Home Today

What a lazy day we had today. The boys didn't get dressed until we went to dinner. I had errands to run, so I went out, but it was super crowded everywhere I went. I had to stand in a big line at Target which made me feel like I was at Walmart. There were 20 billion people at Joann's, and I had to wait through 10 numbers to get my fabric cut. I bought some knit fabric for a sew-a-long I am going to do this summer. More info on that, later.

Riley's bag is packed for Science Camp tomorrow. He'll be gone until Friday. He's super excited. His little brother, not so much. Quinn hates when Riley's not here, even though he can play whatever he wants on the Wii. In the end, he'd rather have his big brother.

Riley, helping Maya dance. Don't you love her tail? It's in a constant state of motion. Everything makes this dog happy.

Quinn dressed as a "Koopa Wizard." I have to google that. Hang on...Ok, I got the 411. Check this out.

Back to work tomorrow, but there are only 13 days left in the school year-it will be 12 when I wake up tomorrow, because that's the hardest part. Once I am up and dressed, the day is half over already! Have a great one!

Coit Tower

After swimming this morning, we headed to the city. I had this urge to go to Coit Tower, so that's what we did. You know, the best days happen when you don't plan anything. It was a very spontaneous trip. We had a really good day. We are all windblown and tired, but we have a bonus day to recover tomorrow!

Can you see the stairs in this picture? They go WAY up Telegraph Hill, to Coit Tower. This is Filbert Street. There were more stairs than you can imagine. It's really pretty though. You go past all of these houses and they have the cutest gardens.

Once we were up in Coit Tower, the city views were spectacular. That's the Trans America Pyramid and downtown.

The view from the parking lot-tiny parking lot (where we didn't park-nooooo, we had to go up a million stairs). Nice view of Coit Tower.

After Coit Tower, we walked around Pier 39-literally, we walked around the outside of the tourist area, it was a lot less crowded. We, of course, ended up by the Sea Lions. The Sea Lions disappeared completely, earlier this year. Nobody knew where they had gone, or why, but now they are back. Cute, and smelly, as ever, and this is the 20th year of them being at the Pier.

After Pier 39, we were going to head toward home, but we decided to take one of those city tours. It was $20 a person, but kids 11 and under were free. Yes, we know Riley is 12. Yes, we know it was wrong to pass him off as 11, but the French driver, never even asked. It was a 2 hour tour, all over the city. The vehicle was a double-decker, open top, cable car bus. The tour guide was a funny French man. The Victorians in this picture are very famous. The yellow one with orange panels is the one featured in the sitcom Full House, as the Tanner residents.

It was an awesome tour, and an awesome day. If you want to see the rest of the pictures I took, all 178 of them, GO HERE.

Happy Memorial Day!

The Tech Museum

Kevin and I took the boys to the Tech Museum today. We met my inlaws there too. There's a brand new exhibit about Genghis Kahn there. We did that first. It was pretty interesting. When we finished with the exhibit, we wandered around the rest of the museum.

Here are the boys having wheelchair races.

Kevin and Quinn both had 3D scans of their heads. This one is Kevin. You can change the color and texture of your head.

Here's Riley defending the Sharks goal.

When you ask Quinn to strike a pose, he does just that.

Oh, and while walking around downtown San Jose, we passed lots of interestingly dressed people. There was a big Aname convention, Fanimecon, going on at the convention center. We wandered over to the front of the center, after lunch. Riley and Quinn were in Mario heaven! There were lots and lots of very different costumes. I have no idea who all of the characters were/are. It looked like everyone was having a ton of fun, and of course, you can't have fun without the Jesus people. They were protesting in front of the convention center. Really? They don't have anything better to do? I really don't understand why they have to show up at public events. Do they really get anybody to convert over, right then and there? Weird. I think they just don't know how to have any fun.

Fun With the Girls

It's finally Friday! Oh my what an exhausting week! Open Houses for my school and the boys' school. Meetings. A volunteer tea at my school, and a book swap today at school. I came home and had all I could do to keep myself from falling asleep on the couch.

I took pictures of the girls, using my Camerabag app. This is the colorcross one.

Aren't they cute? This summer I am going to learn to make clothes for them.

Fisheyes. I'm using this one as my Facebook profile picture.

Have a great weekend!

It's Like Christmas!

Riley's May project for school was to come up with a recipe and then cook it on his own. He also needed to bring samples to class for the other students to try. His day is tomorrow, so tonight I put him to work, cooking his meal.

Riley made BBQ Chicken Cups. Here he is putting the refrigerated biscuits into the muffin tin, and look, someone needs to unload the dishwasher.

Next he cut the grilled chicken into small pieces, put them in a pan and added BBQ sauce. He heated it until warm. He filled each muffin cup with the chicken and popped them into the oven to bake.

Ta Da! BBQ Chicken Cups. You would not believe how yummy they smell. He did a great job. I love how independent he's become.

It was a good mail day today too! My Stella & Dot order arrived! It was like Christmas!

