September Upate

Well the word is out by now. Gino and Giada will have another sibling.  

Gino is dead set on it being a boy and naming it King Kong.

 Chickens are still a big thing around here...they are drawn, held and loved.

 When Giada is at school on Tuesday's Gino has lots of fun with Nana.  We try not to tell Giada all the things that happen without her. Although she loves school, she surely doesn't want to miss out.

 Congratulations to cousin Emily. Looking forward to the big day next year! Love from Lodi!!

 Birthday donuts for Pops, and Birthday dessert with Matt. Lots of September birthday's in our family.

 Pickle time! We finally made them this year. Usually it is in August, but the crop wasn't ready.  We even tried some bread and butter ones this time.

Our days with Stella are always full of adventure. Gino and Stella ask me 100x when it is time to get Giada from school, and she is equally excited to see them at pick up!

 Grape Festival! This year Nonni took all her grandchildren and we were so happy to make memories with Cole.  Watching Cole get so excited when he pet the animals was certainly a highlight of the day.

 

Giada of course wanted to pet the snake. She wondered if it was the same one from the birthday and learned how to tell if it is a boy or a girl from this back dew claw thing by the tail. Claw means boy!

Gino was displaying his new signature move. Smile and eyes closed...hope this phase passes quick!

 

Brave Giada of course wanted to do every big ride. This one she loved. 

The Lorikeets have been here all summer. Giada wants to go see them everyday.  They went one last time before they fly back to Australia.

 Happy 8 years to us. Mike and I had a nice dinner out at Biba. We hadn't been there in awhile, and it never disappoints.  Always fun to eat somewhere that uses our oil as well.

 I hadn't been to the Stockton Children's Museum in a long time. It was a great morning. So much to do, and lucky for us field trips hadn't started yet, so the kids had run of the whole place. 

Yippee! We finally got to meet Max. Marina and Max came to visit the West Coast for a couple weeks and it was so fun to visit with him throughout the week.  He is the BEST sleeper. I had to force Marina to wake him up from his LONG naps after he had slept all night so I could hold him. Can't wait to see you both again in November Neps!

 Where did the time go! All of a sudden she is all grown up!

End of summer fun! School starts!

Towards the end of summer we got a couple last minute visits in with friends!

Kids day at Raley Field with Brooklyn

 Lunch with Auntie Linds!

 Park with the Archuleta kiddos!

 Grace Preschool Buddies. Fun day of slip n slide at Williams house.

 The Lorikeets were back again this summer at Micke Grove Zoo. Giada couldn't be happier. Clearly my fear of birds did not pass on to the next generation.  She would go everyday if she could!

 Day at the park with the Clarins.

 If it can be climbed on...Gino will attempt it! It's all fun and games until one of these times, he loses his grip.

 This girl was waiting all day for her clam chowder.

The kids pretty much want a picture with Lucky every day.

  Cousin Love!

 Annual mud volleyball! Kids loved rolling around in it this year. Not the best year for Guys and Dolls.... unfortunately it was a quick day 0-2.  Maybe next year will be our year!

It was a miracle that we had a free day on the weekend. So instead of staying home and doing all the chores, we decided to take an adventure to SF. The kids loved playing on the beach, and didn't care it was about 12 degrees out!  I think the highlight of the day was seeing the Bush Man. Gino asks every day to look at it on You Tube so he can see the Bush Man. He laughs so hard at it, but I think was startled at the time.

 Our poor Syd had to have a massive tumor removed on her leg. She seems on the mend now. She got some extra love before her surgery. She hates wearing the cone, and Gino thinks it is a new hat. Lucky seems to like the cone too!

Giada made Syd a 'Get Well Soon' sign

You should always sleep with your sword, you never know what can be lurking around!

What a fun day on the water.  I think it was all the kids first time and they loved being able to roam around. We stopped for lunch, found a beach to dock for awhile and a dock to jump off from. All the kids were so brave jumping off the top level of this 2 story dock. Aubrey dominated and was a non stop jumping machine!

New chalkboards in the backyard are providing so much fun for the kids!

Both kids started school recently. Gino is off to Preschool 2 mornings a week, and couldn't be more thrilled.  He loves being able to play in the classroom he has dropped his sister off for years. He wasn't really going for my idea of holding the sign. Between his singing and wanting to hang it on the door, this was the best we got!

 

The day for Kindergarten was here. She had her stuff all laid out and ready to go!

 

The day started with LOTS of tears on drop off. I did not expect that and would be lying if I didn't then shed some tears myself.  But when I got there to pick her up she was so excited and has been every day since. She wants to stay longer and eat with her class, and stay until 3pm. That seems SO long to have her gone, but am letting her do it a few times a week. We are all looking forward to this new adventure.  At the end of day the parents got to come in to hear a special song, it was so cute!

Last but not least on this catch up post!  This weekend I had the Kerns kids as well and we road tripped to Tahoe to see Renee, Nico and Pete.  The kids all did great. So fun to catch up with Renee too. Who knew kids could hunt for crawdads for 5 hours!!

Princesses &Pirates en route!