Hawaiian Style

The other day a few friends from Hawaii got together for dinner to celebrate old times and our friend, Nos', birthday. We started the evening at Kingman and Mary's house where we got to hang out with Novella.

Here's baby Novella getting ready for bed. She was showing off her new dance moves which was pretty adorable.

Here we are at dinner in Laguna Beach. This is a standard Nos picture.

Here's Kingman and Mary.

Here's Natalia.

Here's a fuzzy shot of Natalia and Nos. I'm not sure what Nos is looking at.

We had a great night hanging out and talking about everything under the sun. It felt like old times. Lots of laughs and aloha.

Summers Bounty

Nader's father has a serious green thumb and since we moved to Fallbrook, he has planted a hundred fruit trees. His hard work and effort has paid off. Even though the trees are still very young they are producing like crazy.

Fresh plums anyone?

Here's another variety of plum.

I ate one of these apples today and they are very sweet.

The girls like to help pick the fruit.

After they pick the fruit they wash it. As you can see Bella is supervising their work.

On this occasion the girls decided to jump into the buckets and clean themselves.

The girls are growing like weeds. They are now talking in small sentences. They are also putting themselves to sleep and sleeping through the night. Yippeee !! Potty training is slowly coming along. They are almost there. Yesterday they did not have any accidents. I am thankful for days like these. Last to report, the girls are swimming like fish. They still need floaties but it's pretty cool to see them cruising around the pool. More pictures to come...

Whales, Seals & Cousins

It's been crazy hot here in San Diego and we have been doing everything to beat the heat. We are in the pool everyday and making good use of our fans. Last Friday we braved the heat and headed out to Sea World to spend a day with Maya and Sahara's cousins.

Here's a great shot of the crew. From left: Nader, Milani, Dominic, Polar Bear, Sahara, Maya and Christopher. The only one missing is baby Gianna.

Here she is....

Highlights from our day include feeding the bat rays. These creatures feel like slippery rubber. Pretty weird. They eat fish right out of your hand.

Maya and Sahara were fascinated by the bat rays. They even held out a fish to feed them.

Here's a whole bunch of them coming in for some fish.

Another shot of the twins in action.

We got to see Shamu and friends at the Believe show. The girls kept on telling me that they were Shamu as they swam around the pool later that day. Pretty cute.

Here's the Elmo flying fish ride in the newly opened Sesame Street themed play area. Sahara begged to go on this ride the past couple of visits to Sea World, so we finally took her. Once the ride started she freaked out and tucked herself into her father as far as she could. So you can't see her in this picture, but she is hiding next to her daddy. Maya on the other hand kept on hitting the control lever to go up and down in the air.

Here's Sahara checking out the turtles. The girls can't get enough of turtles.

Other highlights from our day that I didn't get photos of were the star fish touch and feel exhibit, the feeding of the seals and the aquarium exhibits that were full of color and over sized fish.

We had a really fun day and the girls slept the whole ride home.

Coming soon....Maya and Sahara swimming like fish.

Busy as a Bee

We have been pretty busy this past couple of weeks. Here are a few highlights, not necessarily in this order....

We visited our friend Ish and his family. Check out Brandon, Luke and the shark.

They have several pools and water fun parks in their community, so we like to visit them and play. Check out this play set that is in about 2 ft of water. Their is a bucket at the top that fills with water and splashes the play set.

Here are our two water babies. Now that it's hot we are in the pool everyday and the girls are totally fearless. Thank god for floaties.

Maya and Sahara made a father's day card for Papa Epi and their daddy. Pretty cute. On Father's day Sido Paul, Papa Epi, Nader, Bella and Maya and Sahara went to Oceanside pier to enjoy some time together. Maya and Sahara had all kinds of cool things to report when they got back. Like the dolphins they saw and the fish that were caught by people on the pier.

Here's Maya taking care of her baby while watching the Laker's in the NBA Finals. Both Maya and Sahara can chant Kobe's name. Unfortunately the Laker's were annihilated in game 6. We are all very sad about this.

We visited baby Gianna and her family the other day. She is such a cutie. Maya and Sahara love to kiss her and say her name.

Here's out little Dominic looking handsome as usual.

What is it about sleeping babies that make them so adorable?

Maya had the worst day of her life last weekend. We started the day in the jacuzzi, where she slipped and cut the inside of her lip. It was so deep that we took her to emergency in case she needed stitches. Here's a picture inside of the emergency room. When we got home she was stung by a bee. And as if that wasn't enough, later that day she was sitting in a chair that tipped backwards and landed on the back of her head. She has never done so much crying in one day. Thank goodness that day is over.

Here's a tender moment of Papa Epi and Sahara watching TV together. Papa Epi came back with us from Washington State and stayed with us until last Monday. He finally went home even though we all wished he could have stayed longer. He had done a really good job spoiling us. He cooked us breakfast, lunch and dinner everyday. The girls still wake up asking for Papa's pancakes. We love you Papa Epi !!!

Welcome Home

Tata Linda and Sido got back from Australia after being away from Maya and Sahara for over a month. Needless to say the girls were over joyed to see their grandparents again. Here's a group picture of our relatives in Australia.

Reunited and it feels so good...

Maya and Sahara were so excited to see their Tata that they could not stop screaming.

Look at Sahara's face !

Check out this video, it's so cute.

We are so happy that Sido and Tata are home !!

Sido was so happy to see the girls that he started crying. That almost made me cry.

Life is back to normal here and we are all so very happy. Here's our sweet Maya tracing her hand with crayons.

Goodbye Washington, Hello California

We are back in California after nearly 3 weeks in Washington State. Nader seemed to work most of the time we were up there, but that didn't seem to stop us girls. Some of the highlights from our vacation included visiting with Grandpa Epi and Tata Jolly, the Olympia Children's Museum, Tacoma's Defiance Park, Uncle Ken visiting us from San Fran and taking us to the Seattle Space Needle, our mini vacation to San Juan Island and last but not least discovering the many parks in the Olympia area.

Here's a shot of Tolmie State Park.

We visited this beach on the Puget Sound a few times.

Future Element Eden model.

A busy day at Pike's Market.

Might I add there is nothing like coming home to your own bed after a long trip. We are back into our normal routine and unfortunately it feels like we are starting all over again with potty training. While traveling we went exclusively back to diapers. Can someone please tell me why it is harder to potty train a toddler than it is to train a dog? I have had a few very frustrating days dealing with two leaky girls. My mantra lately has been, "This too shall pass."