The Taming of Tenley!

Christmas Comes Early

2010-12-16T09:32:00.000-08:00

Tenley found a big stuffed Bolt at the Disney Store and just fell in love with it. Her mother and I told her no she couldn't have it because she has no more room for stuffed animals and it was so close to Christmas. That presented a challenge to Tenley who immediately called her Grandma and asked her for it. My mother, politely asked me, and then got online and ordered it.

Well, yesterday fresh from her Gymnastics class, Tenley was surprised by the UPS man delivering her package. She immediately grabbed onto it and only let go long enough to eat dinner and get ready for bed. She loves it.

Thanks Grandma!!!!

Santa's Response

2010-12-14T15:00:00.000-08:00

Tenley wrote a letter to Santa and mailed it last week. Today, she got a letter back from Santa. It's really cool and she was very excited.

Visiting Santa

2010-12-12T18:53:00.000-08:00

Today Tenley went to Victoria Gardens to visit Santa and give him her demands...er requests for Christmas this year. As always it was a very long line and Santa's helpers were a bit on the surly side. But there was a cute picture in the end.

Toothless Tenley

2010-12-10T15:51:00.000-08:00

Tenley lost her first tooth today during school. She was writing in her journal and I was on the other side of the class helping some students with a project when I heard "Daddy, my tooth came out!" She was so excited that her tooth finally fell out. Now it's time for the Tooth Fairy to do her part!

And then it was Christmas

2010-12-07T16:25:00.001-08:00

Six Years Old - Time Flies

2010-12-07T16:24:00.000-08:00

6th Surprise

2010-09-12T20:15:00.000-07:00

The Friday before Ten's birthday started out like any other day: up at 6:15, waffle & yogurt for breakfast, dressed/hair combed and off to school. At 11:15, however, her day took an unexpected detour when she was summoned to the office and told to take all her things. Her classmates told her she was lucky because she got to go home early...they had no idea.

Ten was surprised to see us, and a little miffed that she was about to miss out on chicken-patty-on-a-bun for lunch. So, it was with a hint of skepticism and a healthy dose of resignation that she asked, "Are we going home??" "No." "Then where are we going?" "Hmm. Well, Daddy & I thought maybe we'd go to Disneyland." She couldn't get her backpack off & get in the car fast enough.
Once we arrived and Uncle Kev got us all signed in, our first stop was City Hall to get Ten an It's My Birthday button. I love the birthday buttons: they write the birthday person's name (and sometimes age) on it and all day nice Disney Cast Members will extol birthday wishes...and often give special treatment. Best of all, it's free!

The day began as it usually does in Tomorrowland despite the fact that Star Tours was closed (good- I'm looking forward to almost getting to somewhere besides Endor in 2011) and so was Space Mountain (not good- it's Ten & I's favorite, and they're just "themeing" it for Halloween).

Ten & Jeff started with the Rockets, and while in line for Buzz Lightyear, Jeff overheard someone walking past say that they had just gotten off Space Mountain. I was sent to investigate. Amazingly, it was true, and I jumped right in line. Good thing too, because they closed the line about 15 min after I got in it, and Jeff and Tenley were only allowed to go because I was holding our places!

After scoring our ride on Space Mountain (she got to sit in the front because it was her birthday), we hit the Autopia (where Derek, Shulmia and Jason went to heroic lengths to get Ten the "red Suzy" car because it was her birthday) and Nemo Submarine Voyage. It was then that Ten brought joy to her Dad's heart by saying that she'd like a snack and to "maybe do the lightsaber thing".

Now if you've never seen the Jedi Training Academy, it is waaay cute and the kids love it. Some Jedi come out and choose 20 or so Padawans from the audience who get to wear Jedi robes and wield lightsabers while they teach them a simple sword fight combo...then Darth Vader and Darth Maul show up and they get to fight them. Awesome- the trick is getting picked because there are 20-30ish spots and usually 50+ kids vying for them at each show.

We figured Ten had a reasonable chance: it was the last show of the day, she looked cute....and she had The Birthday Button. She got picked, thereby making all her Geek Dad's dreams come true: his little girl was a Jedi!

...and she was taking on Darth Vader!!

The Force was strong with her- she won, but afterwards said that she thought that "Darth Vader took it easy on me."

Having defeated the Dark Side, we trotted off to Fantasyland where she rode the Matterhorn and got her face painted.

Once painted up, we got on It's a Small World. Ten decided to work on her geography skills by trying to guess each country. Some times she did well...and other times we get this: "Look Ten! Cowboys! Indians! Farmers! Where are we??" "Facebook!!" Both hilarious and sad.

As we were waiting to get off the boat, Jeff announced "Aunt Beth and Uncle Bill are going to meet us at the exit" They had shown up to purchase something for Jeff's Mom, and came and found us to say hi. Tenley promptly talked them into going on the Tea Cups with her.

Aunt Beth and Uncle Bill said good-bye to us after the Tea Cups, and we continued on to Mr. Toad, the Carousel, Big Thunder, Winnie the Pooh, Pirates of the Caribbean and the Jungle Cruise. Somewhere in there, we zipped over to First Aid to get me some Advil before my head exploded, and were then seduced into dinner by the smell of fried chicken from the Plaza Inn.

We made it over to California Adventure with just enough time to ride Soarin' Over California (birthday button = "of course the birthday girl can sit in the top row") before that park closed.

One very very tired little girl dragged herself through the World of Disney store to pick out a souvenir, and then almost passed out on her Dad's shoulder waiting for the parking lot tram. She was actually asleep before we got to the freeway- not surprising since she'd been up and on the go for 16 hrs!

The Dad and I tumbled into bed as soon as we deposited Ten in hers. It was a good Disney Day: not too crowded and not too hot/cold. But more than that, it was a great family day: a good surprise, a happy little girl and no angst from anyone.

Tenley's Fortune

2010-09-03T20:18:00.001-07:00

Chinese food for dinner. Read Tenley's fortune to her and she says, "I don't like that fortune. That cookie should mind it's own business."

Icecapades

2010-08-28T10:39:00.000-07:00

"China Sister" Lauren unintentionally did Ten a solid by having her 8th Birthday party at an ice skating rink. Ten has been wanting to go ice skating for the longest time ( I think it has something to do with that Barbie Pegasus movie where Barbie ice skates), but I am extremely clutzy, and her Dad hasn't skated in years. This was the perfect solution, and as it turned out, the perfect place.

Lauren's mom found this ice rink in Van Nuys ( www.vannuysiceland.com ) that from the outside looks highly questionable, but looks like every other ice rink I've ever been to on the inside.

The party started with what was seriously the coolest thing: ice bumper cars. Like bumper boats on ice. They were awesome. Ten was al little unsure before her first ride, but she got off all smiles and giggles and happily got right back in line for another spin.

After the bumper cars, we forced them to come into the warm party room for pizza and fries. They stuffed themselves with lightening speed, and then it was time to skate! They lined up to get their skates, and I have to say I was totally impressed that Ten knew her shoe size. Lauren's big brother Kevin helped me get Ten's skates laced on tight, I handed her a walker and put her on the ice!

She was a little unsure, and was barely moving her feet, but the walkers were great because she felt more confident and less likely to fall. As she made her way around the rink, she started moving her feet more and getting more centered in the walker. Lauren's cousin and big brother also came over and skated behind her for awhile.

She made several laps around the rink, and never fell! When it was time for cake and hot chocolate she exited the ice happy and said that ice skating was really fun.

After the party, we headed back over to Lauren & Amanda's house for dinner, hanging out and presents. Dinner was, as usual, delicious and the kids all happily played together with hardly any drama.

A happy birthday was had by all- especially the Birthday Girl, who we finally said good -bye to at 9pm so she could get some rest before her trip to Disneyland the next day.

Tenley passed out in the car somewhere around San Dimas, her first icecapade at an end.

OC Fair 2010

2010-07-30T23:10:00.000-07:00

We always go to the (very) big LA County Fair every September because it happens right over Tenley's birthday; but it has actually been a few years since we've been to the OC Fair in Costa Mesa.

The good thing about the OC Fair is that it's quite a bit smaller than LA and therefore easier to do in a day. It's proximity to the coast also means that on a Wed in July it was glorious- 75 degrees and sunny with a light breeze. They also do these nice community service days on Weds where you bring in kid's books/canned goods/school supplies/etc. and they give you free admission and a carnival ride-sweet!

When we started taking Ten to the fair 4ish years ago, she liked: seeing the animals, eating popcorn, looking at everything, and taking a spin on the carousel. Now, it's straight to the midway. No stopping, no passing go...no commercial buildings, no arts & crafts exhibits, no free entertainment, no food- just rides, rides rides!! This has been building steadily, and now that she's finally 44" and is starting to be able to go on things on the big midway, well there was no turning back for our little roller coaster loving sweetheart!

We wisely dropped $50 to get she and Jeff unlimited ride wristbands. She started with the swings, which she was delighted to go on all by herself.

Then she moved on to "the tall swings" ...the ones that go 115ft up in the air. She let Daddy go with her though.

Those were pronounced "so cool!" which was followed by "let's go again! C'mon Daddy!!" Repeat.

After 3 times on "the tall swings" and 2 trips on the "mouse trap coaster" with the spinning cars, Daddy needed a break from things that went in circles. So they headed off to the giant Euroslide.

Daddy was saved from returning to the circular rides by the arrival of Kim with Jaxon & Logan in tow. We headed off to see the farm animals and go to the kids midway so Logan could ride rides too.

What followed was a milking demonstration, some cool animal sightings, being licked by a baby jersey cow, a couple kiddie rides and a hot dog on a stick for all. And, one of Ten's last remaining early childhood joys- a pony ride.

...and then that was enough of that. Time to get back to the big midway and all the cool rides. She managed to talk Jaxon into a spin on the "mousetrap coaster", but by now it was close to 7 and the place was getting crowded, so Kim and I went and got Logan some fries and got in line for "the green rollercoaster" so they wouldn't have to wait as long. Jaxon passed on the green coaster, but it was only the prohibitivly long line that kept Ten from going again.

They hit a few other things, and then we said goodbye to K, J & L as they started the trek home. Then Ten got in her last desired ride before her wristband expired...this thing

...you know the one, where it spins insanely fast and you get stuck to the wall?? I couldn't believe she was allowed to go on it by herself, but her Dad wouln't let her go alone. It was the only ride I worried about all day- not that she would be scared, but that either she or Jeff would barf, because when you hurl on that ride it shoots out and makes a mushroom cloud that flies back and hits you in the face. Ugh- the clean up would not be pretty.

Fortunately, neither of them yaked. Ten got off all smiles and giggles and would happily have gone again if her father's constitution had allowed.

Her wristband expired, she happily allowed us to go through the commercial building, and by then we were all wiped out and staggered to our car- gratefull that we had paid the extra $7 for preferred parking.

T-35 days to LA County Fair for a repeat!!

Tenley vs. The Seaweed

2010-06-30T14:26:00.001-07:00

We went to the beach a few weeks ago and got these fun pictures of Tenley playing with all the seaweed she could get her hands on. Enjoy!

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

1st Dance: 2010 Father/Daughter Dance

2010-04-30T21:39:00.000-07:00

Ten has been very excited all week. Why? Because she knew that today was the Father/Daughter dance at her school. That meant she got to glam up and have Daddy all to herself . What could be better?

Last week I bought their tickets, found Ten this neon polk-dot number to wear (I loved the post-Easter 60% off, she loved the giant polka-dots), and orderd her a tiny Tenley-size corsage as a special surprise.

Then we made a plan: Jenny's Nails for a mani/pedi, and then to Aunty Meg's house to do her hair- because if anyone could get Ten's hair to curl (and stay curled) and look cute for 3+ hours, it was Aunty Meg.

Right after school, we headed to Jenny's where Ten chose neon green for her toes and neon pink with glitter over it for her nails. She sat very still, and by the time my pedi was done, she was all dry and ready to go get curls!

Aunty Meg and Uncle Dan celebrated the milestone of "1st Dance" by buying Ten her first piece of "real" jewlery. Ten was overwhelmed with this dainty little pearl and diamond on a 24k chain. They had the chain shortend so she could wear it, and it provided the finishing touch to her ensemble.

Aunty Meg had her arsenal of styling products and piping hot curling iron ready to go when we got there. She patiently pulled the front of Ten's hair back into three twists and then curled the whole thing in ringlets. She finished it off with ribbons and pink crystal hair screws.