Look at all of the pretty things! I am so tempted to wear everything to school tomorrow-ALL of it! Everything goes together except my Azul wrap (the blue/green one).

I hope you all have a great Friday! It's the beginning of a double wide weekend! Yay!

Camera Bag and the President

I got this new app for my phone. It's called Camera Bag. It has all kinds of lenses and you can do some interesting things with your pictures. I practiced on Maya tonight.

This one is called Colorcross. I guess the colors look brighter-that sort of crisp, sunny day look.

This one is Mono. I think it's pretty self explanatory.

This one is fun! Fisheyes! I love how Maya's nose looks all short.

Anyway, that was fun, but the best part of the day was when we heard the President's helicopter(s) over our school. We could tell it was a helicopter, and it was really low. The kids and I ran outside and saw 4 out of 5 helicopters flying overhead! One of them had the president inside! Remember the President was visiting Fremont today? The helicopters flew him from San Francisco to Fremont, and they went almost right over our school. It was super cool! We waved frantically as the helicopters passed, and since it was Warwick Wednesday, we were all sporting our purple, and I told the kids the president was SURE to see our "sea of purple." Then after recess I turned the news on and the students and I watched him speak at the Fremont company, Solyndra. The kids were so excited about the whole thing. It was awesome, really awesome.

Welcome Mr. President!

Ladies and Gentlemen, the President of the United States of America...

Our president is in the Bay Area. He arrived today, at SFO. He then traveled into the city for some fundraising events. He didn't have to sit in the commute traffic either. The police cleared the way for him. I find it fascinating all that goes on when he travels someplace. For instance, how did his cars get here? Did his staff come ahead and drive them here? Did they ship them? How many people does he travel with? Do you think he wears sweats when he's flying on Air Force One? What's he doing now, in his hotel room? Sleeping? Is he watching the local news? I have QUESTIONS! I thought it was cool to see (on the news) Air Force One parked at the airport, with the secret service all around. They really aren't a secret are they? I mean, they are kind of obvious. Anyway, the President will be in Fremont tomorrow, visiting Solyndra-they got stimulus money and are building a new "green" building. I hear our governator will join him. Lucky President...NOT. I hope someone steps on the governator's toe. Teacher hater. Anyway, I digress...it's super exciting having the President here. Too bad the weather won't cooperate. I sure wish he could swing by my school and visit my students-then I could ask him all of my questions.

I Made A Charm Bracelet and A Necklace That Needs Help

I felt restless all weekend, so I decided to play with my beads a little. Remember these? (Not the cute tins, the charms, scroll down). I finally put them to use!

I made a really cool charm bracelet. I actually LOVE it and I want to wear it everyday-at least until my Stella & Dot order comes! I'm not as wild about the necklace-it's boring in comparison with the bracelet. I went back to Michael's today and got some more charms, to embellish the necklace some. I'll show you when I get it all together. I couldn't work on it tonight. My evening was spent baking cookie bars for Quinn's Open House tomorrow night, and banana bread from my old bananas. It does smell mighty good in here though.

This picture is completely unrelated. My Open House is tomorrow night. My para and I did the unthinkable today...we HUNG stuff from the ceiling. Shhhhh. Don't tell my principal. Apparently hanging stuff is a fire hazard, and so is having paper go all the way up the wall. Click my picture larger and look at the tops of my walls. They are bare because there's some sort of rule (only enforced at my school BTW) that paper has to start 18" from the ceiling. Whatever. Rules, rules. We'll take the birds down Wednesday morning-or better yet, as the kids come in with their parents, I'll encourage them to pull them down to take them home-and I have some tall dads I could put to work too! Have I mentioned that one of my student's parents is a firefighter? You may remember this post. Wednesday also begins the destruction of my classroom, to ready it for summer. Yay! Summer! 17 days!

Anybody watching The Bachelorette? I so was not going to watch this hell, but I am sucked in. There's NOTHING else on TV. Oh the drama. I really don't like that Ali either, and I could care less who she ends up loving, but still, I watch. I am sighing and shaking my head.

Niles Town Plaza

Today it was beautiful and sunny outside, but pretty darn cold and WINDY. I am ready for summer weather. I never thought I would say that. I hate the heat, but I am so sick of cold, wind, and rain. It's supposed to rain this week! Anyway, so it was nice enough to go out, so we took the boys and the dog, and headed to Niles, a neighborhood in Fremont, not far from our house.

This train depot and plaza is brand new. The city did such a great job on this plaza. It's so pretty. Can you see the browning hills in the background? "NILES" is printed on the hill. It's been there forever. Charlie Chaplin used to make silent movies here in the Niles area of Fremont. This is a very historic part of Fremont.

This old fashion car is in the plaza.

What a cute, bright red caboose-it's also in the plaza. There's a train that runs from Niles to Sunol (a little city between Fremont and Pleasanton), and back. At Christmas, the train is all decorated with lights and Christmas decorations. Right now, it just looks like a train, but I am sure it's just as fun, and it's probably a lot warmer to ride-then again...maybe not these days.

