Fall fun, Thanksgiving break

The days and weeks continue to fly by. It has been so hard working 32 to 36 hours per week for the family. It seems like there is always something that is being sacrificed. The top two things that become neglected are cleaning the house and making good meals. I have been trying extra hard for the past 3 weeks to plan and make good food because the kids are so busy with school and swim team. The kids can only eat if I have the meals prepared ahead of time, which has helped me prioritize meal preparations. 

I can't even remember the specific day that these pictures were taken, but I thought the boys looked so cute and similar I just had to snap some photos. 

If you can't tell this is first thing in the morning. Rubix refuses to wear a shirt to bed and Axel appears to refuse to brush his hair :). 

Phoenix had her first friend over in a long time. Sana and her painted rocks in the park and played wall ball against the garage. She was so happy to have one of her friends from school come over. She actually came again last weekend, but I was busy cleaning and cooking the entire time that she was here/they were playing outside, I didn't get to enjoy their playdate. 

Rubix has started playing soccer at school, so he is very interested in playing at home. 

Phoenix really wanted to paint her nails a few weeks ago. I am not sure what happened, but before I could start painting them, Axel was already at it. 

Axel is such a sweet big brother. 

The final product!

The kids have been loving using the dominoes for everything except playing Dominoes. Rubix was proud of his creation. He is primarily using them to build "marble mazes". 

For Thanksgiving we had the Worden's over for an early Thanksgiving meal. Phoenix and Axel were fantastic helpers in the kitchen. 

Here we are tight before dinner. 

We had yummy pumpkin pie and fruit for dessert. 

The day before Thanksgiving, we headed to Sacramento. It was Gpa Brian's birthday so we enjoyed a walk to the park and Mexican food. 

Happy birthday Gpa!

Thanksgiving we enjoyed a relaxing day with Gma, Gpa and Great Uncle Dave. Gma and the kiddos worked on arts and crafts while Keith and I got to go for a bike ride. 

We rode to Folsom Lake. The lake was very low and it took us a lot longer than it use to. 

We were able to snap a quick photo before heading back to Gma's house. 

Thanksgiving, Italian style, dinner!

We managed to go to the park on Friday before heading over to Auntie Shannon's. 

All 3 generation of girls!

The kids had so much fun seeing cousin Aya and Braylin. 

We had a very long 3 hour drive home on Friday, but it was worth it. I didn't mention, but on Thanksgiving Gma and I stepped out to visit GG (great grandma Goldstein) (who was at a rehab center after breaking her right hip).

I forgot Gpa Brian's birthday gift in the refrigerator. Axel found it and asked if he could have some. I decided to take a picture to show Gpa Brian the present that I mentioned that I completely forgot to bring him. Oh well! I guess it was the thought that counts!

The kiddos are on there last few days of school before the holiday break. Axel has 4 days of finals starting tomorrow. I get to volunteer in the classroom for Phoenix's holiday party on Friday and the kids have a swim meet this Friday. I will have to find time to update you on the kids swim teams and other news that has happened since Thanksgiving. I should have more time since tomorrow is the last night of bible study fellowship until January, which means I have 3 weeks to catchup on work and personal stuff like blogging!

 

Happy Halloween! End of the Cabana season and Beach Whale swim practices. First rain of the season!

It has been a fun season of swimming on Saturday mornings with Daddy, aka, Beach Whale swim team. He has run fun practice meets for the kids and given out ribbons for their times/PRs. The last practice of the year ended with a 500 yard free style race and fun drills where the kids swam with one arm or leg in groups of 4 or in trains of 6. It was such a special gift to be able to run Saturday morning swim practices. 

Daddy had to leave to Florida to take care of Gpa Paul. He had a productive visit and hopefully, Gpa Paul will be motivated to get strong again. 

Here is Daddy reading to Rubix before he left for his red eye on Saturday night, 10 days ago. 

On Sunday last week we had the biggest storm with the highest wind speeds and rain fall of the year. It was a little scary, having not seen winds and rain like that in such a long time. We went out for a walk in the "calm" of the storm. It took us 50 minutes to walk 2 miles because of the 30 mph winds at times. We loved seeing water flowing in our creeks and .....

Beautiful rainbows that filled the sky!

It may have been the same 3 rainbows, but they seemed to be in different locations. 

We even harvested our last pumpkin in the rain. 

Our little pumpkin patch!

On Friday the kids were able to wear their costumes to school. This was a tough year to get the kids to decide what they wanted to be. After much contemplation Rubix and Phoenix decided on vampires and Axel created his Pi napple shirt and mask. 

Axel has been running again, once a week, for the past month. He ran his best mile of 6:57 and then 10 minutes later did a 400 yard dash with his buddy Joel. Amazingly he was able to PR at 1:19, just one second behind Joel! I was shocked at his effort and ability to push himself on already tired legs. 

Saturday night we carved pumpkins and watched Hotel Transylvania. 

