Category Archives: Friends

Alumni

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Recently I’ve had a few lovely visits from former LPS students. I feel so blessed to have so many of them still here in the area, and love to see what they are up to.

One student from my first year at LPS came the week before break and kept me company at school. I have moved classrooms since he was there, and have two new art classes that I offer. I was very excited to hear how he has returned to college courses and is doing well working and being a student. It makes me so pleased to see them doing well as adults, kinda like a proud parent I suppose. :]

 

A few weeks back, two darling alumni from last year came and surprised me at my dance studio. They had decided that watching me tap was an entertaining way to spend their Monday evening. They brought me balloons and make me posters. It was such a sweet surprise!

I feel so lucky to have such sweet alumni! Have you ever had some great surprise? Or planned any fun surprise for someone else?

Love,

-S

Prom 2016

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Last weekend we had our prom at the Mexican Heritage Plaza. I was super excited to hear that it was planned for earlier in the school year, which meant we were able to include it in our yearbook!

Prom is such a milestone event, and I feel lucky that I am able to go every year and see my students looking so beautiful. They really dress up for it, and look like little stars on the red carpet. I have the distinct pleasure of taking a few photos for it each year, and it’s one of my favorite events as a high school teacher!

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All the staff typically come, and look pretty swanky themselves! This year a small group of us met up for dinner at Left Bank before.

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How was your prom? Do you have fond memories of it? Would you enjoy going to it every year?

Love,

-S

A day in Maui Part 2

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For most of the week we were pretty low-key. We ate breakfast at our condo and had a slow morning. Then we would pack up our stuff, picked up some spam musubi’s, mango bread and coffee, and hit the beach. Often mid-day we needed a pick-me up, and upon the advice from friends and family we stopped at Ululani’s for a refreshing shaved ice.

 

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It was honestly the best shaved ice I had ever had. They take filtered island water, and freeze it in big chunks, that they then shave down to make the ice. The first time I went for my usual childhood trifecta favorite of : lime, grape and cherry. A was more adventurous and tried tropical flavors. I tasted her’s, and agreed the flavors were amazing. The next day, my shaved ice flavors were passion orange, coconut and pineapple. I wish we could bottle that shaved ice up and have them here all the time, they were so good!

Have you had any food traveling that you wish you could have all the time at home?

Love,

-S

Gingham Vest

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Last weekend my best friend A and I went to the mall, officially looking for bathing suits for Maui. I had my mind on another piece of clothing that I wanted to try on to see if I loved it in person as much as I loved it online. I was thinking, no dreaming of a J.Crew vest that I had spied on their website a few days earlier. I usually like to look at my purchases online and consider them for a few days before making the purchase to make sure I will use it and love it.

We tried on a few things (ok, really we just tried on hats, see above photos) at Nordstroms before making our way over to J.Crew. I tried on the vest and promptly fell in love. I seem to love all things navy, and gingham, and this jacket had pockets! It was in short, the golden trifecta!

 

I took it home and am now thinking about naming it. Any suggestions?  Have you ever had a piece of clothing that you just had to have?

Love,

-S

Sun, Sand and the Surf

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Hyannis Port

I really like the motto of working hard so that you can play hard. And for me, playing hard always means relaxing somewhere warm on a sunny beach. My 2015 resolution was to travel more, and that means regularly putting some money aside for a later date to have fun somewhere new!

Often I’m pretty busy, between working a full time teaching job, babysitting around 25 hours a week. Sometimes I’ll sneak in time for a workout, or to grab dinner with either friends or family. When at home, I’m usually washing up some dishes, trying to get a load of laundry done, finishing lessonplans/powerpoints for work and sleeping! I do tend to relax in the form of watching a show for an hour or so in the later evenings.

I usually need to block out time for a trip before I’m able to put away my endless to-do lists, and pull out a fun book! On Monday, my girlfriend and I will be flying to Maui for 5 days, and I couldn’t be more excited to unplug, and enjoy lots of down time

I’ve been on the hunt for a new bathing suit, and even though its a bit early in the season to be shopping for summer, there are tons of choices online that I’ve been eying.

So many have cute back details! I’ve been mostly leaning towards one pieces because I think they will be more comfortable under my swim shirt when I’m snorkeling.

La Blanca *image from Nordstroms website

                                image of Tommy Bahama from Nordstroms Website

There are so many cute choices out there! Any places that you love to score a new bathing suit? Do you prefer a one piece or a bikini?

Love,

-S

Harry Potter World

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Universal Studios

Two weeks ago my best friend Annie and i flew to Florida. We have had this trip planned since last fall, and to say we were excited is a bit of an understatement. We flew out Friday and stayed at a local hotel adjacent to the park. We ended up getting a park to park pass so we could visit Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade, which were basically the only two sections of the Universal Studios Park that we were interested in.

It was, without a doubt, the best weekend I’d had in a long time! We started off in Hogsmeade and then took the train over to Diagon Alley. I took a ton of photos, so this might be a long post.

I was like a kid in the candy shop, running around looking at everything and snapping a ton of photos. It was beautiful and sunny day. I tried the butterbeer nervously, but it was delicious! MY favorite was walking through all of the amazing decorations that that mimic’d things from the book (potions classroom, great hall, etc) as we waited in line for the ride inside of the castle.

I ended up getting a Chocolate Frog and a Gryffindor wax seal as my two momentos for the day. I feel like I need to have some sort of a harry potter party as an excuse to use my new seal!

Are you a harry potter fan? Are you excited about the new harry potter Hogsmeade coming to L.A this spring?

Love,

-S

Snowy Days

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The day after Christmas my family and I drove up to Tahoe. We were blessed this year with a good amount of snow, so we were fairly excited to get in a good few days of skiing. The last three years have been what we call “brown Christmas’s” as in, there is no snow on the ground and we can see dirt for miles. Which is tragic.

This year, despite being in our fourth year of a drought, we had snow!! We visited our family friends a few days later and let the puppies have a glorious playdate running around in the snow. And then we tried out their new front loader, which was so. much. fun!

I drove this puppy down to the end of their drive-way, and now I want one! I have no need for it, but it was a beauty!

Love,

-S

Academy of Sciences

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SF
My brother’s best friend Alex is pretty much part of our family. He comes on our family vacations to Tahoe, is invited to our birthday parties and nights out in SF, and is a cool kid. He fits in so well with our (crazy) family.

Last weekend was his birthday. My brother and I joined him and his parents for a gorgeously beautiful day in the city. We started out with a tasty breakfast at Padrecito in Cole Valley in SF. I had scrumptious fish tacos. Sadly I ate them too quickly to snap a picture.

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Yum, Churros!

 

From there we uber’d to the Academy of Sciences. I hadn’t been since high school, so it was fun to see their newer exhibits. We went into the Osher Rainforest, which is my favorite part of the museum. It’s a four story dome that houses a rainforest and an aquarium on the lowest level. You start on the ground level and slowly walk around and up looking at the tropical flora and different animals. Then, you plunge down to the aquarium level (in an elevator) and get to look at all the different animals that live in the ocean.

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I particularly enjoyed the Earthquake zone where they had built a temporary exhibit where you could feel the two major earthquakes that have hit SF in the last 100 years.

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On our way out we got to meet their albino alligator named Claude. He was one of the few animals that I particularly remembered from my previous visit.

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What was the latest museum you visited? What was your favorite part about it?

Love,

-S