Miramar Airshow

We've gone to the Miramar Airshow at least 5 out of the 7 years we've lived here. It's amazing and Lucas and Marisa LOVE it.
Before the show started we walked around and toured the planes and tanks. What more could a boy ask for? He had a chance to get in a tank and pretend to shoot a gun. If only I was as excited about this as he was ...

Now, just pretend that I now have pictures of many airplanes flying in close formation, doing all kinds of wild and crazy stunts in the sky. Put your hands over your ears to protect your ears from the ear splitting noise of the planes overhead, close your eyes and watch the parachuters coming down out of the sky, and ooh and ahhhh as you see the ground troops put on the "WALL OF FIRE".

See? A thousand words are worth a picture. :-)

Tooth #4

This tooth was so loose it literally fell right out all by itself. He is so excited to be SLOWLY catching up to all his friends who have lost many more ...

Tooth # 3

Lucas is a little behind in the tooth losing department. He just lost #3 last week. It had been dangling for so long Victor finally said he was going to do the "tie a string to it and slam the door" thing. Lucas was giddy with excitement but then chickened out numerous times. Victor finally just yanked on the string and it was out with no pain! Ahhh, the joys of childhood.

Happy Anniversary to me ...

Nine years! Wow. How time flies when you're ... going crazy? That's about how life feels sometimes. We took a one night getaway to La Jolla last weekend for our anniversary. Our new adopted grandparents - John and Jessie took Lucas and Marisa for the night. (They were THRILLED!!) Our anniversary took on new meaning this year as we were very thankful to have each other. The week before, my good friend lost her husband and father in a tragic plane crash. She is left with 3 young girls to raise. Amazing how all the petty little annoyances go away when you realize how insignificant all your whinings are.
The actual day of our anniversary - Wed, Sept 30, I had planned a nice meal (meaning I bought something from the store all ready prepared so it would taste good) and we sat at the dining room table. I had pictured nice conversation around the table with Lucas and Marisa about love, marriage, God, faithfulness etc etc. Then we were going to all 4 move to Marisa's bed and look at wedding albums and I was going to attempt to fit into my wedding dress for Lucas and Marisa to see. It was such a nice evening - in my mind. We actually talked about school and homework, fought over bedtime, rushed through showers and they went to bed without seeing the skintight wedding dress. (Some things are best left alone.)
Happy Anniversary - I love you!
OH, and I appear to have forgotten that I own a camera. We still look the same - few more pounds, a little less hair, a little more gray, a few wrinkles here and there ...

My great idea

I was so proud of myself last weekend. I came up with a great idea, if I do say so myself. We were out on a date night and had a girl babysitting who had only babysat for us a couple times before. Our regular babysitter from the past 5 years just left for college :-(
She mentioned when I took her home that L and M were a little wild. An understatment I'm sure. They admitted to me the next morning that they were indeed VERY wild. So, my punishment to them was they had to help pay the babysitting fee! There eyes were very big and full of remorse as I took money out of their banks and put it in my wallet. I just may have good children next time we have a babysitter! :-)

Yearly Playgroup Camping Trip

Almost every year for the past 6 years, Lucas and Marisa's playgroup has done a weekend camping trip in the area. It's always a fun, chaotic messy time. Here are the highlights! Let's start at the end. Dirty feet. They were actually pretty clean every where else, but those feet ...

LUcas and Marisa love to sleep in a tent. We're the only tent campers in the group, everyone else has nice trailers ... someday. Until then, we're building tent memories. :-)

Some of the moms relaxing while the dads took the kids "fishing" to a nearby creek. Lucas actually caught a fish with a stick and a hook and worm!

And the dads playing horseshoes ... or is it a new dance they're practicing?

Camp food! BBQed hotdogs, watermelon, corn on the cob - what more could a kid want?

They also want s'mores of course!! The best camp dessert.

The moms agree. ALthough I did see some of them just taking the chocolate ...

After smores it's time to "plug the kids in" and put on a movie shown on a white sheet on the back of one of the trailers.

ONe of the evenings we had glow sticks too. There were not enough glow stick necklaces to go around, so Lucas very kindly gave up his and said he'd rather have the earrings anyway. So, should I be proud of his unselfishness or worried about his interest in earrings?

We had plenty of bubbles ...

Plenty of playdough ...

Plenty of children riding on bikes ... (and also dads doing wheelies on bikes trying to teach Lucas to do wheelies on his bike ... thank you very much Jim!)

We took a side trip on Sunday afternoon to Julian to pick apples hoping to escape the heat in Ramona. But it wasn't meant to be. (Escaping the heat that is.) But we did find a nice airconditioned restaurant to eat delicious Julian apple pie.

A great weekend! Now to the laundry and those feet!!

My babies are gone!!

The first day of school! Wow!! Marisa has been beside herself with excitement waiting for her first day of Kindergarten. It was really quite cute. Lucas did not even mind putting on a long sleeve dress shirt, tie and vest in the heat! (This is their "dress uniform" for special occasions. For regular days, they have shorts and polo shirts.) We weren't sure about traffic this morning so we left with lots of time and got to school 35 minutes early! :-) We will have fun with teacher names this year. Lucas' teacher's name is Ms Kang and Marisa's teachers name is Ms Chang!! I'm very excited about the school year and I'm thankful to God that the transition to a new school has been relatively painless. I'm very excited about the 7 hours of free time I will have each day. But I know it will get filled up quickly! So far I have 4 Spanish classes I"m teaching, so I"m looking forward to building that up and hopefully providing a small amount of money for "extras" - like a vacation to see the great wall of China or the pyramids or the Taj Mahal. Unfortunately Victor wants to buy groceries with my money. Can you believe it??
And here are Lucas and Marisa waiting to go into the chapel for opening ceremonies. They were greeted by the Headmaster who welcomed each one by name, and they were to respond "Good Morning Mrs Kim" (and she made a point of making sure each child looked her in the eye as they addressed her. I love it! I'll let the school teach my children all their manners and I can sit around and eat bon bons all day.)