There's this circle of pavement in the middle of the plaza. On top of the circle there are these spinning things, with pictures inside them. If you spin them and look through the slits, the picture moves. A couple of them have Charlie Chaplin cartoons in them. The boys really enjoyed them.

This is a view of Niles Blvd, from the plaza. See that green building? That's my favorite bead store. It's called Kiowa Rose. If you want to see the rest of our pictures, GO HERE.

The Dog Park

Quinn's baseball game was at 9:00 am this morning! We were up and out early, but that meant that we were finished early and had the rest of the day. I took Maya for a "pawdicure." Her nails were getting so long, they were scratching us. When I got home, we turned around and took her to the dog park.

Doesn't she look happy?

Meeting friends in her new glittery harness. There were no fewer than 8 Pugs at the dog park today, all related. It's weird that none of them are in this picture.

Look at the paw prints on the cement! So cute. It's really a nice dog park, and it was quite busy today.

We took Maya over to the big dog side. She's not a big fan of big dogs, so we kept her leash on. There was a German Shepherd who seemed to really like her. He was quite big, but very friendly. She wasn't sure of him, but she didn't cower either.

This child isn't mine, but in today's game, the other team stopped the game to give their catcher a catcher's glove. It was so big for him (he was about Quinn's size), that he couldn't even hold it up. See how it's dragging the ground? He would lift his hand and it would immediately fall. It was hysterical to us, but probably not for him.

Let's Play, Oh I Don't Know, Baseball?

Quinn played baseball Friday and Saturday. I didn't blog Friday because I was asleep on the couch. The following pictures are from his game Friday night. Although we lost, we did score two runs, and Quinn was responsible for both of those runs. He was up to bat both times for an RBI. Way to go Quinn. He is really very good under pressure.

When Quinn gets to the plate, he hits it several times (just like the big guys). I find it quite humorous. He also steps out of the box and takes a billion practice swings, until someone yells to him to get ready.

Swinging the bat. Nice level swing Quinn!

Around he goes.

I think this is the pitch that he hit.

Looking good in the outfield.

We only have 3 games left this season. It will be nice to free up our Saturdays, but we sure have had a great time watching him play, and watching his skills develop.

We are madly getting ready for Open House next Tuesday. There's cleaning going on, art being done, stories being written in preparation. Lots of work to be done for the big show! I don't mind Open House. It's fine. I don't have to make a presentation. I just stand there and smile and shake hands with the parents of the present and future 2nd graders. Easy peasy, and on Wednesday, my para and I will take everything down so that I can begin to ready my classroom for summer.

Our Flat Stanley adventures are up! Our Stanleys have been all over-California, Indiana, Arizona, India and Germany!

A little closer look. Some of the pictures are so funny with grown adults holding the Stanley to pose for a picture. It's also funny to see where some people put a Stanley for a photograph.

We also did these black lined flowers. They are colorful.

And we made these silhouette pictures. There's other stuff too, but I'll wait and take pictures once my whole classroom is clean.

Some Treasures

Sorry for the lack of a post yesterday. It was quite a challenging day thanks to some of my colleagues, a misunderstanding, and a visit to the "shoulder guy." I didn't sleep at all last night, so I am heading to bed when I am finished with this post. I have already dozed on the couch. Oh and by the way, I had the WORST 7 layer burrito from Taco Bell this evening. I think I won't eat Taco Bell again. I did leave school on the earlier side this afternoon and wandered around Niles, then I walked the lake with my mom.

I got these adorable tins at My Friends and I, in Niles. Aren't they CUTE? I just put up new shelves in my living room, so I am trying to dress them up.

Yesterday I found these fun charms at Michael's. They are so stinkin' CUTE! I am going to make myself a really cute, funky, heavy, charm bracelet.

These are my new shelves. Do you like? I put my giant button up there, and on the lower shelves, I put the boys' framed footprints. I printed them exactly 8 years ago today! Riley was 4 years old, and Quinn was 15 weeks. I love them-the footprints, and the actual boys!

I think this is my favorite shelf. I bought all of those things today. Score!! I was too mad/upset yesterday (even at Target, I left empty handed) to shop, so I made up for it today.

The shoulder guy said I did a great job injuring myself-LMAO. Anyone who knows me, knows that I don't do anything half-ass. He agrees that it's something to do with my bicep muscle. He wants to watch it for another couple of weeks since it seems like it is slowly feeling better. I could have had a cortisone shot, but I opted not to do that. I figured I had already been challenged enough yesterday and I would have passed out. I don't do well with needles. I can have one in a couple of weeks if I want one-ok, WHO would WANT one? If, in two weeks, it's not much improved, I can have an MRI and then there would be a decision as to whether or not someone has to go in and fix it. Have I mentioned that I can't fit surgery into my SUMMER schedule. Let's all hope it feels better, and heals on its own. It's actually not bad right now. I was super sore last night, but then the "shoulder guy" made me move it all over creation. Can you believe that my prescription is ready (Lodine) at Walgreens, and I haven't had a chance to go and get it yet? Any of you want to go pick it up for me???