First few photos are from our 4th of July celebration with friends. We started off going to the parade in Montecito, then for a picnic and later on that evening we hosted a gathering at our house before heading down to the beach to watch fireworks.
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| biking to the parade |
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| at the parade |
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| Mia from "Good Luck Charlie". She started in Kindergarten at the girls' school in September |
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| picnic at the park |
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| at the beach for fireworks |
So.......in July we had MANY visitors and it was really INCREDIBLE!!! First off, my Mom, my brother, Ewen, sister-in-law, Andrea, and their children, Keon, Ella and Norah came to visit. We met them in LA and went to Legoland. From there, Jaeda and Sienna went with them to Joshua Tree National Park and Patrick and I headed back to Santa Barbara to get ready for the big family reunion. We had the best time ever with them here. There is nothing like having the cousins together. Totally warms my heart.
Below are some photos that my Mom took when they went to Joshua Tree National Park. It was 110 degrees!!! Sounds like the hike ended up being a short one.
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| Keon and Sienna pledging to be Junior Park Rangers |
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| proudly wearing their badges |
We had about 3 days all together in Santa Barbara before the reunion.
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| celebrating Andrea's birthday Here are a few photos from Patrick and Ewen's bike ride up and down Gibraltar.   |
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| cousin sleepovers every night |
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| had to take them to McConnells for ice cream My cousins Carrie and Sarah helped me to organize the Eberhardt family reunion. It was SO nice to all get together!!! In total there were 28 of us. We made the most of every minute that we were together. There were some incredible memories made those 4 days, to never be forgotten (even for me with my poor memory). We just can't thank all of you enough for making the effort to come to Santa Barbara. It worked out great. We live a couple of blocks from 2 hotels, so everyone stayed at one of the hotels, except for my brother and his family, who stayed with us. It gave people the space to go off on their own for a bit but then also the proximity to our house, to use as the home base. Patrick and I rented tables, chairs and dishes and then hosted most of the meals at our house. |
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| Patrick testing out the margarita maker that I gave him last Christmas. He got really good at making them :) |
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| we had a taco truck one night |
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Fortunately, we have a very active family!!
Here is what I wrote on Facebook about the photo of the herons below, "as many of you know, I rarely post anything on Facebook, however last night something incredible happened. We are hosting a 4 day Eberhardt family reunion (my Dad's side). There are 28 of us in total in Santa Barbara together. Last night after dinner we were sitting on our back patio at our house and 5 herons flew over. This is beyond significant for our family because July 9th was the anniversary of my Dad dying, he has 5 siblings, and the blue heron has always been a sign for all of us that my Dad is close by. This all started the day we had a gathering at my parents' home in Canada after he died in 2010. A few of his close friends and his whole family were gathered in a circle and we were all sharing stories about him. During that time a blue heron flew over us and landed on the roof of his greenhouse. The heron sat there watching and listening. Since that day, many of us have continued to have similar experiences. Patrick and I have lived in Santa Barbara for 2 years and have never once seen a heron and then last night out of all nights, there are 5 and they just happen to fly over our house with his family here. Comfort and deep sadness all wrapped up in one".
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| Mom treated everyone to a catered dinner at our house the one night |
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| My Dad's brother and 3 of his sisters (we missed you Aunt Barb) |
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| first and second cousins (we missed you Lauren and Matt) |
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| pool at one of the hotels |
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| our kitchen got some good use out of it |
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| Uncle Mike and Ewen going through the scrapbooks that I made the girls about my Dad |
All 28 of us went on a hike. One person we came across kept saying "and there are more of you?" every time one of us passed her.
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| at the top |
We all also went down to the Santa Barbara Sailing Center, where we went kayaking and paddle boarding.
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| yummy Backyard Bowls (I think cousin Adrienne might come back to SB just for that) |
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| down to the last 2 family members on the Sunday night...so nice to have dinner with Aunt Sue and Uncle Chuck at The Boathouse at Hendry's Beach |
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| Arts at Laguna camp |
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| Philip and Erin came to watch the girls' end of week performance at Laguna |
Another really good friend (I know....I am sure you are saying "how can she have that many REALLY good friends?" but honestly I really do. I am so lucky. Now I just need to get all of these really good friends to move here :). Anyways, Kristen and I became friends when we did the MSW program at Laurier. Kristen and Doug and their 2 kids came to stay with us for a couple of nights and we had a blast.
