Last Call...Going Private

Shoot me an email with your address if you haven't already done so. I know it's a pain, but I will have the site notify you, via email, every time there is an update to the blog.
Thanks!

Whew!

OK. I think we are pretty much caught up, here. Sorry, grandmas and grandpas for the slacking...

Coloring Eggs

Stella colored her first eggs this year. For a couple of days afterwards, she had to keep going into the fridge to look at them and hold them.

Utah

Stella and I went to visit my family in Utah. We hadn't seen them since last summer, and a visit was long overdue. Thanks to my awesome bro-in-law, we got to fly out for free. Stella was so excited to ride on a plane. It had been a few years since the last time. She did great, and we brought along plenty of stuff to do, as well as some snacks to keep busy. What a champ!

Stella and her Ya-Ya:

The year that Stella was born, I had three other girlfriends who were also expecting. Unfortunately, one of them moved to Utah when Stella was just a couple of weeks old. We had to make sure we saw some of our favorite peeps while we were out there. Stella and Hattie had such a blast together. They took bubble baths, played all things princess, and even swapped nightgowns for the two nights we stayed. Very sweet.

This little monkey (Hattie's sister, Maizy) was my favorite. She reminded me of a bag lady - arms always FULL of toys and blankies. If she wasn't carrying them, she had a little stroller piled high with whatever she could find. I would have stuck her in my pocket and taken her home, if I thought she wouldn't have been missed. Such a cutie!

Auntie Carly

My sister came up to the Bay Area to hang with us for a weekend. Carly just graduated in Theater from Southern Oregon, and is now living in L.A. to start her acting career. In fact, she just got a big part in one of the local theaters down there. We are very excited for her. Stella LOVES my sister. And Carly loves being an auntie. She is so great at getting down on Stella's level and playing with her for hours. Also, Carly is the only sucker who will carry Stella around on her shoulders for an entire day, if Stella bats her eyelashes enough times.
Stella was in no mood for pictures:

She wouldn't look at the camera, no matter how many times we tried:

Eventually, we got Stella to look in the general direction of the camera:

Finally-a smile!

Gotta have the token family shot on the bridge (Stella has a couple of limbs in the shot, so it counts):

Stella with Carly:

Life...

We have just been plugging along, lately. Stella is very much enjoying her preschool - her teachers are wonderful. Stella's sense of humor continues to develop, and she has learned a couple of things that can get Glenn's goat (cheering for the Dodgers, for one - everytime she does it she immediately glances over at Glenn to gage his reaction. Usually he is stifling a laugh).

Glenn is finishing up his last few classes at DVC. He will have his associates in the fall, then off to a four year. Not sure where, yet.

And I continue at my job, and try to drink up as much time with my family as humanly possible.

Our most recent family pic:

Getting Healthy

One of our many New Year’s Resolutions has been to get back to our healthy lifestyle that has gone by the wayside recently. As a result of this new commitment that Glenn and I have made, there have been a lot of discussions about what it means to be healthy, and how important is it to take care of our bodies because they are a gift from Heavenly Father. The other night, we had some steamed broccoli with our dinner. As I was cleaning up dinner, Stella informed me that she wanted to take some of the leftover broccoli to school the next day with her snack. The next evening, I asked Stella if she ate some broccoli for her snack. I couldn’t help but chuckle at her enthusiastic response, “Yes, I ate broccoli today. I’m getting healthy for Heavenly Father!”

Lounging

Imagine Glenn with a focused face, watching the olympics, and Stella just looking normal, as if this is her usual position.

Of course, as soon as I bring out the camera, the smiles are on.

So I asked them to try and look natural. This is the result:

Hiking

Stella has really been into hiking, since we took her to the redwoods back around Thanksgiving. her favorite place to go right now is Briones. She loves it when the cows are out grazing. She also enjoys climbing up the HUGE hills. I am impressed at how adventurous this little one has become, over the last year or so.

This is the first hill that Stella wanted to climb - the picture really doesn't do it justice:

Another view of the hill. We actually climbed three of these bad boys in a row, per Stella's insistence:

Stella hamming it up for the camera:

Krispies

More Krispy making.