Erick and I are enjoying Superbowl Sunday at our clubhouse here at The Madison Apartments. It was completely different without our great friends back in NH hanging out, watching the guys go crazy making their "wings" and drinking lots of beers.  Erick still made the wings but it wasn't with the same enthusiasm.   The weather was a balmy 82 degrees and it was only 3:30 in the afternoon when it started....like I said, completely different this year but we ended up enjoying ourselves with some friends here more than we thought.

Our friend Andy & Erick with the remnants of what's left of nachos, wings, chips n dip and plenty of beer for the guys.  Andy has never watched a Superbowl game in his life, never been interested.  I think Erick enticed him with the "wings" and Andy couldn't resist and stayed.  Andy & his wife Tina moved here from Connecticut a month before we did.  They were are very first good friends here.  Tina was nursing a cold back in her apartments and the kids were playing in another room here at the clubhouse.  

This must have been late at night.  These days I'm not sleeping very well so I try to stay up as late as possible to the point of exhaustion in hopes of sleeping most of the night.  In this picture I'm 7 months along and counting on only about 6 weeks left.  I'm always early so we're hoping for around March 13th date.   This belly of mine is taking up too much space on my small frame and making it quite uncomfortable for me and besides that Blake kicks constantly but mostly when I lay down.  We have to get that boy on a better schedule when he comes into this world because mama aint gonna like being up all night!! (like I have control of that)

We wanted to show you some pictures of a home in Westlake Village that we love.  These are the type of luxury homes we're looking at and cannot wait to move into in less than 6 months.  We absolutely love the master bathroom in this home, the shower as you can see is huge like the one in our house we built in Merrimack.  If only the prices of the homes were the same:)   

Here's the foyer with the staircase .  This room had 20 foot ceiling, lots of windows with incredible light coming through, even though it was a rainy, cloudy day.

This is the type of backyard we absolutely "have to have".  We want to be able to entertain like we're at a resort with all our friends, have parties and "wing fests".  There is actually a fenced in full size basketball court behind the pool area.  How cool would that be that I could let Blake ride his bikes and stuff back there.  The gazebo has a firepit which would be great for roasting marshmallows and warming up around the fire on a cool winter night (50 degrees :).

There's "The Man", checking out one of his favorite parts of the backyard, the bar/outdoor kitchen area.  A nice fireplace with outdoor furniture is another fun place to hang out with our friends and family.  "Anyone need a beer? Hey who needs a cheeseburger. And when are those wings done? Let's get this party going right?"

This is to the left of the previous picture which has the grill, outdoor keg and 'fridge. The outdoor keg is a nice feature in that it gives you ice cold beer all the time and it never ends. Never! It's like hooked up to the budweiser plant or something and never ever runs out. There are munchkins that patrol it to make sure it keeps on working. Kind of like the electric company. You just use what you need. It's very convenient. 

Alexia received Art Classes from my dad for Christmas at a wonderful school within walking distance from out home.  It's amazing what they teach her in just over an hour.  She's already learned how to use texture and tones in her pictures.  She's picked it up quickly and they are actually using one of her pieces (fruit basket) in a new art gallery they just opened.  Here she's working on a bouquet of heart shaped balloons as her next project.  

Alexia's house was her 3rd picture she made at the art studio.  It took her about an hour to complete it.  I'm so happy she's enjoying herself, stretching her imagination and growing.  I've noticed her work improve over just a few weeks...great job, peanut!

Alexia's playing a game of Sequence with a new friend she met here at the apartment a few weeks ago.  Kristen is also in the third grade but has a different teacher.  My dad's girlfriend, Diann, bought us this game when were were in Arizona with Ashley & Amanda the beginning of the month.  We played it several times there and loved it.  Thank you for your thoughfulness, we enjoy playing it almost every other night (Alexia's really good at it too). We even let Erick win once.

Alexia's buddy Mariah also live in our complex.  She's in fourth grade and also takes art classes with Alexia on Saturday mornings.  Here they are enjoying a playful game of tennis at one of our incredible local parks.  Mariah has a baby sister who's only 5 months old.  We enjoy hanging out with Mariah and her family on Saturday nights or during the day at the park.  Her dad is an actor who's been in movies and CSI episodes.  Ashley & Amanda recognized him from the movie "Disturbia" when they were here.  Super nice people who are down to earth and not "Hollywood".  

