I have fallen so far behind but I am determined to catch up.  Ella is now 10 and becomes more of an amazing person every day!  On the actual day of Ella’s birthday, we brought cupcakes to school, picked up Ella and a bunch of her friends and took them to K1 Speed for a fun afternoon of racing!  Everyone had a blast and Sunny made another one of her amazing Disney cakes at Ella’s request.

Ella and her friends had a blast.  They drove around the track like pros!

After K-1, the Kim-Arena’s came over for some cake.

One weekend later, we flew to Las Vegas to spend the weekend with grandma and papa.  We had a really great time.  We stayed at the Venetian and Ella had her first “gondola” ride.

Here is a super sweet series of Ella and Grandma in the lobby.

We came home for another week and then headed to Disney World for Ella’s big 10th birthday celebration.  Before we left, we got to meet our friend Sheila’s new puppy Olivia.  Ella fell in love immediately.

Now for the moment we’ve all been waiting for… our big trip to Disney World!  This is gonna be great!

Here we are all ready to take on Disney World.  The bracelets are called “magic bands” and they get us into the parks, they are our fast passes, they are our hotel keys and they are our money!

Meeting up with Jesse and Heather at the airport.

Ella and Milo meeting up at the hotel.

Sporting our Ella 10 hoodies.

We all were having so much fun with each other.  It was so great to be together.

About to go onto Everest.

The kids having fun at the Frozen Show.

Small World with Papa and Grandma.

SIL love.

A kind stranger took these amazing shots of the 10 of us.  Go team Ella!

Happiness!

Beauty and the Beast!

Heading into dinner at Be Our Guest.

Try the grey stuff it’s delicious.

While eating at Be Our Guest, Heather noticed that Josh Gadd (the voice of Olaf) was at another table in the restaurant.  Ella LOVES Olaf and wanted to meet him.  She went up to him and said, “I’m a huge fan”.  He was really sweet and asked her if she wanted to take a picture with him.  Pretty amazing!

More pics from our great dinner/

We had a fantastic time on the Mine Train ride.

Magic at night.

We all couldn’t stop smiling!

Nemo and the Little Mermaid.

Check it out – Heather, Jesse, Sunny, Ella and I were in one car (the one with the hands up) and Grandma, Papa, AJ, Michael and Milo were in the other one – very careful riders.

Olaf T-Shirt day!  We had a fantastic day at Epcot.

Ella holding magic in the palm of her hand.

Sweet happy Ella.

The end of a beautiful night.

Dear Ella –

Today is your 10th birthday and we just wanted to let you know that we love you so much.  You are such a beautiful, smart, loving, kind, fun, funny, spunky, interesting, and amazing person.  We feel so lucky that you are our daughter.  Now – let the celebrations begin!

We love you,

Mama and Mommy

 Here you are one minute old.  All of our lives changed for the better the moment we met you!

Ella was testing out the fan on her Baymax costume.  It worked perfectly up until Halloween!

Reactions from Ella and Juliet when we tried to talk to the about puberty! It’s going to be a long few years.

 A beautiful day on the Embarcadero.

 Baymax visited with Emmi and Panda today! We took Ella and some friends rock climbing.  Ella really loves it.Walking over to a new restaurant called Zero Zero.

Love these guys!

 Ella was not happy about Grandma writing “sex” in her Bananagrams words.Sweet day at the Berkeley Botanical Gardens. We had an awesome dinner at Alexanders.  Nothing like cotton candy after a 3 hour meal!

 We decided to mix it up and go to Coyote Point.  We all had a great time with Grandma and Papa.

This was the face that Ella used to make when she had to pee.

 So  this is a little inside joke that Ella and Grandma have…Grandma once took Ella to see an Alvin and The Chipmunks movie and she felt tortured!  Guess what grandma -there’s a new Alvin and The Chipmunks movie coming out and Ella can’t wait to see it with you!

 Sweet Ella having her tea before school. These two are growing up way too fast!

 A bunch of staff members from my school had a bonfire at the beach.  Sunny was the master marshmallow cooker.

 Racquetball anyone?

 Ella giving Panda a bath.

Here are Sunny and Ella at a farmer’s market by our house.  They were learning to bake an apple pie.

 Beautiful rainbow in my work parking lot. Ella’s 4th grade class did an amazing assembly on National Parks.I flew to NY for an amazing show that AJ wrote and performed.  The weekend was Halloween weekend so although I missed Halloween with Ella and Sunny, I did get to spend Halloween with your NY family!  Here are some pics from a little party that Jordin and Kevin had.

 Here is Grandma and Papa’s house on Halloween.  Hen and Grandma did a great job!

Meanwhile, back in SF, Ella switched from Baymax to a vampire and had an amazing Halloween with friends.

 September was a fantastic month!  Ella started the 4th grade.  This will be her last year on the 16th Street campus and then onto Middle School!  Ella has a teacher who is new to CDS – her name is Skye.  So far, Ella is loving the 4th grade.  Strike Out Violence Day was a great day as usually.  The 3 of us were together on the field and it was a sweet ceremony.  Ella had a wonderful visit with her friend Sakura who now lives in Japan and came to my back to school night.

First day of fourth grade!Frolicking in the grass.

Strike Out Violence Day!Here is Ella playing the bass in my classroom.  Eventually I will put together a video that shows Ella playing the drums and shredding on the electric guitar.

This is what was on Ella’s table for us on back to school night.  Who knew that she was looking forward to drinking coffee this much!

Here are some more beautiful examples of Ella’s heart.

Must have been a very sunny day.

Ella leading the red belts in some kicks.

Viting with Sakura.  Ella’s Halloween costume arrived and she couldn’t wait to try it on.Ella got her face painted after doing a breast cancer walk.

The picture before was of Ella waiting for the blood moon and here are Ella and Colette on the yard.  Ella manages to get in hugs with Colette and Alicia whenever she can.