Museums and a tea party !

Took the girls down memory lane this week, and they visited this air-craft carrier - the USS Midway which had previously served as a flagship in the fleet in Desert Storm stationed at Kuwait.

Now decommissioned and used as a museum, the girls got to see how sailors actually lived aboard the air-craft carriers, and got to climb into the cockpits of several aircrafts on the flight deck. At full capacity, this air-craft carrier could carry up to 60 aircraft on its deck !

We also did the Museum of Man this week - more like an anthropology museum so now the girls have an inkling what their ancestors looked like (ie. apes) and how ancient civilisations lived.

Here C stands in front of a stone shaft, what is called a Stela, in which the ancient Mayans carved their beliefs on.

The girls were fascinated by what they saw and were busy scribbling in their note books. C had me spelling out all the exhibits for her so she could jot them down. She might not remember what they are already, but the process was good nonetheless....
R's favourite - the ancient Egyptians and mummy exhibits.

Here she is - sitting on a pharoah's throne :)

And the kids went to Tea today !!!

A fanciful one at that, organised by our local library. It's called the Mother and Daughter tea, so i got to go too. Many mothers and daughters actually dressed up in similar outfits and matching hats as well, so it was a real sight to see. We of cos' just went in our usual.


But it was such fun ! The girls got to use pretty glassware and walk up to get their tea poured out of elegant silverware, and snack on colourful cookies and muffins. So wonderful that the library stuff and the volunteers put so much effort into it, and all for free too ! It's really heartening the spirit of volunteerism here.

Then off to watch Hannah Montana - the Movie. It was great. As usual, i cried buckets. Not that it was all THAT soppy - it was just me. We really enjoyed it, better than High School Musical, in our opinion.

So all in all, another fantastic week. Hope you all had a great one too especially if the exam season is over :)

A noisy weekend ...

It was the Red Bull Air Race - a tantalizing display of aerial aerobatics in nifty colourful planes - happening right above us (literally) and out at the bay. It was 4 days (2 days of training and 2 of competition) of non-stop zooming above us, a couple of hours a day.

The men were of course all excited, and i togged my trusty lens down to the promenade to catch some shots... heh, won't bore you with them- just a few here. This plane in orange eventually won the race...

People literally camped out on the promenade fully prepared with beach umbrellas and even mobile BBQ pits ,


but these were my girls' reactions ....

But this wasn't the reaction during their performance first thing sunday morning -


their Mother's Day concert for just ME (they even co-opted papa to star in it) had been in rehearsals for weeks, with flashcards reading 'i love mommy' and self-composed songs ... i was very touched... ahhh... my girls :) AND the papa actually made pancakes for me that morning (er.. using pancake mix just add water kind - but still....). Can't ask for more :)

a sojourn to Hollywood ...

.... well almost ...
all i managed to catch was this from the confines of my car on the freeway ...

and nope... did not get to drool at any celebrities, just these that we met at Universal studios....



C was sooooo excited to see Dora, she couldn't take her eyes off her ! Even after this photo op, she kept lurking around, and didn't want to leave ! Well, who can blame her when this adoring fan has got Dora shoes, dora underwear, and now a Dora backpack (yea - the purple one which Dora carries) that the doting Papa had to get her while we were there...

A terribly scorching day with cool winds, i am now 'blessed' with a throbing headache and a stuffy nose... sigh...

but check out what's happening (click the vid) literally at our doorstep today !! The man is already getting excited and planning a camp-out this afternoon ... Will post pix if i actually manage to catch some shots of those death defying stunts !!

got to go get lunch ready now.... some shots of C playing hand games in the car with jie jie during our long drive out to Hollywood yesterday ....


and to all you fabulous mums ....HAVE A WONDERFUL MOTHERS' DAY !!

National Scrapbooking Day

It was national Scrapbooking Day just over the weekend, and my did i celebrate it in style !!

What better way than just being surrounded by pretty things, cutting and pasting :)

It was great spending a whole day at the Scrapbook Expo attending classes and shopping ! Not to mention the hole in my pocket left by the end of the day !!

I did a Basic Grey class using the Marrakech line and they were just so generous with their kit.

Sorry about the pix here... used my 'mickey mouse' camera which could fit into my handbag, given ALL the scrap stuff + shopping i was already lugging ... so yea....

Here were my instructors Kelly Goree and Becky Fleck .... ahhhh... my moment of scrap celebrity encounter :P

And then went on to do one hosted by GCD studios and an acrylic album class by SEI . This was the only product that i finished enough to be able to show u a picture off ...