Playing Mario Kart with her friend Hope after school one afternoon.  They get a lot of half days here, not sure what that's all about.  Hope is actually the very first friend Alexia made.  When we came out here last April to go apartment hunting and checking out schools.   Hope's family lives in the same condominium complex as Diann (dad's girlfriend) where we stayed for that week. Her family was the only one we saw outside so we went over to introduce ourselves and what a sweet family they are.  They have 3 daughters and Hope & Alexia are the same age. Just so happened that when Alexia was assigned her third grade classroom, Hope was in her class.  What are the chances?   

Ashley took this stunning picture from my dad's neighborhood in Arizona.  The sun was beginning to set and the mountains were a glowing red, just beautiful!

The Valencia Community Center is a wonderful recreation center, where Erick played Volleyball.  Here they offer The Wii games, pool table, ping pong, air hockey and many other activities.  It's a great place to come and have some fun and it's free.  Erick usually takes Alexia here on their Friday "Lexi Days".  Its another way Valencia gets the community together. They do a lot of that here. It's really nice. Lexi and I still continue to have our own day one on one and do something special.  She really looks forward to them and so do we:)  Ashley patiently waits her turn while Alexia and Amanda rock with Guitar Hero. The girls pretty much spent their Christmas break here in CA "mastering" Guitar Hero. 

Ashley captured this gorgeous sunset in Arizona.

Ok, you & I know how in these 55 yr old and older communities they have all these people driving around the neighborhood with their little golf carts, well, my dad's not any different.  He picked this one up and he & Diann tool around in it to get from place to place when they have packages to carry to functions and parties (yes they are actually more active in that respect than most of us) They never stop!  Apparantly all the driving practice Alexia received at John & Judy's in Merrimack paid off, here she is giving Ashley & Amanda the ride of their lives...hold on Ashley. It was pretty strange to see Alexia "driving" her sisters around for a change:) :) She did well but I did hear she almost lost Ashley on a turn.  

The crew at dad's house in Arizona, Dad, Amanda, Ashley, Alexia, Diann and Erick.  This was during one of our card games that dad and Diann taught us.  We spent about 4 days there in the beginning of January and had so much fun.  It's such a pretty state (in the winter) too hot in the summer.  We went to Prescott, AZ to visit Embry Riddle, a school Ashley is seriously considering for next year.  It's an aeronautical school, probably one of the top in the country, right Todd?  For those of you who know Ashley, she's wanted to fly since she was about 11 yrs old and now she's thinking of flying helicopters or possibly majoring in airplane crash investigation or even Homeland Security.  This school only has about 1800 students and everyone there is going for the same thing so how cool is that to go to school with people all interested in the same thing. 

December in Cali!

Yes, there is ice skating in Claifornia and we found it.  We needed something to make it feel like the Holidays.  It was the beginning of December and we headed to one of our most favorite beaches, Santa Monica.  Alexia enjoyed a short time of ice skating, after a few falls she decided she had enough so we went to Starbucks (we're bummed there's no Dunkin' Donuts here) and got hot chocolate.  We walked around the Promenade and had dinner outside, yes, outside in December, of course we were sitting under the heat lamps but it was still wonderful.  The Promenade is like a Faniel Hall area but goes on for blocks of stores, restaurants and street performers.  It's so nice and clean and fun there, it was decorated pretty for Christmas and Alexia took our picture in front of one of the Christmas trees!  There was a day here when a few surrounding towns got snow.  They were at higher elevations.  Palmdale was one that hadn't seen snow in over 10 yrs, which was a dusting.  Well they ended up getting 12 inches and roads were closed, people couldn't get back & forth to their homes and had to stay at friends or hotels for a couple of days.  They just don't have the equipment to clear the roads here so people were stranded in their cars.  We didn't get anything here but the mountain tops were beautifully sprinkled with the white stuff and it was absolutely gorgeous.

