Tuesday, August 30, 2022

Back to school orientation (Wk of 8/15)

I'm not sure if we had any of this in the boys' previous school, but what an excellent idea!   Both boys were able to go into their school at an arranged time to find their assigned locker and wander around the entire school. 

Graham's school is quite large, especially after this brand new wing.  Graham and Charlie had to test out the new chairs too, of course:

Found his locker!  There are built-in combination locks that he will need to memorize:
Hopefully he can find his locker among all these other same ones.  Ha ha!
Woah, a climbing wall in the gym? No way!!
That gym floor is so SHINY!!
We actually signed Graham up for 6th Grade camp that went on for 2 short afternoons the week before school restarted.  I'm not sure if he learned anything or made any new friends, but at least he was able to familiarize himself with his surroundings and his locker :-)

And here is Charlie at his locker.  Smaller and no locks.  I think only 5th Graders in the elementary school get lockers as it's something they need to learn during their transition to middle school.  I love the way the district thinks here:
Charlie got to meet his teacher too during orientation.  She's been teaching at this school for 21 years.  Woah!!

Graham and Charlie are hanging out at the library while Mommy goes away to ask some questions in the office.  If only they will read quietly like that at home!
Here's to a great school year!  So far so good at least - we are into our 2nd week of school now.  The only thing Charlie complains about right now is that he only gets 20 minutes for lunch and the meals are horrible.  Ha ha!  And so far all good with Graham. Yay!  There hasn't been any homework assignment (that I know of).  I hope the boys are on top of it.  They almost always head out to play at the playground with their friends the minute they get home. Hopefully they will soon realize that that routine is not going to last all year!

Recent happenings

Still trying to post photos from the summer holidays!  So here they are.  First off, finally caved in and bought a riding mower.  At first, the boys were talking about getting a push mower but with 1/3 acres, did we really want to spend the entire weekend mowing? There's still lots of weed-whacking to do too!

In the meantime, Charlie is trying to chase down the rabbits in the yard.  Good luck!
Pretty flowers in the yard!  I'll have to learn what grows and what dies out here for all the different seasons:
I'm glad this train track is elevated.  Otherwise, we will be stuck waiting for the train a lot as this road is sort of the main drag for anything and everything!
Aug 10 - our first home-cooked meal! It's been a long time since it's takeout pretty much every single night.  Phew!!
After buying a crowbar, we are finally able to break open the crate for the lawnmower.  There's still remnants of the crate on the garage floor.  But after filling up the mower with gas, we are good to go :-)
Bobby chasing Graham down with the mower.  Ha ha!
It will still be some time I think before Graham gets comfortable with the riding mower.  Plus, he needs enough weight to push the seat down which also acts as a mechanism to keep the mower engine going:
Charlie is still too small to use the riding mower but he gets a ride with daddy.  Reminds me of the days when Graham used to ride the mower with Bobby when we lived in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma:
OMG, here it is... I found it!  This is probably why I keep blogging so much.  It's like our personal diary :-D
And look at Graham now - just curious about how everything works.  He's straightening out the steering wheel here:
And yup, there goes Bobby on the mower.  Hopefully he's paying attention as there's quite a few trees in our yard ;-P
We bought a new hammock.  It's massive!  It can definitely fit 2 people:
I didn't want the hammock sitting out in the sun all day, so it can actually be converted into this seat/chair.  And this little corner by the top/upstairs door seem to work quite well for it.  
I actually fell asleep in it during the first day of school.  These early mornings are killing me.  Ha ha!

A Back-to-School event was organized by our neighborhood a week before school restarted:
Obviously Graham and Charlie enjoyed themselves:
We were invited to the beach area after that with some new friends.  This is definitely the boys' new happy place!
I'm just so glad Graham and Charlie found some new friends to play with.  We are so lucky to have found this little neighborhood, especially when we bought the house sight unseen!

One last photo - looks like this one corn didn't quite pollinate properly! So many gaps.  Ha ha!
A couple from the neighborhood actually drove to a town about an hour away to buy some corn.  It's called "Mirai" corn from the town of Capron.  Wow, talk about sweet!  You could actually eat it uncooked - tasted just like candy!  What's funny about this whole experience was I thought he said $4 per ear so we paid our neighbor over $90 for the dozen.  Talk about embarrassing! We definitely had a good laugh about it and thankfully, he did say that it wasn't the first time that this same incident had happened.  We are such city folks - willing to pay any amount for anything good. LOL!!!

Tuesday, August 23, 2022

Trip to LA (Incognito)

Graham and I took a trip back to LA - mostly incognito.  Graham had an appointment with his orthodontist.  He was supposed to get his expanders on but come to find out, the day before the appointment that the office needed to retake his imprints! Wait, what??!!  So anyway... that didn't work out so well, but the trip did!  Graham and I had so much fun :-)

We can see the Sears Tower in downtown on the way to Midway airport:
Off on our little adventure - just me and Graham:
Cool view from the airplane window:
We are renting a car and this one pulled up just as we approached the customer service desk.  The guy gave us a free upgrade to rent this.  Sweeeeet! :-D
Fancy!
Graham is so happy he gets to sit in the front seat now:
We head over to The Hangar for some food.  Usual tacos for Graham:
At first, I thought I was going to have Banh Mi (a Vietnamese sandwich) but went with the Bulgogi instead:
OMG, I guess I was hungry.  Ha ha!!
As per usual, dessert after:
Another reason for this trip was to also pick up Graham new glasses.  I love it!!
We are still admiring this Challenger.  It is super loud with this Hemi V8 engine:
Next morning... breakfast:
Meeting up with a good friend at 2nd breakfast:
Even though Graham's appointment fell through, I was so glad to be able to catch up with a few good friends. It was nice to sit and relax and chat for hours without having to pack another box or clean another thing!

After late breakfast, Graham and I decided to check out an antique store.  Look at this row of palm trees! Totally California!
Graham found an old rotary phone.  I've never seen this type where the dial is at the bottom/base of the phone like that:
What a fun spot with so many interesting things!  
Graham found an old typewriter which he just couldn't get away from.  Ha ha! And I was actually looking for old door knobs which I didn't find too many of.  So, off to another antique place.  Woah, this place had all sorts of old antique hardware!!
Still didn't find anything that I was really looking for.  Probably a good thing anyway :-P

At night, we went to have dinner with another friend/family.  They even brought along Charlie's belated Birthday card and gift.  So sweet!
Still admiring this car.  LOL!!!  It is so loud during acceleration it's almost obnoxious.  But so fun to drive since that pick-up is so fast!
I had to actually lay off the accelerator plenty of times to make sure I wasn't speeding - which I probably already was at 75-80mph on the freeway.  Oops! He he..!

We went to see the huge mural in San Pedro where we all put together the boat:
So happy we are leaving a little imprint of ourselves and our memories here in CA:
And of course, we had to get some boba milk tea and the usual lemonade from our regular spot before leaving CA.  Poor Charlie is so upset that he didn't get any:
What a short but sweet trip!  And look, Long Beach airport has a new terminal.  Fancy!
This airport tower is still classic.  I hope they don't tear it down:
Love how we can walk up to the airplane still:
Still so many cargo ships hanging out by the harbor:
Looks like a storm is brewing during the flight!
Again, what a fun trip that was although I was really hoping to get Graham started on his path to braces.  Looks like we will have to wait another couple of months until the insurance kicks in from Bob's new job.  Graham is probably happy since he is not in any pain as of yet!