We had just finished when the doorbell rang, signifying that her "date" was here to pick her up. She squealed and said "Wait! Don't let him see me yet!" as she ran down the hall to put her dress and sandals on.

Daddy presented her with her corsage. She didn't get it until we explained that it was a boquet you could wear. Roses you could wear??? She couldn't wait to show her friends!

I'm glammed up, wearing roses, and I'm the center of attention. Life is good!

The 2 best things that ever happened to me!

After patiently posing for the family paparazzi, they were off to the dance! I stuck around Aunty Meg's long enough to hand her kleenex as she teared up looking at Tenley's baby picture hanging in her room and muttering "Oh she's just so grown up!!"

The line for pictures was painfully long when they arrived, but Jeff & Ten dutifully waited so we could get pix of them before they were all sweaty and Ten's curls were gone.

About the dance itself, Jeff said:

" The dance was more crowded than I expected. My first thought was that all the dads would be lined up around the outside of the room while the girls stood in the middle giggling and talking to each other. To my surprise, everyone was dancing. There were girls of all ages, and Tenley immediately found her friends Emma, Ashlyn and Makeda. They were all so cute and loved comparing dresses and hair.

The DJ was playing all kinds of music- he had a pretty good mix. At one point he told all the girls to pay attention to the dads because they would know what to do with this song- and he played The YMCA. Tenley loved doing the hand motions, and I found it particularly funny when the DJ abruptly turned off the music and all the dads were singing.

We did The Chicken Dance, The Hokey Pokey and had a mean conga line going at one point. When the DJ played Butterfly Kisses, Tenley grabbed my hand and said, "This is slow sappy music. Let's go get a cookie." We got back in time for me to overhear one dad
tell another one that the next time he dances with his daughter to this song it will be at her wedding when he's giving her away.

All the girls enjoyed themselves, and I even got to take a little break when Tenley and Ashlyn decided they'd rather dance with each other.

Just a short while later, Tenley informed me that she would like to go to dinner now, because her legs were going to fall off. We collected her swag ( a pink carnation and a magic wand) and said good night to her friends. "

Jeff told Ten she could pick anywhere she wanted for dinner, and she chose......Coco's. Ok.

It was apparently during dinner that she asked her dad if he knew how to make spaghetti tacos. He was clearly confused, so Ten finally supplied that she was talking about the ones that Spencer makes on iCarly. Jeff inquired if she had ever had spaghetti tacos, and since she had not, how did she know she liked them? Her response was to fix her father with a what-are-you,-stupid?? stare and say "iCarly likes them!" with all the DUH! tone her little voice could muster. The woman sitting behind her nearly chocked on her $7.99 steak she was laughing so hard.

At 8:15 2 very excited dogs let me know that 1 very very tired little girl was home. I knew she was wiped by how heavy she was, and the fact that she begged me to take out her hair and get the dress off that just 3 hours earlier she couldn't wait to put on.

She managed to stay awake for stories, but she was gone the moment we turned out the light- my tiny Cinderella, dreaming happily of her first ball.

Smarty Pants

2010-03-29T20:04:00.000-07:00

We always said Ten was a bright little bugger. Ever since she was a baby, we could see the wheels turning in her little mind. Brilliance would come in tiny kernels: "octopus" as a first word, the ability to add in preschool- although she didn't know what she was doing (look Mommy 2 Cooper cars, 3 Bugs, and 4 Elements...that's 9 cars!), and lately she has pushed herself to figure out cursive writing (2 years early) and it's frighteningly legible.

Every parent thinks their kid is smart as a whip...but it's nice to occasionally get validation. This year, Ten got an Academic Achievement Award in Jan., in Feb. she was sorted into the advanced reading group, and today she made the Honor Roll. Actually, she made the Honor Roll with High Honors - meaning that 80% or more of her 2nd Trimester grades are at "A" and nothing is below "P" (proficient).

Way to go Ten! We're SO proud of you!!

Mrs. G's Class High Honors kids: Connor, Michael & Tenley

Smart is Sexy: Tenley & her buddy Em both made High Honors!

Can't wait to frame this!

The Bunny

2010-03-28T20:55:00.000-07:00

Spring has come once again, and with it comes our annual trip to visit the Easter Bunny. We have taken Tenley to visit the same Easter Bunny every year: he's the kid sized audio-animatronic one at South Coast Plaza. He's really cool because he's controlled by someone off site who has a camera and a microphone so he can talk to and interact with each kid individually. The other really awesome thing is that because we have gone every year, Ten's Bunny pix are a great chronicle of how much she's grown and changed during the year.

So here ( in order) are Tenley's Easter Bunny pictures. Hope you enjoy the stroll down memory lane as much as we do!

2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

Gymn Pix

2010-03-08T12:33:00.000-08:00

So I don't think we've ever really discussed Ten & Gymnastics. Ten has always had oodles of energy- the kind that makes you, the parent, want to tear your hair out because she hits the ground running and never stops...and it's been this way since the day they handed her to us. As a result, we have constantly looked for new and fun ways to wear her out since she was 9 months old.

She started gymnastics in Aug of '08- right in the middle of the Beijing Olympics- because "China Sister" Lauren had her birthday party at her gym and Ten loved it.

In August of '09 she got her first trophy for one year of continuous attendance. She was so excited to finally get hardware!

In September, she turned 5, and about 3 days after her birthday, Coach Tiffany called to invite her to join Level 1 Team Gymn. You could have pushed us over with a feather. Really? Turns out that Ten really is really good at gymnastics...and considering the amount of time she spends vaulting around our living room, she should be!

Team Gymn is not what you see on TV at the Olympics- that's Artistic Gymnastics (and you must be at least 7 to compete). Team Gymn involves a team of no less than 6 girls and/or boys who as a group do: vault, floor routine, tumbling, and mini trampoline.

Here are some random pix of The Fireflies at their competitions!

The Fireflies

At march in

About to start their floor routine...

Ten & Em in bridge

At the top of her tumbling pass

About to take off for vault...

In flight... (check out her awesome form!!)

Ok, the last pic is a really unattractive shot...but I put it in so everyone could 1. admire her amazing form, and 2. admire her incredible muscles!

Look at her extended leg! You could bounce a quarter off her tiny booty!

Kung Fu Surprise

2010-02-28T19:07:00.001-08:00

It's amazing to me that Christmas was only about 8 weeks ago. I know this because it was over Christmas break that Daddy bought Tenley a chocolate shake that turned out to be a mocha shake, and the resulting caffiene rush was what prompted us to enroll our child in kung fu that very hour.

Ten's been loving kung fu. For the longest time she said she wanted to "fight like Mulan"- and now she is. She pays attention in class (which has won her 2 t-shirts!), and is unafraid of taking on the boys in her class. The quality of her kicks improved as soon as we gave her a tv tray to use as a target and showed her how to send it sailing across the room.

At first it was hard for her to understand why some of her classmates were getting belt promotions. We tried to explain that each belt color had certain moves that went with it, and you had to be able to do all those moves to advance. Every 8 classes (4 weeks) you get a "tip"- a tape stripe on your belt, and after 4 tips you can move up a belt color if you can do the form! Ten takes this very seriously, and has been practicing her white belt form almost as much as she practices gymnastics. She has 2 tips, and was happy to learn that Master Tim would be back from vacation before it was time to promote her.

So, we were totally shocked and unprepared at kung fu last Tuesday when Master Tim announced that he was promoting Ten to yellow belt 8 weeks early!! Seriously?? apparently he and Master Dan discussed it and felt that she was deserving of her promotion and felt no need to make her wait. She was over the moon- at last she too was getting a new belt!

Master Tim presented a very happy Tenley with her Yellow Belt certificate.

...and Master Dan got the challenge of tying the ginormous yellow belt around the very tiny warrior princess.

Afterwards, Ten and Master Dan posed with her certificate and new belt, and we did our best to get a good picture on our cell phones!!

Congrats Ten! We're proud of you!!

The League of Extraordinary Bowlers

2010-02-23T08:38:00.000-08:00

Sat. Feb 20th marked a first for our family since Ten came home: this was the first year we have not gone to a Chinese New Year celebration. Although we welcomed the Year of the Tiger on the 14th, it seems that most public parades and celebrations took place last Saturday...at the same time as Alyssa's 6th birthday party. So, Ten had to make a choice: CNY or bowling with Alyssa friends. The bowling won.

Here we have The League of (Less Than) Extraordinary Bowlers who gathered for pizza and "Cosmic Bowling" (disco lights, glow neckalces and balls, loud dance music) to celebrate Miss Alyssa turning 6.

The League includes: Michael, Thomas, Isaiah, Briley, Makeda, Ashlyn, Emilee, Tenley and Alyssa.

The bumpers were raised, and they did have a slide to help them lob those oh so heavy 6lb balls down the alley, but they abandond the slide after the first couple frames and went with the "Fred Flintstone" softball pitch instead. Hilarious. I think there were at least 5 of them on each alley, and I'm not sure they ever actually completed a game; mostly because there were frequent stops for pictures, dancing, pizza and games of chase.

Jeff and I played 3 games on a neighboring alley, and were shocked to find that someone ( we have no idea who) managed to convince Ten to sit down and eat something. Had we suggested something so outrageous as stopping for food, the idea would have been immediately dismissed.

Getting them to stop bowling and sing "Happy Birthday" and therefore eat cupcakes piled high wih sugary frosting was not a problem at all.

2 hours and 20 minutes later we left with a tired, happy and hopped up on sugar little kid. Mom and Dad needed Ben Gay for their arms and wrists and some real food (ie. not bowling alley pizza), but a good party was had by all!!

Rainy Day & Tenley-isms

2010-02-09T09:40:00.001-08:00

The Daily Tenley:

Having apparently spent too much time in the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland, Tenley has become convinced that the drawing of Mulan by Eric Robison that hangs in her room is blinking it's eyes and watching her. So at 10:30 last night, Dorian Gray called me to her room to cover the portrait and upon waking this morning reminded me not to uncover it. Apparently, it's companion piece, a portrait of Mushu the Dragon, is not evil and may remain visible.

For her viewing pleasure over her breakfast of waffles this morning, Tenley chose to watch Big Cat Diary and was treated to watching lions have zebra for breakfast. Then she saw cheetas have some sort of antelope thing. Feeling very confident, she told us she could outrun a lion. We told her she might if it was old and had a bad case of rickets. But this prompted a drive to school discussion of which animal was more dangerous: tarantula or black widow? Black widow or "brown culoose"? "Boa constructor" or rattlesnake? Python or "anacondo"? I'm going with "anacondo" as they seem to attract bad tennents and can be a bitch to unload in a good economy.

I Dressed Myself!

2010-02-06T11:50:00.000-08:00

Cheerio !

2010-01-27T19:35:00.000-08:00

Mommy bought the Wii Cheer game and now Tenley has decided to become a Cheerio!

The Ice Cream Slurp

2010-01-26T20:54:00.001-08:00

Diggin' For Wormy Friends

2010-01-24T11:56:00.001-08:00

Today was a great day for digging up some new friends. Tenley raced outside and immediately dove right into the fresh mud and started pulling out worms. She got some really nice fat ones. Somewhere in the middle of all this she had time to stop and pose for the camera once or twice. Now she is just one dirty but happy little girl.

Self Portrait

2010-01-23T08:47:00.000-08:00

Tenley drew a self portrait so we decided to post that today.

One Happy Little Gymnast

2010-01-17T09:05:00.000-08:00

Here is Tenley after her first real gymnastics competition. She was so excited about her medal and flowers. The team did really well. More pics soon.

Gymnastics Girl

2010-01-16T11:49:00.001-08:00

On our way to Disneyland for Gymnastics Competition!

Certificate Day

2010-01-13T06:53:00.001-08:00

Tenley got an Academic Achievement Award on Monday. It was a bright, sunny day and she was really excited!

Mini-Mulan Warrior

2010-01-12T06:46:00.000-08:00

Tenley shows off her new Gi for her Kung Fu class.

Goofing Off At The Eye Doctor

2010-01-11T15:34:00.001-08:00

Sign Drawing

2010-01-08T09:13:00.001-08:00

Tenley works hard drawing the signs that she sees on the way to school.

Couldn't Get Her To Hold Still

2010-01-06T13:50:00.000-08:00

I could not get her to hold still for a picture today and sneaking up on her is very hard. So here is one of her 5-yr old pics from October. Enjoy!

