“You ever wonder why you never hear of a baby having a bad tie day? Well, the reason is, if a baby can’t decide which tie looks the best….
<%image(20090427-ajtiesweb.jpg|336|395|AJ and the ties.)%>
He just wears all of them!!
Oh and for other randomness our tulips are in bloom now:
<%image(20090427-tulipsweb.jpg|448|336|Fun Yellow/Red Tulips)%>”
“Well, as if gang wars weren’t bad enough, today brought the news of a deadly influenza virus that is sweeping through Mexico City. The same strain is here in the US too, but for some reason it hasn’t been as vigorous. I think it helps that in Mexico City you have 19 million people packed into a city about the size of Rhode Island. All the museums, historical sites, and public events have been canceled for the next 10 days. So, if we go, we will not stay too long in Mexico City, we’ll move on quickly to Aguascalientes. John’s immediate family lives in Mexico City, but the extended family lives in Aguascalientes, so we always go both places anyway. This visit we are lucky enough to be comming during fair time, so we are looking forward to the Aguascalientes part of the vist. If Mexico City continues to be shut down, then we’ll spend almost all of our visit in Aguas. (And maybe we can even get Papi, Arnold Sr., to come with us!)
In other news, today was busy. In the morning we hired a teenager and got the pine needles around the house cleaned up. Next came a funeral for a friend of ours at church, who died unexpectately at age 63. Then we took a walk around the lake. Lastly we came home and I helped fill out my mom’s work papers. Now, we are going to make some pizza and watch some movies. Not a bad day.
(Written by John, edited by Denise)
”
“Well, it was a lazy Monday for me and AJ. Denise went to work. Unfortunately, at work her phone was stolen. It isn’t a big deal because it was a “”pay-as-you-go”” phone (in other words it was really cheap). What was surprising to me is that in a matter of a few hours the person who stole the phone used up $19 that was on the phone. Anyhow, Denise bought a new phone today, such is life. Total cost of this incident was $33 dollars (yeah, like I said the phone was cheap).
As I said, for AJ and I it was a lazy day. Our big highlight was walking to McDonalds. AJ usually likes to play in the tunnels they have in their playground, but it was really hot so he didn’t get to have much fun. Other than that AJ and I put the breadmaker up on craiglist (anyone need a cheap breadmaker?) and played with the camera my mom let us borrow.
<%image(20090420-ajstandweb.jpg|336|356|AJ and playing with Mom's camera.)%>”
“So far I know 500 words. My grammar in Japanese is horrible, but I am learning anyway. I don’t have any time or money for formal lessons so I am basically teaching myself. I found this cool website called smart.fm and I study 30 words a day there. Then on the weekends I read a Japanese Book of Mormon my in-laws gave me. Japanese is a tough language to learn because it has 4 ways to write things and they all read like everyone was Yoda (which isn’t a coincidence by the way).
Anyhow, now for the real update last week we spent some time with Denise’s parents. On Christmas Denise gave them this coupon for 4 visits and I was told her parents collected on one of them. We went and watched conference. AJs favorite thing was to run in their yard and try to jump into the television to catch his Uncle Brent.
<%image(20090411-grampsweb.jpg|448|336|AJ tells Gramps it is time to wake up.)%>
“”Time to play Gramps.””
<%image(20090411-brentbabyweb.jpg|448|336|Brent auditions for the Brady Bunch)%>
“”Hey Mommy, why is Uncle Brent stuck in the television?””
<%image(20090411-camobabyweb.jpg|448|336|It's Rambo Baby)%>
“”You can’t see me.””
<%image(20090411-bunnbbabbyweb.jpg|409|336|AJ and Mr. Bunny Chillin)%>
“”Bedtime yet?””
<%image(20090411-ajdirtweb.jpg|448|336|""Grandma this dirt tastes fresh!"")%>
“”So how long we gotta wait?””
<%image(20090411-quilt.jpg|448|336|One of Doris' quilts.)%>”
“Well, we had a fun weekend. Yesterday, 3-28-09 we went to see a really big daffodil garden. This couple has over the last 30 years planted thousands of bulbs and they let the public go and view them in April. Unfortunately, this is going to be the last year because the couple is retiring and doesn’t want everyone going through the garden anymore. Still it was nice to see the lovely flowers:
<%image(20090329-denisedafweb.jpg|448|336|AJ and Denise walking through the flowers.)%>
After viewing the flowers we went to the Riverside Airshow. It was fun, they had F-16 flyovers, old planes, new planes, dog shows, and classic cars. A bit of everything really, but considering all you had to do was pay for the $5 parking it was really fun.
