Browsing the archives for the California category.

Week Thirty One Photos

California, Kids

Can we gloss over the 4ish months that I totally neglected posting these pictures? Haha, I did take their weekly photos I just didn’t upload them all and, never fear, I will not assault you with heaps of photos of my children but I will share some of my favorites that were taken between week 12 (the last weekly portrait post -eep) and now.

Resolution #8 is to post a portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2014.

I am trying to choose one picture of each of them that hopefully shows what their week was like


Our oldest turned 14. I realize this is to be expected but since I’m not even 35 this is a little startling.


Tiny dancer, at her last show of the season this summer.


Little Miss is by far our little fish.

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I Have Missed You!

California, Kids, Marriage

Ugh, being without a computer is rough. I mean, the phone and the tablet and access to the other laptops in the house make it not such a big deal, but when it comes to your pictures and docs, it’s a little unnerving waiting for them to be ‘recovered’. The wonderful news is that my husband managed to recover all my stuff. Go husband! The bad new is, it took forever and I’m pretty behind in my weekly portraits, but I will just jump in this weekend with week 21!

  

In the meantime, here’s life right now, 25 things edition.

1. Our girls are obsessed with Frozen and our Tiny Dancer wraps a blanket around her neck, cape style, belts out Let it Go and tosses the blanket off with ‘…the cold never bothered me anyway…’ As a Canadian family that is bothered by the cold, I find this hilarious.

2. Oldest is preparing for his 8th grade grad next week and I know it’s the ultimate cliche, but I can’t believe he’s starting high school! How, how, how is that possible?!

  

3. On that note, my husband and I just celebrated 14 years of marriage! So rad!

4. We recently started #100daysofbarbecue but we are skipping some days, (because when your husband asks for your grandmother’s chicken pot pie, you just make it for him, ok?), and keeping track of the number of days we’re on. I think we’re on day 9 right now.

5. Dance is on a break until July. OMG an entire month without evening classes?! Note that our Tiny Dancer has chosen to continue with her private lessons and practice every afternoon, so we’re not actually taking a month off, but you know. Some kind of a break is better than none!

  

6. For our anniversary, I made my husband the proud owner of this rad shirt and also this one.

7. I’m more determined than ever to finally finish my Beekeeper Quilt.

8. I’m obsessing over Classy Ladies on Cooking.

  

9. Also obsessing over Sugarpill lashes, but what else is new…

10. We are finally starting to properly furnish and decorate our ‘new’ apartment – it’s been over a year since we moved but we have been really indecisive about staying.

11. I want to start spinning and dying yarn so now we need to find room for a spinning wheel. 😉

  

12. The Fault in Our Stars comes out next week and I’m all set to cry my eyes out the whole time because I’ve read the book so many times my heart is already broken for Hazel and Gus.

13. Maleficent comes out this weekend and I can hardly wait to get my mouse ears on for the premier.

14. Christmas lights in a little girl’s room is the most magical thing ever.

15. Searching for the perfect black strapless swimsuit is harder than I thought. Last year I got wicked tan lines at the pool from being there every afternoon.

16. Avocados go with pretty much everything as far as I’m concerned.

17. I made a new friend and am crushing on her pretty hard. Dear Scout, you’re so rad. Love, May.

  

18. Speaking of! I’ve been making some summer plans and I am so happy to have so many great friends down here. I am seriously so blessed to have met such cool ladies. Vanessa, Tami, Kathryn, Brigid, Erin, Tanya, on and on and on.

19. The girls got bangs and they are painfully cute!

  

20. Every spring I get really motivated to knit for Christmas and usually, I get too wrapped up in the birthdays along the way. Of course, since it’s May, I’m feeling hella motivated. Wish me luck!

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Dragonfruit Ice Cream

California, Healthy

This is one of those ‘not really a recipe recipes’. I have a serious love for dragonfruit and when we first moved to California and I saw it at the farmer’s market I was determined to make something summery and fun with local dragonfruit. Just look at it, it’s so beautiful!

This is a very lame way to make ice cream. Seriously, just go buy an ice cream maker (I am holding out for this Cuisinart one). If you don’t have an ice cream maker though, this will do. Essentially you’re just freezing ice cream in ice cube trays. 😉

Dragonfruit Ice Cream

There are two types of dragon fruit, some are pink like this and taste a little sweet and some are white and taste blander. I wasn’t sure if it was going to be the white or pink kind when I first bought this at the market so I was pretty stoked that it was the sweeter of the two. I will try this again with the white kind if I come across any.

Dragonfruit Ice Cream

All I did was scoop out the yummy insides and mash them up with about 1/2 (maybe closer to 3/4) of a cup of coconut milk. The more coconut milk you add, the softer it will be when you eat it. Though it will be far from soft, a better description would be ‘the more coconut milk you add, the less rock hard it will be’. Then I added a little sugar, feel free to keep it healthy by adding stevia or natural maple syrup or agave or whatever.

