Spring Break

Since the last time I got away for spring break was in 1986, I figured it was high time to do it again. Being old now, instead of being a couple of crazy college kids, it was me and my mom and Carole, hitting the road for Southern California, where we could visit Alisa and Erwann, and hang out on the beach, enjoying the sunshine and sand.

At least that is how I pictured it in my head.  Sadly, the weather was not playing nice this weekend.  We kept hoping and hoping for one good beach day.
 This:

is as good as it got.  Notice the jackets.  When the wind stopped blowing, it wasn't bad.  It was at least warm enough to huddle on the beach and soak in the sun.  But the wind blew almost the entire time, and it was cold.  We sat on the beach for about 10 minutes, then we realized it was not that fun.  And it was getting colder.

So we walked down to the pier, where it was  REALLY cold and windy.  And that was about as good as the beach ever got for us on this trip.  Wah.  Oh well.  That only means that I get to go back soon for a make up trip.  But, when you are in California and the weather is crappy, every body who lives there says things like, "it's NEVER like this here.  We have blue skies and sunshine every day!"  And it really doesn't make you feel any better.

So instead of the beach, we spent alot of time here, at La Petite Sourie ( I'm pretty sure I just massacred that spelling.  But massacre is French,and I got that right).  The food here is so good, and I ate way too many croissants, and palmiers and baguettes. Gained four pounds, thank you very much.  I blame the weather.

We did get to hug some palm trees. though.

 And we met these cool birds at the Santa Monica Pier.

Alisa thought this bird had peed on her head.  The owner had squirted her with a squirt bottle to freak her out, and it worked.

Then we got grandly photo bombed at the end of Route 66

 

And, the highlight of the trip for me was finally getting to the Getty.  The Getty is a HUGE art museum somewhere near Los Angeles.  They have original paintings by Vincent Van Gogh, Monet, Renoir,  Cezanne, Degas,  a sketch by Rembrandt, and a whole bunch of other artists I had never heard of.  We only saw about a fourth of what was there, and I took a whole bunch of pictures, but they would probably be really boring, so I am only posting my favorite, a close up of Van Gogh's signing of Irises.  It was amazing to see the originals.

This is one of the trees in the garden area.  These blossoms are huge, and they hang upside down on this big tree. It was as impressive as some of the paintings.

No trip to visit Alisa and Erwann would be complete without Erwann making something French for us.  These are gallettes and they are delicious.  It's like a different kind of crepe filled with ham and cheese and an egg on the top.  I even ate the sunny side egg and liked it.  Me!  Who can only stomach my eggs dry and cold.

The last night we were there, Alisa and I stayed up really late talking.  Then we got giggly. Then we decided to take a self portrait of the two of us.  It just kept getting sillier and sillier.  I thought my face might explode, I was laughing so hard.   Notice how Alisa can laugh and look beautiful, and I laugh and I look like an ogre.

When I grow up, I want to be just like Alisa.

I also want to be just like my aunt Carole.  Here she is , sipping soup with her straw at Denney's on the way home.   This was just after she had shot her straw wrapper at me, missed, and hit the lady behind me in the head.  It was pretty darn funny. Carole also drinks diet coke and loves to shop, so she can come on my Spring Break anytime.

And now we are back home and back to reality.  Reality proved to be too much for me to handle though, so after two days back at work, I decided to take today off as well. and pull off another four day weekend.  The kids are on spring break today, Monday and Tuesday, so I figured why not.  Now I am off to catch up on laundry and plan a jaunt for us this afternoon.

Fourteen

Fourteen things to love about my brand new fourteen year old:

1. For her birthday dinner, she requested tuna casserole.

2. The dimples when she smiles.

3. She does not yet have her ears pierced.

4. She would rather spend her money on books than on clothes.

5. She volunteered to help out in the church nursery.

 This is not a picture of her birthday dinner.  It is a picture of her birthday lunch.  We played hooky with two of her friends and went to lunch and shopping at Station Park.
 

6. For her birthday cake, she requested a giant chocolate chip cookie, decorated with four leaf clovers, of course.

 

 Look!! Her smile is back! No more pulling goofy faces in every darn picture we took over the past year!

7.On the days that she makes her bed, she still gives her old pal, Rascal P. Bennett, her stuffed dog, a place of honor on her pillow.  I think Rascal will always be her first true love.

8. Sometimes, often in fact,  when I look at her, I can see the same expression she had on her face the first time I laid eyes on her.