January 5th Car Ride

2010-01-05T15:49:00.000-08:00

This unhappy car passenger is mad because Daddy won't let her have a drink of his Coke. What a horrible father I must be!

January 2nd Lunch

2010-01-02T14:42:00.000-08:00

Day two of the new year and Tenley has already decided to be a monster. You wouldn't know it from this pic but today has been one long whine and cry fest! Lucky us.

January 1st Coloring

2010-01-02T14:40:00.000-08:00

Tenley is working hard as a starving artist.

Welcome to 2010 !

2010-01-02T14:37:00.000-08:00

Welcome 2010! Super Hero Tenley has decided that we will do our best to post one picture of Tenley every day this year. Some will be cute and some will be just real life. Some will have stories to go with them and others will be left up to your imagination as to what might be going on. With Tenley, you never know. Enjoy!

Tenley Visits Santa

2009-12-19T17:35:00.001-08:00

This was Tenley's 5th visit to the man in the red suit and this year, more than before, she was looking forward to it and practicing all the things she was going to tell him while we were in line. I asked her what she was going to ask for first and she said that was rude because she hadn't thanked him for the nice email he sent to her. That was first on her list. Whoever it is out there who is teaching my child manners, I thank you. She is awfully cute and very, very excited to be with Santa.

Kindergarten Christmas Pageant

2009-12-18T21:04:00.000-08:00

Mrs. Goodwin's Kindergarten class presents the cutest pageant of all. Starring Tenley and a cast of 23 other ragamuffins. Enjoy the pics and the video!

Christmas Cookies

2009-12-13T14:39:00.000-08:00

shel and Tenley made the ever tasty and required decorated sugar cookies. They started by making the dough one night, then they rolled it out yesterday. Tenley really enjoyed rolling.

Today was decorating. Tenley concentrated very, very hard on her cookies.

She had very specific ideas of what her cookies were to look like. When they were done, Tenley was covered in powdered sugar, frosting and sprinkles.

The cookies came out great and taste yummy!

Fallbrook Gymnastics Evaluation

2009-12-05T21:40:00.000-08:00

Tenley had her first Gymnastics Competition/Evaluation tonight in Fallbrook. This was only an evaluation so there was no first place team tonight. There were several teams involved and a couple of teams were around the same age level as Tenley. She seemed a little nervous at first but got into the spirit of things right quick.

She had a good time and came home with a medal, t-shirt and goodie bag. Next up is the competition at Disneyland in January.

Decorating the Tree

2009-12-05T09:10:00.000-08:00

Last night we decorated our Christmas Tree. Tenley was very excited about the whole thing. She got to put the star on top and then she spent the next hour or so telling us which ornaments are her favorites. Mommy had to help with spacing because Tenley's idea of putting ornaments on the tree is to have them all in one convenient place for viewing.

This is a great age for Christmas because she is finally having fun and is really excited about all of it. I know it only lasts for a couple of years but I wish it would go on forever!

Santa's Response to Tenley

2009-12-03T19:49:00.000-08:00

This was Santa's response to Tenley's letter. It came addressed to Tenley from 1 Candy Cane Lane, North Pole. She was so excited as we read it to her.

Tenley's Letter to Santa

2009-11-29T17:06:00.000-08:00

This year was the first year that Tenley could write a letter to Santa. Mommy helped her with the spelling but Tenley did all the work. She seemed to think that this was an open invitation to ask for anything and everything. It was really cute.

1st Day of K

2009-08-28T22:30:00.000-07:00

Something momentous happened last Monday… Tenley started Kindergarten. Our first week has been hectic, but good.

All that money for those2 years of pre-school has paid off. Tenster trotted off to a new class of 24 kids for 6.5 hrs a day, 5 days a week without even blinking. She’s already ahead of where she needs to be, and in some cases is already at the point they want her to be at the end of the year. She comes home everyday talking about the things they did in school, and proudly shows me her sticker for daily good behavior and her worksheets with the stars and happy faces on them.

We saw her room and met her teacher, Mrs. G, on Thursday night at Back To School night. Jeff and I both really like her- and as usual, Ten’s got her snowed: she really likes Ten and thinks she’s the “sweetest thing and so polite.” Mrs. G is really kind & enthusiastic but firm with the kids, and very open with the parents.

This school is 12 miles from our house, and as a transfer student it’s our responsibility to get her there and get her there on time…or we could lose our transfer. Jeff and I made some practice runs over the summer- and of course there was no traffic- but with 3 elementary, 2 middle & 1 high school all within 5 miles of each other we expected the worst. But, oddly, no. Getting her there takes about 20-25 minutes and is a breeze. Picking her up is another story. You have to get to the school a minimum of 30 min before they let out to get a decent parking place…on Wed. I had to park 3 blocks away.

The 8am start time has presented a challenge for all of us: getting up at 6am. Nobody in this house is a morning person, and it’s a good thing I can program the coffee maker to wake up ahead of me. The only bonus is that with an early morning and all day Kindergarten, Tenley is finally going to bed at a decent time- 9pm. This is the first time since she came home that we’ve been able to consistently get her in bed before 10pm.

So, 1 week down; 40 something to go……

Gearing up for Kindergarten

2009-08-04T22:35:00.000-07:00

Here’s the gear! 3 weeks from yesterday, the Tenster will head off to her first day of Kindergarten! I am actually very happy about this. While a part of me thinks “Kindergarten?? Are you kidding?? She’s only a baby!!” because I’m sure that this is what she looked like yesterday,

another part knows that she’s smart and social and ready for the next challenge. I have fond memories of the excitement that came with each new school year: the joy of picking out that years lunch box, folders, notebooks & pens (this might be where my obsession with office supplies began); wanting to meet my new teacher and see my friends; getting new clothes; and the all important selection of my desk… I hope Ten will come to feel that way about it too.

I’m also happy because 2+ years of personal angst is at an end. The “Where Will Tenley Go To School” question has been a big ulcer inducer for at least that long. See, Jeff & I both went to private school and had very superior educations when we compared with kids that were our age. So initially we planned that for Ten too. But only 1 private school in our town is secular (and we were not happy with the curriculum or the school’s policies), and all the religious ones held issues too: freaky cult-like Christian, conservative proselytizing Baptist, ruler wielding nuns at the Catholics, Episcopalian that only went to 4th grade, etc . etc. etc.

That left us with public school…and a problem. The area that we live in was a nice middle class area when my parents bought the house almost 30 years ago. Now it’s a lower (way lower) middle class area. Here are some of the stats on the school that we’re districted for:
124 in Kindergarten
1022 in the school total
70.65% Latino, 19.28% White, 5.48% African American, 1.96% Asian
75% Socioeconomically disadvantaged
48% English Learners
% of Students performing at “proficient” or “advanced” on the CA Standards Test: English 39%, Math 44%, Science 28%
Only 21.2% of students in grade 5 meet the Physical Fitness Standard for the state
The school has been in PI status (requiring state and federal intervention) for 6 years.

You can see why I was having apoplexy over sending my kid there. Moving was (sadly) out of the question, so that left us with the hope of securing an inter-district transfer. 2 years of research led me to this: anyone can apply, and if a school has fewer applicants than openings in a particular grade- then all of those applicants get in. If the number of applicants exceeds the number of openings, then it goes to a computer generated lottery. Here’s the kicker: you can only pick one school and one alternate. So on May 1st I trotted over to the District offices and applied for Tenley’s transfer. Then I twiddled my thumbs and prayed until June 24th when I got the letter that we had been approved for a transfer to our 1st choice school! I was so excited I almost cried, and did jump up and down while screaming like I’d won the Showcase Showdown on The Price is Right. As a comparison, here are the stats of the school that Ten starts in 20 days:
86 in Kindergarten (which is full day K as opposed to ½ day!)
826 in the school total
50.48% White, 29.6% Latino, 8.6% African American, 8.5% Asian
17% Socioeconomically disadvantaged
7% English Learners
% of Students performing at “proficient” or “advanced” on the CA Standards Test: English 64%, Math 68%, Science 65%
31.1% of students in grade 5 meet the Physical Fitness Standard for the state
The school is not in PI. It is ranked 8th out of all schools (elementary, middle, high) in our district.

I have now breathed a sigh of relief. As a bonus, one of Ten’s friends at her pre-school also got a transfer to the same school- so now I’m praying that they’re in the same class, but we won’t find out until the 21st.

Let the learning begin!!

Pooh, Tenley and the Transformer

2009-07-22T23:30:00.001-07:00

Tenley and I started reading the Winnie The Pooh stories before bedtime. She seems to be enjoying them and we are progressing a story or two per night. Tonight we read the chapter where Pooh and Piglet try to capture a Heffalump. In the story, Pooh is trying to decide what kind of trap to lay for the Heffalump and he says to Piglet that it must be a cunning trap.

At this point, Tenley pipes up and says, "Daddy, I know how Pooh could get the Heffalump?" "A Transformer could be in the trap and it would just rip the Heffalump apart!"

I said, "Tenley, Pooh doesn't have a Transformer." She jumped up, dug around in pile of animals and toys that must sleep with her and produced her Transformer. She proudly held it out and proclaimed, "Well I have one!"

Take that Pooh! If you only had your own Transformer.

4

2009-07-21T14:10:00.000-07:00

Are you still here?!? You’ve been reading this blog for 5 years now, did you know that? I know that because we started the blog about a year before we actually got Tenley, and we just had our 4 Year Reunion!

This was just a small gathering of a few of the families from So Cal that were in our group- there was another reunion held up north that we unfortunately didn’t get to attend. The girls swam and played in the giant inflatable waterslide, swung on the swings and made tye-dye t-shirts! Here (thanks to Natalie) are some pictures of our beauties and their big sisters…

L-R: Maya, Katie, Carissa, Lauren, Grace, Tenley, Soshanna, Amanda, & Lila

Tenley...looking like a bad Japanese ad for popsicles ...or porn...or both......

Grace...living up to her name and being adorable....

Amanda...either showing us her manicure, or giving us the hand.....

Shoshi...just lovin life......

BANZAI!

2009-07-16T23:51:00.000-07:00

Yes folks, this is the end of Swim Lessons, Week I.

Ten has spent the bulk of her class time for the last two days underwater. Her choice, not the coaches: as she's sitting on the steps waiting her turn to practice a skill, the kid just holds her nose- takes a breath- and dunks under. Amazing considering that 2 weeks ago if you told her to go underwater she'd start screaming and crying.

The picture above was taken at the very end of today's class- the coaches decided to let the kids bail off the diving board into 9.5 ft of water (and the waiting arms of coach Brit). Coach Meghan was up on the board to stand behind them, bolster confidence, and give a little push. Alice was timid, and required a push but liked it so well she went back for a second time. Paige went in pretty well, but came up crying. Ditto Corbin. Mailia had to be pushed, and nailed poor Coach Brit right in the breast bone. Then came Ten. We expected Coach Meghan to block her exit and have to talk her up to it and give a little nudge...but no. Ten breezed right past her and confidently banzai'd right into the water. Jeff and I were floored. All smiles, she wanted to go again, but they were out of class time. She happily settled for ice cream in honor of a job well done.

Week II starts on Monday!

“If At First You Don’t Succeed, Try Try Again.”

2009-07-14T20:01:00.000-07:00

To say that Tenley didn’t succeed at the swim lessons she took in the summer of 2007 would be an understatement. We set her up for success, to be sure: it was a “parent and me” class taken with her favorite person in all the world- Daddy, it was only once a week (for 6 weeks), and they were taking it with best buddy Jaxon and his dad. Perfect recipe, right? Not so much. Ten & Jax spent 6 weeks velcroed to their dads screaming bloody murder while the other kids happily blew bubbles and learned to float. The experience was so bad, that Jeff vowed he would “never ever under any circumstances do that ever again!!”

So last year I just threw the summer activity guide away without even mentioning it….but I spent allll year telling her, “ Next year, you will take swimming lessons all summer and you will learn to swim!”

It comes down to this: Ten doesn’t like getting her head & face wet. She loves the pool, or a bath or shower- but there’s always drama if you get her head/face wet , or say try to rinse her hair.
So today, the time came for me to make good on my promise/threat. We signed up last week, and at 6:30 we tried again. I reminded her to listen to her coaches and that they would keep her safe.

She got right in. Coach Meghan said “blow bubbles”- she blew bubbles. Coach Brit took everyone down the side of the pool to kick- she went down the wall and kicked.

