Maui Part 2...

The next generation of cousins. Jack had such a good time playing with Rachel (5), Jacob (3), Rylee (3) and Jack is also 3.


The cousins had a race at the Maui Beach hotel lawn. Sadly Jack was in some far off land day dreaming and came in last place!



The cousins playing Simon Says with Rod.

Maui Part 1...

The family headed to Maui last week to attend my Grandfather's funeral. He was 93 years old when he passed away at home. Apparently he slipped and fell at home, hit his head and he broke his neck...woke up and cleaned up the blood and then passed out again.

When my Aunt discovered his body they took him to the hospital where he was awake and aware of what was going on. The next day my Grandfather wanted to leave the hospital and started to take the IVs out, but the doctors gave him a sedative....and then my Grandfather never woke up and died the next day.

We had the funeral in Paia at the beach, my Grandfather is in the box with his blue hat:



My dad and Uncle took my Grandfather's ashes out into the ocean:



Emptying the ashes from the bag:



Family and friend put flowers into the water and say their 'good-byes':

Aya's Birthday...

We celebrated Aya's birthday a little early before we leave for Maui. Jack made Aya a birthday card:


Jack wanted to help Aya open up her present:


Of course we needed to celebrate Aya's birthday with cake:

Jack's Drawing...

The other day I came upstairs and saw Jack drawing. I took a look at his picture and he drew this "smiley" face:


Not bad. Round head...hair...2 eyes....a nose....a smile....and I think one buck tooth. Nice.

Family Portrait...

Jack made a 'family' portrait at school last week. I have no idea who is who but at least he got the right amount of people!

Valentine's Day...

Aya and I celebrated Valentine's Day at Jennifer's wedding in Manhattan Beach:

The bride and groom, Moses and Jen:

Group photo with Tracy, Billy, Jen, James and June:

Valentine's Day...

Grandma and Jack made cookies for Valentine's Day:


Can you guess which cookie Jack made?



Yup, his is the cookie with ALL the sprinkles on it!

Valentine's Day...

I just wanted to say Thank You to Carolyn for sending Jack a box of cookies for Valentine's Day.

Yup, those are all Jack's cookies and he asks to eat one every night after dinner.

What is this??

A little parenting tip for those that do not know. When your child does some art work, ask what it is before you tell them how good it is.

In this example:

I told Jack, wow what is a great looking Ninja. Jack then yelled, "NNNNNOOOOO!!" "It is a penguin."

Seriously.

Do you see a penguin in that picture? Totally looks like a ninja to me.

Happy Birthday Ryan...

Over the weekend we went to Ryan's first birthday!



Jack slyly trying to get a sneak peek at Jessica!

My Grandpa...

I just found out that my Grandfather and Jack's Great Grandfather passed away on Sunday. This was us in the summer of 2007:



Last year Jack went to Maui with my dad to celebrate Great Grandpa's birthday:

Happy Hour...

We had our first Happy Hour of 2009 last week. Now that downtown Culver City is updating itself and bringing in new bars and restaurants, friends want to come to Culver City. We went to Rush Street in Culver City for our first Happy Hour of 2009:


And this picture is just for Jeff. After Happy Hour we went to the taco truck to soak up all the booze so we would not be hung over the next day. Unlike Jeff, I did not 'rent' my taco's.

Radio Flyer...

Jack got his first 'scooter' from my cousin Tom over the weekend. Jack isn't really good at it yet, but I think he will like this better than the tricycles because Jack just refuses to pedal his tricycles.


Jacks first turn on the scooter....C-R-A-S-H.

Just like his mommy.

Maple Bread...

Now that I am not working I am trying to settle into a daily routine. I decided that on Monday's I will try to bake something so we can have dessert for the week.

Last week I made chocolate chip cookies. I should have taken pictures because it was a disaster. One batch I burn the edges badly so I thought why not cut off the burnt parts? Sounds good, right. Well, I didn't cut them artisically and they came out shaped like octogans and really flat.

The next batch I made was too big and when the cookies baked the dough all connected to fill up the cookie pan so it looked like one big rectangle cookie. I had to cut them out in squares. Aya thought it was the most hilarious thing and couldn't stop laughing. Too bad it didn't stop her from EATING all the cookies!

Last week I tried making maple nut bread.

Luckily for me I took pictures AND it came out decent:

I even manged to get it out of the pan without any problems. It was a little dry, I baked it too long as I didn't hear the timer go off. Bummers.

Before anyone asks the answer is, "No, you can not have any." In addition, the answer is, "No you can't get future tastings either." If I ever bake something really good where my mom gives it the baker's thumbs up then I will think about remaking it.

Super Bowl Sunday...

We headed over to my parents house to watch the Super Bowl and SUPER it was for us! First we ate way too much food. Second, Aya won the half time score AND the final score of our family Super Bowl pool.

I think the halftime 3-D was just a gimmick to get everyone to wear 3-D glasses for 5 minutes and look retarted:



Finally in the head to head betting, I was paired up against my 5 year old cousin Maggie and I beat her 6-4 in various bets to win $2 dollars!

Cha-ching! Miles has a free lunch money now!!