Ready for church and Hana

 This little guy is always ready for everything.  Here he is all spruced up for church.  Joneaux is such a sweet, pleasant little fellow.  He hardly ever cries.  What a nice disposition and soooooooooo handsome.

                                      
 One afternoon we went to lunch at Hana's.  It is one of my favorite restaurants.  Amadeo knows this and so he surprised me by having us eat there.  Papa does not like sushi so he had a delicious bento box.
The miso soup, above, is always a great way to start the meal.

 We ate several different kinds of rolls.

 I love these shrimp rolled in kelp dried kelp sheets.

 I did not love the above shrimp.  Anna and Ama tricked me.  They ordered one especially for me to watch me eat it.  Unfortunately it is a raw shrimp.  At Hana's you have to eat the whole thing or pay extra and so they got a good laugh watching me try to swallow it down.  I also did not like the umi which is raw sea urchin.  Other than that, I really liked everything.  It was sooooo delicious.

Yum! Yum!

The Nutcracker, San Diego Zoo, and 333

 While visiting Anna, we got to go and see the Nutcracker performed by the New West Ballet Theatre.  I love the Nutcracker and love to go as many  Decembers as I can.  I remember many a performance and even being a performer in the Nutcracker when I was young.

 We went with one of Anna's friends and she also met a few friends there.

 Here we are in the lobby.  I couldn't get any pictures of the performance because no photos were allowed.

 Afterwards we were able to meet up with one of the main ballerinas, Ashley Luckow and her husband who just happen to live in Anna's ward.  Andrew played the role of Mr. Drosselmeyer.

 We had a very fun evening and we came home to Amadeo relaxing with Zoe "the firstborn" watching 3D TV.

 We also got to go to the San Diego Zoo.  What a huge wonderful zoo.  I remember going there years ago when I was only 11.  On my goodness. It is a totally different zoo today, of course.

 Joneaux loved all the animals and all the climbing.

This is the view from the sky tram.  It was such a pretty view.

 Riding the sabre toothed tiger.

 Joneaux was worn out after our zoo adventure and I must admit.. so was I.

That evening Anna and Amadeo treated us to a most wonderful dinner at 333 in Oceanside.  The food was sooooooooo delicious.  We started out with a yummy 3 tier dish filled with seafood goodies; shrimp, clams, oysters, and other things I don't even remember.  It was some of the best seafood I ever ate.  Then we all had a main course.  Of course we had little samples of each others food.  After that we were so full that we couldn't eat another bite.  What a wonderful day and evening!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

SeaLife and Thanksgiving

 One of our trips was to Southern California to visit Anna, Amadeo, and baby Joneaux.  Except, he's not a baby anymore.  He turned 2 while we were there.  We all had such a wonderful visit.  Joneaux is the most adorable little guy.  He's cute and nice and affectionate and also so smart.  He already knows all of his colors, can count to 16, knows his abc's and can sing lots of songs.  He loves to look at books and knows lots of the stories.  His favorite right now is a shark.  When we were in the little gift shop, he picked out a shark book and of course Grams had to get it for him. :)

 He's also very independent and had to go up some stairs onto this bridge and then slide down.  

 He did that lots and lots of times.  He had fun and we had fun watching him.

 He spent quite a bit of time building in the little lego part.

 For Thanksgiving we went to Amadeo's parents house.  They are always so welcoming and hospitable.

 The men gathered in the back yard to make two kinds of turkey.  Two were deep fried and one was cooked in the oven.  Everyone brought several dishes to share and sparkling cider.  

 We ate and talked and laughed and laughed and ate and talked some more.  The kids played and played and laughed and ran around.  A great time was had by all.

 After eating, the ladies looked at the sale ads while the kids colored, played games, and did Thanksgiving work sheets.

 Then some watched T.V. while others played Mexican Train.  A few even had a nice little siesta.  Later on in the day we gathered in the living room and each person got to share one of the things they were grateful for.  It was amazing to hear everyone and even the littlest ones had an opportunity to share. Of course a few tears were shed------------a wonderful ending to a great day.