surfer dude

Gordy has never shown much interest in surfing.  He'd occasionally tolerate Todd taking him out somewhere, but he'd much rather "bodysurf" tiny shore breaks or play around on his body board...  until this weekend.

On Friday, we went to Ehukai for sprints.  Todd had seen that there were some cool sand bars in front of the tower, so he'd brought a Gogo board just in case.  And, we were in luck.  There was a perfect spot for Todd to push Gordy into some little waves and he LOVED it!  Every time Todd would ask Gordy if he wanted to be done, Gordy would say, "More!".  

So, the next day, we decided to venture up to the same spot and we scored again!  Gordy had a few falls that didn't seem to phase him one bit and quite a few good rides.  One of them was so long that the video I took lasted 26 seconds!

Gordy is certain that he's a surfer now and it sounds like he's looking forward to his next session.  Yay!

december festivities

Gordy had been very patiently awaiting December and all that it brought.  And, now that it's over he's decided that it was the best December ever.  Here's some of the reasons why he loved it so much:

Tutu Ginger came to visit and while she was here we decorated Nana's Christmas tree and made Granny Goodwitch's Christmas cookies.

After many revisions, Gordy completed and mailed his list to Santa.

Gordy's elf came to life and went to the North Pole each night returning in the morning to a new hiding place.

We sipped hot cocoa with marshmallows while watching the Christmas parade from the side of the street in Haleiwa.

We spent a day on Maui with Nana and twins Hayden and Sebastian.

Gordy was pretty sure that he'd started to grow whiskers.

Salvation army gave us a free Christmas tree (still not sure how that happened).

Gordy found a pet toad, who quickly hopped away.

More cookie making with Gordy's friend Alia and her family.

On Christmas Eve, Gordy and I heard reindeer footsteps on the roof and Santa say "ho, ho, ho".

We left out cookies and wine for Santa and carrots for the reindeer, and hung our stockings with care.

And, most importantly... Santa came and filled our stockings!

End of year swim

As is tradition for the last 8 years, we rallied the troops and completed our 78 hundreds (I did 75s) for 2022.  And, for the first time, Gordy joined (he did 50s with fins)!

Gordy only stayed for 5 so he's not in our after photo, but that's more than nothing!

Now we are all ready for 2023 to begin :)

happy holidays 2022

Tutu Ginger's visit

Tutu Ginger came to visit for Thanksgiving and our birthday!

We all had a great time and Gordy is already ready for a repeat trip.  We hope to see you again soon Tutu!

Piedmont 2022.2

We are now home from another wonderful trip to the Bay area!  The cousins had lots of time to play together (which is cool because they are all old enough to enjoy the play).

We did our best to polish off a fresh jar of Tutu's homemade apricot jam using english muffins as vessels.

We saw some incredible sunsets from the breakfast nook in Tutu's and Pop-pop's kitchen.

We played with Gracie.

We visited the Piedmont firefighters.

Played basketball and tennis with Pop-pop.

Thawed our chilled bodies in the hot tub.

Shared a yummy apple fritter from a bakery by Lake Merritt.

And, experienced 5-star treatment at the Warriors-Kings game at Chase Center with great seats (thanks Pop-pop), VIP parking, access to the Chase Club, and courtside seats to watch the Warriors warm up (thanks Bruce)!

We are exhausted from our big adventure, but are over the moon about all that we were able to do in such a short period of time.  'Til next time Piedmont family, and thank you for everything!

halloween 2.0

Since last year was such a success, Gordy and I drafted up, cut, and assembled notes with ribbons for our neighbors letting them know that we would be haunting our street again on Halloween night.

We put our notes in everyone's mailboxes and crossed our fingers for participation.  Sure enough, half the street was out waiting for our crew at 6:30pm sharp.  And this year, our mob grew from 2 kids to 5!

We had two witches, a unicorn, a cat, and an astronaut complete with a jetpack made of juice bottles covered in aluminum foil and duct tape.  The kids all had a blast running a muck on the street and the neighbors were happy to have trick-or-treaters again.

Seems like we've started a Kaiea Place tradition that we hope lasts for years to come.