V turns 11

Veronica's party was on Saturday, but her actual birthday was on Sunday, so we had a quiet day mostly at home, which we were all perfectly okay with.

This year's gift opening strategy was to close her eyes, open the gift, guess what the gift is, and then open her eyes, although I think she only does this when she knows what the gift is going to be, like this Tale of Sorcery book from Omri:

Her letter of acceptance to Hogwarts arrived by owl... Omri's jaw drops:

She looks confused by this one:

This was pretty exciting:

This was the most excited I've seen the girl get in a while:

Good smile:

It's the complete series of her favorite manga (Japanese comic book):

The name of the series is Death Note, which I'm told is not as violent as it sounds. We started watching the anime version of it together on the TV.

We went out to dinner at Benihana, a Japanese steakhouse where they make a show of cooking the food right in front of you. Omri liked the steak and chicken. Veronica had a California Roll and tried some other new things too.

The photos didn't turn out great at the restaurant, but we had a great time!

Happy birthday again to my sweet pea!

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Veronica's 11th birthday party

After missing them in 2020, I'm really glad we managed to throw birthday parties for both kids this year. Veronica had nine girls over to help her celebrate in our backyard on Saturday evening. It was a unique and memorable event with a fire and movies playing for ambience.

Veronica, testing out our new projector:

We had some anime playing but eventually switched to The Nightmare Before Christmas.

V opened gifts on the deck:

We served sushi, pizza, veggies, s'mores, and of course a cake made by R:

Hopefully we didn't embarrass the girl too much! I think she had a good time, and I did too.

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Happy 11th birthday, Veronica!

This year she is into anime/manga and chilling with her friends, but she still likes sampling frosting with her mom too:

 

I am so proud of this girl (photo by R):

 

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Jack-o-lantern Spectacular

At the Minnesota Zoo with this crew:

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La vida es un carnaval

Over the weekend we celebrated my sister-in-law Chelsea and my nephew Salvador. One of them performed in a singing competition and the other turned one year old.

It was really fun seeing Chelsea on stage:

The competition was kind of a Minnesota-only version of American Idol.

She sang a song in Spanish about how life is like a carnival, which I think many of us can connect with.

Nice singing, Chels!

After the performance we went to Linda's hotel room and had a little birthday celebration for this guy:

Taking a walk after dinner:

Mauro and Mike, just because:

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Hamilton camp

Veronica partook in a theater camp during one week last summer where they performed songs from the Broadway musical Hamilton. I just haven't gotten around to posting these photos until now.

She had a friend there too:

I do have a video of the final performance, but I'm going to leave it offline. Sorry!

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Immersive Van Gogh exhibit

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