This was my attempt at having the kids help decorate for the Winter Olympics.  I was never able to pull together a Russian feast, but we did have a “sleepover” to watch the Opening Ceremony.  It seems like there has been a lot of disappointment for the U.S. this year.  There hasn’t been too many *wow* moments so far.  However, it has been a lot of fun watching the games with the kids.  For some reason, both of the kids really wanted to watch curling.  We finally watched some tonight, and it was quite entertaining.  They also enjoy the biathlon (the shooting part).  D has been teaching them to root against Russia and Germany—haha.  We do like the 15 year old Russian figure skater though—when she spins, it is jaw-dropping.   

Our church has been partnering with a program called CVS which brings Japanese university students to the United States.  On Saturday night, they hosted an Iron Chef competition, so we decided to check it out.  As indicated by the title, the ingredient to be featured was spinach.  Smoked salmon also seemed to play a role in the majority of the dishes…including the dessert!  The dishes were supposed to be inspired by Genesis.  The pasta was supposed to represent the serpent.  The smoked salmon represented the heart. 

This dessert was quite “interesting”: avocado with spinach, smoked salmon, raisins, pomegranate seeds, honey and black pepper. 

There was also a talent show portion, which featured singers, dancers, and a basketball spinner.  This was one of the talented dancers.  The students were quite eager to talk to us.  We shared our stories about our visit to Japan and we told them how we liked Mr. Donut.   

We decided to stop by McDonald’s on the way home.  D had been wanting to try the limited edition Shamrock Shake.

However, the machine was having issues…we had stir it up at home.  #shamrockshakefail (but the kids loved it, of course).

These are the valentines that k passed out to her classmates.

n’s speech teacher gave him a cute card:

One of k’s friends gave her this card based on “Frozen”*:

*I can’t believe how many girls seem to love this movie.  I was thinking of taking k and n to see it, but now that it is only about a month until it comes out on DVD, it seems more prudent to just wait and buy it since the cost would be the same. 

I didn’t want n to be left out of the Valentine card festivities, so I bought him a pack of Batman cards with erasers to hand out to friends at a Valentine party we went to with my moms’ group.  He wanted to do it all himself, and he did.  He looked so industrious.

These are the sandwiches we brought to the party:

One of D’s co-workers handed out these Valentine packages.  She’s Japanese—can you tell? 

It was nice that Valentine’s day was on a Friday.  It felt more relaxed.  D made dinner—salmon, asparagus and rice.  Soo good!  We decided that this will be our traditional Valentine’s dinner from now on.

Heart brownie ice cream sundaes for dessert:

Girl Scout cookie season is upon us.  It is about half way through, and k has already surpassed her sales from last year.  Currently she is at about 325 boxes, and I don’t expect her to go much higher.  Like last year, we pushed hard the first couple of weeks and quickly tapered off.  k’s confidence in asking people if they would like to buy cookies has definitely improved from last year, but there is still plenty of room for growth.   

I revamped our troop’s cookie booth poster, and it looks much cuter this year, if I do say so myself.

This is what our living room looked like on cookie delivery day.  I really should have ordered more in the beginning so I wouldn’t have to bug our cookie mom so much about re-stocking.  Lesson learned for next year.

k handed out bulletins at church as part of Scout Sunday

We participated in National Frozen Yogurt Day at Yogurtland.  This is one of the few times when I allow the kids to load up on toppings, since they are free, so it is a real treat.

Recently, k and n have been really enjoying playing with their “babies”, which is a collection of about 7 or 8 dolls.  I enjoy seeing how they use their imaginations in interacting with the babies. 

This was a scene I found at the breakfast table the other day.  They named the babies in front Boy Champion (aka Little Boy Blue) and Girl Champion (aka Sara, presumably named after their Auntie).

We had a full three-day weekend.  Friday afternoon, D drove down to Carlsbad to pick up his race packet.  k had her second keiki hula lesson.

Saturday morning, we had a consultation with someone to hang our new-to-us television.  Saturday afternoon, k went to a Fancy Nancy-themed birthday party.  Saturday night we went to Souplantation so that D could carbo-load.

Sunday morning, D ran what he has deemed his last marathon.  (He’ll provide more details, I’m sure).  Sunday night, D and k had a daddy-daughter bowling night with her girl scout troop.  n and I had a mommy-son date at In-n-Out.

Monday morning we went on a whale-watching cruise in Newport with Davey’s Locker.  All four of us only had to pay $32 total, which I thought was a good idea (again, we had free tickets through OC Register).  We took our car on the Balboa ferry.

This was our boat.

We gawked at the large homes/boats.

We saw numerous bottle-nosed dolphins.  You can only see the tip of the dorsal fin here, but they were pretty active.

We saw California sea lions.

Unfortunately, we saw ZERO whales.  Yesterday the boats saw a total of 17 gray whales, and according to the website, they saw 5 gray whales during the later cruises today.  Oh well.  We received 50% off coupons for our next cruise since we didn’t see any whales, but I’m not sure when we’ll want to try again.

This was the only whale we did see.

n fell asleep.  I was thankful that none of us became seasick.

It was a lovely day weather-wise.

Afterward we went to my parents’ house to celebrate my sister’s birthday.

We had some free time on Saturday morning, so we decided to check out Turtle Rock Community Park in Irvine.  We started out by checking out the small Nature Center.  There is a short trail that is accessible via the back of the Nature Center.

First we consulted the trail map.

Then we headed toward the right, and found the rock maze.

Then we looked at the human sun dial.

I enjoyed reading the quotes along the way.

This is the perfect “hike” for really small kids—even toddlers could do it.

Next the kids played in the park.

We snacked on mini bagel chips—aren’t they cute?

There is also a small stream with ducks.

I enjoyed exploring this park.  It is always good to spend some time outdoors, and we are fortunate that such outings are possible in the middle of winter. 

Last weekend k went to a princess-tea themed birthday party.  Since the moms were invited, I attended as well.  I enjoyed all of the details, and I think I had as much fun as k.  I am glad k had another opportunity to wear her Easter dress!

Yes, this post is a little late, but better than never.  New Year’s Eve we followed our annual tradition of looking through all of our photo albums.  At night we tried to all sleep on our couch, per our other tradition, but alas, this was the year when we just did not fit.  D volunteered to sleep on the floor.

n took a nap around dinnertime, so he was still awake when D and k were sleeping at around 9:45 p.m.  We were all asleep by around 10 p.m., though.

New Year’s Day was all about the food!