Cecilia learning how to floss

I floss while Cecilia is taking her bath and she is learning how too. :)

Cecilia at the dentist

First batch of limoncello

Finished the first batch of limoncello tonight. Filtered and bottled. Took forever. Looks like pee. We'll see how it tastes tomorrow!

Cecilia's party!

I don't have many great photos on my phone but we had a blast at Cecilia's second birthday party. A bunch of kids came over, ate snacks, and played together with all of the toys. Thanks to Laura for putting it all together and Megan and Gaoder for helping!

Sleepy Baby

Sunday morning Cecilia wasn't quite ready to get up so we lied down together until she was.

Dinner!

We had Megan, Alan, and Gaoder over for dinner and everything turned out great. Megan made an alfredo-spinach-garlic flatbread, Gaoder made delicious potato salad, and we brought and grilled the delicious steaks. In the words of Cecilia: "Ohhh! *points* Beeeefff!"

Yum yum!

Trip to the Fire station and the Mall

Today, Cecilia and I went to visit the fire station with some of the other kids from our mothers' group. She was rather tentative when we first got there, but by the end of the visit she was pretty excited!

The fire truck!

The fire fighters talked to us a little bit about what they do and then they showed us what it would look like when they are all dressed and ready the fight a fire. 

After the fire fighter was dressed, he showed us how he would come into the house if there was a fire. He explained that he would be crawling to stay under the smoke and calling out to see if anyone was there.

Then we got to go see the fire truck again! Cecilia was pretty scared at first (I think because it is so big!) but soon she watched the other kids touching the truck and sitting on it and then she was pretty excited to see the fire truck.

Cecilia rang the bell, but was still rather nervous.

Sitting in the back of the fire truck where the fire fighters sit. What a big girl!

Sitting in the truck back by the hoses. Cecilia really liked seeing all of the equipment!

Standing on the back of the truck.

One of the fire fighters took a picture of Cecilia and Mommy for us while Cecilia was "driving" the truck!

Happy to be there!

Cecilia lay down on the treadmill like it was a chaise lounge chair. I guess it was comfortable. :)

Before we all left, they pulled the fire truck out of the fire station and put on the lights and siren for the kids. Cecilia loved it and kept talking about the siren the rest of the morning! It was a great trip to the fire station!

 

After we left the fire station, we met up with some of the other families at the mall to play and eat some lunch. Cecilia loved getting to play with the other kids and getting to ride on the mechanical toys.

Crazy clouds yesterday

We rarely get clouds in Sunnyvale so I was quite amazed by yesterday's display.

Taking Down the 100 Pound Rusty Steel Beast

Last weekend I decided to take down the old space heater in the corner of our garage. Bryan, Jess, Jared, and Alan were over, and Mary Sue and Gaoder could watch Cecilia while we did this. We started the project with high hopes and confidence that it would go smoothly. We'd just climb up, unscrew it, and carry it down.

However, it was hanging with these HUGE rusty bolts, so we had to go to OSH to buy a huge wrench. The wrench that Jared is holding below got one of the bolts off, but wasn't big enough for the other one! Why would they have used two different bolt sizes...

Once we had it unscrewed, we propped it up on the metal shelf unit, and wondered what to do next... It was far too heavy and high for us to easily and safely get it to the ground, though it would have been nice to preserve it in case someone on Craigslist wanted to buy it... But it wasn't worth risking it falling on us.

So we put a bunch of drywall on the ground to soften the fall, wrapped an electrical cord around it, and pulled. :)

Some damage to the corner, as you can see...

And then the garage looked a lot better!

Another ridiculous thing

Speaking of ridiculous garage things, we took out some drywall above the door and found insulation behind it. It's the only insulation in the garage, what the heck.

After this whole process is done, I'm gonna have so much scrap metal to sell.

Tons of Garage Work

Alan came over to work on his car, but decided against it after some consideration.

Instead, we did a bunch of garage work, taking down shelves (only about 1/6 of them so far...), putting up some new shelves from Home Depot, taking down the old gas pipe that was cemented in and went nowhere, taking down some PVC that was ALSO cemented in and went nowhere, taking out dead power lines, disconnecting useless phone cables, and ripping out tons of other ridiculous things. This garage has clearly NEVER been refactored before.

When my dad comes out in a few weeks we're gonna redo all of the electrical, so I'd better have everything ripped off of the walls by then. The garage is gonna feel HUGE when all of the shelves are down.

Working on taking down the garage shelves

I'm working on dismantling the shelves in the garage. There is termite damage behind them and we want to have room for two cars.

Spring is here!

Happy Hollow

Today, Grammy, Cecilia and I went to Happy Hollow, a park and zoo in San Jose. Cecilia really seemed to enjoy running around the play area and going down the slides. 

Later she got to drive her police car, and ride the dragon train with Mommy and Grammy.

Then we went on a carousel ride and Cecilia rode a dolphin.

 We saw some farm animals (goats, sheep, a cow, and miniature horses). Cecilia likes talking and singing about cows, but when experiencing one up close, she was a little scared. After getting some lunch, we rode the carousel one more time. This time Cecilia got to ride a leopard. All in all, it was a great day!

Oranges!

Andy's girlfriend has four orange trees so she asked if I wanted any... I said how many? What's the upper limit. So I ended up with a trash bag of 50 oranges. Laura and Mary Sue and I spent an hour washing, cutting, and juicing and now we have a half gallon of fresh squeezed juice! Next time I'll make marmalade.

A new friend

Cecilia has recently made a new friend, Shayla. Shayla is about 6
months younger than Cecilia and lives across the street and down about
4 houses. We went to her house for a playdate a couple weeks ago and
have played with her at the school across the street a couple times.
Cecilia and Shayla seem to have a lot of fun together, chasing one
another, playing peekaboo and walking around holding hands. Shayla's
mom took a cute picture of them holding hands.