February, 2015

Cold, rainy days are with us now (late February, early March).  Central Texas needs the water, so we are happy, although there are those who miss their vitamin D.  Below are some photographs (and two videos) from the past half year or so, with a few comments.  Some big events from the last eight or nine months (which is how long it's been since we last posted) are:

Bicycle: Since late last summer—just a month or so after she turned four—Eléa has been riding her little bicycle (16" rims) without me holding on to it.  In fact, she's gotten quite good, such that she can ride to Veryan and Greg's house (3.5 miles) or to Habibi's Hutch and back (2.5 miles each way).  It is rather hilly around here so Luke has to push up the larger hills, but she does quite well by herself on relatively low-grade inclines, and generally refuses help when it's offered.

Wedding: in September of last year (2014) Uncle Seren and Aunt Angela were married in San Diego.  Veryan, Greg, Cindy, Luke, Eléa, Roe and Mark, and Linda (from Austin) were all in attendance.  We had a lovely time, and Eléa enjoyed the beach, though she never actually fully submerged herself in the Pacific waters.

Writing: Eléa has become quite the writer.  She has about ten or so names under her belt, and she can also write "Happy Valentine's Day," "cat," "dog," and a few other things from memory.  We haven't really pushed this on her, as forcing children to read and write at an early age has been shown to have negative consequences—being read to is an entirely different matter—but for whatever reason she has expressed a desire here and there to write this word or that name.

This blog's not really about Cindy, but it must be mentioned that she started a new job this past August, which requires some travel.

Elea got her face painted with her friend Willow in the late summer.

We spent Halloween with Ryan, Katherine, Saskia, Garneau, and a number of their friends, painting faces at the (Ryan) Sullivan residence and then wandering the neighborhood.  Eléa was a cat....meow!

Sometimes thirst defies all taboos.  (At the Exploratorium in San Francisco.)

Eléa in the Austin Botanical Gardens.  She had great fun walking across the stepping stones in the pond, and hiding in the bamboo grove.  If I remember correctly she was pretending that the four of us (Cindy, Luke, Eléa, and Veryan?) were a family of rabbits.

We attended Saskia's birthday party.  (She was turning five.)  Katherine and Ryan had prepared some very nice party games: potato-sack race (which was in face a coffee-sack race in this case...oh the time they are a-changin'), pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey, and egg-spoon race.  Here the first of these two are pictured.  There are also two videos of the potato-sack race, one of them with parent-child teams.

Eléa and a friend in race.

Eléa and Papi in race.

With baby brother on his way, Eléa got a new car seat (pictured below).  Cindy is grown rather large, as can be seen here.  Baby brother is apparently healthy and kicking.  Cindy is having trouble sleeping and has been suffering from congestion and physical ills for many, many weeks now, and she will glad to have the baby out of her tummy.

Elea with Leo, son of Mark and Lisa Goldberg.  This is on the second-floor porch of Maria's Tacos.

  

 Hamuduruwo kindly paid us a visit last spring.  Maduwa came down from Idaho with his son.  Here we have Eléa in the dress that she wore to Uncle Seren and Aunt Angela's wedding.  (NOT the phone with the dinosaur, but the other one.)  She declined the offer of an official role in the ceremony itself, but enjoyed the cookies afterwards and the dancing, too.