Day 6: Chinatown and the Aquarium of the Bay

 On this day of our trip we went with my friend Malisa, her husband Andrew (he's a Talbot student), and their 2 beautiful girls, Serena (Lila's age) and Katherine (7 months old) to Chinatown.  Malisa grew up in Chinatown so she was very familiar with everything and it was wonderful to be able to spend time with her. 

 We went for dim sum which is this awesome brunch-like meal where the servers come around with rolling metal carts and you can choose whatever plates you want from the carts. 

 We were able to try lots of different kinds of Chinese food.  Malisa speaks Chinese so she was able to converse with the servers a bit to find out what they had. 

 Then we walked around the neighborhood and looked at all of the fresh produce along the streets, shopped at a few shops, and got a treat from a Chinese bakery.

 We were able to go to a fortune cookie making factory which was really more like a sweat shop.  That little old lady in the background sits there folding fortune cookies all day!  They charged me 50 cents just for taking a picture.  They did pass out free samples though. 

 That evening I took the kids to the Aquarium of the Bay.  Their sea nettles were really impressive.

 The kids got these shark hats. 

 The Aquarium of the Bay is right next to Pier 39 so we got to see the Christmas tree there. 

 These pictures got a bit jumbled up.  While we were in Chinatown, I let each kid pick something $5 or under as a souvenir.  Brad chose this sword.

 Sky chose this chirping bird in a cage.  Hopefully the sword and the bird don't meet...  Lila chose some weird looking purple dinosaur thing. 

 Here is Sky at the dim sum restaurant in front of some of the rolling carts. 

Day 7: Tilden Park and Fenton's Ice Cream

 Our friends, the Denhams, showed us around Tilden Park in Berkley.  The kids had fun feeding the farm animals celery and lettuce.

 We ate a picnic lunch with the Denhams at the park.

 There was a gorgeous view of San Francisco on the drive to Tilden Park. 

 After the park we went to Fenton's Ice Cream Parlor.  Fenton's was in the movie "Up" and it was really an amazing place.  The ice cream there was really good and the servings were HUGE. 

 Sky is really into root beer so she got a root beer float.

 Brad had a kiddie scoop of cookie dough and comlained that there was chocolate in it.  Robby and his dad Robert shared a banana split.

 Lila got a chocolate shake.

 After the ice cream, we parted ways with the Denhams and drove the 6 1/2 hour drive back home to LA.  Sky has a motion sickness problem and she got sick later that night in her bed.  So, my 10 loads of laundry turned into 12 loads.  But, in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I am thankful for laundry because it shows how much we have and I am thankful for a washer and dryer of my own too! 

Saturday at the Children's Museum

 We went with our friends, the Denhams, to the children's museum on Saturday.  They have a new exhibit called "Kings and Castles".  Sky really likes the bed there.

 Everyone got the hang of the archery except for me!  Brad and Robby were pros by the end of the day!  I love that Sky and Brad still do things like ride a rocking horse together (see below). 

 The older kids were able to take a Japanese art class while we were there.  They learned sumi-e, a type of Japanese painting with soot and water (we had seen some examples at the aquarium last week).  It was more difficult than it looked but by the end of the class they seemed to have figured out the gist of it. 

CATS!

 Today I had the privilege of taking Sky and her friend Savannah to a production of the show CATS! 

 After the show, we were able to get autographs from the cast and take pictures with them. 

 The show was put on by a local high school theater group and it was very good.

 Sky remembered parts of it from when we had seen BIOLA Youth Theater's performance of CATS a few years ago. 

 It was a very fun afternoon!  Savannah's mom watched Lila and Brad (and her 2 kids) while we were at the show. 

Asian Day at the Aquarium

 We decided to go to the aquarium on Sunday and we got quite a surprise as it was Asian Day.  This was especially neat because Sky has been studying ancient China and Japan in her co-op for social studies.  She was able to see some beautiful Korrean dances.

 She also learned a lot about sea otters as we went to the sea otter show.  We learned that they have about 1,000,000 hairs per square inch which is as much as 7 human heads of hair or 1 German Shepherd.  Below she is getting to touch a real otter pelt.

 We also learned that it takes $2,500 a year to feed 1 sea otter.  And that the otters at this aquarium were hiding their food with shells in their fur until the aquarium workers left and then they were using the shells to do otter graffiti on the glass that contains them.  Sky was very diligent to write down the facts that she learned.

 There were many Asian crafts that she was able to do, including this fish.

 And some pretty cool origami...

 The man behind her in the above picture was doing sumi painting-basically painting with watered down soot on rice paper. 

 Sky had a great day at the aquarium.  Brad and Lila basically ran through the exhibits with either Ken or myself trying to keep up while the other one of us stayed with Sky to do all of her crafts. 

On another note, Sky started piano lessons today and is very excited about it.  She dreams of someday playing the harp.  We better start saving our money now!!!!!

Babies R Us!

 Last night Sky and Lila made a baby train with all of Lila's babies.  Lila has a few babies...  She loves them all as any decent mother would.  Apparently Raggedy Ann didn't make the cut though...

Here's Sky with her American girl doll, Sarah, and Lila with her bitty baby. 

Fossils at the Library

 Ken's dad collected fossils and dinosaur footprints.  When he died, we inherited the fossils and dinosaur footprints.  I used to use them for teaching purposes when I taught on fossils each year in second grade in Cincinnati.  Since then they have been boxed up.  This past weekend we loaned them to the La Mirada Public Library to display for 2 months so that others can see and enjoy them.  This is very much in the spirit of what Ken's dad would want done with them.  If you live locally, stop by and see them!