9.She is a chocolate fiend, just like her mother and sister before her.

10. Her hair.  The thickest, softest hair.

11. Our new favorite Audrey quote: " I am obsessed with Cadbury Eggs. They are the BEST thing about Easter!  Oh, and that Jesus thing is pretty cool too."

12. She will sing in public.

13. She is a questioner and a deep thinker.

contemplating what to wish for...

14.  I think the look on Olivia' s face says it all.  Audrey is the best big sister any girl could ask for.  We are all crazy about that crazy girl of ours.

 Olivia drew her a work of art for her birthday.

 

Oh, and she asked for a longboard for her birthday.  I have yet to see her try it outside.  But then again, the weather has not been very cooperative.  Maybe we will have a boarder in our family yet. 

Happy Birthday, Audrey, our little Celtic Blessing!

Drive Time

Friday night after work, I drove to Heber to meet up with our Denney friends so that Alaina and Becka could spend the weekend with Audrey.  While I was doing that, Dan was driving to Brigham City to meet up with our Metcalf friends who were taking Will to Logan for the weekend.  Then today,  I drove six girls ( Audrey and her two friends, and Olivia and two of her friends) to Ogden to go to a popcorn shop and out for ice cream.  Then, right after we got back, I hit the road again, this time to Brigham City to retrieve Will.  Tomorrow, we will trek back to Heber to return Alaina and Becka. That is a serious amount of driving in one weekend, considering we didn't even go anywhere.

As a side note, driving all the way to Ogden to buy flavored popcorn with six girls, only to realize once you get there that you have forgotten your purse, is not a good idea. I had a serious moment of panic as all the girls were running into the store, and I was searching the car for my purse, which was at home, sitting safely on the kitchen table.  I had not a dime on me.   But I did have my cell phone.  So I called Duncan, and he got my credit card number, and the semi grumpy lady at the store agreed to run my card number manually for me. Of course by that point we had already sampled a serious amount of popcorn.  I'm pretty sure she didn't want to lose out on a sale to me.  Same thing at the ice cream store.  All the kids ordered up, and the ice cream was half gone before I told the lady I did not actually have my credit card in hand.  She managed to charge my card manually as well, albeit a bit hesitantly.  As I have always taught my kids, "it is far better to beg for forgiveness than to ask permission. "  As a mother, that phrase has often  come back to bite me.  But it is still valuable and true life advice.  I try to follow it religiously.

Taco Tuesday

Here I am, at 11:30 on a Tuesday night, allegedly cooking taco meat and paying bills, but procrastinating the paying  bills part,  because spilling my guts on the blog is so much more rewarding in the short term. Plus the taco meat keeps interrupting me with its simmering and stirring needs.

In case you are wondering, yes, 11:30 p.m.  is a little late for a taco Tuesday, even for us.   But around these here parts, we have taco Wednesday, which normally, like any sane family, we would make on Wednesday, at a normal time, say around five.  But the neighbors had a baby born six weeks early, and tomorrow is our night to take dinner in to them. And we have all this other stuff going on tomorrow night anyway, so we weren't even going to have tacos tomorrow night, but then, yeah, this story is getting complicated and boring, so I'll stop now.  Suffice it to say that dinner will be delivered to our neighbors tomorrow, by us, as promised, at five pm so they can go to the hospital to see their baby after they eat.  And the important thing is that baby boy is expected to be just fine.

 I thought I had something else to say about dinners going in to people, but I have been thinking about it for a while now, and nothing very intelligent has come out.   It was going to be something profound I think.  What I really think is that I just do not want to pay this stack of bills that is sitting here beside me.   I wish someone would come in and take care of them for me.  If they did, I would gladly take them dinner.

Unless you really really like me, just skip reading this one.

I'm a just gonna jot down everything I did today, for my own sanity.  Just to see if by looking at what happens when, I can schedule things out a little better, and not be so crazy anymore.

I know. Super boring.

6:15 am- hit snooze button
6:45 am- got Will and Audrey up
6:48 am- went back to bed
7:20-7:45- rushed around like crazy getting ready for work and Olivia ready for school
7:50- took Will to school
8:30-6:45- work work work not much change I can do there
7:15- home, looked at the ads, caught up with kids
7:30-8:00 took a bath while Dan cooked dinner
8:30- started cooking dinner for tomorrow
8:50-11:00 cooked dinner, cleaned up kitchen, paid bills
11:00- 1:00am- wasted time online.

