Baptism Day

January 31st, 2009
That's the dress my mom made me for my baptism in 1986. She did a good job preserving it!

Here We Are

Abuela's b-day at IHOP

Uncle D. and Aunt A.

Here we are

Uncle E.'s checking out the treat.

I'm 30 years old now

Getting ready to leave for the surprise party my mom ended up throwing for me!

That's me with my college roommate, Lorelei. We lived in the "Spanish House" together in the Foreign Language Housing , although it was actually an apartment, and she wasn't in my actual room with me. :)

I felt so special that they would drive sooo long from Eureka to come celebrate my birthday. (Itamar also lived in the Foreign Language Housing, but in the "Portuguese House.")

Me and A. with my oldest brother and his wife.

Me and my brothers (the oldest is on the right, and then my younger brother is on the other side of me, and then my youngest brother is in the far left of the picture).

My Dad's B-day

August 30
This is the only pic I have of that night where my mom's in it.
Here's a flattering pic of my brothers and sister-in-law at Red Robin.
Undoubtedly my dad's making a wierd face because of my strange brother.

P.'s trying to sneak a bite.

more b-day (E.'s)

My brother's crazy. I don't think he's ever taken a normal picture in his life.

Family members and E.'s friend.
Old Spaghetti Factory
P. liked his food

Let's go back in time to my brother E.'s b-day

Taking the lightrail (after transferring from the train)



My mom's oasis

I love this picture.

P. at 21 months

I know people don't know P. very well, but I like the comfort of "ignorance" because of my fear that people will judge him or compare him to other kids who are advanced. I know I'm paranoid. Everyone has their folly, and that is one of mine.

So here is my attempt to let people get to know a little bit about him:

He's still a relatively quiet kid. He's only gotten louder with the girls being home and fighting all the time. Now he wants to fight like they do. :( I'm going to try to retrain him. :)

He doesn't talk much, but he communicates very well. I can tell that he's self-concious about his speaking ability. "Eh," is his favorite "word." At times when I've asked him, for example, "P., can you say 'bed'?" and he would reply "no" or "eh." He usually just says, "eh," though. His prayers are hilarious because he loves saying them, but when prompted for each word he'd say, "eh." So "Dear Heavenly Father" sounds like, "Eh--Eh--Eh." [edited to add that he did just start saying "Amen" at least!] He usually grunts with a mischievous smile. He knows what we want, and he won't do it. However, he doesn't hesitate at all when naming all the Star Wars characters he plays with. Go figure.

So the ironic thing about the talking issue is that he loves the alphabet. He loves singing it, of course not with all the right letters, and he points to every letter he sees on every word he finds and says whatever letter he thinks it is. We've caught him playing with the alphabet puzzle and singing the alphabet the entire time. It's cute when he gets to the "L,M,N,O,P" part. He doesn't like to perform though (he gets really shy). Actually he isn't doing all this as often as he used to.

He likes numbers too (not as much as the alphabet), but usually says "Two, Three. Two, Three, etc." while counting things, or counting his fingers.

So I mentioned Star Wars earlier. He LOVES the Galactic Heroes figures that the girls have. (Galactic Heroes are small, chunky action figures for little kids) He plays with the Star Wars characters way more than they do. And seriously people, aside from just having this stuff around, we have not influenced his love for Star Wars. My brother David gave I. half of the Cantina (the whole cantina is 2 different sets you can put together) for her b-day, but P. absolutely loves it. He spends most of his day just playing with it (with the figures). His favorite characters are : Chewbacca (Coocaka), Ponda Baba (Ahhhbaba), Darth Vader (ho-pa), Han Solo (Ohlolo), Leia (Eea), and R2-D2 (deetoodeetoo). My mom said she bought him his own figures for his b-day and Christmas (although he has no idea that the other figures aren't actually his). I would really like to get him the Galactic Heroes Millenium Falcon for Christmas, and the 2nd half of the Cantina for his b-day, but I don't think that'll happen. By the way, he loves the Cantina song, and will not only sing along to the music (there's a button on the set that plays it) but he'll randomly sing it throughout the day.

Let's see, he likes balls, especially soccer balls (heavily influenced by my mom), cars, and trains (choochoo). He'll make anything drive on the ground like a car, or a train. It's great that he likes trains since he hears them all day long. He likes riding on the train, too, and he loves putting the train tracks together that my mom has at her house (they were my youngest brother's, who is now 23--thanks I. for reminding me of his age).

P. likes eating--especially bananas. He likes grapes too, and he eats them like he's never going to eat again. He likes going to Abuelo and Abuela's house, and he likes following Abuelo around. He likes tiny things and putting tiny things together. He is still very flexible. He likes to climb on dangerous things outside. He likes to organize things in a line. He likes to clean up at Nursery at church. He really likes my friend Ashley and her kids. We'll miss them when they move!

I can't think of anything else to add.

I love him, and I think he's really cute. :)

May

1st Grade Singing Assembly


Mignight opening of Indiana Jones
Uncle E.
Uncle D. and Aunt A.
Can you see I.? She's the one with the totally mismatched clothes. Coral poncho, pink/gray/white camouflage gauchos, etc. Everyday she goes to school wearing quirky outfits, and she's totally content. The most interesting part is when she does her hair, which is almost every day: she'll have a red bow clip together with a purple and white headband, and a yellow flower ALL AT THE SAME TIME. That was just an example of one day.

Tools, award, v-day

My high school band director and mentor received this award
V-day