Then Coach Meghan said “ Ok everybody! Now we’re going to float on our faces!” I took a deep breath- the kind Ten needed to. I braced myself internally- when the screaming began, I was going to be kind but firm: she was not going to be allowed to get out. She still looked calm. Corbin, Alice and Mailia took their turns. Coach Meghan held out her hands to Tenley….
…who without a second thought went right to her, took a big breath, plugged her nose, and face planted in the water. She came up giggling. WTF? Yep. Floated on her back, on her face, dove under to get a diving wand off the bottom step, and jumped in and dog paddled back to the steps 3 times.

She got out shivering and pronounced swimming lessons “fun”, and was overjoyed to learn that she got to do it again every day for the next 4 weeks.

We’ll see if she still feels that way at the end of the week…but here’s to success!!

...And we stumble coming out of the gate

2009-06-22T21:13:00.000-07:00

Well it's summer. Tenley's last year of pre-school is officially over, and we've moved on to the more relaxed summer session at school- which we decided to only do 3 days a week of in the name of relaxation...and saving cash. So it's on to Kindergarten in just 9 short weeks (we still have no idea which school she's going to, but that's another blog post). Mostly, I think she's ready to be there...and then we have days like today...

One of the local gymnastics gyms is hosting 3 different weeks of summer camp: $200 for 5 days, 6 hrs. a day- it's an awesome deal. Plus, this gym has a foam pit which Ten loves, and her regular gym does not. I figured this was a prime way to a) get some extra "me" time, and b) allow Ten to experience a longer day on her own without 3 teachers looking after her- something she'll need next year in K. We got Ten all psyched for a whole week of all day gymnastics- and she's asked every week since registration if this was "gymnastics camp time". We made sure she understood that Mom & Dad would not be there- that she would be there after lunch and we would not be there until mid afternoon. She was good to go.

This morning, after we put on her shiny purple rhinestone encrusted leotard but before we left the house, I showed her that in her backpack there was: a washcloth for sweat, a hairbursh with extra hairbands, her Tinkerbell waterbottle, shorts & tank top & undies...just in case (although she hasn't had an accident at school since Oct). I reminded her that she was taking her purple insulated lunch bag with salami, cheese, carrots, strawberries & a juice box in the main compartment, and 1/2 a PB&J and a granola bar in the front pocket. I reminded her that she needed to remember to go potty, tell her coach that she needed to go, and to remember to grab a handfull of TP before she climbed up on the potty, because she wouldn't be able to reach it once she was up there.

We got there, and I was relieved to see that there were at least a couple other 4 year olds in this session too. We put her lunch in the fridge. I showed her where the bathrooms were. I reminded her to put her shoes in her backpack. The coaches called class time, and my kid ran onto the floor without so much as a good-bye or a hug and kiss. I watched for about 5 min and then left.

Life was quiet and blissfull for the next 5.5 hours.

I returned to the gym right on time to find my kid on the trampoline in her tank top...and underwear. I was mortified. First, where the hell were her shorts?!? Second, an accident?? Are you kidding me?? ...and on the first day. The nice mom of the other 4 year old said "I think she just had an accdent...I tried to offer her a spare leotard, but she said no." I thanked her and explained that she had shorts, and I had no idea why they weren't on. Tenley couldn't explain that either, nor could she explain why she had waited so long to go potty, or why she hadn't put the yucky leotard in the provided ziplock. So Ten then turns to me and says, "Mommy, I know you made me a peanutbutter and jelly today, but it wasn't in my bag!" Oh sweet Jesus. The kid's brain is like a sieve. The nice mom, horrified for my child says "Oh did she not get to eat?! Does she want a snack??" I check the bag and discover that the main compartment is empty of all but a couple strawberry bits. "Tenley", I say "were you not paying attention this morning when I showed you where your sandwhich was??" as I show her again. Clearly missing the point, she looks at me earnestly and says "Can I eat it now??" The nice mom asks kindly "Oh, when did she turn 4?" I sigh- and completely embarrassed say "She's almost 5." I look at her fed and dry daughter and say hopefully "When does yours turn 5?" "Oh she just turned 4." Yep. I'm mortified. The nice lady introduces her daughters and niece and taking pity on me and my clueless child asks her 11 and 8 year olds of they'll keep an eye on Tenley and help her tomorrow.

:::sigh::: These are the moments when I wonder why, for a child as bright as Ten is, she can't hold a relevant thought in her head. I could when I was her age...but maybe that was where I benefitted from full time day care- I had always had to remember things and sort of fend for myself in a sea of other toddlers. I am rarely embarrassed by something Ten does, but I was today: I felt like we were one giant mess, the objects of shaken heads and clucked tounges, and that I had a neon sign on me that said "Clueless Unorganized Mother". I'm sure that's not really the case- I think it was just my vision through the waves of heat coming off my cheeks.

Oh well, 4 days to go, and we have nowhere to go but up.

Summer Evening Fun

2009-06-20T19:31:00.000-07:00

Tenley decided she wanted to eat outside tonight so we grilled up some chicken, shrimp and corn and sat under the gazebo to eat. Unfortunately, between the time we decided to do this and the grilling was done, the wind kicked up and it actually got quite chilly. This was an eat fast before it gets cold meal. Tenley enjoyed herself immensely. I'm sure this won't be the last time we do this during the summer.

Tenley At Playschool

2009-06-16T08:59:00.000-07:00

Here is Tenley swinging her little head off at preschool. This is by far her favorite activity!

Russian Tenley

2009-06-13T10:59:00.001-07:00

Tenley found my Russian hat this morning and ran around the house giggling like crazy.

Water Fun

2009-06-12T17:07:00.000-07:00

A couple of weekends ago Tenley and I were working in what we loosely call a front yard. She got the hose and the hilarity ensued. Michelle snapped a few pics of Tenley studying the physics of water.

Pie Making

2009-05-28T14:47:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday, Tenley awoke with a frightful start from her nap. She was not totally awake but was screaming bloody murder. I was trying to comfort her while we were on the couch and she just kept sobbing. Suddenly, without any warning, she stopped crying, looked at me wide-eyed with a big grin and said "Daddy, can we make a pie?"

I was speechless. Less than a second ago she was a sobbing, snotty mess and now she wanted bake? And she wanted to bake something I had never, ever done before? I said sure! A quick trip to the store for some ingredients and we were making a mess in the kitchen. The pictures below show the very short story of the very long pie making process.

I love her crossed eyes in the this picture. She does this on purpose every now and then for pictures because she thinks she is being cute.

So this is the finished Mixed Berry-Double Crust pie from scratch. It was actually pretty tasty. Next up for the Tenley baking school will be a scratch white cake.

Things I Like...

2009-05-19T14:12:00.000-07:00

(Tenley pretending to be asleep on the couch at Target)

Things that I like about Tenley are...

Her amazement at Helicopters and airplanes. She is so excited any time she sees them.

Her ability to crack herself up over nothing.

When she says her lovey kept her up talking all night.

When she says to me "Calm down, she's only a puppy."

Her fabulous hugs.

The funny faces she makes.

The way that she knows and says out loud that people who litter are pigs.

When she puts bubbles on her chin like a beard and says she is Col. Sanders.

And most of all...

When I come home from work and she is smiling and waving at me from the front window.

Newest Family Member

2009-05-02T14:04:00.000-07:00

This is (Insert Name Here). Tenley says it will be Cinnamon. We are not sure yet, and are open to suggestions. She is the newest member of the family. All we needed was cat food. We ended up with another dog. For those of you keeping score, it is now 3 cats, 2 dogs, a 4-yr old and us. I believe I have gone completely insane. If I haven't then the menagerie here will drive me to the nut house soon enough I'm sure.

Tattoo Girl

2009-04-23T14:36:00.000-07:00

Tenley loves her tattoos. For Easter she got butterfly tattoos that come on long strips. Seemed like a perfect time to get a full sleeve. Now she is begging to have the other arm done.

Tenley and the Easter Bunny

2009-04-13T13:56:00.001-07:00

Tenley visits the Easter Bunny at South Coast Plaza.

Tenley on Vacation Part II

2009-04-09T19:00:00.001-07:00

Tenley is still on vacation with Grandma and Grandpa. Here she is trying to drive Grandma's truck.

Mommy and Daddy went to the Getty Villa in Malibu today to look at Greek and Roman works of art. We found a place to make our own Roman pottery so we made a message for Tenley.

Tenley on Vacation

2009-04-07T12:32:00.000-07:00

Tenley is spending the week with Grandma & Grandpa. She seems to be having a great time climbing trees and going to the amusement park.

Tenley playing

2009-04-02T10:51:00.000-07:00

Tenley plays with leaves while we wait at Olivia's for dinner.

Winter Wonderland

2009-03-23T11:06:00.000-07:00

2008 was a year of firsts for Ten: she saw the beach for the first time in the summer, and she saw snow for the first time in December. Yes, I am so far behind in posting, that I am actually just now showing you her 1st trip to the snow from the week before Christmas!

Our preferred method of visiting the snow is to make the short, easy, non-mountain road trip to the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway http://www.pstramway.com/. You buy your ticket at the base station, then you take a 2.5 mile ride up the mountain in a rotating tram car, and at the top you see the picture above: 3o some odd acres of snow covered wilderness just waiting to be explored. There are hiking trails, hills for sledding, and you can rent snowshoes and cross-country skis.

We slipped and slided down the icy trails into a nearby meadow, where Ten figured out the art of the snowball fight rather quickly. She attempted to make a snow angel, but as she's not very heavy, it didn't really make much of a picture. She also attempted to build a snowman, which was alot harder than she expected it be. This caused a fair amout of bitterness and a small meltdown.

We decided to try out the sled I picked up at Sport Chalet. Jeff got this brilliant idea to blaze a trail through 3 ft of snow to try to find our own private hill. Ten insisted on going with him. I wisely stayed on the trail and took photographs of the carnage as they became completely stuck (the pictures are not posted, as I am probably the only one besides Jeff who would find them funny). When they managed to wade back out 30 minutes later, they were freezing & exhausted, and agreed to sled on well used sledding paths.

All in all, the little monster had a good time; and has talked about going back to the snow ever since. The tram still appears to have plenty of snow, so we might have to indulge her again one day soon!

Chopstick Lover

2009-03-10T20:32:00.000-07:00

Tenley enjoys playing with her chopsticks while out to dinner for mommy's birthday.

On the way to Clovis.

2009-03-06T12:58:00.000-08:00

Gardner Tenley

2009-02-20T17:48:00.000-08:00

Tenley plays in the weeds, I mean the grass in the front yard. She says she likes the weeds better than grass.

Sad Tenley

2009-02-18T18:09:00.000-08:00

Tenley is sad because mommy is in Palm Springs taking care of grandpa Duke.

Tenley Goes Postal

2009-02-09T11:14:00.000-08:00

Mrs. Brown, parent of one of the kids in Tenley's class, is a "streetwalker with benefits" a.k.a. mail carrier and graciously arranged for Ten's class to visit the downtown post office for a tour.

Now since Ten's favorite part of her "Elmo Holidays" dvd is Mail Carrier Kelly, and her general fascination with letters and stamps, I figured she would be all gung ho about this- I was: I'd never seen the inside secret part of the post office, so I naturally volunteered to chaperone.

Max the Mail Man gave us our tour, and I found the whole thing really interesting. This particular post office was the first one in our town, and the building was done in 1931. They have great pictures of it being built on the wall, and it still has the old PO Boxes with the engraved numbers and brass keys. It also made it very easy for me to understand why I frequently get someone else's mail.

The kids were only marginally interested: they wanted to play with the parcels, re-sort the mail, and go for rides in the express mail bin.

We did put them on the giant freight scale (been there since 1939) in the back to see how much the class weighed and how much it would cost to ship them somewhere else.

Answer: 767 lbs. of Pre-Schooler! $563 Parcel Post to ship them to somewhere in NY.

The kids favorite part of the trip was, without a doubt, getting to play in the mail truck. They sat on the cargo lifts, re-arranged the sorting bins, pretended to drive, and honked the horn.

And despite my daughter's seeming indifference to this little outing, I have a sneaky suspicion that I will be hearing about all the wonders she saw at the post office for a long time to come.

Rainy Day Hunting

2009-02-07T16:32:00.001-08:00

What do you do on a cold and rainy Saturday in Southern California? You talk your daddy into putting you in old rain boots that don’t fit, you promise to wear your jacket with hood and you swear on everything that is holy that you will not lie down in puddles to pretend you are swimming. Then you go outside and dig in the mud looking for worm friends.

