GOOOOO RIPTIDE!!!!!!!!

Saturday was a BIG DAY for Catie! It was her first official swim meet for her team Novato's Riptide! She was VERY excited and so ready for her big day! We were out of the house at 7:00am, at the pool and she was warming up by 7:30am.... She did GREAT! Did her best! We are so proud of her!!!

Here she is before we left the house...
and a good luck hug from Meigan...

I took this just before I lined them up for their heat....the sun was right in her eyes, as you an tell...

and here is our champ, making her way down lane 2 in her freestyle heat. She came in just over 30 seconds....pretty awesome for this first time swimteam participant!!!!

A Tuesday Surprise

Today, Meigan and I picked up Catie from school and went right down to Larkspur and got on the Ferry to San Francisco. There we got to see my brother Ryan, up from LA for business. The girls get VERY excited to see their Uncle, as we don't see him very often. He lives in Eagle Rock (next to Pasadena) with Nicole and our little niece/cousin Ella, who will turn 1yrs. old very soon! The girls ran like crazy to Uncle Ryan when they saw him, it was really cute!

We had a quick visit and dinner at The Marketplace Cafe at the Ferry Building, and it was FUN!

The girls have a Ferry tradition...no matter what time of the day it is, chips are a MUST on the Ferry! As you can see by this picture...2 very happy girls!!

Sweet Catie...growing up so fast....

It's hard for us to believe, that in less than 2 months, Catie will turn 7yrs. old. She's been with us for almost 6yrs. now, yet it seems like forever! She's changed so much lately, maturing rapidly...She's a fantastic student, quite a swimmer on our local swim team, loves her art class and will be playing soccer in the fall...she's always reading, writing and drawing...and she's amazingly patient with her little sister 80% of the time...

She knows her story...knows how she came to be our daughter....and she in recent times, gets a bit sad thinking of her birthmother, and is full of questions about all of it.

She's such an amazing little girl...we are so incredibly lucky......and to say that we are her parents is both an honor and a priviledge....

We love you so Catie!!!

These were taken Mother's Day out at Limantour Beach in Point Reyes...

Pee Wee Soccer Star

Here is Meigan in action!! We signed her up for a pee-wee soccer clinic for 5 weeks! She LOVES it! ...she's out there for 45mins. every Saturday and just goes and kicks the ball, and she can control it pretty well.....

Strawberries taste best when you grow them yourselves!

We've had our first official "harvest" here in Novato....the weather has been perfect for Catie's strawberries to grow....tonight we got a few of our first ripe berries......Catie chose strawberries for her planter boxes, and Meigan chose cucumbers and tomatoes...







however, since Meigan's cucumbers and tomatoes are nowhere near ready, she had to get in on the strawberry action and plead with her big sister for "just one pleeeeeeeaaaassseeee".....


nuthin' left on that one...this kid can clean a strawberry faster than anyone I know...

What are little sisters for??????

welllll......to cart their big sisters around the backyard, of course......

Sooooooo Busy.....so little ltime to blog.....

Where DOES the time go with 2 kids??? well, it goes to school, preschool, volunteering in class, doing the class art project for the school auction, driving back and forth to swim team practice (oh, did I neglect to post that in March??)...soccer sign-ups, gymnastics.....blah, blah, blah.....it never ends it seems......oh, and I do fit in the gym for me most mornings a week.....phew, makes me tired just typing all this.....

As an updated to our owl visitor a month ago.....we actually got the owl back, and got to let it go ourselves...it was VERY cool...the kids thought it was fun, and the little owl even came with 2 of it's own DEAD MICE for a snack.....yep....Brian picked it up from Wild Care, and they threw in 2 of the dead little suckers....but our owl wasn't going for them...so it flew away, across the street into the neighbor's yard..... what a fiasco that was...but quite exciting!

We had a visitor this past weekend, one of Brian's closest childhood friends from Long Island...he lives in Riverside now, but he came to see us...we haven't seen him in years...we had such a fun visit with Ed..and the girls loved him and he loved them... Brian's been traveling a lot (nothing new there).

Here are some pics from the past month!

Meigan and Daddy out at the Point Reyes Lighthouse

Catie was a bit apprehensive waiting for the owl to fly away.....

I found Meig one day, up in the cabinet getting herself a glass for water.....monkey!

