IDEO Picnic

Following the Primary temple trip we headed to Flood Park in Menlo Park for the annual IDEO picnic. This year's theme was Sweet Tea Jamboree, which meant lots of southern food and Cajun music.

It also meant kids activities, including music . . .


. . . eating . . .

. . . face painting . . .

. . . eating . . .

Who knew Abby would be such a big fan of mussels.


. . . biting balloons to hear them pop . . .

. . . hanging from fingertips . . .

. . . and swinging.

It's enough to wear any kid out.

Primary Temple Trip (May 19)

 
Abby's primary had a trip to the temple the morning of the IDEO picnic. The temple was hopping that Saturday morning and we had to park down the hill behind the temple.
 
 
While the primary caught some shorter movies and a tour or two, the rest of us saw the new Joseph Smith movie. After the movie was done, the sister missionaries opened the doors, and as Jenna and I assembled our paraphenalia we realized that Louisa had escaped. I found her around the corner peeking out from behind a display.
 

Adams Kid Bookclub

  

First Trip to the Beach (May 15)

 

The girls headed to the beach with some friends, much to my surprise (I can count the number of time's I've been able to persuade Jenna to accompany Abby and I to the beach on two fingers). I recommended San Gregorio Beach, a nice little spot halfway between San Francisco and Santa Cruz with a slow moving river that empties into the Pacific (and is significantly warmer than the ocean).

Swingers (May 10)

 

Abby's Ballet Recital (May 10)

 
May 10 was Abby's ballet recital at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts. I was impressed that the 4-year-old ballet students in our community perform on the same stage as more experienced performers. Abby wore make-up for the first time including, much to her delight, body glitter.




Much to my surprise, the whole production was quite entertaining. Each performance was brief enough to keep things moving along, and most had an America's Funniest Home Video quality them to compensate for any lack of graceful movement.

Abby's small class of four, dancing to Louis Armstrong's rendition of "What A Wonderful World", did very well compared to some of the other classes. Our Abby was always a step behind on the moves as she seemed to be watching to see what the kid next to her was doing. This may be due to the fact that she missed the last three practices before the performance (bad parents!). I also notices that her legs seemed much more tanned than the other kids, surprising since she's so pasty white. Then I realised the other kids were wearing white tights. Somehow we must have missed the memo (or the rehersal when they explained the bit of wardrobe planning).

Unfortunately, the only picture we got of the actual number is the blurry one you see above. However, we did capture the entire routine on video, which is available upon request.



Louisa enjoyed herself as well. She still likes to hang out.



Afterward Abby got flowers and the choice of where to go for dinner. She chose her favorite eatery, Fresh Choice, of course.

Lini Learns to Crawl

Lini started crawling this week (May 9).

Camp Lehi

Friday night we camped at Camp Lehi, a patch of the Santa Cruz mountains co-owned and maintained by several stakes in the area. One of the consequences of that arrangement is that our ward has an assignment to provide 100 man-hours of service to help maintain the place. This year we took the whole crew, making this the first camping outing for bothe Louisa and Lini.

The condition that Jenna made on daring such a feat with three under the age of five was to get a new tent. We received our old three-person wilderness shelter about six? years ago from a scout that no longer wanted it. As you can imagine, the tent wasn't in the prime of it's life, and with five people, just wasn't going to provide the buffer space we all craved.

So, we bought this tent, the Coleman Ridgeview (I affectionately named it "the Chateau") from Target:


The Chateau is a 13'x13' three-room behemoth that has plenty of space even after swallowing queen and twin sized mattresses and a pack-n-play.



The girls had a lot of fun making s'mores, looking at the stars, playing with other kids in the ward and discovering the local flora:



Louisa experimented with controlled substances (charcoal from the previous night's fire), and decided she didn't like them.



For service, I climbed up on a scaffolding with a power washer and a poncho to strip the cellulous (i.e. newspaper) based insulation from the walls and cieling of the dining hall, as it was wont to fall into peoples suppers unannounced. It was fun, then tiring, then unbearable. I ended up soaked, poncho notwithstanding.

Mother's Day

Today is mother's day, which is the day we celebrate the choices in life that allow us to experience things like the going-on pictured above: 18-month-old Louisa riding 10-month-old Lini like she was a Shetland pony. The surprising thing was, Lini didn't seem to mind. At least until Louisa swung around, put her in a headlock and rammed her noggin into the wall.

To celebrate the day, Abby and I (meaning I) left mom in bed and prepared ham, cheese and egg english muffins for mom. Being mother's day, I got to forego Bishopric meeting and PEC and we actually went to church in one car, a rare occurance the last four years. I wrangled kids in sacrament meeting while Jenna played the organ, then used Lini as an excuse to escape Sunday School (I actually did think she was sleepy). Third hour I pitched in in Nursery, as all the women had hied away to Relief Society to eat drink and be motherly.

I've been remiss on the blogging the last couple months, but will attempt to catch up on some of the highlights, in no particular order. Read on. 

Cinco de Mayo @ IDEO

The girls came to work to join the annual 5 de Mayo party. I could be wrong, but I think this is the first IDEO party that Lini has been to. As seen in the following photos, the girls had a great time.

Louisa got her sour fix from the fresh limes at the Margarita stands. 

Cinco de Mayo @ IDEO

 

Cinco de Mayo @ IDEO

 

Cinco de Mayo @ IDEO

 

Cinco de Mayo @ IDEO

 

Cinco de Mayo @ IDEO

 

Basic Training

Louisa's strong. The little bugger saw me doing a pull-up and wanted a go, and to my suprise, she was strong enough to hold herself up by her fingertips. We've always said that Louisa will be our gymnast, because she such a waif and because she's so physically intense. Maybe we were right. 

Be our guest

We have a new guest in our home, a six-month-old little girl. A social worker called us last night and again this morning, and Jenna went and picked her up. We're not sure how long she will stay. It may just be for a week or two. We'll keep you posted as we learn more.

Gingerbread house

From a kit, but hey, I squeezed out the quick-drying cement, er. . . frosting.