Family portrait by Leo (hurriedly), March 2008: John, Buddy, Leo, Ondine, Roy
Family portrait by Leo (hurriedly), March 2008: John, Buddy, Leo, Ondine,
Roy
Leo is now six and Roy is eight. We told Roy that just two days ago he was three years older than Leo, and now he’s only two years older. At this rate, we said, when he’s 10 Leo will be 12! Roy thought that bit of number-twisting was very funny, but didn’t buy it for a second. As long as we’re doing the number-play thing, Grammy is twice Ondine’s age.
Grammy came down for a visit! John took the boys to pick her up at the train station downtown. Her trip down suffered from delays upon delays. At one point, her whole train sat in a siding at a maintenance station, getting cleaned because the cleaning crew had missed it. During that hour-long detour, they had no water or toilets. Anyway, her train pulled in to San Diego about two hours late. What a relief!
The festivities kicked off almost as soon as she got in the front door.
Barbara and Bill had gotten Leo an ice cream cake (chocolate cake with mint
chocolate chip ice cream), and we had Leo’s at-home birthday celebration!
After cake, Leo showed off the search-and-find book he’d written and
illustrated: “The Grat Bole of Tofooo Srtch.” We have no idea where he got
the tofu thing. Leo wanted to make sure everyone had a tiny yellow happy-face
sticker, so you can see them on everyone’s shirts in the third photo below.
By the way, these are the first photos from our new Canon PowerShot A590 IS digital camera, now using the 2 GB SD memory card that arrived on Friday.
Leo opened presents, and then everyone gathered round to assemble, read, and
play with. You see Roy and John engrossed in Star Wars
books while Barbara, Bill, Grammy, and Leo puzzle out putting together a Neo
Shifter toy (“For Ages 6 and Up”). Buddy, as usual, is right in the middle
of things. Grammy soon decided she’d had enough, and settled in with a good book,
while Barbara and Bill doggedly fit a hundred tiny pieces together. John pitched
in too, and finally, with three grown-ups (combined age: about 180), the Neo
Shifter was complete. If we all look quite pleased with ourselves, it’s
because we are!
Saturday was a day of rest. Roy carefully assembled a 50-piece T-Rex
skeleton for Leo. It took a lot of determination and persistence, but finally
the dinosaur stood on its own hind legs. It was bigger than the dog! Roar! Buddy
ignored the dinosaur skeleton despite its size and gaping jaws.
Meanwhile, Grammy helped Ondine master the sewing machine. Project #1:
turning a pair of Leo’s pants into shorts, which was a rousing success. Then,
Ondine took in a bunch of tank tops. Then, she repaired the ripped
seam on our duvet! All in all, a very productive sewing session!
For dinner, Grammy treated us to Chinese food, where the boys got three desserts after dinner: Jell-O, soft-serve vanilla ice cream, and a huge bubble gum from the bubble gum machine! John and the boys walked to the craft store Michael’s to buy some model glue, and Ondine and Grammy joined them. They noted that there was a sale on Sunday, and made plans to return. Roy wanted to buy a bunch of water balloons. Gee, that sounds peaceful.
Sunday was Leo’s actual birthday, and also the day of his birthday beach party at Mission Beach! Ondine and Grammy went early, to stake out a place and bury treasure for the kids. Roy and Leo went next door, and John headed out to pick up the six-foot sandwich from Subway and ice from Fresh&Easy. When he arrived at Mission Beach, there were still plenty of parking spaces. Ondine and Grammy had our party area all set up. Roy and Leo arrived with Barbara and Bill.
Leo’s birthday guests were Antonio (his “other brother” from K2), Jake, Jayden, and James, plus there were siblings: Antonio’s little brother Domenic, Jayden’s little sister Gia, and James’ little brother Robbie. We were grateful that all the parents stayed, which made it a lot more relaxing!
The treasure hunt was a huge success. Ondine and Grammy had buried lots of
loot under the blanket for the kids to find: “gold” coins, sparkling “gems,”
polished stones, and beach glass. At the right time, we whipped away the blanket
and the treasure hunt began! In the first photo, you can see some of the kids
digging. Going clockwise from Leo, in the dark blue front and center, you can
see Antonio, Roy, Jayden, Gia, Susan (Jayden and Gia’s Mom), Jake, and Heather
(Jake’s Mom). In the next photo you see Leo, James, and Roy dividing up
loot.
Leo had fun playing near the water, running around with seaweed. Roy spent a
lot of time in the water with his Boogie Board, paddling out, catching waves,
and riding them back in.
It was a great day at the beach! Then, after we all came home, Ondine, Grammy, and the boys went to the sale at Michael’s, the craft store. The boys took some of their own money, and Leo bought a bunch of skeletons and pirates, and Roy bought five packs of water balloons!
In the evening, while we put the boys to bed, Grammy went next door to visit with Barbara and Bill and see their photos from their trip. Then they kept looking at photos, digging deeper into the past.
Monday, Leo wrote all his thank-you notes and is playing with all his stuff! It’s a regular workday for John, and Grammy will be leaving on the train today. It’s always so sad to see her go; the house is so serene with her here that it’s like a mini-vacation for us!
Roy tried to fill his water balloons for a water balloon fight, but found, to his dismay, that he couldn’t remember the trick to tying the knot! Ha! The weak spot in his nefarious scheme!
Ondine and Leo took Grammy to the train station, and then went to Target to exchange the boom box we’d gotten him for his birthday (the CD player didn’t work). They accidentally picked up a slightly different model, which included a tape player, so it was $5 more. But now, Leo can play tapes and CDs and listen to the radio! Roy opted to stay home and work on a painting project.
John is thinking of dredging up some model kits for Roy to assemble, as he (Roy, but also John) enjoys the whole putting-together process, which is why he (John) bought the model cement the other day. They now sell non-toxic airplane glue; who’d have thunk? Anyway, John actually has several unassembled car model kits in his office; back when he was single (yes, they’ve been sitting in his office for more than a dozen years) he would sometimes relax by building a model car just for fun.
John sold the used toner cartridge from his old HP 4M+ laser printer, plus all the expanded memory, for $20 on Craigslist. That’s a real bargain since the cartridge cost $98 plus tax and was only about 2 months old when the printer died. He already loves the speed and two-sided printing of his new laser printer, though, an HP P2015dn. He has had it less than a week.
Also, as long as we’ve gone to a fourth page here, our new Canon A590 IS camera is working out great. The controls are very similar to our old PowerShot A70, the one that John killed by drowning in Beaver Creek, near Sedona, over two years ago. However, the new camera has more than twice the resolution (8 megapixels vs. 3.2), shoots faster, weighs less, uses half the power (two rechargeable AA batteries instead of four), has a longer zoom (35-140mm vs. the more-practical 35-105), and has image stabilization.
The non-zoom 4 megapixel HP Photosmart M22 (bought for about $30 off the clearance shelf at Target to replace the Canon A70) is now a back-up camera. It’d get handed down to Roy, except that Roy already has his own digital camera, a simple fixed-focal-length Argus 3.2 megapixel unit that uses three AAA batteries.
Neighborhood gas prices are still about $4.43 per gallon.
Visit us often - this journal has been updated at least once a week since 1998! Our friends
at WebCounter say you are visitor number
since then.
Back to the Kuraoka Family main page, with lots more stuff, including photos!