Sunday, At 7a, I woke up and got the kids out of the room so that Toby could sleep for a few more hours uninterrupted. We did a walking tour of Carlsbad for about 2 hours. We stopped for donuts and hot chocolate and Lucy promptly spilled all down the front of her little pink sweat suit. She really liked pushing the crosswalk buttons and really cried when she didn’t get to push it. On the way back, we went to Albertson’s and I got a couple of bags of groceries for our immediate breakfast needs. After lunch we went to Flower Fields and viewed some beautiful flowers. Max went sluicing for gems and discovered quite a few shiny rocks including a Tiger’s Eye, his new favorite.

Flower Fields

Flower Fields

Dinner time was at Tony Roma’s with Poppa and Yaya, Jan and Jeff and kids. Toby presented the picture book for Yaya and Yaya loved it.

Saturday: We started the week’s vacation by attending Ryan Theule’s wedding to Beth Kennedy. The ceremony was in Capistrano Beach and was directly on the way to our resort in Carlsbad. As we got on the freeway after the reception, Toby said that she would need to stop to use a restroom in about 15 minutes (why hadn’t she gone before we left?). Well, 15 minutes would have put us right in the middle of Camp Pendleton, so we had to get off the freeway right after we got on. We arrived at The Carlsbad Inn and checked into our room with no problems. We left almost immediately to have dinner with Doug and Gina Morse in San Marcos. Doug did a great job of finding a bunch of restaurants in the middle between his home of Escondido and Carlsbad. It was great to see them and they were off to Hawaii on Sunday. Max had seen the pool and so it was necessary for us to swim right away. After about 10 minutes in the pool with a bunch of older boys, Max was swimming exceedingly well. He was putting his face in the water and swimming the width of the pool without problems. The pool is nicely heated. They also have a jacuzzi that the kids can use. It was about 15 degrees warmer than the pool, but that was not very warm. It felt warm for about 2 minutes when entering after being in the main pool, but I quickly began shivering. At 9 pm the kids went to bed on the sofa bed with many dire warnings about not touching each other. It seems to have worked because they slept the whole night through.

OH MY STARS! Lucy can be soooo hysterical sometimes. She pointed to my arm and asked, “that a bumpy or a finkle?” I had forgotten that I explained the difference between those random bumps on the back of my arms (bumpies), and my freckles (now deemed finkles, I guess). Funny! 🙂

We went to the SB Fair last week – and saw a professional (actor?) cowboy guy do a bunch of lasso rope tricks. So Max has a small rope that he’s been ‘lassoing’ around the front yard. It’s very, very funny to watch – he’s really just yanking it around his body as fast as he can. So today, the kids were playing in the front yard, I’m working in the office and can hear the happy noises, so I’m not paying attention to what the game is. Then they both come inside, and Lucy has the rope tied very tightly around her neck, with like 16 different nots, and he’s been pulling her around, I guess like some cow. OH MY GOODNESS. It was very hard not to run and get the camera, but I’m sure the severity of the situation would have been lost. I untied her (despite her objections – “but I like it!”) and said, “You do not ever tie any living thing around it’s neck with a rope, okay?” Crazyness.

Yes, I realize it was 2 weeks ago. This is pretty quick for me! We praise our Lord for the blessings of family and friends, and especially for His gift of new life.

Dyeing eggs with our good buds the Norbys

Max’s creation

A trip upstairs to do some painting

Easter Day smiles

Easter Bonnets

Cousins Nathan and Lucy – both about to turn 3

Hi there Ya-Ya!

Oooh – look at our loot