Dragonfruit Ice Cream  Dragonfruit Ice Cream

Pour your finished mixture into ice cube trays, and wait a few hours. Another way to do it would be to put your mixture into a stainless steel bowl and mix it every 30 minutes or so until you reach the consistency you’re after. I put them in an ice cube tray and them popped them out and into a cup when I was ready to try it. I let it sit for just a few minutes and it was ice creamy enough for me!

Dragonfruit Ice Cream

This is not a replacement for triple fudge ice cream by any stretch – but if you have a craving for ice cream that’s beyond the usual frozen banana in the food processor trick, while still keeping it healthy, this is a good option.

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Week Twelve Photos

California, Kids

I feel like the weekly resolution check in is getting boring. So I think I will make it once a month instead. I’m making excellent progress with my pictures and killing it with my weekly cake / cupcake challenge.

Resolution #8 is to post a portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2014.

I am trying to choose one picture of each of them that hopefully shows what their week was like


It’s amazing to see him gaining stripes on his new belt. The progression of belt levels in jiu jitsu is so much harder than others.


Candy in a fruit cup was one of my April Fools ‘pranks’ on the kids. 😉


Little Miss loved the story time activities at her dance coach / babysitter’s college!

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Week Nine Photos

California, Kids

Resolution #8 is to post a portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2014.

I am trying to choose one picture of each of them that hopefully shows what their week was like


Third place this weekend at the Dream Jiu Jitsu tournament in Cerritos!


Feeling better this week after doctor visits and pharmacy phone calls, and we got to fit in a park day!


Having lunch at the American Girl store at The Grove is a very fancy affair.

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Week Seven Photos

California, Kids

Resolution #8 is to post a portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2014.

I am trying to choose one picture of each of them that hopefully shows what their week was like


He has been very driven and motivated lately, he’s going to three extra lessons a week.


This little one isn’t feeling so awesome this week.


Little Miss loooooves to help bake!

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Week Seven Resolution Check In

California, Domestic, Healthy, Homeschooling, Kids

Here we go, week seven! This is only my second time posting this on a Friday which is what I had originally intended to do! Thinking about my resolutions every week it’s crazy how fast the weeks fly by! Seven weeks already?!

1. stay at least one week ahead of our homeschool schedule
We are about 3 or 4 days ahead of schedule right now. There are some other long term projects (like my 8th grader’s research paper and my 3rd grader’s science project) that they have been working on overtime since they were assigned, they’re not due for weeks and they’re both almost finished. This is really helpful for both freeing up days for field trips or other outings and for covering sick days throughout the year.

2. celebrate everyone’s birthday (local and long distance) with a card in the mail.
I have been horrible at this! Usually I’m really on top of this until March or so, and then I sputter off into oblivion. This year, I’m so caught up in other things, I have been late with every card I’ve sent and I’ve even missed sending notes as well! I hate the idea of scrapping this, but doing something poorly is worse than not doing it at all. :/

3. keep our family photo site updated (in the 10 years we’ve had that site, we’ve always been about 3-5 months behind)
Making progress!!

4. start a ‘what we did today’ journal (index card version is cute)
I’m so glad we are doing this, it’s so sweet!

5. quit social media that’s not blog related basically I just wanted to quit Facebook
While I am still fielding ‘why would anyone ever leave Facebook?’ emails and messages from well meaning family and friends, I am still happily not on Facebook and I only use social media as So Very Domestic.

6. blog 3-5 times a week
I only blogged twice this week. Boo!

7. make a lightbox and get better at food photography
I finally know what I need! Right now optimum photo taking happens between 11am and 2pm by my kitchen window. With a lightbox, I can take lovely pictures whenever, like you know, at 1 am when I am most likely to be finishing up some crazy kitchen creation. I’m also looking for large tiles as backgrounds!

8. a portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2014
Week One
Week Two
Week Three
Week Four
Week Five
Week Six
Week Seven coming tomorrow!

9. bake a cake every weekend
Week One – Nutella Icebox Cake
Week Two – Orange Creamsicle cake
Week Three – White Chocolate Strawberry cupcakes
Week Four – Pink Lemonade cupcakes
Week Five – Red Velvet cupcakes (with cream cheese icing)
Week Six – Dark Chocolate cake with Strawberry Filling
Week Seven – Pink Strawberry cake with Strawberry Frosting

10. participate in sockdown 2014
I’ve been pretty terrible at this as well so far but there is more than enough time to recover. I casted on for January’s lace socks and life got in the way and I haven’t touched them much at all, but technically I have until the end of February to finish them and as long as I cast on for February’s socks before the end of February and finish them before the end of March they count!

11. finally finish my knitted beekeeper quilt
Ugh. So many puffs to knit still! I have almost 400 hexipuffs but it looks more and more likely that I will need 500 before I can sew it together and actually use it.

I’m replacing alcohol with coffee this year! That means late night coffee drinking with girlfriends instead of wine fueled knitting and so far, so good. Even just a couple glasses of wine with a full meal can make the next morning not so fun for me. This life is way too busy for me to spend Sunday morning nursing myself back to health. Also, I think I get more knitting done this way, even if I have yet to prove that this year!

