Is it Friday yet?

It's been quite a week!  Last weekend was the Fresno Cobra's annual basketball tournament.  It was Kara's first year playing in the instructional division.  She had two games on Saturday and one game on Sunday.  They decided to split the team up into two teams of five, so with only five players on the team, she got lots of playing time!

Sho helped Coach Danny with practices and coaching during the tournament.  What better way is there to spend Father's Day...

Monday started the beginning of a two week session of Medaka no Gakko, the Japanese cultural school that Grandma started back in 1980.  Our family all went through gakko back in the day and it was always fun to be with our friends.

Kara has a small class, but I think it's really cool that two of the kids in her class are the children of kids that were in my gakko class...

With warmer weather and a really busy week, it was great to end with shave ice as our gakko snack. 

Though there has been a lot of reminiscing this week about the old days, one thing we do not miss is the hand-crank shave ice machine.  How did our super-dads do it back then??

What is becoming more and more apparent to me is that Grandma has always been a super-mom.  Being more involved in gakko this year, I have a better appreciation of what she did during our gakko years and maybe you notice there are no pictures of Ben and Jason from this week... as we've been busy, Grandma has saved the day (or week to be more accurate) by watching the boys day after day.  I don't know how we'd survive if it wasn't for our BF.  One more week to go!

Happy Birthday to my BF!

For awhile now, Jason has referred to Grandma as "BF" because she is his best friend.  Recently he said to Grandma, "You are a good BF."

Grandma's birthday started out with a very energetic and exuberant happy birthday song from all the kids... and then Grandma was kind enough to come with us to watch "How To Train Your Dragon 2," which was Jason's first movie in a theater.

Grandma's birthday celebration could not be complete without a little ice cream!!  Fortunately Jason stayed awake long enough to enjoy his mint chip cone.  I think he didn't want to disappoint his BF because nothing is sweeter for Grandma than ice cream with the grandkids! 

Water Day, Swimming and Movie Night on Wednesday... It's Summer!

It is Clay tradition to have a water day to mark the end of the school year... Kara and her friends had a lot of fun running through sprinklers, going down the slide, doing the obstacle course and jumping in the bounce house. 

Ben went to Water Day and had fun with his friend, Chase, who will also start kindergarten at Clay in August.

Kara's showed me her 1st grade report card and was pleased to find out she would be moving on to 2nd grade.  She's had a great year and Kiara is still her BFF, which makes us very happy because Kiara is so kind and such a great friend to Kara... and we love having family play dates with the Zarates!

Ben is so excited that he'll finally be going to school with Kara next year... Though Kara tries to tell him everything to expect in kindergarten, I think Ben will be just fine and learn to love school all on his own. 

The kids all had a great swim at Grandma and Pampa's house this afternoon.  Ben swam the length of the pool unassisted (four times), Kara's dive is progressing and Jason cannot be stopped.  He is eager to put his face in and swim!  He takes a breath and says, "Again!"  I'm glad he's taking to swimming so well... I wish the same could be said for potty training.

It's now 8pm and they are in the living room for movie night and a sleep out... Hello, Summer!

Ben's Graduation!

Tonight was Ben's graduation from preschool and both boys participated in the end of the year program.   

As part of graduation, the graduates had to decide what they want to be when they grow up.  Initially, Ben had a hard time deciding what he wants to be because there are so many choices and because he wants to help people.  Ben's teacher, Miss Kristi, was worried that Ben was going to develop an ulcer from the stress and then quickly he asks, "what's an ulcer?"  So we came home and talked about his top choices...

Ben decided that he wants to be a Lego Creator so that he can design Legos for kids and adults to play with and enjoy.  Apparently, he will still be living at home with us when this happens.

Yesterday, on the way to Pampa and Grandma's house to swim, I asked Ben what he wanted to work on during swimming... side breaths, backstroke or diving.  He replied, "Mom, it's not like I'm going to be a professional swimmer.  I'm already going to be a Lego Creator and a Daddy.  If I'm a professional swimmer, my kids will be mad because I'll come home so late and I won't have time to see them."  As a preschool graduate, he's already got life all figured out.

Quick Trip

We made a very quick trip to northern California over the weekend, but in a short amount of time, we managed to have a lot of fun!

We visited Anna, Marc, Evan and Justin in El Cerrito.  It's great to see the kids grow up together and enjoy playing with each other.  And since both of the Daddy's love shoes, I think it's inevitable that they'll also end up doing more shoe shopping and admiring of each others' shoes in the future.

We headed to San Jose on Saturday evening for a surprise celebration of Jichan's 90th birthday!  Everyone had a great time and we are still enjoying the birthday cake we were able to bring home.

With a fun filled day and full tummies, everyone slept peacefully all the way back to our little town.

"I want to ride my bee-a-coe" and "I want to kick"

We finally broke down and got Jason his own vehicle... He named is Green Machine.  Since it's been so warm lately, he asks to ride his "bee-a-coe" as soon as he wakes up in the morning.

Now all of the kids can ride together, which is pretty fun... But Kara and Ben don't know that because Jason's is a newer model, it goes one mile an hour faster.  Kara thinks her battery just needs more charge.

Everyone got new goggles and we're ready to swim!

We weren't sure how eager Jason would be to swim, but so far, he loves kicking and doesn't mind putting his face in the water and holding his breath.  After he lifts his head up he says, "I did it!  I did it!"

Kara and Ben pretty much picked up where they left off last year... but the fear of having to take formal lessons kicked in for Ben and today, he was cruising with big arms and breaths to the side.  Nice.  

I think we'll be spending many happy hours in the pool this summer... and with the huge bags of sugar we purchased today, it looks like a lot of shave ice is also in our future.  Very nice!

So Much to Celebrate

We started the week by doing a simple celebration for Boy's Day on May 5th... With help from all of the boys, we enjoyed gyoza for dinner.  

The kids colored  pictures of Japanese carp and hopefully soon, we'll be able to fly the real carp shaped flags at our house, just as we did when we were growing up.

Grandma made her famous strawberry pie and I think the kids each had two pieces, it was so delicious!

At a church service last weekend, the speaker asked about special days in the month and Pampa was proud that Ben announced that Pampa's birthday was coming up.  Uncle Todd came into town and we all celebrated Pampa's birthday with dinner out followed by blackberry & blueberry pie and a sleepover at Grandma and Pampa's house. 

On Mother's Day, we were lucky to have three mothers in the house!!  We started off with a delicious brunch...

We had finger-licking good ribs for dinner and Kara and Ben could not get enough!

And isn't it a sign of a great day when you don't have to change out of your pajamas?  We decided that even though Grandma and Pampa's house isn't too far away, it feels like vacation when we're there.  We lounged and had family game time... Uncle Todd found the vintage Life game, which Kara and Ben played for the first time.  And for me, the favorite part of the day was having four generations of our family siting together playing the Disney version of Apples to Apples... It was our turn to be the judge and Ben read the descriptive word of "Best" on the card... There were many great cards thrown into the pile for consideration.  "A Nap" and "The Beach" were two... but Ben's choice as the winner was "Family".  I could not agree more.