Here they are on December 21st, Ashley & Amanda arrived safely over the weekend.  Believe it or not this is our winter weather.  It was actually in the 30's & 40's in the morning and only getting into the 60's and 70's during the day.  The morning I picked Amanda up form the airport it was 5:00 a.m. and 35 degrees and she comes strolling off the plane in flip flops...what a rude awakening.  She was so cold, her blood has thinned from the warm tropical weather in Hawaii I guess.  I have to say the whole time she was here she was "cold".  As you can see in the picture above, she always had a blanket on when she was on the couch.  Of course Ashley thought it was "warm", comparitively speaking to NH weather.  It was so nice to have them here, all our girls together again.  We enjoyed a game of frisbee and catching the football at the park next to Alexia's school.  It felt so good to have the warm sunshine on our face.  As you an tell Alexia is sooooooo happy to have her sisters around again.  She really looks up to them and they just continue to adore their little sister.  

Alexia and Ashley are decorating10 dozen cookies on Christmas Eve.  We love the Spritzer cookies and then ice and decorate them.  Honestly we ended up eating them ALL within only a week or so.  I have to say this pregnancy is so different.  I barely eat and when I do I crave sugar, anything with sugar and carbs is my friend:)  Here I am 6 months along and only 3 to go!!! Yippee,  I've gained back the 15 lbs I orignally lost so we're good!  Blake is obviously growing by the big lump you see under my shirt.  It was great for Ashley & Amanda to experience his rolling and kicking while they were here.  I don't know how much of it they remember from when I was pregnant with Alexia.  

Here is the crew on New Years Eve!!! It was very different this year.  We missed all of you  and we didn't even cook "wings" this year and there was no margarita or beer shots from the roulette wheel,  no sparklers or fireworks either.  I actually made it until after midnight unlike last year, ha,ha.   Being without you all  just wasn't the same.  But as we were texting back and forth you knew we were thinking of you!  

As you can tell we didn't take any Christmas pictures.  Ya, let me tell you about that one.  Don't buy batteries at the Dollar Store.  I thought I was being thrifty but guess what those AA batteries lasted about as long as it took to turn the camera on so I had no batteries for the camera that morning.  Talk about bummer.   Erick took a lot of video, he's so great at that.  

I don't have pictures for some reason of all the girls and Erick taking turns playing Guitar Hero (Rock Band) for the Wii we got for Christmas.  They were all so good, within about a week they were all working on Medium level and more songs were added to their selection.  They really enjoyed that alot.  I even tried it before the girls left to go back to college, it was hard holding the guitar with my belly in the way but I surprised myself and did better than I thought I would:) 

It's New Year's Day!!  We took the girls to Santa Monica and played on the beach and walked on the Santa Monica Pier.  All 3 of them rode the roller coaster, Alexia loves it.  It's not too scary for her and not too babyish.  As you can see the equipment behind us, there are all kinds of excercises you can do.  Climbing ropes, balance beams, pull-up bars.  We tossed the football around for awhile and happened to see a sea lion in the water, it was so cool, he was riding the wave in like a surfer and we could see him through the water.  I couldn't get my camera ready quick enough to take a picture.  

Until next month, enjoy life!

More of November

It's Christmas time in California and Alexia is decorating the tree November 30th in shorts and a tank top.  It reached about 85 degrees this day.  It was defintely different decorating with the warm weather.  Erick tuned in some nice Christmas music to get us in the spirit.  We were unsure on whether to put up our big tree in our small apartment but we made it work.  Alexia was so excited.  

I volunteer at this place called Hunger Defense Fund.  It helps feed those in need, who are hitting a low point and with the economy today, people like you & me are coming here.   They pay $4 & get a box about 12x12 that they get to fill up with items donated by generous people but most of it comes from the local grocery stores (items that have reached their expiration date that they can't sell but are still good) like fruits, dairy products and frozen items.  On this day Alexia came with me to help distribute the food and organize it on the shelves.  We're in the spirit of giving!!

Thanksgiving Day, Erick and Alexia are making homemade pretzels.  They love to cook together, always.  Now that I think about it, Erick seems to cook/bake much more than me these days :) I'm lucky he enjoys it!  After the pretzels were ready we headed to Diann's house for an incredible dinner.  Honestly I have to say it was one of the most flavorful turkey dinners I've had.  She followed a system and prepared some of the items ahead of time and it worked out beautifully because she was able to sit and enjoy family time instead of constantly being in the kitchen.  It was a pleasant change to spend Thanksgiving this year with Diann's family and my dad.  

