Chasing Bluebirds

april 2012

its like i need to just put the date up there because time is flying by and my blogging is lagging, geez! right now i am: swimming twice a week, riding my bike almost every day down the river to the beach (in crazy wind with these recent storms) and feeling so much better! when i was younger i could do three or four hard workouts in a week and be down a size no problem. well at 44, i guess it takes more than a few workouts to see a real change but at least i have swung that weight gain pendulum swinging in the other direction a bit. so on my bike ride today (the river runs right through the wetlands) i was surprised to see this at the end of the trail

the most beautiful, lovely sign dedicated to the wetlands we have been desperately trying to save!!! on the other side is a sign about the san gabriel river channel describing it's route and characteristics, also very well done. in other news, lizzie has been taking tae kwon do (sometimes 5 days a week she loves it so much) and she just had her first belt testing yesterday. it was really cool and i enjoyed watching the other kids too, especially the tiny kids getting really high level belts. this was exactly what this kid needed!!

(poor olive wants in) unfortunately we had a loss of a family member this week but the flip side was lots of visiting with extended family bringing us all closer and reminding us how important family is, how fast time flies. jump stated me planning an east coast visit to finally see all those cousins on the east coast and scout out my favorite state: north carolina. happy spring everyone!!
hanging out with aunt heather

12 years... time sure flies!

my first born is 12! wow!

we spent the day at knott's berry farm

still trying to figure out my new camera, feels really awkward, hoping it gets easier. lizzie struggled a bit, being too little for most big rides and too big for the little rides...
with my squeamish stomach, i took advantage of our time together waiting for the big kids. we shopped and had our own adventures, i treasure these fleeting moments shared with her alone. happy birthday emily!!

christmas 2011

whoa, i am really absent here lately! i had a run of extra work so i have been super busy and tired. finally have a few days off to catch up on everything...

this year i had portraits of both girls made by alice du bois (three different ones so i could keep one and give the other two to the grandparents) we also had my parents dog painted (*unfortunately he became ill over thanksgiving and had to be put to sleep, so sad!*) and our dog maggie as well. it was such a fun process to find photos of the girls to have painted and then interacting with alice as she worked on and completed each painting. it was always a thrill to open up the package with the painting all finished. i highly recommend getting portraits done of your pets and kids and whomever because it is such a unique way to capture a moment in time. i never tire of looking at the first portrait i had done of the girls. you can see the three portraits here and archie as well.
maggie got her annual bone and the girls got dolls, dolls and more dolls (including a justin bieber doll!!)

halloween fast approaching

for the first time in years and years i sewed my kids costumes, pretty much from scratch

 

their new favorite show is adventuretime (not always the most appropriate but...) so they are cake the cat and fiona
we spent last weekend getting the costumes completed then headed to the camp fire carnival
chris just whipped up this "fish" game last minute and it turned out so amazing!!
and it worked too!

happy halloween!!

horses horses horses!!

i was FINALLY able to take a real horse back riding trip with my girls, lizzie hit the age requirement of 7 so she could be included and we found a highly recommended guide near the KOA in Bryce. when we did our first visit to the park and saw horses riding down into the amphitheater, emily went nuts requesting to go too. after some research i found that we could get a longer trip out into some really unique wilderness so we booked a trip outside the park. 

the three nicest horses, ever!! lizzie was really new to all this and her horse just didn't sweat anything. she stayed close to the guide and never wavered...
emily had a paint

my horse "navajo" was an appaloosa
lizzie had a gorgeous chestnut names "bally"
we started our trip walking along a clear blue river, passing wildflowers and sage, gorgeous cliffs all around, heading for "the slots" our guide said. at one point we turned off one river and followed another, the water was bright orange and our guide said it was because this river flowed from Bryce canyon and was orange from all the thunderstorms we had been getting each afternoon. it was surreal to see orange water flowing... so many colors in southern utah
heading into the slots! this was by far the coolest thing ever. most of my photos came out blurry because my horse was bobbing up and down so much through the river...

