Jabober

when she hears that she won 2nd place in a short story contest for a national writing magazine?

Weeeeeeewwwwwt!

Apparently, breathing is one thing that is difficult to do under such circumstances.

Posted by Tammy at 04:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Here's the low-down on some more books I've read recently:

The Princess Diaries and Princess in the Spotlight (The Princess Diaries, Vol. 2) by Meg Cabot: I picked up the Princess Diaries while cruising the library shelves in the kids' section. I liked it enough that I went ahead and picked up the second one the following week. Light, silly teen chick lit. I'm going to get the third one when we go back on Tuesday. I think there are eight books in total.

Writing to Change the World by Mary Pipher: I picked this one up at the library too. It turned out to be a really good book. It's not only about writing, but about how to approach controversial topics and how to say what we feel from the heart. A lot of good pointers, such as using stories to make an audience more likely to understand (and agree) on a theoretical point. If found her writing easy to follow. I ended up writing about three pages of notes and quotes in my writing journal.

See Jane Write: A Girl's Guide to Writing Chick Lit by Sarah Mlynowski: As the title suggests, this is a book about writing chick lit. The story telling techniques and writing tips were pretty similar to what I've read in other writing books. But there were a few twists (like comparing chick lit to romance, and how to make your chick lit main character not come off as a b*tch). The best thing about it - the entire thing was written with a "chick lit" style. Sarah also includes a list of good chick-lit writers.

Boy Meets Girl by Meg Cabot: Meg Cabot was on Sarah's list. And since I love the Princess Diaries series so much, I thought I'd read her adult chick lit. It was OK. Not fantab. I like how Meg told the story with emails, phone messages and journal entries. But many of the characters seemed to have the same voice, making it hard to figure out who was talking. This also made some of the characters seem inconsistent and not too convincing. Even so, I wanted to see if the girl got the guy in the end. I figured she did, but I still wanted to see it happen. So, I read it, and it happened, and ... eh. I like Meg's teen stuff better. Gonna go back to the princess diaries.

Posted by Tammy at 06:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday we went to the Pirates of the Caribbean party at the Disney Studios. Such fun!



Cam and Yoshi played some games and won fun prizes.



Allison got a tattoo.



I got a tattoo.



I spent a moment with my buddy, Jack.



We also got to see the real live model of the Black Pearl.

Posted by Tammy at 05:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Last night, we went out with our friends Dan and Diane for wine tasting up in Montrose. We had a fantabulous time. Without children. For the first time, in like, forever. An adult double date. Unfathomable.

We bought a nice Anglim syrah and Yoshi bought two kick-ass beers: Chimay Blue and Allagash Interlude. Alllagash cost 22 dollars, and the bottle is as big as a wine bottle. Apparently, it's aged in a barrel that had syrah and merlot in it. We can't wait to taste it.

While we were gone, our babysitter drove our littlest one insane:



Actually, the kids had an awesome time. They hardly noticed us coming home. Well, granted, the sitter let them watch as much TV as they wanted and didn't make them get into their jammies - but still! Can't complain if they love their babysitter.

Today we went to the JPL (Jet Propulsion Laboratory (NASA)) open house. We got to see the Mars rover, and some new robots they designed to land on Mars and the moon. There were lots of really smart people dressed in green JPL shirts answering questions.



This picture was at the Mars exhibit. When we first got there, I don't think the kids really "got" that these robots were replicas of the same robots on another friggin planet. After going through the first exhibit though, and seeing lots of pictures and seeing more robots, Cameron and Allison started to see the coolness of it all.



They had an early Mars Rover prototype that they used to show the kids how the rovers worked. The kids laid down in a line, and the engineer drove the Rover over the group, then back again. Megan thought it was the best thing, and laughed through the whole thing. "It went on my butt!" she squealed.



This rover was super cool terrific awesome. This was actually a smaller prototype of a rover that they are planning to drop ship to Mars. They are going to send it out in a pod, which releases a parachute, then kicks in some rockets to slow its descent. After a bit, the rover slowly unfolds from the underside of the rocket pod, which is still hovering above the surface, and the pod slowly lowers the rover down with cables. Then the pod jettisons itself off somewhere to commit robotic suicide or float in space or something.

We also got to check out the fabrication department, where every piece of every robot is custom made. We saw some cool infrared cameras, and did some hot/cold experiments with the camera. We also got to play with some rare earth magnets and a meteorite that landed in Africa.

All in all, great fun. We look forward to coming back next year. We figure, with each year, the kids will get more and more out of it, as they come to understand the mind-boggling coolness of it all.

Posted by Tammy at 09:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here's some stuff we've been up to:



Cam loved his science class this session. They did the Mentos experiment.



Our friends Jeff and Tristan came to visit. We spent the weekend with them at Disneyland. Our friends Dan, Diane, Ryan and Erin came out to join us for dinner Saturday night too.



For mother's day, Yoshi and the kids gave me purple orchids, some chocolate, a bottle of wine and a hand-made card. Then they took me to Balboa beach, and I got to see where Yoshi used to go on vacation with his family when he was a kid. We had a blast.



We recently re-discovered the Kidspace Children's Museum. They did a complete remodel. The inside of the museum is stuff to climb, build, push, pull, shake, and more. Outside is more stuff to climb, splash, ride, and play on. This will be one of our many summer hang outs, especially the creek in the back with a rain simulator.



And here's a cute picture of meg after she had her face painted and put on a clown hat at Kids Funtown in Montrose.

Posted by Tammy at 05:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here are some of the fun things we've been up to:


Meg's first gymnastics class. She loves it. She was born to flip.


The kids got a ton of loot at Easter. It's always a blast to gather at the Sturges household.


Allison's starting to enjoy her Yoga class. She wasn't so sure in the beginning. But she's a natural.


Cousin Christopher came to visit. Well, his flat self anyway. Not nearly as good as the real thing. We're looking forward to seeing the whole family, not flat, at Christmas.


Our friends Mike and Heather brought their new baby, Vinnie, for a visit. He's 3 weeks old. How often do we get to see a baby that small? He's such a darling. Slept the whole time he was here. I got to hold him a little. There's nothing like holding an itty bitty person.

Posted by Tammy at 10:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)