Yeah, my life is riveting, I know.  And I need to go to bed earlier.

Weekend Guests

 This is the first picture of the first  family gathering in our new basement.  We opened up our big table and had a pizza party to mark my mom and dad's 57th wedding anniversary AND to mark the auspicious occasion of having James and his girlfriend Michelle here from Chicago.  They came to visit in Salt Lake for a few days before heading off to Vegas. It was so fun to have them stay with us for a night.  We sure do love James, and meeting Michelle was great- such a sweet girl.

I think these two look pretty great, even after 57 years together.  Maybe we should start planning something a little more grand than a pizza party for the 60th anniversary in 2017.

On Saturday we headed out to show James and Michelle our little corner of Utah.  We went out to Antelope  Island in search of buffalo and salt water taffy, and we were not disappointed.  It was a beautiful day, and even slightly warm.

That is not a buffalo they are standing by, it's a mule deer.

  Then we hiked up to Buffalo Point to look out over the water.  It is about a ten minute hike up to this cool rock lookout.

James on top of the world.

Duncan opted out of this trip.  This is the crew that we had with us.  I keep threatening to get the entire family out here someday for some awesome family pictures.  In the meantime, we work with what (and who) we have.

These two were great sports about hiking all over the place out in the middle of nowhere.

 Like father like son.

Like Audrey like mermaid.

And, as promised, a buffalo.  They really are quite awe-inspiring to see up close.

After Antelope Island, we headed in to have lunch at my new favorite burger joint, the Habit.  Alisa and Erwann took us to one in California, and then, just a few months ago, we found out one had just opened up in Farmington.  Mitch came out and joined us for lunch too.  He and James had a good time catching up after not seeing each other for a few years.  Then all too soon, it was time to drop them off at James' mom's house, for their Vegas trip.  Hope they are having a great time, and we really hope they come back soon.

At the Corner of Fourth and Home

I really can't let today pass without mentioning that it was four years ago today that we moved into this house. It has taken almost the entire four years, but I can finally wholeheartedly say that it finally feels like home.  I love  driving down our street into our neighborhood.  I love my house.  I love our friends and our neighbors. I love our sunsets.  I even love living by those noisy cows.

I think I may have failed to mention that, just in time for our fourth anniversary here,  we finally have a livable basement family room.  Carpet, furniture, it's the real deal down there.  But notice that I did not say it was finished.  I only said it was livable.  We have a ton of odds and ends to finish up, including but not limited to:

-a fireplace insert
-blinds on the windows
-a cold air return cove
-trim around the door way
-paint in the hallway
-trim around  the baseboards on the tile
-tile window sills
-door knob
-book shelves
-cabinets and some kind of counter area
-tv and sound system

All things considered, it is a miracle that we have been able to get as far along as we have on the home improvement track.  In four years, we have finished a bathroom, cleaned up a flood, put up a fence, painted, and finished a family room.  Hopefully, in the next four years, we can add a deck, replace some appliances, and remodel the kitchen.

One more year and Olivia will be the same age that Audrey was when we moved. She will also have lived here half her life by then. I would have to live here another 38 years before I could say the same thing.  It's all relative, ain't it?

Meanwhile, other than home improvement, we have been up to some other stuff too.

Audrey's bird has decided to be social.  We used to have two birds, and neither of them liked any of us very much at all. But then a few months back, one bird died.  Then Chance (the surviving bird) decided he better make a new friend, and he chose Audrey.   If you think that birds don't bond to people or have their own personalities, you are sadly mistaken.  This bird will come out of cage and go straight to Audrey.  He nibbles her ears and eyebrows and climbs all over her. If she leaves the room, he flies right behind her.  The rest of us he mostly ignores.  But he does love him some Audrey.

Tuesday night was Will's solo in orchestra.  So we all went to watch him play, and of course he nailed it.   I'm so proud of him for sticking it out with orchestra.  After the concert, of course we hit McDonalds for some grease and caffeine and goofy pictures.

 Olivia may not look too upset in this picture, but she was quite sad that we went to McDonalds.  We didn't  get a chance to eat before the concert, and it went much later than we thought it would, so on the way home, we decided at the last minute to get something fast for dinner.   All Olivia wanted to do was go home and eat the leftover spaghetti that she had been looking forward to all day.  It was such a let down for her to have to get fast food.  Funny, sweet girl.   And never fear.- She got that spaghetti for dinner the next night.