It is exciting to see the kids able to do more on their own (except Rubix) who I did not allow him to use a knife. 

Here are the kids all ready to go trick or treating yesterday with their pumpkins in front of them. Rubix's monster was adorable. Axel's pineapple was so fitting with his costume and Phoenix's cat was surprisingly really good. I was impressed at her artistic ability, even with a pumpkin!

We spent the evening with the Gunnions. The kids managed 2 hours of trick or treating and we were able to go to the neighborhood of the house we bought and say hello to our renters. 

I couldn't pass up this cute picture of Axel!

Today we managed to sort our candy and pick out a few to save and enjoy. The rest go to the military men and women through a donation that Harker does every year. 

 The kids are trying out for different swim teams over the next few weeks and they are deciding on what swim team they want to join. We will see which one they decide and if all of them or just one or two of them decide to take the next step in their swimming journey. They did well at their first try outs tonight. More to come.....

Rubix's back to school night, Axel's 1st dance, birthday parties, Harker day and more!

On Thursday night before Fall break day #1 the family went for a night swim and had the privilege of seeing the sun set. It was quite beautiful. 

With fall break day comes harvesting our apple crop. Axel and I picked 4 dozen apples and left another dozen or so on the tree for later. It seems like a decade was a long time to finally get a nice crop, but at the same time it doesn't necessarily feel like it has been a decade!

We are excited to say that the Montezuma house is occupied by our renters starting October 1st and we were able to get everything done that we wanted to (except for a few "minor" things). It is amazing that the copper repiping, copper ground electrical work, among other things were all done within a couple of weeks and that we were able to do these and get the place rented in 3 weeks from close. We are so incredibly blessed! We hope our tenants are enjoying the house and we hope this house is a blessing to one of these lovely children below in the future. 

With fall upon us we all started running again. Axel has ran 3 weeks in a row, hovering a few seconds past 7 minutes. Rubix went from a sub 12 minute to a 10:30 minute mile and Phoenix is still working on her form to tolerate running without pain. 

On September 28th, we finally had Rubix's back to school night. Here is his rock that he painted. 

This is a placemat that his homeroom teacher made for all of the students. 

Here is another picture that was hung up in the classroom of our sweet Rubix. 

And last a fun project that Rubix did for back to school night.

Our second round of pumpkins have finished slowly one by one. Unlike, our first round that were harvested nearly all at the same time. This second round have been ready weeks apart. We actually have one more to harvest this weekend that is still in the process of turning orange. 

On October 1st Axel had his first school dance. He was quite nervous, but had a great time overall.

Here he is right before I dropped him off. I was so proud of him for going and having fun.

On October 2nd we went to Tyler's 10th birthday party at the Cabana club. They have been one of our close family friends over the pandemic and it was nice to be able to celebrate with the Gunnions. 

Tyler invited just 2 friends besides our family. It was a little windy and a bit difficult to light his 10 candles for him to blow out. Everyone got a good laugh at the efforts taken to outsmart the wind. 

With team work the candles were momentarily lit and Tyler was able to blow out a few of them. 

A cute picture of Joel and Axel. 

Cake time!

Axel and Tyler gutted through an extra spicy cheetos eating contest and Axel won! Crazy kid could handle spice like he had been eating it for years! 

Here is a cute picture of Keith holding our first rental check. Very exciting!

I started mentoring at the San Jose Kaiser last Thursday and was awe struck by God's gloriously painted sky. I know it was dangerous, but I snapped a few pictures because it was too beautiful to not remember. 

This Saturday we went to Harker day where the kids had hours of game time fun. 

Axel made Eagle masks for all of them to wear to show school pride. 

Rubix got to ride in a bus for the first time from the old middle school campus to the high school. 

Rubix trying to snatch a toy u.

He wasn't quite successful, but he did get a constellation price... 

a weird pumpkin head stuffy. 

Rubix also had fun playing fooseball., 

skiball, 

and basketball, even with the big 4th and 5th graders. 

He also played "hockey", 

did the shock wave and 

and had fun exploring the fish. 

Phoenix spent most of her day trying to snatch up a toy. 

She patiently waited in line over and over again with different friends until....

she was successful and finally won a toy!

We also tackled this fun game. Both Rubix and Phoenix were able to ring the bell. 

Axel hung out with his friends. Luca was his buddy last year when Luca joined Harker. Luca came from Italy just a couple of years ago. He is a sweet kid. Axel also hung out with his friend Shamik. 

Life continues to be busier than expected and we are still trying to adjust. Axel lost a tooth recently. I can't remember if it was in the last blog or happened since then. Axel also broke the 5 foot mark and is 5 foot 1/2 inch! Phoenix and Rubix also continue to grow like crazy, but with Axel it is the most noticeable with growing out of pants I just bought him 2 months ago!

We are looking forward to some more fall/ Halloween fun. The kids are having trouble deciding what to be for Halloween, but we are all looking forward to the 3 day weekend at the end of the month. Check back then for more Szolusha adventures.