Defensive Rookie MVP

We were invited to our very first Sports Awards event at KHA. In previous years, the girls never participated on any sports teams so there was no reason to attend.... Until this year!

Each team was recognized by their respective coach and trophies are given to significant players in Basketball, Volleyball, Softball and Soccer.

The KHA Girls Basketball Team

You know Emily played on the girls basketball team this year for the very very first time.. playing any sport actually! She did well and learned a lot as the games progressed. Little did I know that she did much better than I thought she did. I mean she was a newbie.. very green you know? The majority of the players were on their 2nd year of playing and had some kind of athletic ability. But I underestimated my daughter.

Coach Anderson describign to us how Emily plays on the court

She received the trophy for Defensive Rookie MVP of the year in Girls Basketball! Matthew and I were so surprised and proud of her accomplishment. Coach Anderson said that he was amazed by her determineness and tenacity in her defensive ability in the game. We thank her coaches, Ralph Anderson and Scott Wong for instructing and teaching her the game of basketball.  Ralph says she gets it from her father! Matthew is vicariously celebrating the trophy win through Emily!

Emily with Coach Anderson and Coach Wong

I have to thank Scott (Coach Wong) also because I think Emily learned the most from his advise. He coached the girls through the Prince of Peace Tournament (when Coach Anderson was not available) and they came in 3nd place! Scott tends to instruct the girls throughout the game shouting instructions and directions to them at all times. Emily said she liked being told specifically what to do especially for someone who has not played the game before. He gave them strategies to use and plays to play.

An all in all great coach.. and the apple does not fall far from the tree... His daughter, 8th grader Courtney, received the Athlete Scholar of the Year trophy (an outstanding athlete in 2 or more sports and maintaining a 3.5 or above GPA in 8th grade) along with a trophy from 3 out of 4 the sports she played. So proud of her!

The 8th grade trophies for Athlete of the Year (boy, Zane and girl, Claudia (right)) and
Athlete Scholar of the Year,  Courtney (far left)

Emily's trophy and my thank you flowers.. for helping to raise over $15,000 for the PE/Athletic Dept. It was a great evening!

Play It Again

The school year is ending and the Band Awards are here!

It's an accumulation of all the hard work these kids go through .. practice three times a week at 7:25am for the whole school year.. at least it's that early for the Advance band.

Emily with Band Director, Mr Tony Bolivar

This is Emily's fourth year playing the clarinet, the only clarinetist in the Advance Band and the only 7th grader in band.

Concert & Advance bands combined

This was my second year in being a Band Mom along with the incredible Norma Ibaceta.

Creatures at 5

 The Sulfur Creek Nature Center in Hayward has been a "family' birthday center.

Celebrating Emily's 3rd Birthday (only one grandchild at the time) for Matthew's parents

Celebrating Hannah's 4th birthday with Emily and cousin, Marissa

She loved the chinchilla

Celebrating Marissa's 3rd birthday with the tarantula

So now it's my nephew's turn.. celebrating his 5th birthday at Sulfur Creek Nature Center.

Four grandchildren now.. time flies.. families grow..

Timothy had four animals to touch... although he was too nervous to touch them himself. His sister on the other hand was not!

The tortoise

The snake

The tarantula

He touched this one.. or actually  it touched him.

And the ever popular chinchilla,, yep same one as in Hannah's birthday party six years ago

Yay... he touched this one too!

Happy Birthday Lok-Wing!!

The happy family: Marissa, Kenny, Matthea and Timothy

The Capital (4 of 4)

As we headed to the Capital, we stopped off at the Vietnam Memorial. This circular-designed memorial has full relief bronze sculptures depicting scenes from daily life during the war.  The 5,822 names of our State's dead and missing are engraved into 22 shiny black granite panels.

The Firefighters Memorial is a tribute to over 1,000 firefighters who have died in the line of duty since we became a state in 1850.

Our state capital, where our government leaders work and laws are passed.

The state seal is very interesting. Do you know what each piece signifies?

The seal features:
- the Roman goddess Minerva (Athena in Greek) the goddess of wisdom and war; she was known to be conceived to be an adult and did not go through childhood; like our State we did not go through the growing pains to be an official State; it was like we skipped childhood and became a state much faster then the other states;
- the state grizzly bear (state animal) feeding on grape vines representing our wine production;
- a sheaf of grain representing agriculture;
- a miner representing the Gold Rush and the mining industry;
- sailing ships representing our economic power.
- "Eureka" means "I have found it!" is our state motto.

The Senate Chambers

The decor on the ceiling were painted by famous artists but they were not able to 'sign' their work so instead they created an 'oddity' that would stand out from the rest.

Can you find the 'oddity'?

The Assembly Chambers

The art decor behind our tour guide has a discrepancy also.

Do you see it? I was the first one to find it in our group!

This great grizzly below is from former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.

He saw it at a ski lodge and bought it on the spot to have in his office. It's named "Mike".

The 4th grade class with Mrs. Hinton and our tour guide from PACE travel, Mr. Rob.

