Happy birthday, Nana!

Happy birthday, Nana!  We loved celebrating with you on a sunny day.  

 

Tahoe for Tom's birthday

We headed up to the lake for Tom's birthday weekend, and brought Sunny along.  

Aren't they cute?

It was one of those typical bumper season weekends, not too crowded, with cold and clear weather.  

We went to town to stroll and shop. I made my kids take a picture in front of the big Christmas tree in town. 

Sunday was Tom's birthday, so we went out to dinner at a pizza place we like.  He got this mug of beer and we all toasted him. 

Monday was the first day of the Thanksgiving break for the kids so no school and no rush to get back to real life. We went down to Donner Lake for exploring and pictures. 

Cuties that I forced to be outdoors but ended up liking the adventure until we all got too cold. 

 

Leo's Big Birthday Weekend

It is hard to believe that Leo turned 16 on Sunday.  Sixteen!!!  Time flies when you're enjoying an amazing human grow up in front of your eyes.  

Though this wasn't officially part of the birthday celebrations, the Wednesday before his birthday we took in a mid-week movie.  Just the two of us went to a mid-week showing of Stop Making Sense, the Talking Heads concert film.  It was a remastered version to celebrate its 40th anniversary. We wouldn't normal see a movie on a school night, but it was the last night it was playing locally. 

The theater was pretty empty, but before it started, a few more people trickled in.  We both absolutely loved the film so I'm very glad we made the last minute decision to see it. 

On Saturday, we kicked off the official birthday celebrations.  First up was a trip to the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco to see a Takashi Murakami exhibit.  We saw some of his pieces when we visited the street art exhibit in Brooklyn in 2019

The exhibit was pretty amazing.  I'm very glad we went.  We had the added bonus of seeing the Blue Angels from the museum's roof since the air show was happening for fleet week. 

Sunday was his actual birthday and we started the day with a birthday brunch.  

Nana joined us for brunch.  

When discussing his birthday, Leo declared he wanted a seafood tower for dinner.  Well, a upscale seafood restaurant opened near us during Covid and Leo wanted to try it.  They didn't have a seafood tower on the menu, but Leo was okay with that.  

Serafina was cold so she used a napkin as a shawl. 

First course, oysters.  

That was followed by lobster and another fish dish. Look at these guys ready to dig in.  

We followed up dinner with a visit to Salt and Straw for yummy ice cream. 

It was Tom's first time trying it and he was a big fan. 

Both kids had Monday off from school, so Leo celebrated one extra day with his friends at Top Golf.  Top Golf is kind of like if a driving range and a bowling alley had a baby.  

It was a wonderful, celebratory birthday weekend for Leo. 
 

Serafina's Birthday Weekend

It felt like Serafina spent almost her entire birthday weekend at the dance studio, but luckily, those are people she loves to be around.  There was a special hip hop choreographer visiting for the weekend to teach a Master Class Friday night, and then choreograph her Senior Hip Hop Crew routine and her large Hip Hop team routines Friday, Saturday and Sunday.  

Here's a post from the dance studio of all the kids with the choreographer.  

Saturday morning, her actual birthday, she had some time in the morning to have special birthday donuts and open a few gifts, including these cute pajama pants that look like Mousse. 

That night, after back-to-back choreography sessions, her friend Karin came out to dinner with us.  Here they are post-dance at the restaurant.  They were initially sitting on their own, but decided they could tolerate sitting with the rest of us instead. 

After dinner, we had Crumbl cookies because those are her favorite and they opened one closer to our house. 

After cookies, she opened a few more presents, including this Squishmallow from Leo.  The name was in inside joke and it cracked them both up immensely.  

Sunday? Yep, you guessed it. More dance. 

But Sunday night we got to celebrate with Nana.  I offered to make her a cake but she politely declined.  

On Monday, she had the day off from school because of Labor Day and finally the day off from dance.  She spent time with her sweet dance friends.  

 I think overall she had a pretty good birthday, but it definitely didn't feel as celebratory as we would have liked because of her dance commitments.  I told her we would make it up to her with a Sweet Sixteen party.  

Dance Recital 2023

Another recital in the books!  It was an exhausting, inspirational, fun time.  Each year, I get to know the kids and teachers more and more so the recital becomes more meaningful.  It's such a wonderful way to celebrate the end of the dance season, especially on a year when we aren't headed to the national competition just a few weeks later.  The recital was the actual finale to this dance season, complete with an emotional sendoff for this year's graduating seniors. 

Serafina performed all of her competition routines, with the ballroom routine performing in two shows. Because she was a teaching assistant this year for a pre-jazz class, she was also in the opening number.  Her large hip hop routine closed every show. It is one of the most high energy, fun routines and is delightful to watch. 

