Mission San Antonio de Padua project

Erica's 4th grade school project is Mission Antonio de Padua. She did all the PowerPoint presentation work in school and having a Mission model will get her some extra credit for the project. I was excited about the project and helped her on building the model from scratch, her effort was watching me building it. It took me an hour here and there during a few evenings in the last few weeks and I have finished it finally last night by adding a few details (small rocks I found at the side of our cabin). The model turned out to be quite good and Erica was a very proud girl when mommy helped to bring it to the classroom this morning!  Erica said she got 50 extra credit points, the highest in the class.

Sledding at the Nordic Base!

We got a few inches of new snow last week at the cabin but the weather had been nice and most of the snow on ground has melted. We brought the sleds and drove 20 minutes to the Nordic Base at Mt. Pinos, there were lots of snow and girls had fun time up there, unfortunately I hurt my back on the only ride down a very bumpy slope with Vivian.

Vivian's belated birthday cake!

Vivian's 8th birthday was on the 18th but we never got the chance to buy her a birthday cake and sing birthday song for her until this evening! The girls finished her homework in school as promised, Vivian's turned in her Charlotte's Web book report today, two months in the role to be the 1st person in the class to turn in monthly book report! We rented Charlotte's Web movie from the library and went to pick up a small ice-cream cake from Baskin Robins across the street. The girls had a great evening watching the movie and we finally got a chance to sing birthday song to Vivian.

Vivian turns 8!

Today is President's Day, no school, it is also Vivian's 8th birthday, both of us took today off from work and extended our stay at the cabin. Vivian was the 1st person to wake up this morning, she discussed her plan with us during breakfast, she wanted to spend the afternoon at the amusement park at the Santa Monica Pier. We took off from the cabin at 10am and got home at around 11:40am. Unload the stuff and head out to Santa Monica. We stopped by El Polo Loco for lunch and we arrived the pier before 2pm. We got unlimited passes for the girls and they had a blast on the rides! We left Santa Monica at around 4:30pm and headed to Simi Valley, we had dinner with San & Chen's families, Vivian received surprised gifts from Katelyn and Caitlyn!

Mt. Pinos summit, elevation 8,831 ft

We hiked two miles from Nordic Base to the summit of Mt. Pinos on Saturday. It is the highest place in Ventura County. The entire trail was covered with snow but it was an easy hike, we all enjoyed it!

Happy Chinese New Year 2013 (Year of the Snake)

It's the time of the year again to post some Chinese New Year greeting pictures of the girls! We wish everyone happy, healthy and prosperous in the year of the Snake! Kung Hey Fat Choi everyone!

A short drive to Mount Pinos

We made a short drive from our cabin to check out Mt. Pinos Nordic Base at noon, elevation 8,300ft. There's a  2 mile trail from Nordic Base to the peak of Mt. Pinos, elevation 8,800ft. When the weather gets a little warmer, we will find a weekend and hike up to the peak with the girls.

Some updates on our cabin: The minor skylight water leak has been repaired by Eugene the handyman, he has also adjusted and leveled the staircase for us, $150 well spent. Our cozy living room is finally  furnished, Erica loves to spend her time at the leather chair with ottoman reading her books or playing her ipad. The girls helped me and replaced both side door and back door dead bolts and locks. Next weekend I will be installing a lamp over the dining table which requires some custom built parts and wiring, hope it will turn out nice. I have filled up the wood pellet fireplace with wood pellets, still have 2 bags of 40 pounder in the basement, the 250 gallon propane is still about 58% full. We still have 3-4 months before the weather gets warmer, we will stock up more wood pellets and refill the propane tank when it gets down to about 20-25%. We have picked up a nice patio set at the local garage sale, two more trips, we will have the entire set moved there. When the weather gets warmer, we will also move the BBQ grill there. We still need to buy a set of lawn chair and a side table or maybe a swing or something for the front deck. Our cabin is now well stocked and very comfortable. It has become our 2nd home for the weekends!