What I Will Miss

John. Dad.


Grampa Fred and Granny Sue. Disney Days.


Beach. Friends (and I am incredibly blessed to say that there are WAY too many of you, friends, to picture here!).




The best neighbors EVER.



Balboa Island.


Balboa Ferry.


Endless sunshine.



And I'm signing off, for now anyway. I'll be packing up my computer next as we are quickly approaching our final days here in OC.

Easter Monday

Kalani was so excited about his Easter basket treasure hunt (still think of your crazy good treasure hunts all the time, Momma!!) and all the fun stuff and goodies he found that I let him have 2 tiny jelly beans and a stick of gum Easter morning, before breakfast. Bad idea. He was sick on the couch, throwing up, for the rest of the day. Poor guy, got his Mama's sensitive tummy :(

So, since our Easter celebration was to be just us, John, and Grandpa Fred and Granny Sue this year, we decided to let Kalani be on Sunday and have our celebration and feast on Monday instead! I had been cooking and preparing all the food from Saturday afternoon, on through most of Sunday, so I was initially pretty bummed to have it all just sit there over night. But it turned out really nice! Our Easter Monday morning was very relaxed and everything was already completely prepped and ready to go so it was totally stress-free for me. And we ended up having a fabulous meal, a really nice and casual day ending with some beach play time and a beautiful, long walk along the boardwalk. It was perfect.

The jelly beans...


and stick of gum. Argggh. But check out this expression. Priceless. Love him.


Flashbacks of naked, long-haired, 2 year-old Kalani in bunny ears, anyone? ;-)




Coconut Kumquat cupcakes. Yum.
(although my food photography could still use some work...)


My worker guy, workin' at the beach.


No caption necessary :)

Big Thursday

'Cause that's what my Dad always called it. And that's when my dad always dyed Easter eggs. We always used the vibrant Greek dyes; of course red and usually yellow, green, and blue also. And when my dad was feeling creative he'd make some purple with the red and blue dyes and we'd have some beautiful magenta eggs as well. Definitely my most fond and vivid memory of dying eggs is doing them Greek style with my dad, and then rubbing the almost too hot to touch eggs with olive oil to make them shiny and beautiful.

I wanted to carry on the "Big Thursday" tradition with my boys (well, I think Dylan was napping, actually ;-)) but wanted to go for a little more natural dye options. This year anyway. I'm sure I'll do the traditional Greek eggs with them another time. I used turmeric, red cabbage and annatto. The turmeric and red cabbage dyed eggs turned out great, super vibrant and gorgeous! The annatto was a little pale and speckled, but still pretty.

Our neighbor, and Kalani's best friend, Riley, joined us :)