Such is the life of a 4-year old!

Gung Hay Fat Choy!

2009-02-05T10:42:00.000-08:00

I know, I know: we're bad bloggers and it's been more than a month since we updated. You may flog us with a wet lo mein noodle.

On January 26 we said "Goodbye!" to the Year of the Rat, "Hello!" to the Year of the Ox, and "Happy Birthday" to Aunty Tina. The arrival of Year 4706 was celebrated with a (sort-of) traditional Chinese dinner...if you're willing to count PF Changs as traditional, and you're willing to overlook the fact that the only traditional CNY food on the table was Lo Mein. Ten looked lovely in her new black Qi Pao with the pink & blue blossoms on it.

We ended up scrapping our plans to attend the CNY Parade in LA this year, but we did meet up with Scott, Gaynor, Lauren & Amanda for the festivities at the Huntington Library & Gardens in Pasadena. Despite being Super Bowl Sunday, it was beyond crowded, and there were lots of families there that looked like ours.

Our first stop was to see some Chinese dancers. Ten really liked the first dance that was done with the long silk fans. The peacock dance was a little slow for her, but she was all about trying on a lion dancers costume afterwards.

We wandered through the Chinese Garden and admired the koi fish before heading back to the Sculpture Garden to get a seat for the Kung Fu demonstration and Lion Dance. Ten liked the Kung Fu, and boldly declared that that was like Mulan. I have a feeling I may be searching for a pee-wee Kung Fu class soon. There were 5 Lions dancing: 2 red, 1 green, 1 pink, and a tiny Tenley-sized one. Ten liked the pink one best, and was thrilled when it came up and wiggled it's ears in her face.

After the Lion Dance, we took the girls to the Children's Garden and let them run free for a while before we headed home, having once again fulfilled our promise to the govenment of China to expose our daughter to her native culture.

On Monday, I did my best to make my daughter feel special and instill a sense of pride in her heritage by teaching Chinese New Year to her pre-school class. We read a book about CNY traditions; ate mandarin oranges, crunchy noodles and almond cookies; and made paper lanterns. Everyone was covered in cookie crumbs and glitter, and a good time was had by all.

This is my favourite picture from Chinese New Year:

Behold 'Bitter Angry Tenley'! What produced this charming face and caused the temperature of her head to rise 10 degrees?? Well, you can't pick flowers at the Huntington, but you can pick up blossoms that have fallen. On the way to the lion dance Ten, Lauren and Amanda all picked up fallen blossoms. But Ten discarded hers....and then apparently forgot that. So in the middle of the lion dance she sees Amanda holding her flower- and goes ballistic. She tries to say that Amanda's flower is hers, and that Amanda has taken it, and she wants it back NOW. We know better, we tried to remind her that she had tossed her flower, and told her she could get another later. Ten was having none of it. Finally we told her to stuff it, and if we heard one more peep out of her about it, we were going home. Well, she shut up....and settled for giving all of us the look of death. We laughed at her. Ahhh, the joys of dealing with a 4 year old!!

Christmas Pictures

2008-12-29T09:53:00.000-08:00

Over at Waiting for Sophie, my friend Shana always has these long posts that are picture after picture of her cutie pie, Sophie Lu, from one of the little photo shoots that Shana does at her gorgeous house. You never see that here, because I can't get Tenley to cooperate for more than 5 minutes- and she frequently responds to the sight of a camera by turning her head and refusing to smile.

Today, however, everyone in blogland gets a Sophie-style photo log of Tenley, because we are such award winning parents that we completely forgot to take pictures on Christmas.

This year, Santa brought Ten her own tv and dvd player! This was really a present for Mom & Dad, who were tired of having a war over who got to watch whose movie on the one and only tv in our house.

Other big hits in the present department this year included the jungle gym and Disney princess pajamas from Grandma Susie, the Barbie Razor scooter from Great-Grandpa, Bella Dancerella "Swan Lake" dvd/ballet bar/mat from Mom & Dad, the Disney Princess comforter from Grandma Barbara, and the Kohl's Cares Brown Bear plush from Nana Ruthann.

It was cold and rainy- as close as we get to a white christmas in the valleys of So Cal. We were lucky enough to get to see almost everyone in our real and extended families. We've missed a few people (and you know who you are), but we're hoping to get to see you soon.

Here's hoping that everyone's holiday was merry and bright!

Clothes Goober

2008-12-28T17:17:00.000-08:00

Shopping with Tenley is always an adventure.

Barbies and Horses

2008-12-26T10:13:00.000-08:00

Sitting on the floor playing with Barbies and horses. Nice day after
Christmas activity if you ask me.

Random Tenley Quote

2008-12-18T19:53:00.000-08:00

Upon entering the family-room and seeing Dumbledore fighting Voldemort on the TV, Tenley said...

"He's so Obi Wan Kenobi!"

That's my girl!!

The Christmas Tree That Ate My Living Room

2008-12-08T21:32:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the Enchanted Fairy Forest, formerly known as the Family Room. The Abeis Grandis that currently dominates the rather small family gathering place in our home was not exactly planned, but rather the culmination of events that snowballed into the behemoth depicted below.

Event 1: On Sunday, in a complete reversal of my stance in Saturaday's conversation, I state that I think we ought to buy the tree now so that we have a good selection to choose from and can enjoy it for longer; even though it will doubtlessly be a fire hazard by the time we're gathered around it opening presents. Oddly, Jeff thinks this sounds like a good idea.

Event 2: I visit the National Christmas Tree Association online (www.christmastree.org) and decide that I'd like to branch out, and try a Grand Fir or White Fir. This is a bold move for our family as both Jeff and I have only ever had Noble Firs, either real or faux. Jeff is all for it- even my desire to have it flocked with the fake sparkly snow.

Event 3: Jeff announces that he wants a "big tree" this year, instead of the 3 or 4 footer that we usually get. I'm down with it, as long as it clears the 8ft ceilings in The Albatross- Jeff assures me he doesn't want anything taller than he is.

Event 4: We visit a local tree lot that has a nice selection- including several of each variety of tree they sell that have already been pre-flocked. We discover that White Firs are hard to come by, and Grand Firs are huge compared to Nobles; but we remain steadfast in our decision. We then find a pre-flocked Grand that is on the short side, narrow and flocked just the way I like them. In short, it's perfect. It's also $85. Our inner Scrooge comes out, and we decide to check out some other lots. We are stupid, and do not think to ask if they will hold the tree.

Event 5: An hour and 3 more tree lots later, we return to the original lot, and arrive to see the perfect tree being carried out, having been sold 2 minutes prior to our return. Despondant, we scour the towering Grand Firs until we find an acceptable one that's a foot taller than Jeff, and about as thin as we could hope for. We give the flocking directions (medium flock- all over), empty our bank account, and get a claim check to return at 5 for our symbol of holiday joy.

Event 6: Jeff goes to retrieve the tree while Ten and I haul in the bazillion boxes of ornaments and decorations. Then my phone rings, it's Jeff: he has the tree, but it's been flocked wrong. Way wrong- in my most despised style of flocking with nothing but clumps of heavy flock on the tips of the branches. Can it be fixed? No, once it's flocked- it's flocked. Did they give us a refund? Well, they gave us $15 back. It looks fine. Jeff drives through the black hole on Van Buren and we lose the connection on the cell phone.
I'm furious. I call my Mom to vent. "Almost $90 for a piece of wood that will be dead in two weeks and in the throes of death will crap up my carpet with lethal vaccum cleaner clogging schmutz??? It had better be exactly the way I want it, or I want my money back! Or a new tree!"
Jeff gets home, and it's not ok. I tell him that if he won't take it back, I will. My husband is a smart man, and he didn't think that "Shel is spending the holidays in San Quentin after running down and flocking to death a gaggle of X-Mas tree lot workers after they ruined her tree" would look real good in the family Christmas letter, so he decided to take it back himself.

Event 7: The nice tree lot guys have psycho wives too, and they feel his pain. No problem. Pick a tree- any tree- and they will give it to him as a replacement. They had a really nice pre-flocked one that they wanted to give him- but it was on hold (apparently by smart people). Then they tried to get him to take a 12 footer, but Jeff feared that everyone would get cold having to open presents in the front yard since the tree wouldn't fit in the house. He finally selected one, and they checked off the flocking boxes and wrote specific directions in Spanish on the back of the tag. He said it was a really nice tree, and worth more that the original.

He neglected to mention that it was 8 ft tall, and roughly as big around as Jabba the Hut.

Conclusion: This tree's gay green (and white) dress does delight us. It just takes up half the room and scrapes the ceiling. There's 2 ft of room between the chair (not pictured) and the edge of the tree. The pass-through from the kitchen is currently useless. DB Cooper could be sitting on my end table and you'd never know, because you can't see around the tree. I wish we had more money, because there's alot of room for loot under this bad boy, and the few presents we're buying are going to look pretty pathetic.

It does, however, smell fabulous. You open the front door and the smell- TREE- smacks you right upside the olafactory gland. It also has the distinction of being the first tree in our 10 Christmases that can support my Belleek star...and our usual tree topper: the green Intel Pentium II man.

...may your days be merry and bright...and your tree be (correctly) flocked white.

And The Hits Keep Coming

2008-12-05T20:20:00.000-08:00

Among the many insults hurled at mommy by Tenley are, "Hey, where's that lady?" and "I'm sorry you have no friends" and the ever popular "I'm not your friend" and tonight's winner was:

"Mommy, you're not impressive!"

This was stated in the car on the way home from dinner. That's Tenley, always good for a laugh!

Random Tenley Quote

2008-12-05T19:57:00.000-08:00

Proclaimed by Tenley during dinner at The Dragon House...

"Everything was so beautiful and everything was so Chinese"

Random Tenley Quote

2008-11-29T14:32:00.001-08:00

"Mommy, I'm sorry you don't have any friends...but you have aminals!

Happy Thanksgiving

2008-11-27T14:21:00.000-08:00

I Gave a Bunch of 4 Year Olds The Bird

2008-11-25T13:33:00.000-08:00

Yep, I did it. I gave them The Bird. Right there in pre-school. In front of their teachers, no less. Actually, I gave their teachers The Bird, but they (the 4 year olds) were the intended recipients. Those 4 year olds (including my own) had it coming to them- there they were prancing around in pilgrim hats and being happy (and noisy) at 8 in the morning...after I had spent a mostly sleepless night in Tenley's room warding off monsters. I figured "Why not? Let the teachers deal with with the fall out from this!"

So I smiled and gave it to all 20 of them....

with a jaunty wink and a "Bon Appitite!"

...Good luck gettin' those little pilgrims down for a nap.....

Cardboard II

2008-11-16T19:07:00.000-08:00

Influenced by an episode of "Wow Wow Wubzy!" and an episode of "Backyardigans", Tenley has decided that she wants to be a robot. The truth is that as robots go, Tenley is far more Terminator or Cylon than R2D2.

Tenley Has Worms

2008-11-15T15:23:00.000-08:00

Tenley is holding worms from Grandma's plants. She giggled as they
crawled all over her hands and arms.

The Best Toy Ever

2008-11-15T10:12:00.001-08:00

Nothing is better than your own spaceship, truck or train. And the
very best thing of all is when those things are made with your
imagination and a cardboard box.

My Chauffer

2008-11-13T07:48:00.000-08:00

Tenley decided she would drive to preschool today and I could ride in
her car seat.

Random Question of the Day

2008-11-08T10:12:00.001-08:00

We were driving along when Tenley asked me a question....

"Daddy will you take me to Scotland?"

Gotta love the way a 4 year old mind works!

Happy Halloween 2008

2008-11-03T21:37:00.000-08:00

The Halloween festivities started early this year with the annual trip to Disneyland for Mickey's Halloween Treat waaay back on the 4th.

We spent the afternoon enjoying the nice weather and going on rides at Land with Scott, Gaynor, Lauren, Amanda and big brother Kevin. Then the whole tribe headed to dinner where we met up with Kim, Zak, and best buddy Jaxon - which (sadly) ended up being the only time we saw them all night! When dinner was over, we rendezvou'd with Doug, (a very sick) Tina, and future husband James dressed as Buzz Lightyear to begin the candy harvest at CA Adventure.

