birthday weekend

Tomorrow are Davin and my mom's real official birthdays. We celebrated this morning with breakfast in Orange at mom's house.

We decided to celebrate a day early due to tomorrow's celebration of these two engaged love birds...

It was a lovely morning with good food and fun family...



Davin opened a new backpack full of school goodies for first grade, a Star Wars learning laptop, and a Target gift card. I'd say he has had a great start to his weekend of festivities. Which reminds me... I must get ready for 60 guests coming tomorrow... Ta Ta for now.

A girl and her dog

For some reason, Avery has really taken to the dogs this summer. Especially Taco. She runs to the backyard when she wakes up each morning. She has a special song she sings just for the dogs. She forgets NOT to pet them when their eating... ouch. She is constantly trying to put her hairbows and barretts in their short chihuahua fur... not so successful. She also carries Taco around like she is a baby doll. I can't really tell if Taco is enjoying this or annoyed. I happen to have my camera at arms reach during one of their recent love fests...

Crunch time

Trying to get that haunting stack of photos as short as possible before going back to school.

so grown up

As he rounds the corner to his 7th birthday next week, I have come to a few realizations about Davin. He has really turned the corner from a maturity stand point. He is truly enjoying soccer on his own, out of the shadow of his big brother. Yesterday he picked out a random book off of a shelf and he just read it to me! And it wasn't because I said to. He wanted to, and was able to read that book! We went school shopping for he and Hunter. Davin came home and hung up all his new clothes on hangers by himself. I'm sure he was treasuring brand new, never-been-worn clothes, since he is normally the hand me down king. Unfortunately he falls victim to the middle child syndrome when it comes to clothes. As we approach his first grade year, I couldn't be more confident about our decision to have him repeat Kindergarten last year. He is ready, motivated, and excited all on his own!



Enjoy this last week of being 6 buddy!

Shades of Summer

I am involved in a game right now called "Shades of Summer". It was started by a very creative scrapbooker Liz K. If you are not familiar with her blog, you are in for a treat, just click on her name above. A few months ago she posted a picture of herself with these cute yellow shades on and asked if anyone would like to have them sent by mail to them, to email her the address. Well 180 women responded to the offer, including me. Needless to say she went out and picked up 14 more pairs and sent them in boxes around the country to everyone who wanted to play. So my task was to take a picture of myself in the shades, scrapbook a layout of the picture in a book that was included in the mailing box, and then within two days send the box off to the next player on the list. So yesterday, I did just that. I wanted my picture to represent my love for LA. I took the kids up to the Griffith Observatory which happens to have a fabulous view of the Hollywood sign. After many attempts by Hunter and a few non-english speaking tourists...here are the results. It was really fun!
The observatory is great day out. And it is FREE. A gorgeous view of Los Angeles. And you can hear the musicians practicing right down the hill at the Greek theater.
They have a great movie that plays on a dome ceiling that simulates what it is like on all of the planets. The chairs recline way back. The kids enjoyed that the most...
This sundial was accurate. The kids had never seen one before. After I taught them how to read it, they compared the reading with my cell phone time each time we passed it.

The Greatest Show on Earth

At my ultrasound, when I was pregnant with Avery, one of the main reasons I was so excited to have a girl was to one day attend her recital... and tonight we did just that!  We could not take cameras into the theater (enter frown) but here are a few highlight pictures from the night.  I made these fans to give all Avery and Annika's "fans" that attended the show...And lastly, the reason Avery loved her first recital so much is because how much fun Miss Nicole, her teacher, made class every week.  I think Avery loved her teacher more than dance itself. We hope Miss Nicole's new schedule as a Clipper cheerleader doesn't keep her from teaching dance in September... but we are so excited for her!My face actually hurts tonight from smiling so much.  I don't think I could ever get tired of this.  I think I need to get myself signed up for a class of my own.  Hmmm I wonder how stretchy that parrot costume is?  Don't worry, I'm only kidding.

recital ready

Yesterday the girls took professional photographs at the dance studio in make-up and costumes.  I think all the prep work became a reality to Avery.  She was quite the little observer seeing all the older dancers take their pictures and change costumes (being that some of the lead dancers are in up to 10 routines!).  We snuck Annika away for a quick cousin shot... don't they look grown up?Tomorrow during the show I opted out of being backstage with the girls so I could can actually watch the recital. To make life easier for those trooper moms that DID volunteer, I made garment bag tags for Avery and Ella's costumes to make life easier for the brave souls changing these 4 year olds.  This way they know how their costumes are supposed to fit:And lastly just a little card I made to show Miss Nicole how much we have appreciated her hard work and most of all PATIENCE with these little animals...I am not sure who is having more fun with all of this me or Avery?  Am I reliving my youth or what?  Check back to see what I made to show appreciation to all of the "fans"... hee hee hee

back from the beach

Well here they are... 3rd annual Doheny Beach camping trip. 10 kids with another year under their tiny belts... a little older, wiser, and SASSIER too...

Beach camping is the best... there is so much to do...the kids loved jumping the waves this year. thank goodness for water shoes, the rocks were relentless...


It amazes me that the kids never get tired of digging the deepest holes, or building the biggest castles!



Our attempt at a posed family photo, with our borrowed son A.J.

And a few more pictures i love...What else are two girls supposed to do when camping??? but wear make-up!

The Carty family


After making kites, having airpline glider Olympics, playing horse shoes, making countless smores, playing flashlight tag at night, here are the tired kids anxiously waiting for next year's return!

Doheny Beach or BUST

We are off and camping to our annual Doheny Beach trip with the Carty's and the other Ancich's. We have spent the day packing and cleaning because it feels so good to come home to a tidy house after three days with sandy toes.

Here are all the kids on the strictly prohibited lifeguard tower just over a year ago. Stay tuned to see our pics from the trip to see how they've all grown when we return on Wednesday! Maybe this year, just one of these 10 kids will LOOK at the camera...I know, high hopes...ta ta for now...

A Sneak "BEAK"

Today was the dress rehersal for Avery's dance recital next Saturday. All the girls are different animals, but this bright green parrot is my personal favorite...


Ella makes the cutest monkey EVER...

Here are a few other WILD cuties...

And lastly the costume for Shirley temple's "Animal Crackers in my Soup"...

We can't wait to see what these 4 years olds come up with on stage!