In addition to her competition routines, she performed with her four technique classes as well.  Here's a few shots from hip hop.  My phone acted up and I couldn't record it. 

Here's her technique class contemporary routine.  I took this video during dress rehearsal so there is a lot of talking in the background. 

Here's a video of the opening number featuring the teachers, TAs and seniors.  This is also from rehearsal so they are all in various costume pieces.  For the actual show, they looked more uniform with matching shirts and bottoms. 

I helped back stage for the two morning shows.  I got this cute picture in the wings before the girls went on for Show Jazz. 

Serafina's school friend Bella came to the first show.  It was really sweet of her to support Serafina. 

Tom, Leo and I got to watch the afternoon show on Saturday. 

Sunday morning I worked backstage again.  I got a few pictures of Serafina's ballet dance from the wings.  She wasn't that please with me about it. 

Her bestie Sunny, along with Sunny's aunt, and Serafina's former teacher Mrs. Ghelfi, came to watch with her daughter Sadie.  Sadie loved the recital and had lots of questions about it.  She had her mom sign her up for a class as soon as they got home.  

They hung out with us during the break between shows. We walked around to the front of the theater and I got this shot. 

Ah these two. 

The final show was Sunday night.  Tom, Leo, Nana and I were in the audience.  The little jazz dancers that Serafina was a TA for performed during that show and I told her I needed a picture of her with "her little friends" (that's what I called them all season when she went to assist in their class).  Serafina was dressed for her Senior Hip Hop Crew dance that went on immediately after their routine. 

After the show we were able to give her lots of flowers and praise.  

That night we celebrated my birthday and Father's Day with one delicious cake. 

I don't really mind spending my birthday at recital.  Next year, Serafina will be old enough to sign up to participate in the "Dancing Dads" routine.  Tom isn't so sure about it all, but it is a crowd favorite and Serafina assured him he'll be towards the back.  
 

Spring Break 2023 Part 1 - Colorado

Spring break was late this year, but we had the rare gift of the dance studio holding its spring break the same week as the school district.  It gave us the opportunity to travel for spring break.  After some discussion, we decided to head back to Colorado and meet up not only with the family living there, but also Tom's Aunt Marie and Cousin Marisa who traveled from New York.  We haven't seen them since summer of 2019 and they have never met our nephew Theo.  

Mike and Lynz graciously open their home to all of us, which gave us maximum opportunity to visit with each other and their new puppy Drake.  

He's the tiniest little ball of fluff!  

But the best part of staying was spending time with Theo. 

Our first full day in Colorado we headed to Boulder to check out the University of Colorado campus.  It's a little early for Leo to look at colleges, but it was a nice day out and we wanted to walk around.  It's a beautiful, but overwhelmingly large campus.  

After lots of strolling, we headed to downtown Boulder for a drink.  Tom snapped this picture of the kids in front of a sculpture.  

We had a drink with a big crew, including Tom's sister Maggie and her boyfriend Will.  

Adorable Theo enjoying a "mocktail". 

After drinks, we went to dinner at Carrie's new house.  It was a super fabulous place with a beautiful view.  Lots of picture taking before dinner, 

Here's Marisa, Theo, Serafina and Leo. 

The next day was all about shopping and cooking for this big crew.  Pasta and meatballs, of course!

Tuesday was Marisa's birthday and an outing to Meow Wolf.  We were excited to explore the Denver location of Meow Wolf since we very much enjoyed our visit in Santa Fe. 

We didn't all stay together because it's almost impossible to travel through the space with a large group, but we did all run into each other at one point and made sure to take a picture. Here we are left to right: Maggie, Marisa, Mike, Tom, Serafina, Will, Leo and me. 

Of course I loved the book cave. 

Leo in the driver's seat. 

We had a fabulous time, and it was especially nice that it wasn't very crowded.  

We had some time to kill in Denver before Marisa's birthday dinner, so Maggie took us to a nice park to pass the time and enjoy the weather.  

Maggie and Will drove Leo to dinner and captured this important photo at the convention center on the way to the restaurant. 

The restaurant was a crowd pleaser.  Even Theo was a happy guy, until he got bored of sitting at the table, of course. 

 It was so fun to be able to celebrate Marisa all together. 

Serafina and the birthday girl. 

For our last full day in Colorado, we headed to a Colorado Rockies baseball game.  

It was Theo's first game! 

The Rockies stunk it up and lost badly, but we were there for the snacks and to document Theo's first game. The Welcome Center gave him this cool certificate. 

Not even the foam finger could turn the tide for the Rockies. 

After several warm days in Colorado, the weather turned chilly for our outdoor activity. We survived. 

It was a great gathering in Colorado, chocked full of activities and delicious food.  Tiring, but worth it to reunite with family we haven't seen in a while.