California had another wonderful couple of months of rain. It seemed like we had more rainy days than non rain days. We tried our best to embrace it and enjoy the weather. Rubix actually got use to wearing a rain jacket and boots.
We had way too many birthday parties the past few weeks. We had two Pump it up parties in a row in December. Rubix got to enjoy his party first and then Phoenix got to enjoy her friends party directly afterward.
Although Phoenix had plenty of energy for Vishak's party, Rubix was very tired and hardly played and fell asleep on the way to our 3rd party/garthering.
Our 3rd gathering was a fun evening at Eileen's house where we were able to see the beautiful lights that their neighborhood has every year.
Phoenix had her holiday performance before break.
I think I mentioned it before. She was one of 6 children in her grade that were asked to do a special dance. I was so proud of her. She was energetic and knew all of the dance moves and all of the words to the 10 Christmas songs that she sang.
After the break Rubix started preschool at Challenger. Here he is bright and early on January 6th. Daddy traveled to CES and left the night before so it was an extra early day and long week for the kids.
Here he is in front of the school ready to go in for his first day. He absolutely loves school. He has officially completed 3 weeks. He has made several friends, he is learning the days of the week and months of the year. He can now recognize most of the alphabet. He can write his name. He is learning to draw. I will have to remember to take a picture of his dragon that he brought home. They teach step by step drawing and it is amazing what they come home with. He has also eating like a champ. He is the only child that eats his entire lunch every day. I pack a little bit bigger lunch for him than I do for Phoenix. He eats an entire 2 bread sandwich, 1-3 fruits and some veggies. AMAZING!
This was a park visit during the 2 week break.
Rubix was on the big kid swing and Phoenix convinced him to go on the little swing so she could push him.
Here is Rubix on picture day morning! It was quite the big deal to have his first school picture. Proud boy and proud parent.
It has been a very cold and wet winter. We have had thirties for the lows. Rubix decided one morning that he wanted to wear pants to school. I was extremely proud of him. He has worn pants now about 5 total days. According to Rubix, pants are great for pockets!!!!
Last weekend the kids went to Aisha's birthday party. She is a Christmas baby, but the parents waited to have her party. They moved in down the street from us this summer and having another friend in the neighborhood is such a treat. It is amazing how they grew up together the first 4 years of their lives and even though they had almost 2 years apart they still get along great. Here is Rubix in the jump house.
I did not get any pictures of Phoenix because she was too fast to capture.
On Sunday we had Phoenix's party. She had Ashley, Kyla, Nicole, Caitlyn and Aisha over.
Caitlyn and Nicole's little brothers were here as well. The kids painted picture frames and trays, they made bracelets and jumped in the jump house.
Phoenix thoroughly enjoyed herself.
The party lasted for nearly 5 hours. The girls really got along well.
Monday Keith stayed home with the kids while I worked, which was such a blessing for me. On Tuesday I took the day off in order to go to Phoenix's school to celebrate her birthday. Here she is with her birthday hat and sticker.
She wanted me to bring in ice cream sandwiches. Instead I brought in ice cream bars because they are gluten free and her teacher and a classmate are gluten free. Here is a super cute picture with Caitlyn, Ashley and Kyla. None of her closest friends are in her homeroom, hence why they are not eating the ice cream sandwich. I just love how much they I enjoy each other and that they still wanted to hang out with Phoenix even though they were not allowed to have her birthday treat with her.
Mrs. Wallace, Phoenix's teacher was thoughtful and asked if I would like a picture with her. It was one of those times where you know that the 30 minutes I was at Phoenix's school was well worth the entire day off of work. Moments like this are priceless. She knows how much we care and love her because of the small things like being present.
Here is the birthday girl before bed. She is exhausted.
One last photo with just daddy and our now 7 year old.
While we were having fun celebrating Phoenix, Axel was having fun with his friends. Carmen picked up Kristin and Axel and took them to her sister's beach home in Watsonville. You might notice that Axel finally got glasses. His eyes haven't changed, but he was squinting more and more. He first failed the eye exam at 6 years old. The glasses really help his eye fatigue that he was getting with all of the reading and screen time that he does with his school work and of course, his 2 hours he gets to play Minecraft on the weekend.
Axel and Kristin had a blast.
They played all day on Saturday on the beach. Both kiddos were sore on Sunday from all of the digging they did.
Here is Axel with his glasses in Language arts class. Mrs. Guarino was the one who finally said that Axel is squinting all of the time and really needs to go to the eye doctor.
On Sunday, Axel spent the entire day with his buddy Joel. He had a fun filled weekend despite not being with us. It was actually really nice to be able to focus on Phoenix and the younger two.
Axel has his 5th grade show next week. He will be doing 4 performances. He also has to pick his language and electives by the end of next week. He already submitted his elections. He hopes to do Japanese for his language. His top 2 choices for electives are Tech Theater and Speech and Debate. His back up is ceramics. I think they don't find out until a few days before school starts in the fall on what classes they actually get. Axel was invited to a special math summer school that is only offered to the P3 5th grade students. It is not required right now, but if he stays on this very accelerated program, summer school will be required as many of the classes offered are advanced placement and need the summer months to complete the entire year of curriculum. To give you an idea we found out that Axel will be completing Calculus BC his Junior year and then we think his senior year he will be taking a class similar to differential equations.
Phoenix is rocking math herself and has not only caught up with all of her math facts for addition and subtraction she is now working her way through the multiplication table. She is also being introduced to division. She will have to have her entire times table memorized up to 12 x 12 next year. I don't think that will be a problem as she has 0-5 up to 12 nearly down and she has all of her 9's down thanks to daddy's fun math tricks.