Alexia was invited to a school friend's birthday party.  Her friend, and protector, Kouran Mayweather is in her class.  He's the son of Floyd Mayweather Jr. the famous boxer.  He has his own promotion company and limo so about 18 kids literally got the red carpet treatment as they entered the limo, balloons and sparkling cider.  They headed to a car racing place that actually had cars that looked like the Indy cars.  She had to wear gloves, a protective net over her hair and a helmet.  She absolutely loved it.  I thought she'd be nervous but she enjoyed driving herself around the track. She was so proud to tell us that she came in 5th place the first race and 1st place the second race.  That girl is competitive.

There they are getting ready to enter the limosine.  These are some of Alexia's classmates.  Lyana, Bella and Hope, Alexia is on the right.  The birthday boy is wearing the black/red sweatshirt and is holding hands with his sisters.   They got the royal treatment riding to the party destination and back.  

Here we are living it up in Beverly Hills with Erick's college room mate Kaz and his wife Jen.  They were here from Connecticut for the American Music Awards.  They got a great "hook up" from a friend (sat 5th row).  They were towards the front, sitting next to Nickelback.  We met up with them for the day at the Beverly Hills Wilshire Hotel, where they were staying.  We happened to see Kathy Bates and another actor but we couldn't figure out his name.  During the AMA rehearsals that day, Jen got to hang out with Queen Latifa and Alicia Keyes.  She was so star struck.  We haven't seen these friends in probably about 6 years, how about that?  We had to move to the west coast to see them:)

We went to the Anaheim Ducks vs. Washington Capitols NHL hockey game on the 19th.  Our old neighbor Bruce Boudreau, who used to coach the Manchester Monarchs, then the Hershey Bears minor league was promoted to NHL coach last November.  It was so great to see him again.  Their team won that night 6-4.  He got us backstage passes to see him and some of the players.  Which by the way, are better looking with their helmets on.  

There they are Erick and Lexi holding their backstage passes, it was a great time.  Honestly, I don't think we've been to an NHL game in years (back on the East Coast).  We're here 3 months and come to watch one.  They are very loyal fans to their Ducks out here. Erick enjoyed his $9 beer (ay carumba).

As you all heard on the news, we had some terrible wildfires out here.  Apparantly this is the time of year.  We weren't directly affected but as you can see from this picture how close it was.  We could smell the burning, it was as if we were at a campsite and had a fire burning.  We kept our windows closed even though it was beautiful out.  This went on and off for about a week.  

Yes, it's the middle of November and we're still hanging out by the pool, and you?  Ah, I just had to rub it in once.  And of course my 5 month pregnant belly is showing.  It may look little but it feels big.  Lots of movement goin' on in there this month.  I can tell his bones are getting stronger because his kicks are much more noticeable. 

Halloween Night

Here it is, Halloween night.  Many of the homes were decorated so well.  This one was a huge spiderweb with a big furry spider.  You can barely see Alexia and her buddies, Isabelle & Nicholas on the right.  This was one of the first houses we went to.  The weather was beautiful night, in the mid 70's.

Another house that was decorated for Fall & Halloween.  Alexia enjoyed herself running from house to house with her new friends, but it just wasn't the same as last year and years before with her friends Courtney or Jake & Haley.

Here are the 3 ghouls, Isabelle was a pirate, Nicholas was a zombie and Alexia was a Navy girl.  The Madison (the place we live) had trick-or-treating bags and candy for the kids set up in the lobby, it was really nice to go and see the other kids from here dressed up.  

We were one of the first people on the streets, as you can tell it's still a bit light out.  It was almost 6:30 but still too light.  We're used to beginning at 6:00, here there are no set hours, just begin at dusk.  Since we were going to the neighborhood near Alexia's school and we were sure there would be tons of kids, we wanted to get in early.  Some of the areas are gated so we had to sneak past the gate when a car drove in or out.  

There was this one lady that had this spooky house. It was all dark  with scary music. She came to the door all hunched over and giving a slight moan. Isabelle just ran. Lexi took off say that it just wasn't worth it. It was pretty funny.

Happy Halloween Everyone!

Boo Bash at Bridgeport School

There were 4 themed rooms for our Haunted Stage.  The first was a tarot card room, second was the haunted forest/graveyard, third was the strobe light room with hanging spiders and bats and the fourth was the cafe with "finger" sandwiches, bloody wedding cake and amputated arms with rats eating them.  In this room we had a standing mannequin as the waiter.  We had some dummys sitting in the chairs and a couple of real people dressed up in costume so when the people came through they didn't know who was real.  Erick did a great job with this, he scared LOTS of people by being still until they came right up to him.  He was great!!!

