Dino Day and other exciting adventures....

My self-induced, albeit brief computer hiatus has come to a close, but I must say that the few days 'vacation' did a world of good! With my focus taken off the computer and my 'work', I was able to attend to what is really the most important...my family life. Aaaahhhh!!! All I can say is that I feel refreshed and rejuvenated from the last few days of being back to my normal pace. My heart is not pounding a marathoner's pace like it had been and I feel like I have it together again. For awhile there, I was beginning to think I was loosing my mind!! The kids and I spent quite a lot of time together, just playing, taking walks and doing our normal routine, and during nap times...instead of gluing myself to this computer screen, I deep-cleaned the house, finished (well...almost!) the piles of laundry and cooked good meals. Life. I love this slower pace!

Today, as you can see from my title, was Dino Day!! A much anticipated day for Luke and his best buddy Hudson! Sarah and I ventured out to see the gigantic dinosaurs just outside of Cabazon and the boys LOVED it! Here is the link, if you want to check it out...http://worldsbiggestdinosaurs.com/. It is a pretty interesting place! The apatosaurus (which I thought was a brontosaurus...shows how much I know!!!) has a cool gift shop inside it's huge belly and the T-Rex in its bold presence, is so neat to stand beneath! Apparently, the dino's were recently purchased and are Christian owned. The new owners are building an addition onto the original dinos with a pro-creation theme. The new section will open Memorial Day weekend. We snuck a peek at the new area...looks pretty neat! Definitely worth another visit (or two!!)

Luke, dressed for the day in his T-Rex shirt, was all smiles as we climbed on and around the huge creatures! We had to hang around for awhile until the gift shop opened, but it was well worth the wait! Luke got to take home a new dinosaur place mat for the dinner table, a cute new dino book and a little package of 'magically growing' dinosaurs that double their size when placed in water. You remember those from being a kid, right?! It was great fun! We ate at a nearby restaurant for lunch, which with a very sleepy and fussy baby, was admittedly not my favorite part. Especially when the other patrons near to our table shot me irritated and annoyed looks as Ellie squirmed and screeched in her chair and in my arms. :( I was fit to be tied for a while there! Definitely feeling a little stressed. BUT....Luke was so well-behaved and such a good eater that it made this stressed momma feel much better! :) Here are some cute pics from the day....

We had a few other adventures this week too...mostly surrounding my hunt for good locations for a few upcoming shoots I have. On Sunday we scouted out Oak Glen again, to see if spring had finally 'sprung' up there. It had! It was a gorgeous day! The sun was shining and a warm breeze blew. Luke, Ellie and I ate snacks in a meadow and climbed trees. (Luke did anyway...Ellie's still a bit young for that!) :P Ty was with his buddies at SuperBike (a motorcycle thing-a-majig) so we went Daddy-less. :( We missed him, but made the most of it! Here is a favorite shot of Luke from that afternoon.

And when I snapped this picture of Ellie, an old one of Luke came instantly to mind, and I was inclined to compare the two. Given Luke's early arrival, they are developmentally the same age in these two photographs. Luke was 10 1/2 months, while Ellie is 8 1/2. I didn't realize until seeing this picture, that she is doing exactly the same things now that he was doing at 10+ months. Makes sense. And its interesting to see! Here you can see their resemblance as siblings, but they are most certainly different kids! :)

Then on Monday, Ty surprised me by taking the day off and we did some more location hunting just before sunset. We grabbed some yummy burrito bowls from Chipolte (mmmm!!) and had a quiet picnic dinner in long ago-forgotten Caroline Park. Sarah had mentioned the spot to me in the week prior (she was doing a shoot too over the weekend!) and since it was on our way home, we stopped to check it out! We were glad that we did because it was a stunningly beautiful place! I hadn't been there since a friend of our was married there in the fall of 2004 (I think I was pregnant with Luke at the time) and let me just tell you, it was NOT as beautiful in the fall as it was this past week! The grass was knee-high in the meadow and with the sun setting just behind the trees, the air was sultry and magical. Beautiful...simply beautiful. A wonderful place to savor some time with my family! I got a few cute shots of the kids, but nothing as 'magical' as it seemed at the time. I need some more photoshoping skills to recapture that part.

This one is at the Lincoln Shrine by Smiley Library...we stopped there too!

Waving hello to her fans! :)

So.....those have been our adventures in recent days. Too bad none of them included my little fantacy of soaking up the sun on a prisine beach somewhere in Jamaica! A girl can still dream, right? But I guess time with my family is the next best thing! :)

Thanks for checking in my friends! Until next time....