Hola and here are the other ones that have been piling up.
Here she is showing me how dirty she is from playing on the garage floor. Moments later she licked her hand. A real moment for me.
Fat lip girl. Home improvement girl.
Don’t know who that on is…
…and the fires that have since been extinguished in our neck of the woods.
Here’s a picture of our Little Red Riding Hood. Pam ordered a wig and made a nice Grandma costume for herself and splurged on a nice plastic wolf nose and ears for me. It’s no surprise that we took 1st place at the Calabasas Ward Halloween Party for best costumes…..personally I don’t think we won because of me.
Things appeared to have died down a bit up near Santa Paula and Ventura however there is still a very thick layer of smoke. Here in Calabasas, at work, I can look out the window and see ashes falling, almost like a very light snow. On the news they are reporting that the Simi Valley fire, the one we are most interestd in, is just 5% containted at this point and they still have much of the 118 closed. I know that the Santa Susanna pass is closed as well as up near Porter Ranch (the nearest Wal Mart). Hopefully we won’t have any more excitment up our way.
Here’s how we look from outer space. Santa Paula/Camarillo/Simi fire is the smaller fire to the top left while the larger center one is the one making all the news in San Bernadino.
As I made my last entry I was watching the fire move accross the mountain range that seperates us from Camarillo. It was pretty intense and as the wind picked up and shifted, it headed down the mountain until there was so much smoke we couldn’t see it anymore.
I was curious how close it was getting as we could see big billowing plums at what looked like right accross the street. So we headed out in the car to see where it was coming from. We are a little less than a mile from the freeway 126. We hopped on the freeway and were amazed that the fire was at the freeway already and HUGE. I have never seen anything like it. The air is so bad with ash falling and smoke that we decided to take off. We gathered a few things and are chilling in Calabasas for the day. Hopefully it will be contained today before it takes any buildings or homes. It was really close to some though and it is worrisome. There are not enough firecrews available and I hear they are unable to use air help because of the winds and smoke. These things can’t be fought with hoses. They are just too big. Over 200 homes in other fires in SO CAL are already burned. Oh yeah… 8 homes burned from the Moorepark fire I saw last night, and the whole area is shut down. As I am listening to the news right now they are close to shuting down our freeway (126). We should have brought clothes with us.
I’m still not able to post pictures. What is up with Xanga?
Last night I attended Dave Haraguchi’s baptism in the Calabasas Ward. On my way in I took the 118 freeway through Simi Valley. In the distance I could see a fire burning. It was generating a lot of smoke and ash was falling even as far as Simi. I decided to take the same way back since it would be a little quicker than the 101. As I came over the rise into Simi the sky was absolutely breathtaking. All the smoke made an incredible sunset. Some other motorists thought so too and instead of paying attention to the road, slammed into each other and the median. I think 3 or 4 cars were involved. Not me luckily though. Then as I approached the last exit for Simi traffic came to a screeching halt and there we sat. As we inched closer to the Madera Exit I could see the problem and then I got the report from the radio as well. Moorpark was engulfed. Apparently the fire that was burning way off in the distance made it’s way very fast to Moorpark and Simi and from the smoke I see in the sky this morning all the way in Santa Paula it is still burning. As darkness fell the flames became much more visible. INCREDIBLE. Helicopters all over the place. People were stopped all along the freeway and standing on bridges watching it burn. It took me 3 hours to get home because the 118 and the 23 were shut down and the street that were open were jammed with people. We survived but Serra’s little diaper didn’t . She promptly leaked all over her father as we walked in the door.
The sunrise is amazing this morning.
After much greif we still have the Camry. It is a long story and not really worth telling except that TO Toyota is full of incompetent people that have no idea what they are doing.
FIRST SENTENCE: Where did IT go? And soon to follow was: I don’t know! along with the appropriate shoulder shrugs. I also think that she may be an early potty trainer as she comes to me and grabs her bootie and asks me in baby code to change her soiled britches. She eats with a spoon or fork now. Not super well, but well enough. She loves to throw things away in the garbage and will do that little errand eagerly. She also likes to carry items for me.
Most of the Halloween costume items came yesterday and I still need to do some sewing, but that will get done today and tomorrow.
Yesterday Mom graciously took me to Costco and we hit some other grocery stores as well. We now have a microwave. It is interesting to live without one for a few weeks. Jared would not survive methinks. NO Microwave Popcorn.
I mentioned the other day how dirty Serra~V~ got playing in the garage. Here is one of her showing me how dirty her hands were. She kept licking them to clean them. The fat lip doesn’t show too well on the picture but it is the best we got. Serra~V~ also enjoys getting tools out of the tool box and “fixing” things. We caught her in the act. The other one, we are not sure who it is of.
xanga not cooperating. pictures later
First the grocery stores and now public transportation. What is it with super low skilled people and sense on entitlement. Most of the picketers stand out there and get drunk all day, and some have been known to harass shoppers. Most seem intimidated by them. I have been past them a few times without incident and enjoy the quiet no line atmosphere inside. I hear are some deals to be had this week as the stores are trying to entice people in. Maybe we’ll take a walk today.
Brian took my car today as the Saturn seems to be having some overheating problem. It may be the radiator. We will deal with it, but for right now, I am thankful to have a spare vehicle and no where to go today.
