Painted Chairs

I (Ashley) painted these 2 chairs over summer break. Though break was 3 months, it really only took me a few weeks to paint them.

The chairs were part of a 4 chair set...so I really should paint the rest. I will do them very soon! I found a pretty picture of roses that I liked, and modified it to suit the chair as well as the color of the paints we had at home. The whole chair was sanded down, painted white, and then the roses and leaves were painted on with acrylic paints.

The two chairs and table we got really cheap from a garage sale near our old house. Mom sanded them down and we stained them a nice deep mahoghany color.

Marcus's 11th Birthday

Marcus is the best little brother in the world.

He recently turned 11 years old on December 11th. My dad claims he turned 12 (don't believe him!) By my excellent math skills, he turned 11!


We went to the Samkee Bakery near 99 Ranch. He wanted a tiramisu cake this year. We bought the cake and brought the cake home in the box, and hid it in the fridge outside in the garage.

When Dad came home later that night, we all gathered around the dinning table with the camera and took pictures! Then, finally, the birthday boy blew out his candles! He had gotten his birthday present the day before- a new game for his Nintendo DS.

.
.
.

Garden Work

Mom has decided (again) to take on another huge project for Marcus's school. She wanted to makeover their garden, so like any other makeover, here are some before and after shots, as well as work in progress ones.



Mom has been working hard at Marcus's school's garden. She volunteered to help fix it up to grow flowers and vegetables for the children to enjoy. Every weekend she recruited parents and their kids to help out in the garden. For quite a few days they worked hard preparing the garden for the plants. They removed all the yucky weeks and old plants, and made sure the soil wasn't too hard.



This was the garden before Mom came through to help it. What a mess! There were plants allll over the place-messy and unorganized. The weeds were a nightmare.


At first, it was a mess of random plants and weeds. Days of hard work pulling them out produced a nice, empty cleaned up garden!

This is the end result! Mom did allll of the pipe lines and replaced the old ones that were terrible. Isn't the garden so pretty now? It's a wonderful green color- the plants are looking fabulous!

This is a picture of the blueberry plants that were planted in the garden. Hopefully we'll have a lot of blueblerries this year. Yummmy!

Before and After of the pipes (the result of Mom's hard work!)
Isn't it such a huge difference?

Before After

Finally, the most important picture!

This is Mom working DILLIGENTLY in her garden. Look at her go!
She put a lot of hard work into this garden-it's like her baby. (Poor me :( )



.
.
.

Our house, our lives, us!

.

Mom wanted to take pictures of us in our "natural habitat" for you to observe.

Here is Marcus watching tv, while eating his snack. The messy coffee table signifies that Mom hasn't had time to clean it up.

Marcus's tilted head shows that the show is very interesting! The fingers poised above the little (doesn't make sense, does it?) bowl filled with snacks means that he's ready at any second to attack.

Ahh. This is Dad's favorite spot in the whole house.

Well technically it isn't part of the "house"... But still, it's his prized possession.

This is his doghouse in the backyard, his own little retreat.

This is a very good view of our backyard. It's like our own park in our backyard.

A Day in San Francisco

Today we went to San Francisco (mainly to buy the delicious eggtarts and cocktail buns they have at the famous bakery there- Golden Gate Bakery). Brrrr, it was cold! We walked the streets of Chinatown and then went to the the pier.



After eating dim sum (of course!), we stood in the loooong line at the bakery. Immediately after buying them, we dug in. Yummm....they were delicious! Doesn't that look good? :)





This is a view from Coit Tower overlooking San Francisco with Mom, Ashley, Marcus, and Doris.





This is the view from inside Coit Tower with the fresco murals that were painted on the walls inside the tower.



This is a view from the pier- a boat called the San Francisco Belle.
Marcus had a lot of fun walking on the pier scaring off the seagulls and pigeons. Poor things- they flew away so quickly!