We got divided (didn't conquer), but still managed to to end up with enough candy to cause our children's dentistis to spontaneously begin twitching. This year, that wasn't much of a concern for Miss Ten: she was way more interested in going on rides and seeing the princesses. Regardless, she & Amanda were adorable as our "twin" Belle's.

Later on we split up again so Ten could hit a few more rides, and as luck would have it, she got to see Belle herself right before we went home.

She did the whole day: school, drive, D-land, dinner, 4 hrs of Halloween Treat with no nap and a remarkably good attitude. It was no surprise when she passed out on her dad's shoulder waiting for the tram.

The middle of the month brought Amanda's birthday party, and Break-fast (see previous post re. the Peanut Butter Bar incident). Then it was time for the annual trip to the Live Oak Canyon Pumpkin Patch. www.liveoakcanyon.com

This year's trip was so-so. It was hot (80+ degrees) and Ten had refused breakfast that morning so she was a cranky kid by the time we got there. As usual, the goats in the petting zoo (who are bigger and heavier than Ten) knocked her down and took her cup of feed, prompting boatloads of tears, harsh words directed at the goat, and a replacement cup of feed provided. Repeat. At that point you just remove the crying mess of a pre-schooler and try to wash her hands.

Ponies were ridden, ATV train was ridden solo this year, bounce houses were bounced in. The tiger slide was attempted once and deemed "scary". We did, however, talk her into trying the super trampoline. She was a little unsure about the whole thing, and her initial jumps were attempted awkwardly with straight legs- odd since she loves the trampoline at gymnastics.

But then the trampoline guy did her a solid, and raised her weight so she was off the tramp and pulled her down and let her fly high on the bungees. She loved it- all giggles and grins from ear to ear.

Our last order of the day was to hike out into the pumpkin patch for our annual picture and to procure a suitable gourd for carving.

Since the holiday fell on a Friday this year, we decided to go to Jeff's parents house in Clovis. We drove up on Thursday morning and spent Thursday night carving our pumpkins and toasting the pumpkin seeds.

This year marked a 1st for Tenley: she went Trick-or-Treating. For real. Usually we go to Aunty Kim's or one of the local churches for their carnival and Trunk-or-Treat, so Ten knew nothing about the traditional door-to-door method of candy collection. Fortunately, the Grandparents live in a nice, safe neighborhood where everybody knows everybody and it's still safe to trick-or-treat like we did when we were kids.

We got her all dressed up and explained the process. She looked at us as if to say "You expect me to believe that if I knock on someone's door, utter some nonsense words, and hold out a bucket- that they'll just give me candy???"

We started her out easy at Joe the next door neighbor's house- whom she just loves. Though dubious, she followed the instructions, and was delighted when Joe dumped a handful of candy in her pail. By the third house, she had the hang of it and we were told to hurry up, because we were aparently slowing her down. Now she was looking at us like "You two have been holding out on me." She did a couple blocks and called it a night. However, each item in the bucket has been counted and inventoried. There will be no removing anything without her knowing.

It was a good trip, and we may do it again next year. Sat & Sun morning were spent relaxing and playing before the long drive home.

Welcome November- bring on the Bird!!!!

Pig Tails

2008-10-25T14:09:00.000-07:00

Tenley looks fabulous in her pig tails and Halloween kitty shirt. We
are on our way to the Pumpkin Patch!

God Makes Them Cute so You Won't Kill Them

2008-10-21T13:47:00.000-07:00

We celebrate all the Jewish holidays with our friends and travel-mates Scott & Gaynor and their adorable daughters (and Ten's China Sisters) Lauren & Amanda. Scott loves anything with peanut butter, so it was no surprise a couple weeks ago when I started making a Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie to take over to their house for "Break-Fast" aka Yom Kippur. Now, the running gag is that I'm not allowed to set foot in the house unless I have a pan of Crunchy Peanut Butter Bars - which belong only to Scott, are immediately hidden, and which he does not share- hence the Pie which was to be shared.

Since I worked both jobs on Wed, I only got the Pie made- but I wasn't concerned because I had plenty of time on Thursday morning to make the bars. So the well timed plan was: get up, breakfast, grocery shopping, make bars, lunch w/ Aunty Kim & Jaxon, leave for Scott & Gaynor's house approx. 5 billion miles away.

All was well...except that I desperately needed a shower & Ten needed a bath. I worked it out: bake the bars- cool slightly- glaze; then shower while the glaze set, throw Ten in tub, do chocolate ribbon while Ten plays in bath, bars will finish cooling and icing will set while we have lunch- voila! ready to cut & transport before we leave!

Everything was going according to plan. Ten helped mix & bake the bars, and was coloring happily while watching "Wow Wow Wubzy!" while I did the glaze- she even got to lick the spoon.

I jumped in the shower.

15 min later I was out & Ten was in the tub.

I decided to make sure the glaze was set enough for the chocolate before I started the double boiler.

and THIS is what I found:

What the? Oh no. Horror. Cat?? No, wait....those look like little finger trails.....

"TEEEEENNNNNLLLLEEEEYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!" People at the other end of the street probably heard me. I storm into the bathroom & demand an accounting....and she LIES!!!!!

"Tenley! Did you drag your grubby little fingers through the glaze on Uncle Scott's Peanut Butter Bars???"

"No."

Must. Control. Fist. Of. Death.

"Really. Then who RUINED them?"

No reply. She starts looking at her feet poking out from the bubbles.

"Did you do that?"

She nods.

I give her the speech about how disappointed I am in her behavior, that she ruined Uncle Scott's special dessert, what "double dipping" is and why it's gross, and tell her that she has lost the priviledge of lunch with Jaxon. (It is difficult to do this with a straight face when the person you're admonishing has soaped their hair into bunny ears and has a bubble beard a'la Colonel Sanders.)

I call Gaynor who laughs so hard she snorts, and assures me that Scott won't care. I call my Mother to confirm that my proposed method of fixing them will work- she laughs so hard she chokes, and tells me it will. I send a picture from my cell phone to Jeff - he calls me and all I hear is laughter. :::sigh::: I call Aunty Kim to cancel lunch- and she takes my side- she'd be really ticked if Jaxon did it too! Thank you!

Truthfully? It's funny....now. My own fault, I know. I just didn't think she'd bother them. She'd never done anything like that before. I learned my lesson, and if I had a chalkboard, I'd write it 1,000 times:
I will not trust a 4 year old I will not trust a 4 year old I will not trust a 4 year old I will not trust a 4 year old I will not trust a 4 year old I will not trust a 4 year old I will not trust a 4 year old I will not trust a 4 year old I will not trust a 4 year old I will not trust a 4 year old I will not trust a 4 year old.....

The Big Chair

2008-10-20T10:21:00.000-07:00

Here is Tenley trying out a big chair at Crate and Barrel on Saturday.
She had the best time going from chair to chair.

Blue Ice Cream

2008-10-19T22:14:00.000-07:00

This is Tenley's favourite ice cream from Basking Robbins called Wild Ride. It's a blend of apple and blue rasberry that is very, very tart. She would eat a gallon of it if we would let her.

Today Tenley Said....

2008-10-06T09:36:00.000-07:00

Today while getting ready for school, Tenley said.....

Tenley: "Daddy, did you know Uncle Dan is a Police Officer?"

Daddy: "Yes I did know that."

Tenley: "Are you a Police Officer??"

Daddy: "No"

Tenley: "Oh (thoughtful pause)...Uncle Dan is really cool!"

Nice. Not even 8am and already dissed by a 4 year old.

Tenley Turns 4!

2008-09-26T19:59:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, the Tenster celebrated her 4th birthday. Being the award winning parents that we are, we’re just now getting around to telling you about it!

Having just recently discovered that starting next year in Kindergarten I will no longer be able to bring cupcakes to class for my little girl’s birthday, I went all out and made ice cream cone cupcakes this year. The reason this is “all out” is that you really can’t make these things a day ahead of time- the cone gets disgusting. So this necessitated me getting up at 4:30 in the morning to bake-cool- and frost with the star tip in the pastry bag so they look like real ice cream and we could take them to school at 8:30. They were a hit.

The big day began with opening presents from Mom & Dad while waiting for Grandma & Grandpa to come over so we could go to breakfast. She was underwhelmed with her Sonya Lee doll, liked her Map of the United States puzzle, very excited about the Barbie watch (she’s been asking for a watch for a couple of months- and no, she can’t read it accurately or tell time), and over the moon with joy about the plastic knight’s sword with sheath I bought for her at the $.99 Only store. Go figure. Grandma and Grandpa arrived, and were greeted at the door by the birthday girl clad only in Tinkerbell underwear with a sword stuck in the side of them. We eventually managed to get the sword out of her undies and get clothes on her so we could go to Ruby’s for breakfast.

We returned home and Ten went outside to play on the swing set that Grandma & Grandpa had given her as a present. It had arrived before her birthday (actually it arrived the day after we left on vacation, and the giant 150 lb. box lived on our porch the whole time we were in Atlanta) so it was already set up and in daily use. Then Grandma Suzie arrived with her present…and we all trouped out to the front yard for the presentation & to see how it was received.

From the moment my Mother saw that Tenley sized Formula 1 car, she knew she was going to get it for Ten- just as soon as they had the Team Ferrari red one back in stock. And now here it was (it had been in it’s box in our garage for 3 months) all put together, charged up, and absolutely adorable. We were a little worried about her reaction, because best bud Jaxon has a Power Wheels 4x4 Jeep that she’s afraid of. Turns out that we had nothing to worry about. She jumped right in and with minimal instruction she was on her way up the street. She spent the better part of an hour going back and forth and doing donuts in the neighbor’s driveways. The thought of her 16th birthday causes me to shudder. The only way we actually got her out of the car was to remind her that we were going to the fair. That was sufficient motivation to step out of the vehicle – but only after reassuring her that it was staying at her house and she could drive it again when she got home.

It was a very tired and already over stimulated Tenley that arrived at the LA County Fair. She actually handled it pretty well, but the were several times that I kicked myself for not bringing the little stroller so that she might have been able to sneak in a cat nap. Her unlimited ride wristband let her hit all her favorites – although she was very put out that she couldn’t ride the Tilt-a-Whirl (not even with an adult) and that she was still too short for some of the more thrilling kids rides. There was also the annual trip to the cows (and drinking of the world’s greatest chocolate milk), she got a henna tattoo just like Mommy’s (ruining her shirt in the process), and we took her to the Winter Wonderland building where she played in the “snow box” and went sledding with her Dad. I foresee a trip to the snow this winter.

Eventually everyone was exhausted and we decided to call it a birthday. Ten ended her special day by blowing out the candles and feasting on the giant chocolate cupcake we bought her. She collapsed into bed not an hour later, and the first thing she wanted to know when she woke up was if it was still her birthday.

Happy Birthday little Warrior Princess!

Dragon Con

2008-09-19T22:51:00.000-07:00

My favourite author in the world is Anne McCaffrey. She has more than 100 books to her credit, is now 82- lives in Ireland- and has broken both hips- had a heart attack and a stroke. So when I found out that she was “crossing the pond” to attend Dragon*Con, there was no way I was going to miss what might be my last chance to meet this woman and get her to sign my books.
Dragon*Con is a 4 day sci-fi/fantasy/pop-culture freak fest that takes place over Labor Day in Atlanta. I actually went to DC back in ’94 (for the same reason, but Anne fell and broke her hip and didn’t get to come) – and my has it changed! It is now the second largest convention of its type in the US (right after ComiCon), and it focuses on science fiction and fantasy, science, gaming, comics, literature, art, music, and film. It is attended by all manner of fans. Some who are merely interested and some who live the life! Can I just say that the people watching was amazing. People dressed up as their favourite characters, authors, actors, aliens and even some original ideas (DO see the pix below).

There’s so much to see and do- and now that the Con is so big and so crowded there’s very little time to do it. I had no trouble getting a 3rd row seat for the reading that Anne did on Friday, but I had to get in line 2.5 hours before her book signing session on Sunday (and I was still #67). Lines meant we had to make some choices about events. Since I was in line for the book signing, I missed getting to attend the Miss Klingon Empire beauty pageant (www.trektrak.com/2008/08pageant.htm) because the line to get into the pageant started at about the same time. Jeff, however, used the 2 hours of down time as an opportunity to do something good: he hit the blood drive and opened up a vein for the Red Cross- netting a t-shirt and winning a lightsaber in a donor raffle in the process. We also had to divide and conquer: on Sat. morning Jeff went and watched (and photographed) the parade, while I went and got in line (1.5 hrs early) to get seats for the Torchwood panel (apparently there are A LOT of women out there who are warm for James Marsters form).