When Alexia began school here in August I wanted to get as involved as I could.  They are huge on parent participation and because of it they are an accredited, distinguished and blue ribbor school here in California...which isn't easy to do.  I joined the PTA and have enjoyed all the new friends I've met as well as how the school runs, their beliefs, how the fundraisers work & where the money is going.  I'm so happy that I have done that.

Here was the tarot card room, with a spooky talking witch inside a glass ball.  Battery operated candles, old books and skulls were all part of this room.

I volunteered to help out with the annual Boo Bash.  It's a Halloween festival that has games, prizes, contests and the main attraction...the Haunted Stage.  I was fortunate enough to work with 2 other women on this enormous project (little did I know what I was getting myself into)  We spent several hours a week planning, shopping, decorating and working together to make this better than last year.  Luckily one of the women, Sabrina, had a great vision and the accessibility to many "real props".  Here husband, Al, is the master prop person for the TV show "Criminal Minds".  I have to say, we had some very real looking limbs, teeth along with professional fog machines and whatnot.  The other woman, Dianne is a graphic design artist and created all the signs and menus for the Bistro. It turned out to be bigger & better than any of us could have imagined.  We spent a whole weekend setting it up, lucky Erick was recruited to help and believe it or not had fun and met some great people.  All the hard work paid off and even 6th graders were impressed (they are always the most critical since they are the oldest in the school).  We heard so much positive feedback

The haunted graveyard/forest with spooky music and live branches hanging from the celing and taped to the walls.  We had real leaves, bark mulch and moss on the ground so it made it crunchy and smelled just like a forest when you walked through.  Erick had fun hanging the branches from the ceiling :)  Thanks babe!  Alexia was so proud that Erick & I worked on this project and I got a chance to see her during school hours now & then since I was there.  I love that part, knowing that she sees our participation and how important it is to volunteer.  

We hope you all have a safe and HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!

Fall season in Cali

So here they are, Erick and Lexi atop a hay pile at Lombardi's Ranch.  This is a popular place here that everyone goes.  It has the horse drawn carriage rides, train ride around the corn fields, pumpkin patch, sunflower maze, music and food.  It's really pretty, on this day it was in the low 70's which was a pleasant change from the 100's we've been experiencing since we arrived in August.  I guess our blood is beginning to thin because it actually felt cool to us.   

Alexia and I are chowing down on the caramel apples we made as we soak our feet in a warm bath and watch Extreme Home Makeover.  This was a Sunday night ritual we did together in NH and we've tried to continue all the fun things we used to do with her, out here.  I was really looking forward to these caramel apples.  They were so yummy, although we don't have Macintosh apples out here...bummer.  Fall is definitely different out here.  We miss the beautiful tree colors of New England.  In this picture you can get a glimpse of our apartment. But we don't miss the cold and front of October either :)

Alexia picked this pumpkin out of the thousands on display.  When we carved it that night, it came out so awesome, of course I didn't take a picture:(  We used the stencil and carving utensils from that little kit.  Unfortunately it didn't even last a week before it started rotting and becoming moldy inside.  We wanted to preserve it until Halloween so we went online and they mentioned coating it with vegetable oil, so we did but within a day it was looking & starting to smell nasty.  Make a note: no vegetable oil on pumpkins. Guess we learned for next year!
 

Alexia is enjoying a dish of shaved ice as we took a break from the train ride and pumpkin picking.  Look at us in our pants, isn't that funny.  Every day other than this we've been in tank tops and shorts and still are.  It's been in the 90's this month, average.  I thought they said it was going to cool down in October...oh yeah, it has from the 100's.  Although the heat is different, we are loving it.  Sure is better than the 30's and 40's you guys are experiencing back East, and the snow you're already getting in upstate NY and NJ, what's up with that?  Better put snowsuits on the kids and winter boots to go trick-or-treating tomorrow.

We went to a park in Castaic, just minutes from us here in Valencia.  Alexia is in a play area climbing a tree.  It was an interesting visit there, pretty park but not a lot to do.  The lake was beautiful, we had a picnic lunch and watched the model gas engine airplane competitions.  These little planes sure looked like the real thing just smaller and they were performing some cool stunts in the air.