Autumn Harvest

With chestnuts, persimmon, and pomegranate gradually making their appearances at the farmer’s market, we know it’s that time of year. With an enthusiastic fruit picker at home, we always try to arrange a visit to the farm during this season.

Thanks to Min’s suggestion. This year, we visited Gabriel Organic Farm in Sebastopol. We certainly were not disappointed with their abundant Fuyu persimmons. But best of all, we were pleasantly surprised to discover this mysterious fruits- pineapple guavas. We also have this plant in our yard but didn’t know what it was until this trip. The plant looks like a mini olive tree and the fruit yields very distinctive aromatic taste and smell. It somehow reminds me of the passion fruits. We cannot get enough of it. We ended up getting more of it than persimmons.


What is this mysterious fruit???

Mommy, please help....

A Weekend Afternoon

On a recent weekend, we visited a friend's newly renovated house and garden in Portola Valley. While Ryan was busy chasing Ole and Tera, we enjoyed the leisure afternoon with friends in a beautiful and relaxing garden .

Ole and Tera are certainly Ryan's favorite buddies now. Yesterday I asked who he would like to invite for his birthday party next year. He initial list only included aunty Denise and cousin Tony and quickly, he added Ole and Tera, two australian shepherd dogs....


Ole is mellow and easy-going.

Tera is sensitive and territorial. Just like children, they have their own personalities.

Awakening

I lately found myself in rage and frustration more and more often when disciplining Ryan. Often time, at the moment of heat, I turn to yelling and coercing for the convenient and band-aid solution. As I noticed he becomes more resentful and angry toward me, I knew my parenting style needs to take a turn.

But what really daunted on me was one day I told Ryan I was going to a “how to become a good mommy” workshop at his school. I asked him if he could guess what the counselor was going to teach us. He immediately replied “no yelling and no angry face”. As I was desperate in search of effective parenting/discipline techniques, I knew I found mine right at that moment – Self Discipline.



Ryan has been keeping all his treasures in this shoe box. The findings can range from pine cones, corks, leaves, dandelion to gems from school. This is the first thing he digs in every evening returning from school.