We did make it to the Mr.Star Wars contest, the MST3K panel and viewing, the Ghost Hunters panel, a random reading of a script by an author who commandeered actors from the audience, the art show, the build-your-own-droid demo and contest, all three dealers rooms and a concert by a “darkwave” band called The Cruxshadows and found that we really liked the Goth/NewWave/Sudo Vampire music. We even bought the current CD. Most of our time was spent happily wandering around with large drinks in our hands taking pictures of the various costumed freaks.

The weekend was made more interesting by the fact that we weren’t the only people in town. Chick-Fil-A decided to hold a pre-season bowl game between the Alabama Crimson Tide and Clemson University. So the town was awash in 70,000 normal unsuspecting people swathed in red or orange circulating among the various fairies, cylons, jedi, etc. These poor people had no idea about the Con, and clearly didn’t know what to make of it. It was also Black Gay Pride weekend. Need I say more?? Clearly, this was the city to be in if you were looking for a photo-op.

Jeff had a great time and says he’s totally willing to go back. I’d love to go again and do the Writer’s Track…we’ll see how this year goes. Watch the slideshow below to see some pix we snapped during our weekend. Enjoy!

1st Loss

2008-09-15T11:56:00.001-07:00

Beeps McNutt

Sept. 3, 2003- Sept. 11, 2008

We came home from vacation (which is a post & Flickr album all by itself) on the 2nd, and noticed that something was seriously wrong with Beeps. She was always a skinny, dainty little thing; but she was incredibly thin, her eyes were gooey and looked sunken, and she was obviously really really dehydrated- despite the fact that she was drooling and vomiting

As soon as the vet opened on the 3rd- her 5th birthday- we rushed her in. She was indeed dehydrated... and jaundiced. They admitted her and began administering sub q fluids, antibiotics and tube feeding. A blood panel revealed that she was experiencing liver disease/failure an an alarming rate. Unable to get her re-hydrated and to keep any food down, they began IV fluids on Friday the 5th.

A new blood panel on Monday the 8th showed that we had arrested the liver deterioration, but she was still drooling and vomiting. She would not eat or drink on her own.

On Wed Sept. 10, our vet explained the full situation: liver disease in kitties is a tricky thing. It can take weeks (sometimes more than 10) to get it under control -if it can be controlled and managed at all. Beeps was now beyond the ability of his clinic- she needed a specialist, a little kitty internist.

The practical problem with this is that the nearest internist is 35 miles away, is $100 just to examine her, $1000 for a sonogram of her liver, and God knows how much per day as a hospital inpatient...we were already trying to figure out how on earth we were going to pay her $100ish a day bill at this clinic. The emotional problem is that even if we won the lottery, we could put her through all the things the internist would try...and still be in the same place. Her prognosis was not good to begin with, and we could do weeks and weeks of treatment and still get nowhere. We were really left with no choice. I was up until 2am Wed night crying, and the tears started as soon as I left Ten at school on Thurs. morning.

She was happy to see me as usual, and for the first time in a week she "spoke". We had a nice long scratching and ear rubbing session- and when I would stop, she would stretch out the paw that didn't have the IV and rest it on my hand and gently hold my hand with her claws and purr as loud as she could manage without choking. I just stood there sobbing and petting, telling her I was sorry.

When the doctor came I asked if there wasn't anything else we could try. No, there really wasn't- and he wasn't at all convinced that an internist could save her either. I told him that I felt as though I was just giving up on her, and that I had failed her as an owner. He tried to make me feel better, and assured me that this was hardly giving up- and that were this his pet, he would be doing the same thing- it came down to the poor prognosis and the quality of her life.

Jeff came from work to say goodbye, and after they had a nice little lovefest we moved her to a place where I could hold her... as hard as it is for me, I refuse to let anyone cross The Rainbow Bridge alone. The IV made it easy, and it was only a matter of moments before I felt her go limp and her heart beat ceased beneath my hand. I just held her and sobbed until even her light little body got heavy for me.

I miss her. She was only 5- far too young for her little life to be over. I still look for her on the end of my bed, in the bathroom window sunning herself every morning, and I still check to make sure she isn't asleep in Tenley's bathtub before I close the bathroom door.

She was Mr.Smudge's (our 11 yr. old male) favourite. He adopted her, and gave her a thorough bath every day and cleaned her ears at least once a week. Sadly, this probably explains why he has it too. We think one of them got it, and shared with the other. So despite my grief over losing my soft spotty girl, this isn't over yet- I'm still medicating my old kitty and trying anything and everything to get him to eat.

We didn't explain all of this to Ten- she doesn't understand. We explained that Beeps died, and Ten says she misses her...and wants to know when she's coming home. I wish she was.

Rest in peace my sweet friend.
We will miss you always.

Bowl-A-Rama

2008-09-06T09:56:00.000-07:00

Weeks ago, during the great Internet Crisis of '08, we got a bee up our butts on a Saturday afternoon and decided to take Tenley bowling. As random activities go, bowling is pretty Tenley friendly: minimal down time, minimal parental assistance, special Tenley type devices like a ramp and bumpers, and instant results of her actions.

We secured a lane, had the bumpers raised, got a ramp, a Ten sized 4lb. ball, and some shoes and heavier balls for Mom & Dad. Tenley was extremely bitter that there weren't any shoes small enough for her- she really wanted those, and we heard about them for all 3 games. I predict that I will find stolen bowling shoes in her closet by high-school (not that her father or I would ever have done that...)

We let her go first (of course). She insisted on carrying the ball herself, and her dad lined up the ramp for her.

We taught her to give it a good shove...which she did with greater and greater flourish as the game went on.

Thanks to the handy-dandy bumpers, she usually knocked down several pins- and even got a couple of strikes!

Despite the fact that there were only 3 of us playing, and she got to go first, it was apparently (in her mind) still too long between her turns as during her Dad's turn she would always climb into my lap and complain "Daddy's not being nice. He's not sharing. He's not taking turns." I would patiently correct her and explain that he was taking turns: it was her turn, then mine, then Daddy's- and it was her turn again next. My explanation fell on deaf ears.

Now, we had the bumpers up and Tenley is only 3...and we - the adults who have gone bowling since childhood- LOST TO THE 3 YEAR OLD!!! Not once, mind you, but twice!!!

Oh, the shame......

Questions of a Three Year Old

2008-08-14T10:57:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday morning I was watching TV. An old James Garner movie "Support Your local Sheriff" was on so I thought I would watch. About 15 minutes into the movie Tenley got up and came out to see me. She jumped up on the couch and sat next to me to watch the movie.

Then the questions started. They came fast with not time to answer...

Why does that man have a gun?

Is he going to shoot someone?

Hey look daddy a horse!

What is the horsey’s name?

Is he a bad horse?

Why is that man riding the horse?

Where is he going?

Does the horse like the man?

Does the horse eat donuts?

Why is that lady running in the mud?

Oh look, another horsey.

Does that horse like the mud?

How come that horse is stopped by that fence?

The questions continued like this for another 5 mins or so. Finally she had to take a breath and I tried to answer one or two of the questions which obviously led to more questions. The movie was ruined.

I can't remember the last time I watched something all the way through without stopping for questions, snacks, potty breaks or stopping her from killing the dog. It was probably 4 years ago but that is like 15 years in toddler years.

Miss America

2008-08-03T00:52:00.000-07:00

After the car drama, we arrived in Clovis for a long weekend to celebrate the 4th. Grandma & Grandpa’s house is always a good destination because it has several of Ten’s favourite things:

1) A swingset
2) A large blow-up kiddie pool
3) A big grassy lawn to run and play on
4) Toys you don’t have at home
5) Plastic eggs filled with candy hidden throughout the house
6) A dog to terrorize
7) Next door neighbor’s dogs to terrorize
8) Next door neighbors to stalk
9) A park & a grocery store within walking distance
10) Grandparents who have an endless supply of cookies, and will let you do/watch almost anything you want whenever you want.

You can see the appeal of this pre-schooler Nirvana, yes? Daddy & Mommy like it because it comes with lots of wear-the-kid-out activities, and 2 responsible adults who are delighted to watch and assist the child.

We spent Independence Day morning at the Rotary Playland in Roeding Park in Fresno. http://www.storylandplayland.com/default.asp The Fresno Rotary built this little carnival ride type amusement park in 1955. As an adult, I looked at it and thought “this place needs a serious coat of paint and some landscaping services”; but kids like Ten are just delighted to hop on the rides and run through the water play area. We even took the pirate ship pedal boats out for a cruise on the lake.

After a nice nap & some yummy bbq, Ten & Grandpa played a round of “golf” in the backyard (I think Ten has a future in hockey) while we waited for it to get dark. Then we moved to the driveway broke open the red, white& blue glowsticks, and began setting off the fireworks. At 9:30, the high school around the corner started setting off the big ones, so we walked to the corner with everyone else in the neighborhood and watched from there. The booming and high pitched whistling of piccolo petes’ stopped around midnight, signaling an end to this year’s celebration.

Ten spent Saturday swimming, swinging and asking for more fireworks. The guys taped up my car and I knit & napped. We left before church on Sunday morning in an effort to beat the traffic…but we’ll be back at the end of August. Well, one of us will anyway…

Why You Should Rotate Your Tires

2008-07-31T11:11:00.000-07:00

The Culprit

So! There we were, on our way to Jeff’s parents house in Clovis for the 4th of July, 3 hrs into the trip- just outside of McFarland- when the road started making a very strange sound…which was followed by a small bang and loud thumping. It sounded as though someone were hitting my car with a baseball bat, and I looked out of my window to see black chunks of something flying past the window. The old woman in the car next to us practically veered into a tree trying to move away. Something was WAY wrong. We pulled off the road into the gravel and got out to see what it was. Holy crap- my right rear tire had disintegrated…all the tread had completely separated, and all that was left was the interior with steel belts exposed and starting to snap. Not only was the tire obliterated, but it destroyed my car when it happened. My bumper was ripped through and hanging by a thread, one running light was completely gone – just a hole and wires, the entire fender was missing, the running board was missing clips and hanging half off, and the whole rear quarter panel was covered in dents and black marks.

The bad news: no spare. Nope, my spare is actually on my car (and might have been the disintegrating tire for all I know) and the tire riding in the spare position is one I had to replace a couple months ago. Great. The good news: every year for Christmas I have my Dad get us a AAA membership- for just this very reason!

We limped off Hwy 99, navigated around some corn fields, found a small truck stop, and discovered we were in Delano. The nice AAA girl told us it would be about 30 minutes. I called my mom and had her get on the internet to see if there was a Costco, Wal-Mart or some other cheap tire emporium nearby. Nope, we were s.o.l. Fortunately, when the large, sweaty, stained t-shirt and missing teeth tow truck driver showed up, he loaded the car right up on the flat bed and said not to worry- he knew a very reasonably priced shop right down the road.

We get there, and as the driver is unloading the CRV from his truck, Jeff starts looking at my other 3 tires. Tire #1 has the little “time to replace me” nubs sticking up from the declining tread. Tire #2 is completely bald on the inside (hmmm…maybe I should add “rotate tires” to my calendar). Tire #3 is just dandy- obviously the one I recently replaced. So it turns out that we didn’t really need 1 new tire…we needed 4. Well, let me tell ‘ya: if you need to buy tires, Delano is the place to do it. The guys at Pacific Tire hooked us up with 4 Yokohama’s w/ an 80,000mi guarantee for $320- installed. Then, like a pit crew 4 Mexican guys with jacks ran out, jacked up the car and had the tires changed with the 1 good one on the back as the spare and had us back on the road in 20 minutes. Brilliant.

The damage was considerable. Jeff’s dad and next door neighbor used the shiniest duct tape I have ever seen to tape my bumper and running board up so we could drive it without fear that we were leaving a trail of debris. We filed a claim on-line and on the 14th it went to the body shop for evaluation and estimate. The total? $1500. It went back to the body shop on the 21st to begin the repairs, and on the 24th we found out that the estimate had gone up another $2100. Yikes….thank God we only have to pay the deductable!

The body shop posts pictures online through our insurance web site, so we can watch the progress. I know the windshield (which was cracked by debris) has been replaced, but I have no idea where they’re at with the rest- hopefully I’ll have it back before August!