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| the guys did a big bike ride (Patrick is still so impressed that Doug did it without bike shoes) |
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| Shoreline Cafe where you can eat at the table outside with your bare feet in the sand (love) |
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| Nora, Jaeda, Sienna and Angus |
Some friends from the girls' school invited us to their place in Lake Tahoe. We flew to Reno and then drove to their place. What a magical place. We loved it. It is soooo beautiful. It is the largest alpine lake in North America and the 2nd deepest lake in the U.S. at 1,645 feet deep.
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| crystal clear water |
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| Jaeda at volleyball camp |
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| Sienna at tennis camp |
Wow....July was one busy month. August was a little more low key. The first few photos are from the girls at a camp called "Girls Rock" where they got to play musical instruments and sing all week, before performing in a band at the Friday performance.
Summer Fiesta
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| the Fiesta Fair |
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| cracking the confetti eggs on each other |
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| watching the parade |
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| watching the Fiesta dancers |
Off to go blueberry picking with some friends. We then went and had lunch at the Firestone Brewery, which was really neat.
For Patrick's 40th birthday, he decided that he didn't want a party or to go away on a trip. He just wanted to ride his bike from San Francisco to Santa Barbara. He had been talking about it for about 8 months and in that time, some people decided to join him. For a variety of reasons, everyone dropped out except for our friend Mike from Waterloo. About a week before they were to depart, they decided to not do the one big long ride but instead to do daily long rides from our house. They had an amazing time!!! Thank you soooooo much Mike for being here to celebrate P's birthday!
Mike's wife (and our darling and wonderful friend Wendy) and their 2 kids came at the end of the biking week, which was lots of fun.
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| the rattle snake that we saw just as we were finishing our hike....there was maybe a little bit of screaming and running that may have happened :) |
In mid August, we tried to fly to Illinois to be with my cousins, my Mom and my Aunt for the celebration of my Aunt Janet's life. Sadly, she passed away rather quickly after being diagnosed with cancer in January.
Unfortunately, we didn't make it to the service. The girls and I left the house at 4:30am and got to LAX to take our flight that was booked for 7:30am. We got on the plane and they said there was a mechanical issue, so they had a mechanic look at it. To make a VERY long story not so long, basically the back door fell off of the plane and then the inflatable slide inflated and knocked a bit of the wing off. It was interesting because no one was upset or panicked at all. Everyone just kept saying that it was just good to know that there mechanical warning signs exist. Anyways, that didn't seem stressful at all, compared to the rest of the day. They told us to wait in the waiting area because they were going to try to get us another plane. After about an hour or so, they told people to go to customer service because they weren't able to find another plane. We waited in line from 9:30am-3:00pm that day (each person took about 30-45 minutes at the counter and there was only one person working until 2:45). It was horrendous!!! Thankfully the girls were absolute angels. By the time we got to the front of the line, they said they could get us to St. Louis airport (where my Mom was supposed to be picking us up) the next afternoon. Obviously that wasn't going to work because by 3:00pm, the gathering at my Aunt's place was almost over. It was sooooooo disappointing. So in the end....we ended up flying straight to Toronto on a night flight, which didn't leave until 10:00pm that night.
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| the line |
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| waiting for our flight |
We ended up being in Ontario for about 10 days. As always, it just wasn't enough time to see everyone that we would have liked to, but as I have said many times......the best way to see us is to come visit us in Santa Barbara. That way we don't have to share our time with anyone but you :)
One of the first things we did when we arrived in Stratford, is we went to The Gentle Rain (my parents' business for over 30 years). I took some photos of the memory photo wall at the store. It is always such a mixture of pain and comfort when I am anywhere that was such an important and big part of his life.
We stayed at the farm with my Mom first. One of the girls' favorite things to do there is play the piano.
Nana treated us to the "Alice Through the Looking Glass" performance at the Avon Theatre in Stratford.
