Golden Gardens

Is there anything better than Seattle on a sunny day? Not much...

Road Trip (version 1)

Do I really need this silly cone again?

After visiting GiGi, Erich, Neal, and Olive headed to Medford for a quick trip. Erich had work, Neal wanted to see some cousins, and Olive had two surgeries. Olive is out of surgery, and is in recovery (thank you Nana and Papa for taking care of her!), and will be staying at Nana and Papa's house for awhile for some much needed R&R. The All Creatures Animal Clinic is really the world's best vet- this was Olive's second ACL surgery in as many years.

This was Neal's first solo trip to Medford, and with the Patten and Kemmling cousins at Nana's it was pretty exciting for him (5 boys at the same time?!). The first night, all of the boys headed down to the pond.

Stay tuned for summer Road Trip II.... We are all headed down to Medford on Labor Day, and Erich and Deepa will be going to Sonoma for a few days without the kids (wha?!!?!? no kids?).

Trip to Grass Valley

We have two trips this month. The first was last weekend; we went to visit GiGi (Erich's Grandma) in Grass Valley. Grandpa Mark and Becky were also there to pick us up at the airport (or at least Deepa and the kids....to make a long story short, Olive and Erich "missed" the cut off for the flight, so had to come down on a later plane in first class- while Deepa got both kids on the original flight). 

GiGi and Sonia chllin on the couch

GiGi took us to Janet's house, where there was a beach for the kids to play and swim. Neal, to no one's suprise is a born "water baby," but Sonia has really started to love the water also. She has a week of swim lessons in September scheduled at Nana's house.

OK... we didn't have Sonia's swimsuit, but we improvised! (She's wearing NG's shirt)

Too cool for school

Kiddos with GiGi

Family hike

Last Sunday, we headed up to Index (about an hour out of town) to hike Bridal Veil Falls. Mom and Dad didn't realize that the hike was pretty much straight uphill to the falls! But, the kids were troopers, and we made it all the way up to the top...Sonia only needed to be carried about half the time:). Despite being exhausted, we were very self-congratulatory about doing the whole thing, and the falls were beautiful.... so all in all it was a great time!

Storm game and some video

Nealguy has no fear, and will essentially climb on anything that he comes across. He'll go headfirst down a "big kid" slide with no hesitation. Here he is trying to turn his chair into a teeter-totter:





Sonia, Margaret, and I went to the Storm game this week. We met Coach Romar and banged on our bambams. But, afterwards, Sonia was quite taken by the all-city marching band practice!

1st Haircut

In honor of Neal's first birthday, we decided to follow Indian tradition and shave his head. Our little fuzzy-headed guy didn't really enjoy the process, but big sister sat by his side and gave him stickers until it was done. What a team! Here are some pictures of the play by play:

Before

During

After