<%image(20090329-jetweb.jpg|448|161|The sound of freedom is LOUD!)%>
<%image(20090329-yellowplaneweb.jpg|448|336|Apparently AJ wasn't affected by the ""SBSO Junior Deputy"" Layoff deal.)%>
Other than that the big news is AJ is now walking. He isn’t very good yet, but he gets really excited when he gets somewhere so it is fun. I made a small video today in the church parking lot. We are going to have to find a baby leash or something now because he doesn’t like to stay still (not that he did much when he was crawling).
”
“This is some video of a recent trip we went to in Upland. We went and looked for a restaurant called Tango Baires. We had sausage sandwiches, empanadas, and alfajores:
“We have been so busy we really haven’t had much time to update our blog. We are doing alright, it has been snowing a lot lately in the mountains. Here are some pictures and videos of stuff we have done lately.
Feb. 7th, 2009 Dickens Festival:
We have done this before but we decided to bring AJ along this time. It is a festival every year held in Riverside, CA to celebrate Dickens (the author).
<%image(20090216-Dickens09Bird3web.jpg|448|336|This was a very elaborate costume.)%>
<%image(20090216-AJDickens09web2.jpg|448|336|AJ really liked this balloon.)%>
Later that evening Denise was inspired and actually milled some red wheat:
<%image(20090216-DeniseMillingweb.jpg|448|336|Denise was proud of her grinding skills)%>
Feb. 8th-13th, 2009 Del Mar, CA
I had a Records Supervisor class in Del Mar for work. Denise and AJ came with me. We got to San Diego ok, but while there the head gasket on the Kia blew up and it was interesting getting back. While down there Denise had bought me this nice chocolate cake for Monday night. Denise called me after she had gotten back to the hotel. Apparently, it wasn’t “”AJized”” and he found it. Not only did he eat 2/3rds of it, but he took the remaining 1/3rd and smeared it along the hotel floors. This is all I got to see of the chocolate cake:
<%image(20090216-AJDelmMar09web.jpg|448|336|Can we say Chocolate overload!)%>”
“(We should just rename this blog, AJ’s favorites, but anyway)
Here are your givens: Some of AJ’s very favorite foods are egg rolls, taquitos, chewy granola bars, and pizza crust. Now guess his favorite fruit.
1. tangerines, peeled and sectioned
2. a piece of banana for each hand
3. apples, sliced and cored
You would think bananas right? You would be wrong, because this is a trick question. AJ’s favorite fruit is apple cores. He enjoys tangerines (he starts to eat each section, but mostly just sucks them dry) and he likes bananas too, especially if it’s in two pieces, one for each hand, but the best is an apple that Momma or Papi has “”started”” and that he can nibble off the edges. He is very indifferent to apple slices
Below is a picture of AJ enjoying pizza crust in LA’s Farmer’s Market. We have a deal, I eat the messy tomato sauce part, he enjoys the chewy crust.
<%image(20090131-089.JPG|336|447|null)%>
P.S. What is AJ’s very favorite food in the entire world? Whatever you are eating.
”
“<%image(20090105-refine.jpg|240|329|null)%>
A good friend of mine introduced me to the concept of one little word, one word that defines your direction for the year.
My word this year?
Refine.
I want to clear the impurities out of my body, my house, my life. Less stuff, but more good stuff all around me, in fact only the best stuff. I did not pick the word “”refined”” which seems to have this slight ting of snootiness. I don’t want “”refined”” taste, I want to refine my life. Does that make sense? How about you guys anybody else want to think of a word for the year?
”
“<%image(20090120-fatalbert.jpg|432|285|AJ loves the Cosby kids.)%>
Hey! Hey ! Hey! I guess it was only a matter of time but AJ has found a television show he likes. Only thing is at our house it is a Internet show because we don’t have any way of getting any other signal to our house. I think he likes Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids because they have a lot of funky music in the background and the shows are only 20 min each (that is about the time limit of his retention). Anyhow, if you want to see what this show is all about you can watch it too at www.hulu.com/fat-albert. AJ highly recommends it.”