Happy Birthday Novella !!!

Novella Royale Kingman turned 1 year old the other day and what a happy day it was.

Here's the birthday girl with her flower power cake.

Here's Novella with her party planner (a.k.a. mom).

And here are just a few pictures of the many people that were there celebrating Novella's big day.

The girls discovered a caterpillar and were carefully checking it out.

Here are the monkey twins having a barrel of laughs.

Happy Birthday !!!

It was Dominic and Milani's birthday the other day. They are the other set of twins in our immediate family.

Here's a close up of Dominic. He's pretty happy to be playing in the bouncy house. He is our miracle baby who was born premature and weak. You would never know the difference and now he is turning two !!! You've come a long way baby !!

Here's his sister Milani looking absolutely beautiful. There was no getting her out of that bouncy house.

Here's Nader's brother Brian and his wife Christine with the birthday twins. Oh and did I mention that they are expecting their 4th baby any day now !! We are all very excited around here to see our new niece/nephew. We don't know yet.

Here's a shot of Sahara in mid air while daddy tackles Maya.

Jump Maya jump !

Beeeeeeach

Whenever I ask the girls what they would like to do for fun, Maya always answers, "beeeeeeeach". If it were up to her, we would go to the beach everyday. Here's some pictures of the last time we went to Oceanside Beach with Sido (Grandpa Paul) and Tata (Grandma Linda).

Here's a pictures of Sahara digging in the sand. Grandpa Sido is in the distance with his feet in the water. Sahara is so attached to her binky that she now has one in her mouth and is usually carrying another one or two.

Maya tried to grab the camera from me to look at pictures and I snapped one of her. Maya has been a handful lately. She has been acting stubborn with just about everything and is very obsessed with doing everything herself. This is normally fine but when you wait nearly half an hour for her to get dressed only to see her put her arms through the leg openings and her legs through the arm openings, it can get a little frustrating. Mind you she won't let you help her out of her predicament.

Here's Sido burying Sahara in the sand. This is a great way to keep her in one spot.

She thinks it's hilarious.

There is a play set on the beach in Oceanside which the girls love. Here are a few pictures of them going down the slide.

Dads Gone Wild

Let me start out by saying that I love my husband. But when he decided to take a break from shaving for a couple of months he starting looking less like the man I fell in love with, and more like a Chia Pet.

Oh my !! What is the deal ??? The beard may have saved him from shaving but the draw backs included me and the girls keeping our distance because of his scratchy kisses. Not to mention the general terrorist look that he was sporting was rather scary.

Finally after much begging and pleading by everyone we know, he finally conceded and shaved the thing. Ahhh, much better.

Nader was gone for five days this past week for a work retreat at Mammoth Mountain. He was busy snowboarding, hanging with work friends and having long delicious dinners. Oh, and he went to a few seminars that help him keep his engineering licence updated. This is the longest he has been away from the girls and we all miss him. Come home daddy !!!

Mission Bay, San Diego

This past weekend we met up with my cousin Merna and her family and her good friend Mimi and her family. It was a beautiful and sunny day and all the kids had a good time. There were 6 kids all together running like a pack of wild animals.

Here's our picnic area.

The kids are enjoying corn and apple juice.

Check out this Carl's Jr. moment. This is my cousin Merna and her 3 month old baby, Jad. Can you see the ketsup on the baby's beanie?

Here are the kids playing in the sand.

The white rabbit came to visit. We learned that the rabbit was rescued as a baby from a box at a gas station. She's come a long way.

The rabbit was a big hit.

Lego Land

Maya and Sahara met up with their friend Olivia at Lego Land the other day.

Here's Olivia with her mom, Laura.

Here's Maya and Sahara on the slide.

Another view of the slide. Can you see Maya at the top of the slide?

Maya starting hanging around a new friend she met at the play ground.

Here's Maya and Olivia playing together.

Escondido Children's Museum

We visited the Children's Museum the other day. This is what the place looked like 5 minutes after the girls got there.

Sahara is standing next to the little house.

Maya is cooking in the little kitchen in the little house.

Two cooks in the kitchen.

Maya is working on the pizza and Sahara is cooking the toppings.

We got one of those frogs that grow in water.

This is pretty gross. I can't wait to throw it out.

Mixed Plate

I have a bunch of random pictures to share...here's Maya eating some mini waffles for breakfast.

The girls have learned how to eat zeit and zatar. For all you non-Arabs, that is pita bread dipped in olive oil then dipped in spices. Maya and Sahara have watched their grandparents enjoy this traditional breakfast and have quickly picked it up. Take a look...

It might look like they are eating dirt but I assure you it is very yummy.

Today we planted 20 sunflowers. The girls helped put dirt in the pots, then one by one placed a sunflower seed in the pot, then watered each one after mom covered the seed and patted it down. These sunflowers should grow 6'-7' very quickly. So the girls have a new job of caring for these sunflowers as they watch them grow. We will keep you posted on this project.

I haven't mentioned the new addition to our family yet but last week we adopted a beta fish we named Shiva, the destroyer. The girls look forward to feeding her every day. This fish has been a great source of joy lately.

Maya and Sahara helped me harvest avocados today. It was pretty funny, all the low hanging fruit is gone so we got creative and I held Sahara up over my head and she grabbed the out of reach avocados. Then Maya collected the avocados that fell to the ground. It was a lot of fun.

Now that the weather is warming up and the flowers are blooming like crazy the girls have been picking flowers. We take Bella, our yellow lab, on a walk every day weather permitting, and we make several stops to pick flowers along the way. This is in addition to the constant flower picking around our house. Here's a picture of Sahara fat baby hands holding an African Daisy.

This was the sunset last night. Now that it's warmer, the girls have been spending the majority of their days outside. It was hot enough to fire up the jacuzzi and play with the girls in the water. We have not been able to do that in a while.