A Family Adventure

Today, along with Gramma and Papa, Uncle Robbie, Auntie, and cousins McKenzie and Haylee, we had a family adventure to The Aquarium of the Pacific. It was a day of celebrating Papa's birthday as a family, and doing something fun!

In the Lorikeet Forest, where neither of the girls wanted to get near the birds, or have the birds get near to them. At the shark lagoon and sting ray touching pools, where again, neither of the girls wanted to stick their fingers into the pool. I don't blame them. LOL. We had a great time at the Aquarium. It was someplace where we'd been wanting to go to for a while now, and it was fun to go with our family.

After the Aquarium, we went across the street to the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. for lunch. We had a fun time enjoying all the props from the movie, Forrest Gump, and answering trivia questions, etc. Here is Papa with all four of his girls. We had a wonderful time at the Aquarium and at lunch. Happy Birthday Papa, hope you enjoyed your day!

** I should add, the shoes that are at Papa's feet, aren't his shoes. LOL. If you haven't seen the movie, Forrest Gump, the main character in the movie has those shoes and sits on a park bench just like that one. The shoes are ceramic models that you can place your shoes into to look as though you are wearing Forrests' shoes. :)

Hannah's Bean Plant

A couple of weeks ago in school, Hannah planted a little bean seed. Last week, they got to bring their sprouted bean plants home. We finally got around to planting it in a pot today.

6 Year Check Up

Hannah saw her Pediatrician today for her 6 year check up. She weighs 53lbs and is 47 inches tall. Both are in the 90th percentile. Our Pediatrician says she's growing "proportionate" and that's great. Hannah was happy to hear the news of not needing any shots or blood drawn. LOL.

The Countdown is On...

As of today, Hannah only has 5 weeks left in her Kindergarten year! It's so hard to believe that soon, she'll be a 1st grader, who'll be packing her lunch and staying all day for school! Whatever will I do with my time?? LOL. Are you kidding?... I've already got it figured that I can make it to my Happy Place and back in the amount of time Hannah will be at school! Although I know a trip to our Happy Place wouldn't be the same without Hannah.

Some of the parents have been talking, and it looks as though there will only be one 1st grade class on our track next year, so more than likely, our class will be together in the 2006-2007 school year. This is such a wonderful advantage of being on a year round track schedule. Our class this year has been great, with the exception of two or three students. LOL. The parent involvement and outpouring of support and generous donations when it comes to parties, and participation in Teacher Appreciation Week have been beyond what you would ever expect in a public school setting. We really do have a great class!

Happy Easter!

Easter for our family isn't about the Easter Bunny, or the baskets, or egg hunts, although egg hunts are a lot of fun. Easter is about Jesus Christ who died on the cross for our sins and then rose from the dead 3 days later.

With that said, I was sooo excited about the Easter activities that followed our early morning church service. It was called Holyland Adventures: The Jerusalem Marketplace. There were 14 stations all centred around what it would have been like to live during Jesus' last days. Most of the stations had something for the kids to make and take home to remember their experience.

This was the basket weaving station. Using raffia and a piece of specially cut paper, the kids weaved their own basket. This was the Musical Instruments Shop where you made your own tambourine out of paper plates and jingle bells! This is Synagogue School. In Jesus' day, girls weren't allowed to attend Synagogue School. At this station the kids learned how different the Hebrew alphabet was with rubber stamps. In the Carpentry shop, you got to experience what it must have felt for Jesus to have worked as a carpenter. These are just a few of the stations and only a few of the pictures I took throughout the morning. It was such a wonderful way to celebrate Easter.

If by chance, any of your local churches do Vacation Bible School, and in the coming months you start to see advertisements for this theme, I would highly suggest sending your kids! It was such an awesome hands on experience.

The Birthday Celebration Continues

Hannah got a gift certificate to Build a Bear Workshop from Grandpa Steve, so we went to the mall this afternoon to "Build a Bear". But before going to Build a Bear, we had dinner at The Rainforest Cafe. Once she had food in her, they couldn't come sing to her fast enough, and weren't quick enough in bringing the bill for us to pay. She was so anxious to get to Build a Bear and get her beloved bear she had picked out when we were at the mall a couple of weeks ago.

