Legoland Holiday 11-30-14

We took a trip down to Legoland to check out their holiday decorations. It was surprisingly light at the park, although we did see Denise Richards with her youngest daughter. We saw Lego Santa and Lego reindeer, Cecily checked out the real snow and snowman, we enjoyed some holiday treats, saw the Big Test Holiday Show for the first time, and then we headed over to the Legoland Hotel. We surprised Cecily with an overnight stay at the hotel to celebrate Richard's birthday. We ate dinner at the Skyline Cafe before heading up to our pirate themed room. Cecily and Richard took a dip in the pool, and they were happy to have the pool all to themselves. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3VwyA

Thanksgiving 11-27-14

Happy Thanksgiving! Richard loved Allen's oil-less fried turkey so much, we went out and bought our own oil-less turkey fryer to make our Thanksgiving turkey. We injected the turkey with a butter seasoning and made cranberry sauce, stuffing, green beans, potatoes, and gravy for our Thanksgiving meal. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3Vwvw

Family Thanksgiving 11-23-14

Since Allen had to spend Thanksgiving with Cindy's family (also celebrating Sandy's birthday), we had our family Thanksgiving today. Allen was very excited to cook the turkey for us in his brand new oil-less turkey fryer. Caren made an Oreo cookies and cream ice cream pie just for Allen (got to have his "chocolate" pie!). Cecily loved hanging out with Quinn and Brendan. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3Vwrg

FSEA Solar Car 11-20-14

Cecily has been doing an after-school engineering program called FSEA (future scientists and engineers of America). They have been working on creating solar cars so that they could race them today. However, since it was cloudy, they ended up using batteries instead of the solar panels to race their cars. The kids had fun seeing their cars race each other. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3VwYg

Girl Scouts 11-19-14

At our Girl Scout meeting today, the girls discussed ideas for our Bronze Award. Scarlett had a great idea for upcycling our school spirit wear. Then the we discussed ideas to help us raise money for our bridging trip to San Francisco. The girls made some Christmas crafts to sell at our fundraising craft fair in a couple weeks. They made reindeer candy canes, glittered seashells for ornaments, and put together some mistletoe. They loved doing arts and crafts and can't wait to sell them to earn some money for San Francisco. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3VwUQ

Keurig 11-16-14

Caren had hosted Shutterfly House Parties in the past, and today she hosted a Keurig House Party. Cecily was so excited to be the first one to test out the new Keurig 2.0, making herself some hot chocolate. Caren's guests enjoyed the snacks and trying out the new carafe option with French Vanilla coffee as well as using the individual K-Cups to make their own cups. House Party sent a whole box of free K-Carafes, K-Cups, Keurig carousel display, cookies, Keurig mug, mints, creamers, sugars, cups, and coupons. Caren also went out and bought tea and cider to add to the assortment they sent and had either mugs or Starbucks travel cups for the guests to take home with their mints and coupons. It is fun having a Keurig in the house! http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3VwnQ

Caren's Birthday & Soccer 11-15-14

Happy Birthday, Caren! Her friends Sam and Mandi came over with their kids and decorated the front of our house to help us celebrate. Cecily was so excited to see the colorful decorations. Caren's family came down to have lunch for Caren's birthday. We headed to Buon Gusto for some yummy pasta, pizza, gelato, and cannoli. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3VwFQ

The Tsunami Strikers had their final play-off game this morning against the Highlighters playing for first and second place. We were down one player, and the other team played hard. Unfortunately, our team did not play as well as they usually do. During the third half, our goalie dropped the ball, and it rolled between her legs. So our team lost 0-1. We came in 2nd and got new medals from the league. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3VwJg

In the evening, we had our end-of-the-season soccer party at Natalie's house. The kids swam for a very brief time in the freezing pool since the heater had broken. But they still had fun together running around and playing air hockey. The coach passed out the collage picture frames that Caren had made for each girl as well as a $5 gift card to Bubba Sweets as their end of soccer gift. While running around outside at the park, Cecily saw some boys from her school playing flashlight tag. She had so much fun that we were one of the last families to leave at 9:00. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3VwNw

Tomi and Jack's Visit 11-12-14

Tomi, Jack, and Brandy were supposed to stay with us Saturday night. But Cecily had food poisoning so they ended up coming and staying on Tuesday night. Since Cecily was sad she didn't get to see Tomi and Jack as much as she had hoped, Caren took her and Emma (who also turned 10 on November 10) to see Big Hero 6. Such a cute movie! In the afternoon, we went to Pattinson Park to hang out again with our old playgroup friends. We had SuperMex for dinner (yummy Mexican food for Brandy before she goes back to New York). Cecily was sad to see her friends go, but hopefully we can plan a trip out to see them again in New York now that they bought a new house. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3VwBA

Soccer & Tomi's Birthday 11-09-14

Our first play-off game was supposed to be this morning against Sophia's team, the Maroon 12. Unfortunately, the other team mixed up the time and ended up forfeiting the game. Our girls played on the field with the referees for about 10 minutes after our coach passed out the first place medals for our team coming in first place for the regular season with a perfect 80 points. Tomi and Jack had come to watch Cecily play, but they ended up running around and shooting goals with some of Cecily's teammates. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3Vv1w

After the non-playoff game, we headed to Peter Green Park for Tomi's 10th birthday party. The kids had fun creating their own volleyball game. Happy 10th Birthday, Tomi! http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3Vv5A

Beach Bonfire 11-07-14

Cecily was so excited because our friends Tomi, Jack, and Brandy were coming to visit from New York. We had seen them two years ago when we went out to visit them in New York to help celebrate Tomi's 8th birthday. Since they have family here, they had a lot of people to see and stay with. Tonight, we had a beach bonfire to get all the old playgroup friends together. Haley took a little time to warm up since she hadn't seen the other kids in so long. But they all ended up having a great time. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3Vvxg

Girl Scouts 11-05-14

Our Girl Scout Troop took a field trip to the Orange County Performing Arts Center to tour Segerstrom Hall. The girls had been to the center a couple years ago on a school field trip to see "James and the Giant Peach." The two docents, Noie and Sharon, were excellent guides as they took us through Segerstrom Hall into the backstage area and onto the actual stage as well as seeing the dressing rooms, scene storage, and the loading area. It was interesting to compare this backstage tour to the backstage tours we have done on a cruise ship. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3VvsQ

Soccer & Halloween Party 11-01-14

The Tsunami Strikers played the Virus again. Cecily was so exicted to play soccer in the rain, but it stopped right before the game started. Our teams were pretty even, going into the second half with a score of 1-1. But our team came on strong winning the game 5-1. As our coach said, we ended our season with a perfect 80 points in first place. Cecily was happy because Michelle came down to watch her play. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3Vvkw

In the evening, we went to Cole's Halloween party. Caren and Cecily had their caricature drawn, and they enjoyed yummy tacos from the taco cart. http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8UbNGrdw3VvoA