Capitola

Having fun with Colorado cousins at Capitola beach

Feb 2015

 Happy Birthday Rachael!

 Rachael at the delta

Natural Bridge beach

For our annual trip to the beach at Christmas break we went to Natural Bridge beach.

March

Mardi Gras was in March.  We celebrated with jambalaya... 

and king cake.  (But no baby inside.)

We went to the Star Wars exhibit at the The Tech in San Jose. 

It was awesome. 

We even got to ride in the Millennium Falcon cockpit. 

The Activity Day girls in P3 had a daddy daughter activity on Pi Day.  They dressed appropriately. And I made pie. 

 St Patrick's Day.  We went to the parade in Dublin...

... to lunch at Salito's...

 ... and tasted the rainbow (cupcakes).

On March 18 Ryan and I celebrated 20 years of being engaged. What a couple of clueless kids we were!

February

Of course the big news in February was Rachael's 9th birthday.  We celebrated with six friends and three cousins at California Pizza Kitchen.  We got a tour of the kitchen in the back (so cool!) and each kid got to put toppings on their own pizza.  It was a lot of fun.  

I made a pizza-looking cake for the birthday cake.  Probably her easiest birthday cake ever.  

Since her party was not on her actual birthday, we had a candle and a cupcake on the 16th.  

I thought Rachael might be old enough to appreciate our version of cookie dough ice cream.  Ryan thought maybe not.  He was right.   

And finally, daffodils bloom in February in NorCal.  Wow!

January

Recapping 2014, one month at a time...

We cooked a turkey and made dressing and mashed potatoes for New Years Day. Mostly so...

... we could make this amazing leftover panini sandwich. It's really that amazing. 

We went to Tiburon and I had crab cake eggs benedict.  Really my life is all about food I think.

Our ward had the opportunity to provide service at the Oakland temple by helping to take down Christmas lights. There were only four kids from our ward there and Rachael was the only girl.  We got really dirty taking lights out of the flower beds but we learned a new appreciation for the lights and the amount of work it takes to make them look amazing. 

In January our dishwasher broke down so Ryan taught Rachael how to wash dishes by hand.  It was fun the first night.  The next six weeks of hand washing were less fun.  

Ryan finished reading the last Harry Potter book to Rachael, so we celebrated by watching the last movie with butterbeer and snitch cake pops.  

We decided to celebrate random holidays and food holidays this year, starting with Chinese New Year.

December

 Our annual girls trip to the temple to see the Nutcracker

 And of course we went to Fentons!

Instead of a gingerbread house we made a cookie tree this year.  It was fun.  

Rachael performed in the Nutcracker this year as a Matador!  

 She's the one at the front of the line on the left. 

The costume 

Some of the third grade classes had an event called  "Poetry and Pie." Rachael memorized a poem called "Helping." 

We visited Widmer World in Pleasanton.  We were surprised at how many things they had at one home.  We will definitely go back.  

Obligatory Sunday family picture 

Frosting cookies on Christmas Eve 

Uncle Declan helped us  

 Cookies for Santa

The weekend after Christmas we went to the Sacramento temple for Michael Arntz's wedding. 

And we found some snow outside the reception! 

We took our annual trip to the beach, too.  We checked the tides and decided to go to Fitzgerald Marine Reserve to see the tidal pools.  

It was amazing!

November happenings

We traded the Corvette for an Audi convertible.  Ryan misses the Corvette but not the puddles of oil. 

Rachael and I made zeppole and hot chocolate from Giada's kids books. 

We went to the Williams Sonoma at the Standford Mall to have a cookbook signed by Giada.  She was really cute with Rachael.   

We used Ryan's Sofitel points to take a trip to Beverly Hills. The hotel gave Rachael a teddy bear; she named it Coco. 

The view from the hotel room 

We found a Ferrari store in the mall.  This is as close to a regular Ferrari as we will probably ever get.  

 The LA Temple was only a couple of miles from our hotel so we went to take a look. 

Disneyland!

Space Mountain! 

Christmas Ears! 

Grauman's Chinese Theater on Hollywood Boulevard 

Rachael with her hands in Emma Watson's handprints.  We walked around Hollywood and found lots of stars on the walk of fame. 

Thanksgiving with Maddens

The day after Thanksgiving we went back up to Maddens and had a fry party in the fryer.  We deep fried macaroni and cheese, green beans, onions, cheese sticks, and anything else we could find.