This year for your birthday you decided you wanted to ride ponies with a smaller group of your friends, instead of having a big birthday party and inviting everyone from school and elsewhere that you know.   The party itself at Show Stables (www.showstables.com) was a lot of fun!  We had your party on Saturday, December 14th, this year.

Prior to the party, Avi, Alec, and Alex were dropped off at our house.  Mommy took you, Avi, and Alex to get your nails done, and I took Alec bowling.  At the party, Aiden, Surabhi, and Harris joined us.  Everyone got to ride a pony for at least 20 minutes, and you had your own pony the entire party!  They offered a complimentary lesson as part of your birthday party package, and we did that on Friday, December 27th.  You loved it so much that we signed you up for lessons, and you have been twice already.  Your favorite pony is Wilemina 🙂

On Saturday, December 7th, you attended your first basketball class/camp!  It was a short, 3 hour ‘camp’/class, that we thought was going to teach you the fundamentals of basketball (dribbling, shooting, passing), but it turned out that most of the kids there had lots of previous experience playing basketball on a team or experience otherwise.  Given that you had zero experience going into this, it was a little intimidating for you, but you did really well despite that!  There was probably 100 kids there, and it was super loud.  You actually knew one girl from your gymnastics class and hung out with her most of the time.  By the end of the 3 hours you were shooting so much better and actually made a couple of shots!  I don’t think basketball is going to be your new favorite sport, but you had fun nonetheless 🙂

On Friday, December 6th, we went to your school’s annual gingerbread-house decorating party!  This is such a fun event.  They supply already made gingerbread houses, and a TON of candy, marshmallows, cereal, etc.. to help decorate them.  We usually end up eating half the candy and drink hot-chocolate while we decorate.  Most of your friends usually go, and you have so much fun being at school for something other than school 🙂  We didn’t win anything this year, but that’s ok, we just go to have fun and enjoy the evening.  I love doing things like this with you!

This year we went down to Grandma & Grandpa’s house again this year for Thanksgiving.  We stayed the entire week, from Sunday to Friday. We had a great time as usual and did a lot of fun stuff.  Playing with the animals, helping Grandma cook, playing with Grandpa in the backyard, miniature golfing, movies, going to the park, painting class, Jurupa Valley Dinosaur Museum, shopping, and of course Thanksgiving dinner itself.  Lots of good memories this year!

On Sunday, 10/27/19, your ballet career came to an end with your final recital.  You had been taking Ballet for 1.5 years, and after starting Taekwondo, you didn’t want to take ballet anymore.  You did so good at ballet, and I had been taking you to CVPA (Castro Valley Performing Arts) every Saturday for the past 3 years! (1.5 for tumbling, and 1.5 for ballet).  For me it was a special tradition that I am really going to miss!  🙁   But, now we have a new tradition of Taekwondo, as well as your other activities, that I always take you to.  Here is a video of your last dress rehearsal for your last recital.