In the longtradition of Halloween Dances, today Serafina's Hip Hop class performed a few little routines in costume. Her real costume is too big and delicate for dance class so I talked her into wearing my costume for the class.
Here's my pretty unicorn with a little bit of gold glitter and pink lips.
Of course she needed a rainbow rubber band mane. I made the tutu myself this weekend.
She was pretty happy being the unicorn. The only downside of having my eight year old wear my costume before me is that I won't look nearly as cute when I wear it.
Here's a little routine she choreographed with two other girls.
And here's a sequence the class has been working on.
It's hard to take good videos since she's always in the back, but oh well.
The kids have today and tomorrow off from school for teacher training. Last year we took advantage of the time off and made the trip to Southern California to see friends, family and Disneyland. This year we couldn't pull off such a big adventure but we had a pretty fun (and exhausting) day trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium.
I knew the last time we went to the aquarium was for Leo's birthday when he was little, but I couldn't remember which birthday. A search through the blog reminded me that it was for his fourth birthday. That's a long while back!
Here's a little illustration of how much time has passed.
We visited the jellyfish first. They still inspire plenty of awe.
It was a gorgeous day outside - low 80s and very clear.
Serafina was a little timid with the touch pools but she touched a couple of things. Leo had zero interest in touching things.
Seeing what's out there.
So many things to check out. We especially loved the penguins and otters and the deep sea exhibit with some weird looking fish.
We had to experience this several times.
So gorgeous outside. We sat here for a little while just soaking up the sun.
I tried to take a selfie with these goofballs and every single one was super goofy.
We managed to hit our favorite ice cream shop, Marianne's, on the way home. Imagine that.
Serafina isn't exactly loving soccer this season. She'd much rather spend her time on a grassy field doing handstands and backbends and cartwheels. But she made a commitment to a team so she'll finish out this season. But before the game started, she had to get some tumbling in.
She actually played better than usual. She stayed on the ball more, moved it up the field and even took a couple of shots on goal. No one from her team managed to score this game, but they all played hard.
Serafina and her teammate Elise (number 20) are the two tallest girls on their team...maybe even in their division. You can see they totally tower over this little purple player.
Leo had diving lessons today but made it to the field to see most of the game. He found the game complete uninteresting so instead he stuffed himself into the carrying bag for my folding chair.
Tom went on his annual backpacking trip on Thursday. I made the questionable choice to let both kids take turns having sleepovers. On Friday night, Leo went to Nana's house and Sunny came to our house. The recent Sunny sleepover went well so I was confident this one would go smoothly as well.
And it did! Here are my charming dinner dates.
Serafina's soccer game and soccer team pictures were both canceled on Saturday because of poor air quality from the terrible fires up north. Leo's diving class was moved indoors so he did his training on trampolines and mats. The air quality was bad all week. Often in the morning we would wake up to smokey air and hazy skies. Sometimes it would clear up some in afternoon, but it wasn't guaranteed. The school held indoor P.E. and recess almost the whole week.
On Saturday night, Serafina went to Nana's and Addison came over for a sleepover with Leo. She had missed his birthday party for a family wedding so this made up for it. She brought him cool Star Wars Lego set and they got right to it. I have no explanation for Leo's face in the picture.
Tom will be home later tonight. It is our anniversary today; we've been married for 12 years. This is the second year in row we haven't spent our anniversary together. We will celebrate on a different night soon.
Here's my big boy. I had to go get him donuts this morning even though I knew there would be treats later. I was just so excited for him and his milestone birthday.
The big one - oh. He was excited to hit double digits.
There was a lot of Lego assembly today. He got this big set from Tom and me.
We went out to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory. I'm not sure what put the idea into Leo's mind, but he decided he wanted to go there. Of course, it was crowded on a Sunday night and we had a long wait. Nana joined us but the picture I took at the table wasn't flattering so I'm not going to post it. But she was there and she was a good sport about the long wait. Here's my hungry crew.
We ended up bringing the cheesecake home. Leo was pretty excited and we sang Happy Birthday to him for the third time in two days.
And just like that. I have a 10 year old. It went by in a blink of an eye. I'm so glad I have this awesome kid in my life.
Leo is turning ten tomorrow (TEN!!!). We celebrated today with a birthday party. Of course, we had to come up with a spooky treat like last year. We decided to do "vampire cupcakes". First I made some vanilla cupcakes. Second, I dropped the tray pulling it out of the oven and lost several of them, but I don't want to talk about that part. Then I cored out the middle and filled it with cherry "blood".
Then I gave them bleeding bite marks with the cherry blood. I left a few without the bloody middle since I knew not all the kids would be into the filling.
Anyway, the theme of the party was "messy fun". The kids arrived and we started our first activity - painting with water guns.
They had fun squirting the paper.
Beautiful masterpieces.
Then we had a lunch break but only a couple kids ate for some reason. I guess they already had lunch.
After lunch we had a round of Chubby Bunny. The point of that game is to see how many marshmallows you can stuff in your mouth and still say "chubby bunny". Tom took some video of the game, but honestly, it's too gross to watch.
Next up was our cheese ball toss. Step one was getting on shower caps. The boys were into it, but Sharon (the lone girl at this year's party) wasn't interested.
They teamed up. One kid got shaving creamed up and the other tossed the puffs trying to see how many they could get to stick. Then they switched roles.
Here's a video of the first round. At the end of the video, Sharon asks if she can toss some and she did.
The aftermath.
To clean off the shaving cream, the kids had a big water balloon fight. Then they came inside to decorate some jumbo marshmallows. That activity didn't last long. Too many Nerf guns to mess around with instead.
Then it was cupcake time.
Here's the inside of a "bleeding" vampire cupcake modeled by Tom.
We also had silly prizes.
All and all, it was a fun party. There were only five kids here (including Leo), which gave me the false hope that things would be mellow. They were not. Those kids were crazy and nearly destroyed my couch multiple times. Next year we will be venturing to another location for the birthday party.
Here is one of Leo's more unusual gifts from one of his buddies.
Tomorrow is the actual birthday. He will be the big 1 - 0. I'm definitely "in my feelings" about this one. It's such a milestone that's he's been around for ten years; that Tom and I have been parents for ten years; that he is so rapidly leaving childhood behind. Our plans for tomorrow are pretty low-key. There will be a lot of Lego building and a special birthday dinner with Nana. I also predict I will be hugging him a lot and saying "I can't believe you are 10." Hopefully he tolerates that.
Today was the school's Multicultural Festival. It was hot and exhausting, just like last year. I helped in the Nicaragua booth, just like last year. My friend Gaby, who is actually Nicaraguan, set up this mural since Nicaragua is the "mural capital of the world". Kids were encouraged to add to the mural with art and words that reflect their favorite part of Laurelwood school.
Here's Serafina's contribution - a profession of her love for math.
