Grandma's House

On Saturday we went to my grandma's house to help pack up items and get her dinning room set and china cabinet. My grandma moved to an assisted living community a few months ago, so we are sorting through the items still in her home. This is hard because she kept everything and there is a lot of emotions involved. We went through some of the items in her front room/dinning room, bedroom, and kitchen. I had fun finding items that brought back childhood memories and Rich had fun trying to sneak items into our take home pile. My grandma is a collector and a pack rat. She has more Franklin Mint coin collections than I can count. She also has figurines, stuffed animals, 8-tracks, Happy Meal toys, and the list goes on. She also has a lot of paintings and pictures of family. This is going to be a big job and I feel bad for my mom and uncle who have to do most of it.

I am happy to now have items in my home that belonged to my grandma and that we will be able to pass onto our children. I have added some pictures of the more memorable and interesting items we have. I have also added a picture of my grandma, Charlotte Oliveira, who I love very much.

Grandma and me Christmas of 2007.

Grandma's China Cabinet. Isn't it beautiful. I have always admired it.

Stained glass window my grandma made.

Some of Grandma's old purses and her beaded rose shoes I use to play dress up with.

Rich snuck home a giant fork and spoon. My grandparents got them in Hawaii. They will eventually hang in our kitchen. Rich was pretty excited about his prize and they remind him of the TV show "Everybody Loves Raymond."

Happy Birthday Mom!

Last Sunday we went to Rich's parents to celebrate his mom's birthday. It was a lot of fun. We got to spend time with some of our nieces and nephews and visit with Rich's grandpa. Luca also had a blast playing with all the kids. They love him and he loves them. Luca had so much fun that he was completely worn out the next day.

Stuffed Pork Tenderloin

Last Sunday Rich and I fed the missionaries. I have been wanting to try a recipe I found for a pork tenderloin, so we tried it out on them. The pork was stuffed with a basil pesto which was also spread on top and then covered with a bread crumb/Parmesan mix. I was a little nervous that the pork might not come out, so we also made spaghetti and meatballs as a backup. We were happy to find the pork was delicious and went well with the spaghetti. Luca also enjoyed both the pork and meatballs.If you look closely under my arm, you can see Luca staring at the pork hoping to get some. He was sad he had to wait the hour for the pork to cook, but was happy when his bowled was filled with pork and meatballs. He ate faster than anyone at the table.

Daffodil Hill

Last Saturday we went to Daffodil Hill in Volcano, Ca. This is something we have wanted to do for the past couple years, but it is only open for a few weeks each year and we always seem to miss it. This year we were determined to go and last week was our only opportunity. The daffodils and tulips were beautiful. There are over 300 varieties and over 300,000 bulbs throughout the grounds. We were amazed that there were so many varieties of daffodils and took pictures of our favorites. Next year in our backyard we plan to make our own miniature Daffodil Hill..

Turkey, Deer, Pheasant...Oh My!

Today Rich got home earlier than usual, so we took Luca on a long walk along the bike path. I decided to bring my camera to take some pictures of the reasons we love the path so much. We saw a lot of wildlife and had fun watching Luca track the scents through the fields. The only problem was when we got home we had to remove the weeds in Luca's fur and he did not like it. We found a lot of burrs stuck in his fur, so we decided we probably won't take him walking through the fields of weeds anymore.

On our walk we saw deer, turkey, woodpeckers, and many butterflies.

While Luca and Rich were walking through the tall weeds tracking a scent they scared a pheasant and it went flying. It was pretty neat to see and I barely got a picture. I was really far away, so the blown up picture is a little blurry.