Animal Adventure

Q loves animals, as much as she loves princesses. She is the only two-year-old I know who can pronounce Jaques, as that is the name of my cat. Last Saturday J, G & myself accompanied the littles on a trip to Six Flags to watch the dolphin show and look at the snakes.

I'd never seen a silver snake before 

Loved this fake elephant slightly

They are both crying in this photo

Lil' J checking his hair in the mirror

 Riding the balloons

Love Q's expression

Another jeep ride 

While auntie K waits with the bags... 

Then it's Christmas again 

It was a three-for-one deal - zoo, rides, and Christmas. Result - two happy kids.

Christmas in Review

Christmas was lovely, as always. We celebrate multiple times with the extended family. I suppose it is something of a miracle that everyone lives in the same state, and no one much more than 3 hours from where my parents grew up in the bay. Highlights:

Q looking far more angelic than reality proves in her new Cinderella gown.

 Seeing the lights at the temple on Christmas Eve

 In the grandparent's room

J contemplating the musical mechanical toys - notice he has placed them all in a row

Thrilled about her Ariel doll 

Christmas tree 

Represent ornament! 

My favorite Christmas movie!

Pops turns 51!

First, I should give feedback on the most wonderful gift I did for his birthday last year (here). I was excessively disappointed not all 50 of the cards came back! We had about a 50% return rate. If I hadn't sent them out in a rush (so he might get some on his birthday) and I had made a list of what number everyone was I would have been making some aggressive phone calls. Maybe the explanation wasn't clear enough?

This year we kept things simple - dinner.

I counted the dishwasher I bought for their anniversary as D's gift. In fact, I counted it for the parent's anniversary, G's birthday, D's birthday, and Christmas for everyone.All those birds with one stone.

Above the booth at the restaurant there was a poster for the Great Gatsby Festival at Lake Tahoe. I'm not sure how I have spent most of my life living in California and have never heard of this roaring event. Umm, a 1920's tea and fashion show, a vintage faire, historic house tours, rides in vintage cars, costumes encouraged? This has been missing from my life, I've discovered a gaping hole where it should be. August 2013! I mean look at these:

Event poster from 1994

Guests lunching (credit: Annie Flanzraich/Tahoe Daily Tribune, link)

And, there is an even more charming event in September at Dunsmuir - the Gatsby Summer Afternoon. Do yourself a favor and visit the link and scroll down to the pictures. And, um, there is an Art Deco Society of California? Of course there is...yet another gaping hole.

Sadly with the movie coming out in May the festival at Tahoe will probably be way more packed than last year - bad timing K. Not that I'm not looking forward to drooling over the movie's sets.

Wait, what was I actually posting about? D's birthday. Best dad ever!

He's sweet to put up with his peculiar children.

2013 Won't Goals

I used a different approach to my yearly goal list for 2013. As an expert to-do list maker I have notebooks full of lists. This year, rather than compile a list of things I want to accomplish this year I decided to do the opposite. It’s a list of things I absolutely DO NOT want to find myself having done at the end of 2013.

Plus, it seemed kind of silly to make a list of goals - it would be exactly the same as the things I've been praying over since April. I'm constantly goal focused and planning, so I decided to add something to mix up how I'm measuring things.

Many wonderful things in my life I never plan on. Sometimes efforts to plan (and I put A LOT of effort into planning) get in the way of good things I’m not seeing. Or I use time and energy that would be better used by doing things rather than planning. And this way I've identified things that are NEVER going to be priorities this year - related to my goal to change the way I look at my time and prioritize my to-do's (this post).

And while there are many goals I could put on a resolutions list, in reality there are only a handful of applicable and realistic anti-goals that I don’t want to inflict upon myself in 2013. As long as I’m not doing them, I’m good, and I can check things off those ubiquitous to-do lists as desired. 

Bright things ahead. 

Won't to be Happy. 

Happy 2013!