I have to comment on our tour guide, Mr. Rob. He is from PACE Travel which specializes in custom student group travel with a Christian slant. This is what I wrote to PACE Travel, "He was extremely attentive to the kids and parents making sure we were traveling well and accommodated our suggested requests such as to move the visit to Capitol to the end of the day instead of in the morning so we wouldn't have to rush through the Capital to get to our next destination.  He made a point of remembering each of the students' names and took an opportunity to get to know each of us parents individually. He had a great rapport with the kids giving them sticker rewards as he reviewed what they had just learned from place to place. He was also extremely knowledgeable of all the places that we visited. He had many stories and factual information about each destination. He was prompt, never kept us waiting and the bus was always ready for us to board once we were done with one location. Lastly, you can tell he loved the Lord and wanted the kids to see God in everything whether it was to point out how God and His Word relates to all that we heard and saw or pointing out a character in a painting in a museum who had followed God's teachings or when he was praying for safe travels whenever we headed to another location."

I have never traveled with a tour guide (and I have been with many) that prayed every morning  before we headed to our next destination and who genuinely cared about the students and wanted to get to know us as parents. Very refreshing! It made the trip most memorable!

Old Town (3 of 4)

We stopped at the Old Schoolhouse Museum which I thought was pretty cool to see.

The schoolhouse is a replica of the State's early days of education. It is a traditional one room schoolhouse found throughout the country in the late 1800s. 

The kids found the classroom rules very different from current times:
- Boys and girls are separated by side in the classroom;  they are not supposed to play together,  sit together or even intermingle.
- When answering a question from the teacher, the student must get out of their desk, stand next to their desk and curtsy (girl) or bow (boy) before speaking
- When reading aloud they must do the above then read aloud while standing
- There was no paper; just individual chalkboards to write on
- The older students helped the younger ones

After the schoolhouse, we visited the CA State Railroad Museum. It has the Sierra Scene which shows a large scale representation of a construction scene high in the Sierra Nevada representing the Donner Pass (1867) featuring the locomotive Gov. Stanford.

The mail train was fascinating. Potential mail sorters had to sort 70 letters in 60 seconds without error while the train was moving to be considered for the job on the train.

Fun stops: The Pony Express (above) and Candy Heaven (below)

NEXT UP: The Capital

I Found Gold! (2 of 4)

To find gold, we headed to James Marshall Discovery Park.

In front of the replica of the sawmill that James Marshall bulit

On January 24, 1848, James Marshall was building a sawmill for Captain John Sutter using water from the South Fork of the American River. He noticed several flakes of metal in the water and realized that they were GOLD!

A Chinese grocery/herbal store

Some 80,000 immigrants poured into this state during 1849, many whom were from China.

A Mountain Man Talk by Clancy the Mountain Man

We had our own opportunity to "pan" for gold.

Hannah with her teacher, Mrs. Hinton, panning for gold

It was an interesting experience panning for gold. It was definitely not easy. It took a lot of patience and a good eye. The gold flakes were tiny and bright yellow while the 'fool's gold' was more silver than bright yellow. And there were lots of gems in the soil like amethyst. I was lucky enough to find 5 gold flakes. Everyone found gold expect one very determined parent. That's okay. Her daughter found some and shared with her.

Can you spot the gold flake?

Our next stop was to Sutter's Fort. This fort was a 19th century agricultural and trade colony and the fist non-Native American community in the Central Valley.

Guides are dressed in period garb demonstrate pioneer life at this 1840s living history site.

The main building of the fort is a two story adobe structure which is the only original surviving structure at this reconstructed Sutter' Fort Park. It was here that James Marshall privately met with Sutter in order to show him the gold he found while he was constructing the sawmill.

Fascinating seeing how life was in the mid-1800's.

NEXT UP: Old Town

Eureka! (1 of 4)

Hannah went on her first overnight field trip to the State Capitol! I was a chaperone and we had to meet at the school at 5:45am!

In the parking lot praying before we leave

There were only 9 kids going plus 11 adults (including the driver and our tour guide) for a HUGE motor coach! It had WiFi and a charging outlets next to the seats! Sweet!

Hannah was impressed with our 'bus'. It even had hardwood floors!

We stayed at the Holiday Inn. I had the privilege of chaperoning Laneya, one of Hannah's good friends, since her parents were unable to go. Laneya and Hannah go way back. Her mom taught both Emily and Hannah when they were four years old in preschool. Laneya has been in the same class with Hannah since Kindergarten.

The kids of course hit the pool even though the water was cold!

We dined at the old Spaghetti Factory.

Hannah with Laneya and Alice

Yummy spaghetti

But before we hit our State's capital, our first stop was to Gold Bug Park & Mines. These two mines, Priest and Gold Bug, were real gold mines from the Gold Rush Days.

The Priest Mine was dug into the hillside by hand in the 1850's.

We had some great tour guides which explained how the miners were able to find gold (you look for the yellow vein of the walls) and how the miners scaled the walls (called scaffolding) to get to higher ground.

Duffy and Dewey, our tour guide miners, demonstrated how the miners used explosives in the mines.

This was not an easy nor safe profession!

Next we checked out the Miner's Blacksmith Shop. Miners always need to have their tools sharp and in good shape! Breaking down rocks was hard work.

Hannah with an iron snail

Lastly, we visited the Stamp Mill. This large machine 'stamped' rocks into tiny tiny pieces so it can filter and sort out gold from the rocks.

The people operating and manning this machine were brave! It was easy to loose a finger or hand in this contraption!

NEXT UP: I Found Gold!