Catie models her new uniform for Novato Youth Soccer......she'll be wearing #1 for the season!! she is very excited!!!

a shot of the girls on Friday on the way to school...

The girls on the Larkspur Ferry on Saturday with our friend Ed...the girls didn't leave him alone for a second the entire weekend! We had a great day in San Francisco, ate our way through the city, and walked the girls from the Ferry Terminal, to Pier 39, to China Town, back to the Ferry and home...they ate all day, and were STILL hungry at 8:30pm that night...

A trip to the city is not complete without a ride on the Pier 39 carousel.....or a trip to the Sea Lions.

How much damage can a 5 inch Screech Owl do in a home??

Wel, we have had quite a few exciting few days...starting at 5:10am Friday with a loud banging coming from the living room...Brian got up to see what it was, then I got up, and we knew there was "something" in the livingroom fireplace...but what "IT" was, we weren't sure...whatever "IT" was, was desperately trying to push the fireplace doors open...so we got the flashlight out and looked in...I was expecting to see one of the many gigantic racoons that we have here, but nooooooo.....what we saw was this little, big-eyed bird...we looked closer and realised that it was a FREAKIN' OWL!!!!! an owl in the house.....what the?? we looked at each other, laughed for a second and then said "oh s_ _ t"..now what do we do?" For startes, not wake the kids at that hour....

I called the Marin Humane Society emergency number...they came over at 5:45am...told us it was a Screech Owl...she tried to get him, and he said "nope, not gonna catch me"..and he jumped up on the flu door opening in the chimney and became unreachable.....

then, he jumped back down about 10mins. later, so back came the Marin Humane Society...we waited, waited, waited...no owl coming out....I was past time for kids to eat, get dressed and to school....so we had to leave the house with the little sucker back up in the chimney again...

I take both girls to school, and I call Anna to tell her I can't make the gym, due to my little "friend" in the house...LUCKY for me, Anna's neighbor works for WildCare, this great organization in San Rafael that helps animals ...so Anna and her neighbor Becky came over, and Becky tried to get the little owl out, but no luck....so she called her ofice and and they have an "extraction specialist" on their staff.....so she came up....and tried and tried and tried and tried for 2hrs. to get this little stubborn, naughty owl out of my fireplace....we had to dismantle the gas fireplace, take the doors off the fireplace, even had a person inside my fireplace up into the chimney trying to get this little 5 inch bird OUT!!!

here is Becky (in the blue shirt) and Jasmine...trying to get our little "friend" out.....

but Jasmine has been defeated by this 5 inch little creature.....he's not coming out.....

we blocked the entrance with a sheet taped to the outside of the fireplace, took the cap off the chimney, hoping maybe the owl would go out the top...so last night we all went to bed...Meigan passed out from pure exhaustion...and Catie was SO worrid about this owl getting out into the house....she finally fell asleep, then at 11:30pm, she was crying out LOUDLY in her bed...I ran into her room, and she was sobbing uncontrollably....I asked her what was wrong, and she said she was too scared to get up and go to the bathroom.....poor bean....so I took her in our room, and she fell asleep with us.....so much for getting a good nights sleep...

This morning, 7:25am, Brian gets up...and comes down into the living room, and all I hear is "oh no"...and I hear Catie come running up the hallway and she jumps on me in the bed and under the covers....I hear Brian chuckling to himself, and he says "hon, we've got a houseguest in the TV Room"....

and here it is.......

so, I called the Humane Society again, and our same wonderful person came back, and caught the little sucker, but not without a fight...he got out the net the first time, flew to the living room, then she got him again, then he escaped again in the kitchen...and finally she got him and put him in the box to keep him safe....he'd had no food or water for over 24hrs...poor little owl......

now, what did he do inside the house????? well, he knocked over picture frames, turned my walls sconces sideways, and turned pictures on the wall in my entry way sideways and upside down....he must have been flying the loop around my house...I'd have loved to see that! All things considered, it could have been much worse...he was really kind to us and didn't do that much damage.....

Then, it was all over and Winnie saves the day!!! here's our favorite Humane Society Emergency Rescue person...she came on Friday morning and tried to get him....and she came back this morning...Catie opened the door and yelled out "Hi Winnie, come quick the owl is in our house"...so cute!

she grabbed the fiesty owl with her hand after his 3rd escape attempt this morning.....then let the girls get right down next to her and see him upclose...they thought it was really cool.....though Catie was hesitant to get too close, Meigan ran right up front fast!

so, here we are at 10:00pm...the fireplace is put back together, picture frames righted, sconces fixed and kids asleep with no worries.....

and we're SOOOOOOOO tired!

