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Independence day! 3 day weekend! This year  the holiday fell on a Saturday, so we all had Friday off. It is so much nicer to have Friday off instead of Monday: you enjoy it so much more as it comes at the end of the work week. In Tizi’s case, it was also the end of her class and the beginning of her summer break (1 week). So, party on! Well, at least party as parents of a 19 months old can.

The weather has been beautiful and warm, and on Saturday, after our traditional “sleep catch up ritual”, we went to Torrey Pines State Natural Reserve: it is a beautiful collection of mostly short hikes overlooking the ocean in La Jolla. We explored the visitor center first, where we could see many stuffed animals. Keegan was particularly fascinated by a giant crab. Then we headed down a pretty easy trail, and Keegan wanted to walk almost the whole way down. A born hiker! Matt was very proud.

Of course on the way back uphill, he did not mind to get a ride on the backpack, but who can blame him?

Lost in meaningful thoughts while staring at the Ocean

Keegan even got to see a real train in the distance, the Coaster, and it has been repeating “choo-choo” since then. It is amazing how he hears trains even far in the distance now.

In the evening, once Keegan  went to bed, Tizi and Matt had a nice romantic evening and dusted off the projector to see Benjamin Button. We forgot how nice it is to see movies on a “big scream”…which of course reminded us that maybe we should hang the real screen we bought months ago…but this is another story.

On Saturday, 4th of July, we decided to avoid the crowds and we kicked back at home. Plenty to do here. Keegan discovered the flashlight, and had a blast projecting light everywhere, on the ouch, himself, the ceiling, and trying to chase it around.

He is now getting more and more excited about the computer. He is dragging the chair over from the kitchen, so he can reach it, and loves to play with the mouse. He has actually already mastered the click and drag, and the double clicking. This can actually be dangerous: on Saturday, as he was playing around and practicing his mouse skills, he managed to dial ALL my Skype contacts. Fortunately, since most of them are in Italy, only one of them was actually connected at the time, so I have found myself in an unexpected Skype conversation.We have all heard of Drunk Calling: I guess we could call this Kid Calling. Accident or not, it was nice to chat and catch up.

yes, he is right handed and yes he is using a MAC

In the afternoon, we filled the baby pool and the water table and splashed around. Then we set up the grill for some yummy dinner. The stores are obviously open to my surprise, so we were able to get some fresh meat…but we forgot the propane. So we ended p using the camping grill…oh well, everything still tasted delicious.

4th of July’s spread!

Of course Keegan did not even want to try the burger or salad, and was quite happy with his rice and pasta. He was definitely more enthralled with the holiday spinner than the food. And he did enjoy the dining “al fresco”. He can now say “pap-pa” together with the food sign when he is hungry. And he can definitely distinguish between papa’ and pappa, and he pronounces them correctly.

We put him to bed at 8pm: we have tried to see if moving his bedtime of half an hour would give us half an hour more sleep in the morning. After trying for a full week, I can say the experiment failed. He still wakes up at 5.30, regardless. Even when he wakes up super early, around 4.30, and we got him to go back to sleep, 5.30 is still his wake up call. We even thought we may have forgotten an alarm set in his room…no,this is just our little cricket. So, we will move his bedtime back to 7.30, so he can get more sleep, and we have a little more time for ourselves.

No fireworks this year: the trees are blocking the Seaworld’s show, but we could hear it. This was not too big of a deal: we will go see them next year. Besides, Tizi started feeling pretty sick, so she went to bed early anyway.

Sunday was another fun day: we went to Balboa Park to check out the Koi fish, the Green house and play in the grass.And more fun and games back home.

It turns out Tizi had a bad flu coming: fever arrived on Sunday and she did not really feel any better till Thursday. We are talking about sore throat, fever, achiness, headache…the whole deal. Nice way to spend a week off! Of course, she was not able to tackle half of the items in her to do list, but at least now she had something to blame. And, no it was just a nasty, regular flue, and not swine flue: after spending all morning at the UCSD urgent care center, and getting two huge swabs shoved up my nostril till i cough and my eyes teared up, (I am for the brain the nurse said, jokingly?) she know that for a fact. So, what was the doctor’s advice? Ride it out, and take three prescription-strength ibuprofen a day for the pain. Well, now that it is time to go back to work, I feel good again. I guess it was better I did not have to drag myself  to work, but still…

Anyway, we still managed to have a great holiday weekend and we were grateful for the extra day we got to spend together.

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