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| fun at my favorite park when I was a kid |
From the farm, we went to London to spend time with Patrick's parents, sister, brother-in-law and their kiddies. One of our first things that we all did together was go to the Clovermead Apiaries. It was a day filled with loads of fun. Those cousins sure know how to have a lot of fun together.
We then headed to Waterloo for a few days and got to connect with some of our friends.
A visit to the bench that many of our wonderful friends (from our old neighborhood) gave us after my Dad died. The thoughtfulness still completely warms my heart.
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The girls have really gotten into baking. Patrick and I are now crossing our fingers that they REALLY get into cooking :)
Every class has a back to school party outside of school hours that the class parent usually hosts. For the second year in a row, it has been at the Hope Ranch Beach.
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| Jaeda doing her back to school shopping |
The few photos before are from a dinner party that we paid to attend, as part of raising money for the school auction. It was absolutely beautiful.
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| gift bags at the end This year the school organized a back to school party for the entire school at Padaro Lane Beach.  |
First Day of School
Jaeda's special friend who had been gone for 6 months in South Africa (they were excited to learn that they were in the same class).
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| Jaeda's classroom (there are two 5th grade classes with 16 kids in each) |
Sienna's special friend
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| Sienna's classroom (19 children with 2 teachers) |
This year I was asked again to help with the Crane School Fair. Last year, I said "no because we will have just moved". I didn't really have an excuse this year. Below is a photo of the girls helping me count the tickets used to purchase food and activities. It took me/us about 8 hours.
After Adderley (the girls' drama class) one evening, we came back to the house. Jaeda's 2 friends were standing in the front hallway and one of the girls said "I didn't know that you had a cat that looks like a bobcat". We all looked around and sure enough there was a bobcat. When he heard us, he/she sprinted across the lawn and leapt into the tree.
Each summer the school (teachers and students) are given a reading challenge. If you read more than 5000 pages you get to check out as many books as you want at a time, throughout the school year. If you read over 10,000, you get to go for lunch with the Headmaster. Jaeda read the second most in the school at just over 20,000 and Sienna read 12,000. These girls were on a mission this summer to read enough pages, so that they could have lunch at Via Vai with Mr. Weiss. Here are some photos of the presentation.
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these are kids from the lower school (K through 5th) that went to lunch with Mr. Weiss (the headmaster)
Below is a photo of the tile that we sponsored at the girls' school in England, as part of Upton's fundraising campaign for the Arts Block. Upton will forever have a very special place in our hearts and our memories. |
As you know, September is always a busy month for us because of the girls' birthdays. Fortunately and thankfully, my Mom comes every year for their birthdays. The girls are able to have a party every other year. This was the non-party year (yay for me) :)
This year the girls chose to go to Universal Studios for their celebration, so we did the special passes which allowed us to go to the front of the line on all of the rides and we had a guide that took us through the different movie sets. I know you will find this shocking but I actually forgot my camera. You are probably thankful, since you then only have to look at one photo from our day, as opposed to 20 :)
Below is a photo from the celebration of Sienna's birthday in her class (we brought in fruit and mini lemon muffins)
For Sienna's birthday, she chose to go to Mollie's for dinner (her favorite restaurant). After dinner, we went home to open gifts and eat cake (as you can see she changed into her SONOS pjs).
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| art set from Grandma and Grandpa |
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| her new slack line from her Nana |
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| Sienna being sung happy birthday to at school morning assembly |
Below are photos from the celebration of Jaeda's birthday and 3 of her classmates' birthdays. In 4th grade and up, the classes celebrate birthdays of the month together just once a month. Each parent then contributes to the special treat (ice cream sundaes this year).
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| Jaeda getting sung to at school assembly |
Jaeda chose San Ysidro Ranch for her birthday dinner. We ended up going out on the night before her birthday because she had basketball on her birthday.
On the actual day of her birthday, we did gifts and cake after her basketball practice.
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| converse from Grandma and Grandpa |
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| Logo game from Nana |
It is a school tradition to have the birthday students have their photo taken with the cake hat on next to the coyote.
At the end of September, I ran my first 10km race.