The End of an Era...

Tonight we bade farewell to our beloved car...we loved our car, but it grew too small for us and 2 kids, and carpooling, swimteam, etc...nevermind when Nana and Grampa come, there's no room for them either.... we got this car before Catie turned 3....oh, so many memories in that car...so many tantrums, spills, goldfish dumps, laughs, roadtrips......but, it was time to say farewell to our lovely Lexus.....

AND HELLLLLOOOOOOOO TO OUR NEW 2007 NISSAN PATHFINDER!

this nice little gem is right up our alley! with a 3rd row seat, for Catie and her friends, and it folds down for extra storage.....

as you can tell from the next few pictures, the girls are VERY excited about the new car!

Catie tries out the side mirrors for blowing kisses......

Meigan has excellent form scaling the folded down 3rd seat to get into the 2nd row....

I think it's safe to say, these new wheels are a BIG hit with the girls!!

now, about that new car payment.......

How To Catch a Leprechaun...1st Grade Style.....

here it is...Catie's leprechaun trap!
what a FUN 1st grade project! I though I'd help her, but nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo....I got the "Mom, Daddy is an ENGINEER and he KNOWS how to do this...you don't!".....well, smack me in the face...geesh.......

so, on the weekend, Catie and her engineer Daddy got busy with this contraption! trapping the leprechaun with chocolate gold coins, with sticky tape! I say it's a winner!!!!

so much for my idea....I just make lunches, clean up messes, drive to school, art class, play dates, gymnastics and swimteam.....

How to play in the sandbox WITHOUT getting sand in your shoes....

I about fell off the bench today when I saw Meigan doing her new trick!
I told her to take off her shoes and go in the sandbox, and she said "no, I can do it this way, SEE"!

truthfully, I had the camera ready as I expected her to go head first into the sand, but nope, she held it together....she's quite the agile little monkey...she can balance, pull herself up on monkey bars, invert on the rings at gymnastics....she's too much!

Goggle Girl..........

80 degrees outside suddenly..................pool barely 60 degrees.....2 girls skinny dipping.......
2 frozen children.........

pneumonia.....

kidding.....I hope....

Ringing in Chinese New Year

Can anyone match the crocs and the kids?

These are a few fun pics that we took on Saturday night, celebrating the last night of the Chinese New Year celebration... We had Anna, Steven and Norah over for noodles (for the kids) and a fabulous london broil and salad for the grown ups...and that's it.....well, alright...I'll tell the truth...a few pomegranate martinis were consumed along with some really good wine...and the kids stayed up MUCH MUCH MUCH too late...but it was very fun! I bought a lot of poppers in Chinatown for the kids, and they had a blast throwing them on the ground and hearing them "pop" and stepping on them.."More Please"
Norah was having a very good time with the poppers.....
but all that celebrating tuckered out the girls...and they had some down time, watching Charlotte's Web...they all had their little stuffed pigs with them, and some popcorn and they got comfy in our bed....(and I was finding popcorn for days after under the covers).....

and then, things got "lively".....Meigan and Norah got their jammies on and got happy feet....Brian was playing some very old vinyl records and the girls were having a great time dancing around.....

Catie was making all of us menus for her restaurant called "Friends and Family" and taking our orders..writing down everything that we wanted...she's such a smart girl...reading and writing....then she decided that Steven needed some "doctoring"...and made him homemade casts....out of my nice chinese new year napkins and scotch tape...

and at last the party was over and it was time for all little girls to go to bed! shortly after this hug, Meigan went to bed and passed out!

It was quite a fun CNY party at the Van Weele house....next year we'll be hitting the big parade in San Francisco and splurging for the bleacher seats! Catie loves the parade, but this year, it was going to be too much for Meigan and Norah...lots of loud drums and firecrackers..

Happy Year of the Pig!!!

Meig's stylin' new flip flops....pretty cute, huh?

she picked these out at Target (fondly known to my girls are Tarjay).....Catie got lavendar ones... I have to admit, they are very cute...and even cuter on Meig's tiny little size 7 1/2 feet...