Civil War Days

On Sunday during Labor day weekend instead of battling our backyard after party mess we decided to go with my brother and his gf and my mom and dad to the Civil War days at a park in Huntington Beach.
We walked in and everyone was dressed in their garb of that era. There was a band playing

and watching the performance we saw Mr. President Lincoln! He gave Gabe and Parker a special penny after they took a photo with him.

There was all kinds of little boys running around with the guns and civil war hats so we bought Parker those too for the day.

We wanted to get a good spot to watch the battle but first not without looking around

We saw a bunch of little boys preparing for the battle...they told Parker to step in line!

Parker got to learn a lot of things from them such as loading his gun, and marching and about face plus tons of other things.

He was doing a really good job at paying attention.

After he was dismiss with the rest of the boys we walked to meet up with my family at the battlefield but took the scenic route.

Then Parker wanted to explore in the woods.

Ava loved trying to climb on the canons which were used in the battle.

we got some lemonade and roasted corn on the cob and went to sit down and the battle began.

It was really loud! They had the fife player and drummers marching through the battle....Imagine....being in a war and your the guy playing the drums....or fife

The southerners...They lost this battle

It was really amazing to watch

Lots of wounded and dead

More and more were defeated

After the battle was over there was a moment of silence while a trumpeter played TAPS in memorial to those that died. Afterwards the crowd bursted with a very generous round of applause for all the re en actors. It was quite the experience that we all felt privileged to watch. What a great time!

Ava's Dancey Dance Yo Gabba Gabba Party

Now most of you all know that Ava is the biggest Yo Gabba Gabba fan! We celebrated her birthday this year with a Yo Gabba Gabba Dancey Dance Party! It was kind of hard though cause she had fever the whole day on and off and was trying to have the best time she could but was really out of it at times. I think she still had a lot of fun!

For the goodie bags we had Dj lance boom boxes filled with fun treats and toys and yo gabba gabba stuff.

Ally and I made Muno pretzel sticks. I bagged them all up early sat morning.

We counted including children 65 guests..not too shabby! Not all at the same time.

We had some games such as The Party In my tummy game where all the kids would throw plastic foods into Brobees tummy and Pin the eyeball on MUNO.

We did cupcakes. I had a long table and had all the background scenes for each Gabba Land character and I was going to lay all the cupcakes out but due to all the flies that kept trying to attack the food I kept all the cupcakes inside the plastic containers.

These were a big hit at the party. My friend Adrian made these cupcakes for me. She is a amazing pastry chef. I let her decided on the flavors. She did pretty good considering she was not too familiar with who the characters were so as I am naming these of what she called them in parenthesis in Toodee ( blue fellow) was coconut cupcakes.

Muno (red creepy guy) was red Velvet and Foofa ( pink lady) was white cake with strawberry jam and strawberry frosting

Brobee ( green dude) was chocolate

and Plex ( Yellow Weirdo) was banana.

Ava wanted the Toodee one from the get go! She just could not wait till we passed them out/

All the kids seemed to be in paradise with all the toys we had out. The loved the roller coaster and the play house and the ride on vehicle.

Then Plex came to make a special visit

The kids faces really lit up. There were more kids I should have panned out more in the photo to get them all!!!

Plex got the Dancey dance party going!

Everyone was saying GO PLEX GO PLEX GO PLEX as he danced to 80's music

Ava's face was a riot...she did not know what to think about Plex..*click on photo to see pictures close up* aiden my cousin Amber's son LOVED Plex so much!

It was soo funny all the kids faces. This is Xander checking out Plex from a distance.

I think Aiden was Plex's biggest fan!

Aria and Maddie playing Party in the tummy!

We had so many friends come to the party it was great hanging out with everyone! I was trying to mingle and chat with everyone...I think I managed to talk to everyone a little bit.

Ava got lots of presents. We sat her in the shade to open them.

She got almost through all of them until she came over to me and laid down in my lap.

Guillermo and Alex

I think just about every child that left was either crying not to leave or begging to stay...must been a fun one!

It was finally cooling off and the sun was going down ...time for the strobe lights and fog machine! The kids were all trying to catch the fog in cups.

Since it was cooling down now Plex decided to come back for a bit and have a few more dances.

Ava got used to the whole Plex thing..She had a fever though in this picture. I gave her tylenol after.

The kids that remained into the later afternoon of the party got some good quality time with Plex.

I think Memo here had the best time out of all the kids at the party. he was a real party animal!

I finally got Parker to pose in a picture!

My friend Jesse was djing 80's stuff and electro stuff..towards later in the night we went on to lounge, soul,ska and 60's .

Pretty much everyone had left but a few of our friends and kids where we decided to hit the lights , turn up the music and break out the beers and wine.

We lit up the fire pit and the tiki torches around the yard.

We moved the characters to the dance floor and order pizza.

It was a great ending to the Gabba Party~

Just a bunch of friends hanging round the fire

Back to School

This past Wednesday Parker started school.
It must have been a little scary to go to a new school where he knows NO ONE.
At his other school he knew almost all the kids in school and his classmates were mates of his since kindergarten.

It is pretty wild that all these school years in Long Beach he had to wear a uniform...this new school district do not do uniforms.

Parker likes it though cause now he can dress with his own style!.

We put in a transfer form though for him to go to a different school then his home school.

we did it for a few reasons. First of all his class has 33 students...way more then his old class of 20. also the other school we want to take him to has a better reputation and higher grade scores.

So far he has really enjoyed school and has made some friends already.