Jaeda decided to play club basketball this year. She practices twice a week and then we travel to tournaments one weekend a month. They are called the Dream Chasers.
Field trip to the landfill. This man was talking about how they use falcons to control seagulls at the landfill. It was very interesting. He said that they also use them at the local hospital and 2 of the resorts in Santa Barbara.
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| Hershey loves his bully sticks Butterfly exhibit at the Natural History Museum  Jaeda and her friend counting pennies on this restaurant in the Funk Zone for math class |
October 2014......so at the beginning of September, I told lots of people how nice it was to be in our 3rd year at the school. I said that besides working on the school fair, that things just seemed really calm and easy. Well that all got blown out of the water in the third week of September. Sienna's classroom teacher and the Deputy Head (Vice-Principal), came to me and said that after 11 days of school, they felt that she should be moved up to the 3rd Grade. We had numerous lengthy conversations with the school and with each other about what to do. The school felt like because of her level of focus, where she was at academically, her height and her maturity, that 3rd Grade would be a better fit (by the way 3rd Grade is the grade she would have been in, if we had been still living in Canada or the UK). Anyways, we struggled and struggled but in the end decided to move her. She is still struggling with how to have her special friend in 2nd Grade and to have her new friends in 3rd Grade but overall, it was the best thing for her. It is like she grew up and matured a whole year, just within a week or so. She is very happy and I think she likes not being the tallest (she is the 3rd tallest in the class). I think it is still much harder on me than her. I loved the kids and the parents in the 2nd Grade and we had really all bonded as a class (for the most part), since we had all been together since Kindergarten. Fortunately, it is a small school and a small community, so we will still all see each other.
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| Sienna's new class |
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| Jaeda's class....so many white Crane sport uniforms because they didn't know they were getting their class photo taken and they had team sports after school |
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| bball debrief from Coach after the game |
Each year, Crane has a Music Hour (which is more like 3 hours), where children can sign up to perform (playing an instrument, dancing, singing, do a comedy skit). This year, Jaeda and 3 of her friends sang/danced to "I Knew You Were Trouble" by Taylor Swift. Sienna and her friend sang "This Little Light of Mine" with a bit of a funky twist.
UCSB has amazing speakers and performers that they bring in throughout the year. In October we got to see and hear the author, Michael Lewis. We also got to meet Magic Johnson before he did a talk at the Arlington Theatre. Both were very interesting, motivational and inspiring speakers. Patrick was super excited to meet Magic.
Some friends and I went to see Lorde perform at the Santa Barbara Bowl.
We went to Las Vegas to celebrate our friend Adam's 40th birthday. Adam was one of Patrick's first friends when he started at RIM. When we got to Vegas (an hour flight from LA), we went to see the Cirque de Soleil "Beatles" show. It was really good.
We met up with the crew for dinner and drinks after the show at the Cosmopolitan Hotel.
The big night out was on Saturday. We had dinner at STK and then went to the Marquee Club.
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| Jaeda's presentation about National Parks |
As I mentioned before, I co-chaired the Crane Fair with 2 other women/friends. It was a HUGE job. We worked on it for about 8 months. I don't think it would take that long or be as much work if we did it again. It was just all brand new to the 3 of us and unfortunately, we didn't have a lot of information from the previous years.
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| end of the day |
The school has a Halloween parade for the lower school (K through 5th). Each child has to introduce them self and say what they are dressed up as.
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| as you can see Sienna is still one of the tallest |
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| Jaeda's class |
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| Sienna's class |
After the school festivities were done, we went to Coast Village Road which during Halloween is called Ghost Village Road. All the stores area decorated and they hand out candy.
That night one of the family's from Sienna's class had a HUGE Halloween party for families. There were about 300 people there. Patrick and I caved and actually dressed up for once.
Sienna's first trip with her new class....The Natural History Museum to learn about the Chumash Native Americans.
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| Jaeda had a play date at a classmate's house (who happened to move here from Quebec) |
We will miss being with our families this Christmas and it will be the first time in our lives that we won't be with them for the holidays. Fortunately, we just saw my Mom in New Mexico 2 weeks ago and Patrick's parents are coming to visit in January.