Sent from the body shop on 7-30

Gotcha Day #3

2008-07-24T23:48:00.001-07:00

6-27-05

10 months

Size 3-6 month

6-27-06

1 year, 10 months

Size 6-12 months

6-27-07

2 years, 10 months

Size 12-18 months top, 9-12 month shorts, 2t pants

6-27-08

3 years, 10 months

Size 2T top, 18-24 month shorts, 3t pants

Despite the delay in posting due to issues we’re experiencing with our internet access, Anniversary #3 of Gotcha Day happened right on schedule on June 27.

Ten went to pre-school in the morning (didn’t want to miss “water day”), and Jeff and I went and saw Wall-E. I know, it sounds like something we all should have done together: but given our Kung-Fu Panda experience, Jeff and I opted for a tribute to our former child free moments. After school we met up with Aunty Kim & Jaxon for our weekly lunch date at Chick-fil-A, and then headed for home to get in a quick nap before we went to Castle Park.

Castle Park has become one of Ten’s favourite places because it has lots of rides she can go on by herself with little to no waiting in line. Our Gotcha Day outing there provided Ten with 2 unexpected bonuses: 1) Jaxon & family came along to help celebrate, so she had a buddy to run amok with; 2) the nice guy who sold us Ten’s combo ticket made an oops and thought it was part of the “buy a day, get the summer free” promo, so she ended up with a season pass! A fine time was had by all, except for the adults realizing that we’re not 16 anymore and only good for 1 or 2 spinning rides each.

SO! We’ve now been riding the Tenley roller-coaster for 3 YEARS! And let me tell ‘ya, this year has produced A LOT of hills!!

School Girl: Ten has been going to pre-school for 3 half days a week for 10 months now. I think it’s been really good for her, her attention span has improved a little and she spouts off all the time with things that I know I haven’t taught her like the Pledge of Allegiance and how to swing on the big girl swings. She always says “I had fun at pre-school” when you pick her up, and is always happy to see her friends when she gets there. Bonus: her class next year has 3 other cute little Asian girls in it too!

Gotta Go: Potty training began in earnest this year, and our big girl is really good at using the potty now. She’s also good at holding it, so when she tells you she needs to go, you don’t have to pick her up and run. Accidents are pretty rare, but she still has to wear pull-ups at night and for nap, but the nap pull-up is almost always dry. Hopefully we’ll be done with all of that by next year!

It’s in the Jeans: This child is a bean pole. She continues to just grow up and up and up. Buying pants for her is a nightmare- she’s all leg- by the time we hit shorts season, the length of her pants was right for her age, but the waist size was so 2 years ago. At least her feet seem to have slowed down for the moment, but she’ll still need new tennis shoes by Fall. Her hair is getting longer too- a few months ago she surprised us by deciding she wants long hair like Mommy, and we can now get a pony tail or two in it again.

What ‘chu talkin’ ‘bout: Everything. Constantly. This is payback- I know it- it’s the Mother’s Curse (“I hope you grow up to have a child just like you!”) in action. I know I never shut up, and now neither does Tenley. The good news is that her manners are pretty good- she usually remembers “please”, “thank you” and “excuse me”. She remains the living incarnation of Transformers’ Bumblebee by frequently speaking in quotes from various movies and TV shows…that often make no sense or relate to anything else.

3 Sucks: Seriously, the so called “terrible two’s” are nothing- I’d go back to that any day. Three has been awful: any little thing that doesn’t go her way and she goes into full meltdown. Crying, wailing, kicking, screaming, pulling her hair, growling- the works- and it can last for hours because she refuses to calm down and just keeps working herself up. It’s worse if she’s tired or hungry. The kid spends so much time in time-out these days, I think she thinks it’s a scheduled activity. I take comfort in the fact that 90% of the other 3 year olds mother’s that I talk to say the same thing, and other parents assure me that by 5 they’re like real people.

You Are Not Alone: With Tenley, you are never alone. Ever. I think this is one of those weird personality shapers from her orphanage days- she still wants your complete and undivided attention at all times. If she’s watching tv, she wants you watching her watching tv. She can’t just ride in the car and sing a song or stare out the window- she wants continuous interaction whether it’s conversation, requests/demands for drinks or toys, etc. No one in this house has peed by themselves or showered uninterrupted in 3 years.

My Obsession: Ten continues to become obsessed with random things. There’s always a movie and/or tv show- currently it’s 101 Dalmations II- Patch’s London Adventure and Curious George. I’ll take the animated monkey over Little Bear any time, any day. The kid also loves cars, and is obsessed with VW Bugs & PT Cruisers. She points them out constantly- everywhere, wants you to look for them too, and you must acknowledge when she shouts out that she’s seen one. We’re trying to broaden her horizons with Cooper Minis and Honda Elements.

The next year will bring some big changes: pre-school 5 half days a week, and Mommy is probably going to go back to work. Can’t wait to see how Miss Ten rolls with the punches!!

The Ballad of Jeff, Michelle & the AT&T U-Verse

2008-07-21T11:46:00.000-07:00

AKA: why we haven’t posted in a fortnight, even though we have pictures & stuff to say.

Like most everyone else in the US, we are feeling the pinch of the economy. So a couple of months ago we decided to take stock of our expenditures and see where we could lighten the load. We had satellite tv for $56 a month, and cable internet which we were paying $60 a month for. We felt that surely we could do better, and sure enough, Jeff found that AT& T had DSL for half that. Great.

So I called AT&T and told the nice lady what I wanted. She proceeded to ask me some questions and then began extolling the virtues of AT&T U-Verse: a fiber optic connection that could provide our tv, phone and internet all in one for $69 a month with a $200 cash back bonus, free installation, and no contract. We signed right up.

Here’s how this works: AT&T contracted with outside vendors to have fiber optic cable run to most neighborhoods, and then the service rides plain old copper wire into your home. There’s a “gateway” – sort of a super modem- that everything runs through. If you lose service you lose both tv & internet. The install tech explained that if your service drops, you have to unplug the gateway & then plug back in, then you re-boot the tv…but this was not something we were going to have to worry about.

Two weeks into our new service, it was dropping at least once a day; and it was when it dropped & refused to come back up at 9:30 at night (right in the middle of a movie) that Jeff lost his ever-lovin’mind. At that point, he ripped the tv box out of the wall, put the dish receiver back, and was up on a ladder with a flashlight in his mouth un-doing the fiber optic connection and re-attaching the satellite. I was then told to get rid of the U-verse tv, get the satellite people out to fix their connection, and get a AT&T tech out to fix the internet connection. Truthfully, I wasn’t sorry to see the U-verse tv go: I didn’t like the DVR nearly as well as the satellite DVR, and it turned out that we did have a satellite contract, so that $200 cash back would have to have gone to get us out of our contract early.

Here we begin the long parade of AT&T techs:

Tech #1 checked our wires, checked the speed, and discovered that the modem was set to Samoa time.

It still dropped 2-3 times a day for 1-2 hours each time. Place service call

Tech #2& 3 (they’re a matching set) discovered we were still using cable that had likely been around since the Eisenhower era, and switched us to Cat 5 cable.

Dropped daily 2-3 times for a couple hours each time. Place service call

Tech #4 removed and replaced a little gray box at the MPOE that was fried, and checked for interference on the line.

Now drops once a day…for 6-8 hours. Place yet another service call.

Tech #5 – Mario. Now I have nothing but nice things to say about Mario, because God bless him, he bent over backwards and tried valiantly to do everything to make this piece of $h!t work. Mario began by reviewing what everyone else had done. Turns out fixing the fried gray box is a temp fix at best- if there’s something else wrong on the line it’ll fry it again. So Mario begins running lots of tests, and calls out a line tech (one of the guys who climbs up the poles) to start testing the pairs. This takes 2 days.

Fixed! Runs great 24/7…for 3 days. I call Mario who made the mistake of giving me his card.

Tech #5-Mario. Mario wonders if the dial tone from the phone line is causing interference, and arranges to take our dial tone down for 24 hours to see if the internet works then.

It doesn’t. It still drops randomly for 2-3 hours at a time at all hours of the day & night. Then it falls into a pattern: it drops everyday between 10:45a & 11:30a…and doesn’t bother to come back until after 6pm. I call Mario. Mario calls the line tech. We play phone tag for a week.

Tech #5- Mario. Mario shows up at 6p on Friday having finally gotten permission from dispatch to come back out. He starts testing the jack in the house and looking at the modem configuration and calls in another line tech to re-rest the pairs. Jeff starts teaching them about computer/modem configuration. Line tech #3 informs us that Cat 5 cable is only good for 100 ft at a time, so we have a problem. They decide to have us go wireless– just as well because techs #2&3 actually stapled through the Cat 5 that they ran in several places. A hole is drilled into our bedroom wall and the wireless router is installed. Hurrah hurrah- it works!!

For 2 hours. Jeff invents new swear words while ripping the router cable back out of the wall. Then he called the cable provider to arrange for us to have cable internet installed again on Wed.

I called and cancelled the U-verse today. It would have been great if it had worked, although not as good a deal as we hoped because it turns out that phone was not included in the price. Also turns out that a lot of people thought phone was included; and a lot of people are having the same problems we are. So, 2 months later, we’re right back where we started.

I’ll blog more on Wed …when I have internet that works again.

No Internet - STILL

2008-07-18T18:18:00.000-07:00

The Big 4-0

2008-06-30T02:14:00.000-07:00

The June before we were married, Jeff turned 30. We celebrated by driving my convertable- top down- for a long weekend in Solvang. We went wine tasting (got hammerd too- 20 shots of wine will do that), saw a play (http://www.pcpa.org/), and I had a Cheesecake Factory cheesecake delivered to the romantic inn (http://www.peterseninn.com/) we were staying at.

Last Thursday, the next milestone was reached: Jeff turned 40. This time, we stayed home.

Jeff took the day off work, and we embarked on the grand experiment of taking Tenley to the movies for the first time. She wouldn't sit in her own chair- not even with the booster seat. Instead, she sat in her dad's lap. She was antsy before we finished the previews. She watched randomly, wandered up and down the (thankfully empty) row, and 30 min to the end of the film told us emphatically that she was done and it was time to go. We told her "no", and fortunately the last 20 min is pretty action packed so she made it to the end. We will not be repeating that experience anytime soon. After surviving the movie, we picked up Jeff's "Gray Hare" cake from Baskin Robbins, and headed home for lunch and a nap.

The lunch part was fine, but the crazy 3.75 year old pitched the mother of all fits (the current whining and crankiness going into overdrive until it's a full-blown tantrum) about taking her nap. Nap is a problem for Ten: she still needs it, but she doesn't want it. It's a problem for us too: good luck getting her down before 2 (regardless of the time she got up), and she'll sleep 2-3 hours because (despite what she tells you) she's tired. This means she gets up at 5 something and is then up until 10 or 11 at night. You don't want to wake her up either: the screaming, whining and crying will begin immediately and will not let up for at least 2 hours. If she doesn't nap, she'll still stay up until 10, she'll just be a whiny, cranky wretch for hours. In the end, there was alot of yelling and screaming ( by all three of us) but she did take a nap.

Jeff chose the Red Lobster (of all places) for his birthday dinner...turns out he just really wanted steak & shrimp. They don't do birthday dessert, and since we had cake at home, I had a chat with our waiter on the way back from taking Ten to the ladies' room and arranged to have a candle stuck in his mashed potatos and happy birthday sang to him. This would have been very funny and a great little surprise...except that there are no secrets with Tenley around- she ran straight back to the table and told her dad everything. Thanks, Ten.

On Sat. night we met Uncle Kev, Tia Lorena, & baby Alexis for Belated Birthday dinner at Chevy's. Kev made up for the spoiled Red Lobster surprise by having a sombrero plunked on Jeff's head and a loud Mexican birthday song belted out in his honor.

I have no idea what I gave Jeff for his 30th birthday, but it had to be better than the 2 t-shirts, car sunshades, and Chillow (http://www.chillow.com/chillow.html) I gave him this year. Kevin gifted him with the kind of books that should never be put in Jeff's hands (manuals on how to build things that will launch projectiles & blow things up) and a Taters of the Lost Ark Mr. Potatohead. The Moms (his & mine) have donated to the Jeff-wants-an-iPhone fund, and he's anxiously awaiting the July purchase date. But the grand prize for "Best Gift" really goes to Kev's mom who sent along the basket pictued below in retaliation for the year Jeff gave her Depends.

Happy Birthday honey. Here's looking forward to 40+ more!!