i hope it's clear that these slot canyons are cool!!
we headed back out of the canyon (i had a small mishap on a "run" up a small hill... my horse decided to jump the river before doing a few more jumps up the hill causing me to lose my stirrups and slide off one side. luckily he stopped when i yelled "whoa!" and i just dropped softly to his side. totally embarrassed though, i hopped back up and resumed the climb up. emily laughed at me from behind and a few minutes later she had her own mishap: her saddle was not tight enough and slipped around and under the belly of her house tossing her to the ground as well. luckily she just hopped off and wasn't hurt. our poor guide was mortified but with these calm and docile horses, it was really not a problem. we had a great laugh and talked about it for days after) we made it to the top and had a nice long pause with the view
then headed back across the valley to the truck and trailer. our guide told the girls they will never remember the first boyfriend they have but they will always remember their first "real" horseback ride with their mom. so cool!
hoping to take some riding lessons back here in the city, i think we were all inspired to continue riding.

bryce

how do you describe bryce national park in utah? hmm... well it is just about the most beautiful place i have ever seen in my life

i promise to bore everyone who would ever read my blog as much as i bored all my facebook friends with an endless borage of bryce photos (borage? is that spelled right?)
so for maybe a few weeks or months on end i will post all the photos i took.. for now though here are the fabulous pool pics from the KOA we stayed in just outside of bryce:


our first 4 days we spent in the "luxury" of a koa with showers and a pool... then we moved on to bryce, no hook ups (no electricity or water), luckily we had a wonderful bathroom and showers for 2 bucks. our solar panel worked wonders to keep our battery charged for evening lights (loved reading before bed)... i think the luxurious koa eased us into the roughing it at bryce. a few more pool pix:

i highly recommend southern utah for your next family vacation, what a beautiful and amazing state. national parks have never failed us and i feel such pride every time i visit a new one. i wish we could get our government to run as smoothly as our national parks... :)

kool aid tie dye

so i found out after using kool aid to paint with (a past camp fire meeting) that it stains everything like crazy. the tablecloth we had used while painting had the most amazing tie dyed look to it (i am sure there is a photo of that somewhere in this blog...) anyways i had a eureka moment to make our t-shirts using the kool aid. it smells divine and since we are outside at camp we can make a huge mess

it took about 5 minutes to set up too, easy easy. i recommend making it very concentrated so the colors are bright. we did notice a difference between 100% cotton t shirts vs polyester blends (the cotton worked better) and i liked the effect having a wet vs painting/ dripping onto a dry t shirt (i must note though that if you want these t-shirts to really last and stay true to color you need to set the dye better, maybe with vinegar? we made these knowing the kids would destroy them during the week and probably throw them out. it was the process of making them that i focused on, one kid came with a pink shirt on the last day because she had washed it, oops!)

there were local journalists here that day doing an article on our camp so of course the kids loved being photographed!
one of the crafts we did in the lodge was knapsack tie dye and then sewing... it was a really easy way to teach kids to sew and it looked cute with the girls t shirts. i actually think this idea was so cool i might make some purses/knapsacks for myself with this pattern. so easy! i am busy planning a HUGE monstrous italy trip for next year and we head out to utah next week. more photos of camp and our trip coming up!

summer + park

Camp Wintaka

the kids spent a week at camp wintaka and boy was it strange having no kids around! i found it refreshing in some ways and really lonely in others. i know that my kids love camp and this was lizzies first time to finally go with her big sister. getting ready to go she showed a few signs of being overwhelmed and i got a tiny feeling she might actually get homesick. upon her return she said she was fine and never really missed us much. it's perfectly natural to miss your kids or for kids to miss their parents and i think it's a great life lesson to muster through it and realize you will be ok, that missing someone means you love them. 

i admit i was teary eyed when liz came off the bus

we had a "date breakfast" this morning, cleaned up the house and set up a special lunch for the girls (flowers in vase for a special touch). girls arrived at 2pm, tired but happy. i am so glad my kids are experiencing the same camp i did, loved hearing all the stories about what they did and what they ate and how much they loved their counselors. emily has already picked her camp name (for when she is a counselor) M and M of course!

summer flies by

finally some r and r at the cabin!
special time with grandparents at the children's forest

we supersized our pool this year, my biggest dream is to have a REAL pool but for now this makes the heat waves manageable...
happy summer!!