The family that votes together

Well we all went to the polls together, Shelley, John and Yogi and we all voted.

Well Yogi didn't vote and he's a little upset about that. Trying to explain why he can't vote yet was difficult. It really doesn't make much sense that kids have no vote. Yogi will be paying for George W. Bush's policies for a long time.

After we came home I said to Yogi: "I want you to remember this day. It's an important day in American history."

He said: "Of course I remember this day. It's today!"

Thank you G-Pa - Yogi loves Lego Batman for Wii

Tooth Care

School Starts!

Yogi started his 5th year at Play Mountain Place Tuesday (his 2nd in Primary Group in Mountain Yard.)

The pics below are from his first year (2004) and his 2nd year.

Ready for Little Nursery. The first day ever!

First year of Big Nursery.

Yogi's first visit to the dentist

Yogi went to the dentist today for the first time. He's on the phone right now with Granny Deb, telling her about it. "It's not a he...and she's very nice."

He got his teeth cleaned, x-rays taken (no cavities,) and his back teeth sealed to prevent decay.

Yogi's birthday is coming

Yogi is going to be 7 next week! Hard to believe. It feels like it's gone by so fast, although looking back over pictures I guess we've had 7 years full of good times.

Over the past year Yogi has really become a boy with hardly any trace of toddlerhood left. He's into Pokemon and Wii games, boogie boarding and playing with his DS, swimming and Jinenkan. He's moved from Playmobil to Lego, now that he can build things out of the millions of small pieces that only look like the picture on the box for about 10 seconds (after hours of frustrating construction for John!) He and John are on the last few books of the Harry Potter series, after which they'll see the movies which have been banned until the book-reading is completed.

Other books he's been listening to on CD include the Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Chronicles of Narnia, Redwall and others in that series, Eragon and Eldest, Castles in the Sky, The Mysterious Benedict Society, and many others. He loves stories and can listen for hours. His ability to focus is fierce. He still doesn't read, but is definitely showing signs of being close. However he resists being taught, so we have to slip reading tutorial in when he's not looking! He's good at math - can do simple addition and subtraction in his head.

He's articulate and outspoken. He's not shy about shouting, "Mommy!" (Or whoever else is close by...) "A little help here?" And he says funny stuff all the time. I still find it hard to believe that he's my kid sometimes. He just seems like an amazing creature that came from some kind of magic place!

Alienor Has Arrived

Yogi's friend Alienor has dodged the hurricanes and arrived in Dominica.

Saying goodbye to Alienor

Yogi's dear friend Alienor Mendiburu moved to Dominica in the West Indies yesterday. Alienor and her family moved to Los Angeles from Paris, and she came to Play Mountain Place when she was about 5. Yogi met her in House Group when he was 5 years old and Alienor was 6.


Saying goodbye was very hard. Both Yogi and Trip wanted kisses on the lips, but Alienor (being the smart girl she is) would only kiss on the cheek.

Here they are in the back of Fabienne's fab*fab convertible.


Finally it was really time to say goodbye.


We will all miss Alienor, who is very special. And we'll miss Fabienne, Bernard and Lupin, too.

But we know we can visit them in the Caribbean, and eventually in other wonderful places as well!

Yogi in costume

Yogi is very game to dress up. He and I recently went to the thrift store to put together an Indiana Jones costume for him.

Yogi and his best friend Trip at the end of Yogi's Indiana Jones birthday party.



Yogi attended Asher's disco-costume birthday party dressed as an American Indian. Our friend Michele made this costume for Yogi for last Halloween.

But will he learn to wipe?

Yogi and I were sitting on the couch this morning watching Mythbusters. I glanced up at him and he wiped the back of his hand across his mouth and got that I-wasn't-doing-anything-I-shoudn't-be-doing look on his face.

"Yogi!" I said. "Are you playing with your spit?" (Playing with spit bubbles is a gross thing he's been doing for a couple months now, and he knows I think it's disgusting.)

He broke out in a smile, and I said with a laugh, "You're so weird and gross!"

He cracked another tiny smile and then said, "I'm a kid."

A pause, and then he concluded, still smiling, "I think I'll grow out of it."

Great Weekend

Saturday was Yogi's birthday party. We had it early because his best friends Alienor and Trip will be out of the country starting next weekend. Trip is going to Sweden where his father is from for 3 weeks and Alienor is moving to Dominica with her family. More on that later.

So we set up an amazing Indiana Jones party with an adventure/treasure hunt that was a huge hit with the kids. Shelley really did an amazing job (with lots of help from Hope and John and Thelma...Sam gave moral support) putting the party together and despite some moments of stress for the grown-ups a great time was had by all.

One of the presents that Yogi got was a boogie board so with this present in hand we went to the beach on Sunday.

After boogie boarding for two hours in the amazing surf (Yogi is a natural - like his dad he loves everything about the water) father and son built a pretty cool sand castle just ahead of the incoming surf. The castle withstood the onslaught for quite a while but inevitably fell to the encoaching tide.

On the way home, to top off an eventful day, Yogi lost his tooth!

That night, Mom and Dad were so tired they almost forgot to let the tooth fairy know about the tooth...if you know what we mean.

Thank You Alienor

Yogi and Alienor decided to play a trick on John, and spent last night making a "present" with the appropriately decorated card for him.

We didn't catch the unwrapping, but we got John on camera enjoying his present!

Yogi learns about women

Overheard in the back of the car (they're playing with Scooby Doo magnets):

Yogi: "Why do you get to decide where the skull goes, missy?!"

Alienor: "Because I'm smart."

John Started New Job, Yogi Hits Home Run

John started working this week at Blitz Interactive which is an interactive agency. He's working on some cool things involving Naked Juice, FX shows and something that rhymes with Jar Bores.

Yogi started playing T Ball last month. I am experimenting with a new tool so I haven't actually checked to see if Shelley has blogged about this already but T Ball is hilarious. Yogi hit a home run his first time up at bat because he just didn't stop running. He passed one of his teammates at 2nd base.

Overheard

Trip: Do you love Sponge Bob, Yogi?

Yogi: No.

Trip: You don't? Why not? He's so cool!

Yogi: I like him. I like Sponge Bob. But I don't love him. I don't want to marry him.

Smooth operator

While we were sledding, Yogi asked if we could get some hot cocoa. We'd gotten some on the way up to Snow Valley, so I said no, that one hot chocolate was enough. "But mom!" he said, "I really want hot chocolate. I think it would be so romantic."

Don't know where he gets this stuff.

California Weekend

This past weekend we spent a few hours on Saturday at the beach building sand castles (actually we built the Shire, Rivendell, Mordor, Isengard and Minas Tirith out of sand). Then on Sunday we drove up to Big Bear and had a wonderful time sledding and making a snowman at Snow Valley.

Amazing place.

The downside is that I seriously injured my tailbone on the bumpy sledding run but it was totally worth it.

Happy New Year!

We had a wonderful Christmas and New Year. Lots of swag for everyone. Yogi's pile literally almost fell over on him at one point.

We created a New Years ritual mash-up by writing up three limiting beliefs and burning them (new age) and then we (Shelley, Hope, Gramma and I) took turns smudging the house (various traditions) as the others sat and rang a meditation bell 108 times to keep away the 108 human weaknesses (Japanese buddhist).

One New Year Day we had our annual pancake party and a bunch of folks came over and ate and talked and had a merry old time.