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Week Six Photos

California, Kids

Resolution #8 is to post a portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2014.

I am trying to choose one picture of each of them that hopefully shows what their week was like


Competing in the IBJJF Pan Kids Jiu Jitsu Championship was no joke. He did well!


Wearing her new NRG shirt from last week’s competition to her rehearsal and stretching class today.


Out to breakfast with the whole crew at Coco’s Bakery.

Yet again, a day late. 😉

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Week Six Resolution Check In

California, Crafty, Domestic, Homeschooling, Kids

Every week, I’m looking at my goals for the year and going over my progress one at a time in an attempt to help me achieve them. I intend to do these on Fridays, but I’ve only managed to get it out on a Friday once. This weekend marks the end of the 6th week, the year started on a Wednesday so for this purpose and for counting cake weeks, I’m totally ignoring that week. 😉

I skipped last week because the transition from homeschooling through the local school board to doing it through California Virtual Academy has been more challenging than we had anticipated, but I think we are ironed out the issues in our schedule.

1. stay at least one week ahead of our homeschool schedule
This was my original resolution related to school and then we started a new program (which we love, hooray for California Virtual Academy) and our goal became to stay on top of the new schedule. After two full weeks of this program, we’re finding a groove and we are able to get a little ahead of schedule to allow for some wiggle room and we have found time for review to make sure the new concepts are really sinking in. Today we were working on some assignments due on Tuesday (we don’t have classes or assignments this Monday), so we are barely one day ahead, but given how challenging the move from standard to advanced curriculum has been I think a day is pretty good. Hopefully in a couple of weeks we’ll be an entire week ahead. 😉

2. celebrate everyone’s birthday (local and long distance) with a card in the mail and a little letter an email.
I hate to admit that I can’t follow through with something but it’s so much worse to do too many things half way. I’m learning my limits and I’m changing this resolution to sending everyone an email on their birthday. The idea behind the resolution in the first place was to stay in touch with long distance family and friends outside of holidays.

3. keep our family photo site updated (in the 10 years we’ve had that site, we’ve always been about 3-5 months behind)
I went to start working on this last week and I came across a whole lot of messy code I had left for myself. My husband made it easy to include php files for me (because he is the raddest) making updating so, so, so much easier, but I am going through my folders of pictures to untangle the mess. It should be another few days of sorting through it all before I can actually start adding new photos and videos.

4. start a ‘what we did today’ journal (index card version is cute)
Still doing it, it’s so cute!

5. quit social media that’s not blog related basically I just wanted to quit Facebook
Still not on Facebook! It’s funny though how many people are almost personally offended and ask how we’ll be able to stay in touch without out it! You can just email or text or even use Instagram or Twitter or Tumblr! I have also been asked what triggered the decision to quit, like it had to be some big event and my solution to it is quitting. Really, it all boils down to a pretty simple concept that we all already know. Without Facebook, the shelf life of some friendships (and most acquaintanceships?) would be a lot shorter. It is such a cultural norm to add acquaintances on Facebook from your neighbors to people you haven’t seen in 10 years to randos from the gym and on and on. I had quite a collection of acquaintances that I really didn’t want to have, but every time I deleted someone, I’d get a message from them asking why I deleted them. As if knowing that we haven’t spoken, even online, in years isn’t reason enough.

6. blog 3-5 times a week
Yikes, I only blogged once this week!

7. make a lightbox and get better at food photography
I have been looking online at Home Depot to find some plain tiles to use as backgrounds in food photography. Still need to research more.

8. a portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2014
Week One
Week Two
Week Three
Week Four

9. bake a cake every weekend
Week One – Nutella Icebox Cake
Week Two – Orange Creamsicle cake
Week Three – White Chocolate Strawberry cupcakes
Week Four – Pink Lemonade cupcakes
Week Five – Red Velvet cupcakes (with cream cheese icing)
Week Six – Dark Chocolate cake with Strawberry Filling

10. participate in sockdown 2014
I mentioned last update that January’s techniques were lace and intarsia, and that I went with lace since I’m still fighting with epic intarsia socks. I have hardly knitted at all in February – I haven’t even finished January’s socks! Tonight is a marathon knitting fest, if I finish January’s socks this week, I’ll cast on and try to finish February’s socks.

11. finally finish my knitted beekeeper quilt
I have knitted about 10 more puffs for this blanket, maybe another 90 or so to go? I laid out my 360 puffs to see how big the finished blanket would be with just that many and decided I’d need about 100 more. I’ll check again when I have another 100 to add.

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Week Five Photos

California, Kids

Resolution #8 is to post a portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2014.

I am trying to choose one picture of each of them that hopefully shows what their week was like


Out for a Chipotle date after meeting his new online learning advisor.


4th place & the pink award at the NRG Golden State Championship!


Weekly library haul, fresh bedtime stories every week.

Yet again, a day late. 😉

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