Christmas parties

Today Lydia had her Christmas party where they had little stations for games and food creations.  Then they did a book exchange where each child brought in one of their own books to give to a classmate.  A few festive songs were sung, and then they were off to lunch.  

Book exchange

Fun song

After two parties at school, it was my turn to celebrate.  During my girl's night out, I ran into Lydia's first grade teacher, Ms. Nitti

After dinner at Art's Table, we went to Sweet Lady Jane for dessert.

And ended up leaving with about $100 worth of free bread.  A Merry Christmas indeed!

Sophie's Sing Along Christmas Party

All smiles

Always ready to take a picture

Guess I should get her a hippopotamus

The falling of toe nail

 This post is not for the faint of heart, so be forewarned!

A month or so ago, Lydia was messing around with one of the dining chairs and it fell and landed on her big toe.  Within days, the entire nail turned black, but was still attached to her toe.  During the next few weeks, the nail started detaching itself from the toe to the point that it was barely hanging on by a tiny piece of skin.  Tonight we decided to remove the dead nail so that the nail beneath could have room to grow.

Before

Lydia twisting her dead toe nail off

After

Sophie's "Big girl" dance recital

This was the first session that Sophie was in the regular ballet class and with the "big girls".  It was a crazy session because her auditions were almost always on Thursdays, so she kept having to do make up classes on Mondays.  At the end, Sophie did the performance with the Monday class, plus, she got more face time since the Thursday class is almost double the size.

Sophie with Amelia

Sophie only practiced with this group half the time, so she wasn't able to fully memorize everything.  I felt bad, but at least she still had a good time.

Front and center

Sophie still complains about dance class because she hates wearing tights, but I know she still likes going.

She used to be the best dancer in the class (because she was the oldest), so this new class was certainly a change.

My little ballerina

Gotta love Costco flowers

 Sweet Sophie

When Tai visits

Trung's older brother Tai from New York was in San Diego for a few days and drove up to spend the day with us.  We had lunch at Hurry Curry on Sawtelle and walked around for a little bit before dropping the kids off at a birthday party.  We enjoyed a sushi dinner at Sugarfish without the kids and then went back to the songwriting party to watch their performance.

Curry-ed out

Brothers

Practicing their song

My girls

Mini divas

Lydia and the birthday girl

Happy birthday, Katie!

The big performance

Thanks for visiting, Tai!

A "Truecar" Christmas

Trung and I always look forward to his company parties because they are so much fun.  This year, they changed it up a little bit.  The last two years, the Christmas party was at the Annenburg Beach House from 12-6, and they would serve lunch and a light dinner around 5.  This year, the company separated the party into two events.  12-4 at the Santa Monica Civic Center for food trucks, go cart racing, and arcade gaming; and then 5-10 at the Annenburg for dinner and karaoke.  Though it was pretty much an entire day event, I think it worked out well and the separation was nice.

It rained just this morning, but cleared up with enough time to run the go carts

Our favorite game, Killer Queen, which pits teams of five against each other.  So much fun that we didn't even do go carts this year.

My team of five

Liquid nitrogen chocolate s'more ice cream...a very "cool" concept, served at the evening party

Hour (or two) of coding

This week several companies are offering free coding sessions.  One place called CodeRev Kids was offering a free two hour session, and even though Lydia had to miss the first half due to basketball practice, she still got a good hour in and really enjoyed it.  Sophie had her final ballet class and had to go because her performance is on Sunday, but she got a mini session in as well. 

The kids are such techies

Dancing with the Local Stars

A nearby dance studio just opened up and offered free dance and hip hop classes.  Sophie and Lydia went to the dance/ballet class, and Sophie went to the hip hop class the next day since Lydia had basketball practice.  Lydia did not want to have anything to do with the class though.  I was confused why she was so adamant about not participating only to discover that she was afraid she would trip and bust her head open again.  I told her that she only needed to try for five minutes and if she really didn't like it, she could come out of the room and sit with me.  She never came back out.

Also, I recognized one of the moms as George Lopez's wife on his show.  I got confirmation after some googling that it was indeed Constance Marie.  Wish I could have gotten a picture, but as usual, that moment of opportunity passed by.

Sophie's solo...she liked the class, but likes her current ballet class better.

Earning their keep

This weekend I introduced a "chore list" to the kids, where they earn 2 points for every chore that they do.  The points earn them little prizes from a "toy box" that they hand picked.  The girls already fold laundry (socks and underwear) on a regular basis, but we are slowly adding a few more things to the list.

Putting return address stickers and stamps on Christmas cards

Lydia putting Christmas lights on the stair railing

Sophie fluffing up the Santa girl's dress on her stocking

Folding towels while reciting the "Pledge of Allegiance"

After all that work, some electronics time is well deserved

Friday Funday

My days are usually uneventful, just a morning workout or two, lunch, and then get ready to pick up the kids from school.  Today was a bit more interesting.

Sophie shared her writer's workshop writing about "How to read a book"

After zumba, my friend Catherine and I had lunch at a healthy, delicious place called Lemonade.  Then we got complimentary desserts and facials at Caudalie. 

I picked up the kids from school and spent a few hours relaxing before we headed over to Montana Ave for their annual holiday walk.  We had lots of sweets, popcorn, and cider.  We even saw Santa, though it took a lot of convincing to get Lydia to take a picture with him (because she knows he isn't real)!