Workin’ at the Car Wash
When Mom’s in charge of washing the cars, the boys’ feet stay firmly planted on the ground.
When Papa’s in charge, not so much.
No standing! Oy.
Author: Christy
Sunday Morning Hike
We took the boys up part of the Altadena Crest Trail on Sunday — a short loop starting around Mt. Curve/Maiden Lane and ending up at Lake/Loma Alta. The beginning is an old road that passes by the backyards of the neighborhood houses (including our gardener, Vivien’s house). At one point, there is a rock sculpture that the boys thought was pretty cool. Bruce decided to do some “repair” work and put some rocks back that had fallen.
As he touched things, of course, more rocks fell. Ezra got a little worried and asked Bruce to STOP!
Along the path, someone has put a swing which both boys enjoyed.
This is the only real climb — which is a good thing because Finn was about done at this point.
All in all, this hike was very successful and just the right length for little Moision tolerance levels.
June Jubilee
The Saturday fun continued at Aveson’s June Jubilee. Sadly, I have only one picture — Ezra, Finn, Ruby and Chapin cracking confetti eggs. A perennial favorite.
Fun at the Heliport
The Pasadena Police had an open house at their heliport on Saturday and the boys and I had to check it out. Mostly, they had just been acting crazy at home and with Bruce busy relocating the sprinkler system, I had to get out of the house. We got to see a few helicopters, Pasadena’s SWAT strike vehicle (who knew we had one?!?), and two simulated arrests. Here are the boys in the SWAT truck.
And here is the calm before the storm of the second simulation — cops pulling over a truck and calling in the K-9 unit for backup. Very exciting. And scary.
More pictures and a story here.
Finn’s Last Day in the Oak Tree Class
Finn finished up his second year of Cottage last week and is now officially done with the Oak Tree class. As usual, there was a last day potluck — here are Finn and Charlie enjoying some snacks. Mostly Finn just liked the orange cups and plates.
He had made a book with pictures from the year and here he is showing it to Teacher Ana.
And to Teacher Art.
He was very proud.
Here’s some of the group getting ready for the end of the year ceremony.
On to Rainforest!
Ezra & Jack
Most days, Ezra can’t wait to get to school to share some bit of information with his best friend, Jack. For instance, when he found out you can eat squid ink, he wanted to rush home to tell Jack. They are two crazies. Here are they are on a typical morning at Aveson waiting for school to start.
Finn’s Latest Obsession
Captain America.
Laguna
A couple of weeks ago, my friend Cari asked me if we had plans for Memorial Day weekend. Of course, being the procrastinators that we are, we didn’t, and she proceeded to invite our family to join them at their family’s beach house in Laguna Beach. After a very stressful month, Bruce and I jumped at the chance to enjoy a relaxing weekend. And relaxing it was. Check out this view from the deck (where the kids were having lunch).
Ezra and Finn did a little boating.
After lunch, the kids changed to swim suits and we hit the beach. Here are the boys showing off their new swim shirts.
Needless to say, they had a blast chasing waves.
Ruby, Ezra and Finn were in and out of the water for a couple of hours.
Here’s a video sample of the beach activities.
Chapin wanted nothing to do with the water, choosing instead to build a house of sticks in the sand.
The kids were pretty worn out and bedtime went better than expected. Since all four were in the same room, we anticipated shenanigans but I think they were just too tired. Here’s Bruce doing bedtime stories.
The next morning, the kids rose early, had some breakfast and got ready for a busy day. Finn did some exploring with Chapin’s “noculars.”
And everyone had a grand time riding bikes, tricycles and plasma cars on the cul-de-sac. We tore them away from their games to go to the aquarium at the Ocean Institute in Dana Point, just down the road. They played in the fishbowl.
Touched some sea creatures.
Checked out the ray. (Finn was not too sure about that guy.)
And then Bruce said, “At 3:00 they’re doing a squid dissection!” Little did we know, what we thought was going to be a demonstration turned out to be do-it-yourself squid dissections.
I was lucky enough to be sitting with Ezra, who wanted to do most of it himself, so I only had to cut it open. He, for instance, got to squeeze the lens out of the eyeball. Ick. Bruce did most of the one he and Finn were working on, and Cari handled most of Chapin’s.
Here’s Ezra with the squid ink “tattoo” Bruce gave him.
Ezra was most thrilled, and grossed out, to hear that you can eat squid ink.