I think I may finish unpacking boxes today. We still need to put in extra shelves in the closets but I can still sort of organize things until Brian gets to that. The projects that still remain are the kitchen and bathroom floors and said closets. Then sometime in a few weeks I think I will tackle the patio area. We will post pictures in a while when we get around to it.
Serra does really good on the stairs like I said before but had a little mishap last night. She misstepped and planted her face on a bar of the banister cutting into her top and bottom lips. She looks like she had collagen injections. So much for a perfect face for Halloween pictures. We have been anxiously waiting for the last bruises to fade. Poor Boogus.
Brian didn’t mention in his last entry that it only took Serra 3 days before she was taking the stairs with no hands. It makes me very nervous especially when she decides to carry things. Yesterday I was doing a lot of things in the garage and she was out there busy as can be. She got so filthy I couldn’t even let her touch anything when she got in the house. Straight to the tub for her. She seems to be adjusting although she still hasn’t spent an entire night in her own bed. Of course, we are indulging her a bit because of all the upheaval in her life.
She has started trying to say words and imitate more. She babbles constantly, but also has versions of MILK, PRETTY, BABY, NIGHT NIGHT, PEEK-A-BOO, BELLY. The funniest is when she sees us get in the shower or change clothes and points at the appropriate area and says BELLY. She uses a lot of hand motions and showing to get her point accross. She follows direction really well. Go put this in that box , or go put this in the garbage, and off she goes.
OUR WARD. It is a very small ward and apparently doesn’t see much turnover. When we were introduced in Sunday School, we got applauded and hurrayed. The first lady that asked us if we were visiting or new freaked out when I said “new”. She said, ” Really! No one ever says that!” So needless to say we recieved a warm welcome. The teachers were awesome as well. I was actually taking notes in Sunday School and have some great FHE ideas if anyone is interested. The bishopbric is brand new and ourm bishop is Japanese.
Well, back to moving in. Still working hard at it. The garage is now cleared enough for 1 car. I can get to the laundry and it only took me 2 full days to paint the shelves.
Well it’s hard to believe that we have already been here two nights. It seems that each room is in a state of disrepair and full of bins waiting to be gone throuigh however we are as happy as clams being in our own place. Much thanks are deserved and will be given to Mom and Pop C for boarding our family for the last 10 months. I think we owe them a small fortune to recompense the items damaged by our little hooligan. Speaking of hooligan, she has seemed to adjusted well to her new surroundings She misses seeing her Uncles and all the love they gave her. She’s filling their void with running up and down the stairs and helping us do our little jobs around the house. Here’s the little tyke, bruised cheek and all.
Today she was fussy for most of the afternoon as she didn’t want to take a nap do to everything that was going on. She had finally had enough and climbed on the couch, covering herself with pillows, and announced “night, night”. It was seconds later that she was out like a light. Here’s the proof.
You’ll notice that it looks like she’s upside down…a credit to her dad’s photography skill and inability to flip it with the Kodak software.
As for the house, it’s coming along fine. We’ve made big strides and it’s amazing looking at some of the before and after pictures that we have. Many thanks are due to my brother Eric and my old man Dwaine for coming down and helping us out. Not to be forgotten, Serra came down from Logan and spent many hours here helping Pam paint and clean. Thank you so much! Here are some construction pics for all those that wonder what it is we are doing. This is the before picture of our living room area.
And after…
Notice the pergo, carpet, wall paint, trim around the door, and banister paint. Not pictured are the new door handles, locks, doorbell, pergo stairs to the garage, and fresh new power and cable outlet boxes/covers.
The next shot is from our upstairs landing to the kitchen and eating area.
The biggest changes are the pergo, new white paint, new ceiling fan, and not pictured are new kitchen wood blinds, screens, water line to the fridge for the icemaker, baseboards, and electrical outlets near the sink (complete with GFI safety). We plan on carrying the pergo through the kitchen but I hit a snag when I realized I needed to pull the existing floor instead of just laying the pergo over it. I’ll need to get a scraper to peel that stuff up….likely a next weekend job.
Today I woke up at 8:30 and went to work caulking and preping our new cabinets for paint. Here they are in all their glory. Pam has the first coat of primer on there now and will finish painting them monday. Power is wired to the four middle cabinets adjacent to the TV area for the home entertainment system. If you look carefully in the top left corner you’ll see some wires coming out. I plan on wiring some indirect lighting along the top five shelves that will be controlled from a switch on the wall (thanks Dwaine). Should be FANCY!
After the caulking was finished I was also able to remove the old vanity top from the upstairs bathroom and install the new cultured marble top. Along with that was a new faucet, valves, feed lines, drain, and trap. I was also able to install the medicine cabinets that Pam and Serra had reconditioned as well as grout the tile. Both Pam and I are bushed. There is still the matter of baseboards, towell rack, mirror trim, and cabinets above the toilet to install to be completely finished with that bathroom. We’ll take some more pictures as it gets closer to completion.
I also wanted to include a picture of Serra’s new pet….
It’s a perferctly preserved bat carcas that Aunt Serra found while cleaning out the fan above the range. Pam returned it to it’s natural habitat on our front porch. The fur is still rather plush and it’s really the ideal pet as there is very little maintenance, low food bill, and it never needs vet visits. I’m trying to get Pam to make a little pouch for Serra V so she can carry her friend everywhere she goes…..no luck so far.