AND i actually was all prepared to go home empty handed when during the LAST class, and the LAST prize to be given away - my NAME was called !!! AND i got THIS !!!!!

thank you thank you SEI !!!! muack !!!

It would have been SOO SOOO SOO much more fun if my scrap "kakis" were here with me .. sigh... i miss you gals dearly :( hope you are keeping well ...

Happy May Day !

It's just too quick how almost half of the year has flown by ...

We had a relatively quiet week except for these new friends we met :)

(dolphins - R now wants to be a dolphin trainer..)

(feeding the seals -
we learnt the difference between seals and sea lions .. the latter has ears)

(Shamu - a killer whale - the star of 'Free Willy' )

(the beluga whale who lives in the arctic)

(these guys are just tooo adorable...)

And some candy shopping at the Scrapbook Expo !!! happy :)

Taking some classes too tomorrow - terribly excited - and one with Becky Fleck too from Basic Grey !! hahha... hope my 'produce' would be decent enough to post.....

Some shots of girls to close off... have to include them for the benefit of doting family members who come by just to see how these two are getting by ...



see ya soon !! Enjoy what's left of the nice long break !

swine flu..

hey everyone,
thanks for all the concern expressed and messages sent. It is really quite scary listening to the reports given that we are only 20min from the border of Mexico. We are taking care and avoiding all crowded areas, and we have also stopped cooking and consuming pork - just to be on safe side. Thank goodness too the girls don't go to school, and all we do nowadays is hit the fresh open areas like nature parks ... so we are keeping safe. Don't worry ya...

love
L

Lots to tell !!

It was a wonderful past few days !

BBQ
We have been watching the residents here head down to the grill every single night, so we thought we would do the same. Hubby invited his two other friends and wife to BBQ too so it was a lovely cheery affair and we had chicken wings, lamb chops, salmon on the grill and home cooked chicken rice, and settled ourselves on a picnic table overlooking the San Diego Bay.

Really, what could be better ?! Gosh we were eating from 6 - 8 pm, and enjoying the sunset !! And thank goodness too !! Cos' guess what we saw next ???!!!


Dolphins !!!! Right within eyesight ! Not in an aquarium or Sea World but in their natural habitats ! The girls and I leapt from our seats right to the banks of the promenade for a closer view and it must have been just God's grace that i managed to catch this shot of one of the dolphins (there were 2 of them) leaping from the waters ! Ahhhh... breathtaking... a close-up ...

On the home front, we made exciting progress too ! The books i ordered from Amazon finally arrived - Hillyer's "A child's history of the World" and Voskamp's "A child's Geography" are simply amazing, and i'm the one totally fascinated. We lost no time in checking them out and i loved Voskamp's style and wonderful lesson ideas. Here's what the kids did in trying to understand how big Earth was, in relation to where they lived, and concepts of states, countries, and continents ....

R's version
(think she attempted to draw in Disneyland in California too)

C's version
(guess in C's mind, Pooh, Piglet and company all live tog with us !)

Cool huh... i'm pleased... and they are already asking when can they do 'that Earth Book' (that's C speaking) again, and start on the history one... :)

Junior Rangers

We headed to Point Loma today with the intention of a hike. It is a rock face that we peer at daily from our side of the Bay, and the spot where the first European landed in 1564, on the west coast of America, and where Lighthouses were built to guide the ships into San Diego harbour then, still stand. This was the view that greeted us...

And what do you know - it's Junior Ranger Day, and the museum and visitor center was abuzz with activities. The girls had free muffins and then got to get Junior Ranger Badges, a Certificate and their names announced over the loud hailer too !

But all this, only when they completed the activity books with little quizzes about the exhibits.
C had to complete 3 of the activities and R, 5 of them, and they set about their tasks with much enthusiasm....


(R trying to figure out where we stayed through the binocs. The patch of light brown in the background is in fact the airbase where J works...)

(... R trying to get those answers down ...)

C here getting help from Papa.
These two have been really bonding very well.
On weekends they are really like Uhu glue ;P

The girls even had to take a pledge that as Junior Rangers, they would do their best to protect and preserve the park !! It's really been great exposure for them, as before this i don't think they had a clue what Rangers did...

here's R taking her pledge...and C getting her badge !
But of cos' the girls still found time to horse around ... love these shots taken by hubby today..

(C with lighthouse in the background)

Thanks for dropping by ! Have a great week ahead ya, and keep safe ! We are missing you all !

Hugs,
L