That night we went to Cosmo’s to visit Dick, Claire and Alex, and have a delicious Italian dinner. Unfortunately, I was too busy gabbing to remember to take pictures, but I’m so glad we got to see them while we were down in their neck of the woods.
The next day we planned to leave early, but just couldn’t drag ourselves away. Rob and Bruce took the kids down to the tide pools, leaving Cari and me with a quiet house and a nice conversation. The kids had more fun, came home starving and inhaled their lunch on the patio.
One of my favorite parts of the weekend was watching the kids meld their different styles of play. My boys’ superhero play became superhero/princess play with Ruby. There was even a wedding between Queen Ruby and Iron Man’s alter ego, Tony Stark (played by Ezra, of course), complete with a bouquet of flowers picked from the neighbor’s yard and a procession down the cul-de-sac. Their imaginations and flexibility floor me.
Finn passed out in the car while we were still on PCH and slept the entire ride home. Ezra didn’t nap and had a spectacular meltdown about 5:00. All signs of a great trip! Thanks to the Bannings!!
(All of my pictures and videos are here.)
Kindergarten
Further evidence that Ezra’s having a good time in Kindergarten:
He put these on for school this morning. His hair was a bed-head disaster, his shirt was too big and these pants are stained beyond belief. I chose my battle and asked him to change his pants. Luckily, he complied so he only looked like a ragamuffin from the waist up.
Tour of California 2011
We met Bob, Vanessa and Thomas today in Thousand Oaks to see the final stage of the Tour of California. It was a much-needed fun day after a tough week.
We got a spot not too far from the finish line. The cyclists rode five laps around so we got to see a good bit of riding. Here are Ezra and Finn anxiously awaiting their arrival.
Finn is an avid Team Radioshack fan. Obviously.
These were the leaders in the first lap, although there was at least one rider ahead of these guys but my iPhone camera was a little too slow to catch him.
Thomas wore his helmet the entire day which caused a lot of smiles from the other onlookers. Here he is with Ezra waiting for the final lap.
And here’s a video of the peloton riding past us in a blur and their support cars. I liked the Jelly Belly car at the end the best.
“Camping”
Bruce set up the tent on the balcony Friday night so the boys could do some camping. Here’s what it looked like from the backyard.
And here Bruce and Finn discuss logistics.
Bruce was going to sleep with them but Ezra stole his cot so only the junior Moisions ended up in the tent. They fell asleep pretty quickly with no shenanigans (but an hour after regular bedtime), but they woke up (and woke us up, of course) at 5:30. Ouch.
Ezra’s Latest Creations
Ezra has done a couple of fun projects lately — one at school and one at home. First, the one at home: Wire Vine Man.
Inspired by our beloved gardener, Vivien, and the loads and loads of merciless wire vine that she pulled out of our yard. It’s strong, hard to pull out, and strangles the plants around it. Perfect for a superhero.
Second is Blu made from potatoes, tissue paper, and feathers (among other things) at school. He told me about this project all week and couldn’t wait for take-home Friday. His teacher told me that he “stayed true to his design” throughout the whole week.
And here’s the real Blu.
Pirate Song
I worked at Cottage yesterday and took this video during music time. I don’t know what the actual name of the song is, but Finn sings it at home all the time and calls it the Pirate Song. Clearly, it’s a class favorite.
Van-pires
Last night at bedtime there was some discussion about vampires. I was a little worried that, this being bedtime, the vampire talk might cause nightmares, so I wanted to make sure the boys understood that vampires aren’t real. Here’s the conversation I had with Finn after he shared his not-so-extensive knowledge on the subject.
Me: You know something else about vampires?
Finn: What?
Me: They’re not real.
Finn: Yes, they are. I saw a van-pire.
Me: You did? Where?
Finn: When I came out of my Batcave.
I couldn’t help cracking up, and then neither could he, and I figured we’d be OK in the nightmare department. And we were.
Carnival!
No, we didn’t go to that Carnival (although Ezra now dreams of going to Rio since seeing the movie). On Saturday I took the boys to Sierra Madre Community Nursery School’s annual Spring Carnival and they had a blast. They played some kids’ carnival games like the ball toss.
And the sucker toss (tossing rings onto suckers).
They really liked this bouncy slide.
But they mostly liked eating sno-cones and cotton candy. And, of course, smashing the confetti eggs. Ezra had a crocodile technique.
But mostly they just tried to get as much confetti on each other (and me) as possible.
