So Romantic!

So tonight I found this:

Beautiful rose petals strewn in front of my bedroom door, and a trail of petals leading from the door to my bed.

I know what you are thinking - Dennis is quite the romantic, right? Lucky me!

Well, not quite. Dennis is away on a camping trip.

So who is Mr. Romance?

Luke!

He gathered a bunch of petal from the garden and carefully placed them down in a pretty little trail to my bed with these instructions:

"I did it for you mom. Leave them there, and then next time you and Dad go on a date you don't have to go to a restaurant - you can just go to your bedroom instead. It's better than a restaurant."

Boy, Dennis would agree with that!

What a little Casanova, huh? I always knew he was a ladies man. I better keep a short reign on that one.

I wish Dennis would hurry home. Wouldn't want these perfectly good rose petals to go to waste.

The Green One That Got Away

St. Patty's Day seems to get a lot of attention around here, especially with Caleb and Luke. we always wear green and have corned beef and cabbage, Irish soda bread, green jello, and shamrock cookies, and someone always manages to build a leprechaun trap.

This year I heard Caleb yelling in the front yard and ran out to see what the matter was. His eyes were wide and he was claiming that he really saw a real Leprechaun down the street. He was so excited and I snapped this picture while he was describing just what he saw.

Knowing there were Leprechauns in the neighborhood inspired some creative thinking as my boys decided to build a better Pat-Trap. When I walked out the door first thing that morning as I was leaving for seminary, I almost tripped on this trap. It isn't too humane, as you can see. Caleb stuck push pins and corn cob holders in the bottom of a jar sticking up, with a ramp for the poor little leprechaun to climb inside. Yikes! Glad we didn't catch anyone!

The trap Caleb made for school was much kinder. He spray-painted a paper bowl to look like a pot. He found some plastic gold coins, only they were not gold enough, and he insisted a leprechaun would never believe they were real, so Caleb found some metallic gold spray paint and insisted I make them look real. He put them in a box, put a ramp on it, and them put plastic wrap over the top to trap the leprechaun in. He he had the best trap in his class, though that tricky leprechaun still managed to get away anyway - clever fellow!

They wanted to leave the traps out indefinitely, but I informed them that the leprechauns all go back to Ireland when St. Pat's day is over.

Better luck next year boys!

But they sure had a good time trying to get us some gold.

Romantic Weekend at Lake Arrowhead

A few weeks ago Dennis and I had the rare opportunity to escape to the mountains for a romantic getaway in snow-covered Lake Arrowhead. We had a great room in the beautiful Lake Arrowhead Lodge with a view overlooking the quiet lake. This is an early morning picture from our balcony.

We got up there friday and spent the day shopping at the outlet mall. See, I am a lucky girl! It was so fun to shop without kids in tow and a hubby who was being particularly generous. He even let me pick out a fabulous purple purse at the Coach store!!! That man knows how to get the flames lit for a romantic weekend!

That night, after he went shopping with me, I sat and watched a Lakers game with him. I think I got the better end of that deal. Gotta love that together time.

Dennis' idea of a weekend getaway is to sleep in as long as possible. My idea is to have time to explore on my own. So while Dennis slept, I got up super early to take a quiet sunrise walk by the lake, just me and my camera. Click here to see lots of cool pictures I took that morning at Lake Arrowhead that I posted on my photo blog. I love mornings, especially for taking interesting pictures.

I thought this was funny. A store was empty with boxes piled inside, but there were still men's underwear in the window display. So random. Wonder how long those have been there? Guess they thought that was better than leaving the window empty.

We spent all of Saturday together. There was not much to do in Lake Arrowhead. We went for a drive around Lake Arrowhead, then went to the movies and saw The Adjustment Bureau. Cool film. Then we went back to the mall and shared a caramel apple.

No romantic getaway is complete without a fancy meal. We had a fantastic dinner at the hotel's restaurant. It was so romantic, overlooking the lights on the lake. Yummy too!

On Sunday morning, I got up early again, this time to sit on the balcony and paint a picture of a friendly blue jay that kept sneaking over to steal some blueberries, but we still made it home in time for church.

It was a wonderful and much needed quiet weekend! Thanks Dennis! I love my man!

SO Snow!

For President's Day, we decided to head up to our property up in the mountains near our house in Idyllwild. What a great day we had!

It was a perfect day. There was tons of snow on the ground, due to the big storm that had blown through that weekend, but the day we went up it was sunny and warm.

It took Luke a while to get his "snow legs."

Caleb jumped right in!

The main itinerary of the day - sledding!

Luke couldn't decide if he was having the time of his life, or was completely miserable.

Dennis oiled up some snow to make a tiny ramp. But as small as it was, some folks got some big air! WHEE!

And some folks crashed and burned.

Poor Luke.

Good times!

Yep, that is a boogie board - that is what Southern California kids use in a pinch for sledding in the snow. It didn't work too great though.

Does this look like fun to you?

Going up?

Yes, even I put down my camera and gave it a try. Instead of catching air on the jump, I just kinda got stuck.

So I decided to stick with taking pictures!

Cute Caleb! He couldn't get enough!

Of course it was not all about the sledding. Lisa and Chrystine made a very cool snowman.

And Dylan and Nate took advantage of a few snow banks to have a serious snowball fight.

Still, sledding stole the show! I couldn't convince Caleb that we were done.

The picture on the right was Dylan who nearly glided into the stream! Luckily he got stuck there, head down, just a few feet above the icy water. I was on the other bank, so all I could do for him was laugh and snap a few pictures. Crazy kid.

Then, when we all started to feel a bit chilled, we headed back to the car for some tailgate hot links...

and some steaming hot chocolate! That totally hit the spot! What could be better?

We are so glad we have that land up there to escape to! Wouldn't want to live in the snow for too long, but spending the day up in it is just about perfect! Hope we get another snow day in before it is gone for good.

Loving the Living Desert!

We decided to spend the first day of our 5-day Presidents' Day weekend at the Living Desert.

It was an absolutely perfect beautiful day! We had a great time.

Of course, the first thing we always have to see are the trains. Boys love trains!

Luke wore a jacket because he wanted to - he certainly didn't need to, as it was a beautiful sunny day and not chilly at all.

I love humming birds!

Then we went to check out the new discovery center. It is really nice!

There are a lot of hands-on things to do in there.

Then we went for a ride on the merry-go-round.

Those teen and pre-teen boys didn't want to go on at first thinking they were too cool, but the sure seemed to enjoy themselves!

Luke was the spider, and all the boys were the bugs caught in his web.

The Living Desert is a great place for boys. They seem to feel right at home there with the wild animals and all that dirt!

Up close with some wildlife.

It is a beautiful time of year to take pictures at the Living Desert, and it was also late afternoon, a really pretty time of day.

The desert plants are all starting to bloom with tiny little desert flowers. It smelled wonderful! In a few more weeks it will be beautiful!

Glad I brought my macro lens.

What a great day!

We love the Living Desert!