Ennio's Rube Goldberg Project

 To be done.

Activities during and after school...

 Ennio playing the flute (he gave up on the trumpet 😕)

Lily obsessed about make-up, especially eyelashes... And to think that I still played with my Barbie dolls when I was 12...

Valentine's Day dinner at Castaway Burbank!

As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, California is slowly opening up again. Restaurants are now open for outside dining, and while we are not in the habit yet of doing that again, I thought Valentine's Day would be a nice occasion to try it out! Marcus suggested to go to Castaway Restaurant in Burbank. I had raved about that place when I had gone back in 2019, and he had never been yet. I was not able to get a reservation for February 14, but there were still tables available for the next day, February 15, so we decided to celebrate the love in our family the day after Valentines 😁. It wasn't a date for just the two of us, because we don't feel comfortable yet having a sitter at the house (plus, we just don't have a regular sitter anyway), so all four of us went. It felt so special! We sat outside (inside dining is not allowed yet) and kept our jackets on because it was a bit chilly. The kids were excited to be next to the fire pit! We enjoyed our drinks and food immensely, from the first sip to the last bite! A night to remember!

The entrance to the restaurant: a red carpet!!!

Yummy mocktail!

... and cocktail!

Ennio pretending to be drinking the cocktail!

Good food for Ennio = lobster dogs!

And for Lily: steak with fries!

Getting cozy by the fire pit!

Dessert!

Just a picture of the cookie Ennio baked during his Zoom Social Skills class this week!

Best investment in times of Corona...

 ... our Japanese wall-hung Toto toilet! No more need to hoard toilet paper 😂, we will be all right!

Christmas chocolates in February 😇

Look what finally arrived today: the box Oma Eva sent in December with German "Weihnachtsschokolade". It was 10 weeks underway. We are happy that at least, we got the package... My parents sent chocolate figurines for Sinterklaas and they never arrived. Even worse, when we tracked the package, it was here at the post office, but then it was never delivered, but returned to them!!! We will never know why that happened! Now, we are still patiently awaiting Lily's Adventskalender which was mailed in November. Keeping our fingers crossed 🤞

Update on February 16: Lily's Advent Calendar arrived! It's a make-up box and each door holds a small piece of lip gloss, eye shadow, brow pencil, brushes,... Wow, thank you, Oma Eva! Lily was actually very excited she could open all the doors at once and didn't have to wait 25 days (well, actually she did wait over 3 months if you count how long the package was underway 😂)