While most people are reflecting on the last year and setting goals for the coming year, I just feel frozen.  2018 was full of dreaming about life in California and now I'm sitting here staring at it, the blank page that it is.  I am excited to see what fills the pages of our life, but it's a little strange to be a foreigner in your own life.  As Ben would say, we'll just take it a step at a time and next year's post should be far more exciting.

Merry Christmas!

It was a restless night in anticipation of our first Christmas in the new house.  Somehow the kids made it to 6:30am before they were in our bed with stockings.  Colin confessed that he peaked in his stocking in the middle of the night...I love how honest he is.

We put little Lego sets in the boys' stockings and Eli had to immediately build his.

We got Maya a stocking this year and filled it with new bones that we got at a local pet store.  

They were natural bones, but perhaps a little too natural.  Something about that bone made Maya act like we've never seen her.  She immediately become possessive and protective of the bone, hiding it in the couch and then burying it in the yard.  She even snipped at Colin when he got too close to her bone.  That was not a fun way to start Christmas, but she later went to him and licked his hand where she snipped him.  

We took out time opening presents.  It was fun to see the kid's reactions to the gifts they gave each other; one of the things I love about them growing up.

Alison's gifts sum up perfectly what it's like to be 11: a new doll and an upgraded Kindle (that she likes to call an iPad) and was equally excited about both.

Eli got her a contortion T-shirt, I got her these shorts she wanted and all of the sudden she looked years older.

Alison got Eli this bear blanket that he is absolutely in love with and he was so excited about Daddy's present to him that he gave him a literal bear hug.

 We had tea pastry and egg strata for breakfast and then spent the day relaxing and playing.

Have you lost count how many outfits the boys have had on?  Me too.

We set out a charcuterie for lunch and grazed for the afternoon.

Which was probably a mistake because we really didn't notice how much the kids were eating plus all the candy.  By dinner, the kids weren't hungry.  Ben and I thoroughly enjoyed prime rib, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole and zwiebach.  The kids thoroughly enjoyed leftovers the next day :). Colin ate Nonny's potatoes for every meal until they were gone!

I was going to take a pretty picture of the table and then realized that the aftermath is a better picture of reality.

 Alison helped me make a peppermint pie, which went pretty much untouched as well.

Lesson learned; dessert is not needed on Christmas.  Eli was so tired by dessert time that he basically fell asleep at the table.