At the Build a Bear Worshop, there is this process of building your bear. First you choose your animal, I say animal because it's not just bears you can build. Then you take it to get stuffed, you then hug it to make sure it's huggable. Then they have you pick a heart and do this of routine of things with the heart...rub it on your forehead so it's smart like you, rub it on your muscles to make it strong, close your eyes and make a wish, etc, etc. They then sew up the animal and you take it to get fluffed. From there, depending on if you want to spend more money, you can pick out an outfit and get it dressed. Hannah chose the Snow White outfit of course! The final part in the process before actually paying for your creation, is sitting down at the computer and naming it. Hannah chose to name her bear "Snow White". From there you take your new pal to the registers where they put it in a cool box, put your pal's birth certificate in there and have you say this pledge of how this is your #1 pal! And here is Hannah with her beloved Build a Bear creation, Snow White. After our adventures at that mall, we had somethng we needed to return at another nearby mall. At that outdoor mall, there was a horse drawn carriage, just like Cinderella's carriage. Hannah's been wanting to ride on that for a long time. Because it was a special day Steven said we'd go for a ride. Needless to say, she so excited she almost lost the extra special adventure because she wasn't listening. On our way to determine where we needed to board the carriage, we saw this little kiddie train. And I jokingly asked Hannah if she wanted to ride the train instead of the Cinderella carriage, thinking that her answer would be a for sure 'NO', boy was I ever wrong when she chose the train!!! LOL. Fine by us, it probably saved us at least $20!!! The girls enjoyed the train ride and it was a great ending to a nice birthday celebration!

It's Official, She's 6!

Hannah is officially now six years old! On this day, 6 years ago, at 7:49pm, Hannah entered intoour lives and our family. And has been bringing smiles and blessings to everyone who knows her ever since. If you'd like to read the events of that big day, you can check out her birth story.

Happy 6th Birthday to our Hannah!

Easter Egg Hunt

It has become a tradition on the Saturday before Easter, the families with children on our Cul de Sac, come together and we have a massive Easter Egg hunt. The participating families donate things to ensure the eggs are filled. This year we did something a little different and some of the eggs had special coupons inside. These coupons could be redeemed for such fun things as a kite, bottle of bubbles, sidewalk chalk, playdough, and other fun things. The coupons appeared to be a huge hit this year! This year we hid 225 plastic eggs in the front yards of five houses on our street, with eleven kids participating!

Birthday Dinner

This evening we had the grandparents and Auntie and McKenzie and Haylee over for dinner and cake in celebration of Hannah's 6th birthday tomorrow. For weeks I've been asking what Hannah wanted me to make for her special dinner. After several menu changes, Hannah decided on Pizza and Macaroni & Cheese! Works for me! All I had to really concentrate on was making and decorating her cake. As always Hannah and Rachel had a wild time with their cousins. It's amazing how wild and crazy four little girls all under the age of six can get. LOL. Some of the presents Hannah received were: A Gameboy Advance from Mommy and Daddy, along with a couple of games. The Chornicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe DVD, and play figurines, and the Gameboy game! A gardening set, a gift certificate to Build a Bear, which she's been wanting to do for a while now. Following presents we had cake and ice cream and a lot more fun and craziness from the girls.

Let the Celebration Begin...

Hannah's birthday celebration has begun! She took homemade cookies to school today. Last month for St. Patricks Day, I made green cookies and sent them to school. Well, they were such a hit with all her classmates that she promised her friends I would make those cookies for when she got to bring a special treat for her birthday. And that's what I made. I was happy to hear the report back that they were again a huge hit!

Because it was Hannah's birthday, she got to pick a book from a book basket. She's been talking about which one she was going to choose all week long. She was going to pick the Curious George
book so that she could read it to Rachel. How sweet is that? Rachel was so excited to see the book when Hannah brought it home.

Needless to say, Hannah is excited for her birthday dinner tonight!

Poster Contest

Hannah's school is currently having a poster contest, put on by one of the schools business sponsors, the water company. The contest is to design a poster that expresses the theme "Conserving Water - It's Easier Than you Think".

Everyone in the school is expected to particpate according to Miss Cejka, Hannah's teacher. I think it's expected because the school is a Magnet School, one that specializing in visual and performing arts.
After talking her idea out, she came up with the idea that if you collect rain water, you can use that water to water your plants and flowers. So we divided her piece of paper into two sections. One side has grey rain clouds raining, with a watering can catching the rain. The other side shows a girl watering a sprouting flower with that same watering can! It looks great!

