Happy Dance

While at the elementary school Halloween parade, I caught Nathaniel doing a little dance in his costume. It's going to be a fun day in 4th grade.

What does that mean?

This morning I blew a fuse in the kitchen becaue I ran the toaster and microwave at the same time (I know I shouldn't) and the kitchen and laundry room outlets are all on the same circuit (can you say, "Old house charm"?). When I flipped the breaker switch the fridge made a kerchunk noise, and then made a noise like it is doing in the video. 7 hours later the fridge is still cold and no sign of thaw in the freezer, but the noise has me worried. The fridge is only 9 years and 9 months old. It should last longer than that, right?

Not my garden...

My garden is in sad shape. I feel guilty spending the time posting pictures. There's no way I have time to clear the summer plants and put in the winter veggie seedlings that have outgrown their seedling flats.

Loren Somerville

I noticed I didn't have any photos of Loren from our trip. Maybe he is too low key or maybe he doesn't do anything cute... I found one. See him looking over his shoulder at the camera? I guess that's kind of cute.

Somerville Visit

We had a fun visit from the Somerville family. They arrived late Friday night and early Saturday morning 5 year old Alexandrea was up helping me make scones for breakfast.
We went to the beach even though it was kind of cold. The boys didn't care. They were in the water right away.

Luke is 12 and is already taller than his mom (and both my boys too.)

They had a great time. No wonder they didn't get cold - they never stood still.

The beach is a happy place to be a boy.

But I think Alexandrea thought it was too cold.

Can you believe it?

Amazing news... Chris was actually spotted at Disneyland. 9 1/2 years in S. Cal. and this is the first time he has gone since he was a kid. See if you can spot him in front of the Haunted Mansion ride.
The occasion was that Monday was the last day for Chris to be a full time S. Cal. resident. Tuesday he loaded up the Prius and headed up to San Francisco to start a new job in Capital Risk Management (you all know what that is.) I'm teaching classes through February, and so the boys and I will stay in S. Cal through then at least. (OK Bethany. That is what I was coming to grips with. We had 3 weeks from the job offer until his start date to figure everything out. I'm not pregnant.)

Chris' sister's family visited last weekend, so we spent a fun day with cousins in a Halloweenie Disneyland.

Nathaniel posed by his initial.

We posed by the F. (Why?) We were meeting someone there.

Chris made the C into a D for Davis.

Chris and Caryn sat on the C.

Now we do the long commute, long distance Dad thing. Hmmmmm...

First day of the fire, last day at the beach

A little over a month ago, just before school started, we woke up to a smoky day. The "Station Fire" that was just barely completely contained this week started the afternoon before. So we headed to the beach. Despite the hot days since then, it was my last day at the beach for the season (AYSO=all you saturdays occupied).
We went to Manhattan Beach which has a small aquarium out on the pier. Here is Nathaniel finding out if the shark can bite his head off.

Shark breath.

Davis and Nathaniel on the pier.

We went up above the Rosebowl to take some snapshots of the fire. This is only one part of it. It spread from here (JPL in the foreground) all the way east past Pasadena. At night you could see flames on the hillside.

Luckily for us, the air-flow was headed from the ocean to the east, so our air wasn't as smokey as it could have been. It's still weird to see ashes floating down like grungy snowflakes.

September update

Here is my attempt to update September. There was more, but I haven't come to grips with it all yet.
Nathaniel started 4th grade this year.

Davis and friend on first day of 8th grade.

Nathaniel has a rock polisher and collects rocks. Here is the starting batch from the latest "tumbling". One the right you can see a few pieces of jade he collected from the beach on our trip to the central coast this summer. The rest were a gift from his Grandma.

Nathaniel loves rocks and collects them whenever he has a chance.

Between each step in the process the used grit is washed off the rocks and the next type is added. It looks like cement after the bits of rock are broken off to smooth the edges.

Here's Nathaniel displaying the finished rocks (and his sunburn).

After 6 weeks and 4 types of grit, the polishing is done. Then Nathaniel starts to give them away as he collects more for the next batch.