a peek into our kitchen

I got a little carried away with my playing the other day-Playmobil is just too darn addictive. So here's another toy scene: our family dinner table.

To the left is Dave with his overflowing plate of stuff, then Maku with his stuff jumping off of his plate, then Snow with her ski cap and her usual plate of sprouts (if you could see her other hand, you would notice a bunch of tiny toys that she always brings to the table), finally there is me standing by the stove with a spatula in hand. I'm always cooking and serving, with my hair tied back, always some other thing to cook, condiment to fetch. I'm good at organizing other things but I can never get dinner right; funny, even with the toys, I forgot to put the drinks on the table.

sweet surprises

Yesterday I turned thirty-six! I received quite a number of birthday wishes; yay! My sister gave me an almost surprise birthday dinner. Dave surprised me with a tiny ice cream cake with giant sparklers on it and a frozen fly (not his intention) in the middle. Today my friend Gina baked me the yummiest cake. What a perfect day!
Later this week, an outdoor massage on my new lounge chair (thank you, weeta) and a cold beverage. Looking forward to relaxing and ignoring the mess of toys and dirty dishes behind me. What a way to end a deliciously moist birthday. (^.^)

blowing bubbles

The bubble engineer conducting another bubble blowing experiment.
Maku has been busy working on his bubble blowing skills, finding the right bubble blowing tool and perfecting his bubble blowing solution.

chasing the sunset

When Snow was one and we were new to this area, we went to a different beach almost every weekend and on Sundays at sundown we brought along her little wooden drum and took part in a drum circle at our local public beach.
In the past few years there's always been a red tide bloom whenever we plan an afternoon at the beach, so we scratched that off our list and spent our Sundays playgroundhopping instead.
Yesterday we went to the beach just before sundown for Snow to enjoy the drumming and the dancing once again and for Maku to experience it for the first time. It was crowded, it was stinky, it was patrolled. We hardly heard the pulse of the drums or the wail of the horns; an electric guitar drowned out their tribal rhythm. Having less than an hour before sundown, but determined to watch and enjoy the sunset, we ran back to the car, drove around the island, and found this. I don't know how we missed this part of the island before, but it is officially our beach for this summer. Our special little spot to play in the surf, build sandcastles and watch sunsets.

Cousin Jin

A post by Snow:

She's cool! She's 9!

She knits! She sews!

Florida summer

Sticky armpits, bug bites and clothes drenched from a sudden afternoon rainstorm. Looking forward to my seventh summer here in southwest Florida. Let the season begin.

on a rainy day

take out the umbrellas

and the raincoats

dance in the rain

spread out the blanket

and have an indoor picnic!