Coloring Easter Eggs

Hannah and her friend Emily colored Easter Eggs this afternoon. We had all the stuff to do it, and then an Easter package came from Gramie that had a cool drying tray and really cool egg dye with cups! It was perfect timing!

The Training Wheels Come Off!!

For the last week or so, Hannah has mentioned a couple of times of wanting to take the training wheels off her bike. We've prepared her that it might take a while for her to get the hang of it and that more than likely she would fall off a couple times, but that it was okay, and she needed to not give up, but to get back up and try it again.

This evening after dinner, Daddy took the training wheels off Hannah's bike! He followed behind her for a brief few minutes and then she was off.....all on her own. And stayed that way for the rest of the time outside!! She had no crashes or falls. She still has trouble stopping, but other than that, the girl has got it!!!

Needless to say, she did much, much better than we had anticipated. LOL.

A trip to The Hesperia Zoo

One of Hannah's favorite things to do when she goes to visit Gramie is going to the zoo. The zoo used to be called The Cinema Safari Zoo , but we know it better as Gramie's zoo. This zoo, while little in size compared to such zoos as The San Diego Zoo, it's a much better place for seeing awesome animals up close and personal. Not to mention, all the animals in this zoo have done 'showbiz' in some form or another (thus the previous name of Cinema Safari). For example, this lion, his name is Truman. He's very popular these days as he was the lion the animators and movie people used to fashion the CG form of Aslan, the lion in Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe.

This is Quincy the Bear. Birdy, holding his stuffed animal. We had a great time on our tour, it was just the five of us (Gramie went with us), so we had the animal trainer all to ourselves to ask questions and get information about the animals. And that was nice!

Hannah's Fridge

In school, Hannah has a writing journal that they write in a couple days a week. They draw a picture and then have to write two sentences about what they drew. These are some special writings that were taken out of her most recent journal to come home

This journal drawing was the only one in the entire journal that didn't have any corrections made by the teacher. We think it's because Miss Cejka knew this would be a special picture and needed no corrections.

"I see Jesus on the cross" Recently Miss Cejka mentioned to me that at least once a week Hannah complains about being tired. She wasn't sure if she was truly tired or was just using that as an excuse to not do what she was asked to do. Hannah goes to bed between 7:30-8:00 on school nights, so we came to the conclusion her saying she was tired was just an excuse. So when we saw this drawing in her journal, it made us laugh.

"I am tired"This drawing of Snow White shows how great Hannah is getting at details in her colorings.
"I like Snow White. She is pretty."

Weekend at Gramma and Papa's House

Some pictures taken by Gramma and Papa when the girls spent the weekend with them two weeks ago.

Working with her beads to make a beautiful necklace. Picking some flowers from Gramma's daisy bush. Helping Papa wash the car. In the field across the street.

It's April, and You Know What that Means...

...it's Hannah's birthday this month!!! She's our Tax Day Baby, as her birthday is April 15th. We filled in the month of April on Hannah's calendar and here she is pointing to her big day. Hannah's pretty excited about her birthday this year. I think it's because she is growing older and is able to fully understand what having a birthday means, and in her little world...that means presents. LOL.

In the years past, I've put on big parties for Hannah's birthday. All the parties having been themed and having games or crafts, and always inviting friends and family and it being a big deal. For example, for her 4th birthday we did a carnival, it was suppose to be in the backyard, but due to rain, we had to bring it indoors. Last year it was a Garden and Bug Party. But this year, we're skipping the big party and simply having the Grandparents and her cousins over for dinner and cake the night before her birthday. Hannah's birthday falls on Easter weekend this year, so the weekend will be filled with lots of fun things. But until then...she's counting the days!

A trip to the Discovery Science Center

We went to the Discovery Science Center with our friends, the Whittlesey's, today. All the exhibits were hands on in some way. They were a lot of fun and educational as well! It was a great family outing!

Hannah learning that she can use her muscles
and lift herself in the "Can You Lift Yourself" exhibit. Hannah and Emma having fun at the Stream Table,
where you learn about erosion and it's effects. Watching how their jumping and stomping measures
on the seismograph in the "Quake Zone".Combining efforts to make a really good cloud ring.