Island Adventure Cont. - Catalina Tile

Island Adenture Cont. - Some Places We Ate

Our first dinner was at Antonio's Pizza.

The bench in front of the campground eating leftover Antonio's pizza

Lloyd's of Avalon for our daily dose of ice cream and candy

The best fish and chips I've ever had

Sally's Waffle Shop for what else - waffles and omelettes

Coyote Joe's for a light lunch of shared chicken nachos

This was our last stop for breakfast before getting on the boat to go back to Long Beach. That's our stuff piled up by the wall.

Island Adventure Cont.

Did you know the definition of casino is a building or room used for social amusements and that the casino on Catalina Island was never used for gambling?

Happy Couple
Natalie with her first "island drink"
Kevin waiting for breakfast
Happy Family

Catalina at night

An Island Adventure

John and Kevin climbed up Mt. Whitney two weeks ago. With Brent in Europe, that left me and Natalie with a day to ourselves - no boys. While I was searching around for something for us to do I ran into the Aquarium of the Pacific online. I thought, "that would be fun", but I didn't want to go so far away with just Natalie I wanted to go with the "whole" family and since it is the launching off place to Catalina Island I planned a whole trip around it. We left on Tuesday night, met John in Woodland Hills (he was on travel) left early on Wednesday morning for Long Beach. Our goal was to arrive at the aquarium when it opened, tour it, then head off to Catalina for four days. And that we did. We arrived on Catalina early enough to set up our campsite then go back to town for dinner. It's about one mile to town. We didn't pack any food; just sleeping bags and tents and of course toiletries and clothes. There were showers at the campground so we were all set. We stayed three nights. Every morning we left the campsite and didn't return until after nightfall. We saw all kinds of wildlife on those walks; deer, woodpeckers, quail, and squirrel. The walks back were very relaxing; a nice way to reflect on the day and have intimate family time. So, needless to say, Natalie and I did not go to the aquarium that non-boy day. That day, Natalie and I went to Lancaster to see the newest Jackie Chan movie then to Palmdale for lunch and back-to-school backback shopping. I don't have any pictures from that day.

Here are some choice pictures out of about 300 from our "non-boy day" inspired family vacation. Oh, by the way, Brent is safely home from his European vacation. I have yet to take an after picture, but I will and I'll post it too. He does look different.

The Aquarium of the Pacific

Here's Natalie taking in her favorite of all the sea animals, the sea lion.

John touching a sea ray.

Kevin touching a sea ray too.

An adult sea ray with a leopard pattern. Cool and weird.

Seahorses.
Did you know male seahorses have a front pouch they use to carry around fertilized seahorse eggs and when they hatch the male is the one to tend to the hatchlings while the female seahorse has simply left her eggs and gone off somewhere?

Family photo.

Catalina

Getting there; a picture of "the boat".

On the boat.

On the boat too.

In Case You Were Wondering . . .

This is what the inside of my refrigerator looks like right now.

Any questions?

Pink Flamigoes

This morning John and I woke up to find plastic pink flamingoes covering the front lawn.

It's a fund raiser for the local girls soccer team for tournaments and what not throughout the year. They were "sent" to our house by some friends who knew we would be generous enough to donate money to their cause. $5 to have the girls remove the birds and $20 to have them "sent" to someone elses front lawn. As far as I know they are still outside. We called one of the team members at lunch to have her come and get them, but they have not shown up. School starts tomorrow, maybe they are too busy getting ready for that. Hmmm . . . am I the new proud owner of twenty some plastic pink flamingoes.

Great idea for a fund raiser. Hint hint Robin.

Here's a Better One

of them dressed like vegetables.

And that's all I'm going to say about that.

I promise.

"Here's a Blondie For Your Trouble." ~ Nancy Drew

Seriously. Have one.

Toby Mac

Toby Mac played at the Anaheim Angels Stadium last Sunday with the Harverst Crusade. I was excited about seeing him live, but was less than enthusiastic about the venue.
I'm glad we went but . . . yeah.

Here is a picture of him from the big screen after he took off his beautiful white blazer.

Oh, another treat from the concert was seeing Dennis Agajanian.


Here he is playing guitar.

The one below is a video of Toby's fancy footwork.

One More Thing About That

The Ditty Bops concert we went to a couple weeks ago was the first performance of their Farm Tour. To honor the farmers they dressed up like vegetables! Amanada was dressed as a carrot

and Abby was dressed as an artichoke. Here she is holding a vegan cupcake singing up a dream.

Awesome!

Third Stop

After the museum we went to another favorite dining spot for lunch. Can you guess where?

After the satisfying fare it was home again, home again.

Next stop . . . TobyMac.

The Nex Day

The plan was to see The Ditty Bops, stay over night and in the morning eat at our new favorite breakfast place in the city, Du Par's. After breakfast no one was quite ready to go home so we visited the nearby Los Angeles County Museum of Art. I'm so glad we did. I was introduced to Dan Flavin, an artist of fluorescent tube art. I was so excited by the exhibit I wanted to walk through again and again. What a nice surprise.

Here are some examples of his work.

Isn't it so pretty?

So . . . The Ditty Bops

I first heard The Ditty Bops on XM radio last Fall. A song called Fish to Fry caught my ear. I have since discovered more of their songs to Love. They are two very creative and talented girls with a mission to inspire and entertain. Check them out at the link above or here.

While poking around the internet to learn what I could about them I realized I could see them live. And see them live I did at the lovely Henry Fonda Music Box Theatre in Hollywood. I arranged an overnight trip for the whole family; John, Kevin, Natalie and Me. We stayed the the Beverly Garland Holiday Inn in North Hollywood and ventured to the venue via the Metro. Fun! John admits to coming to the show with me out of humor, but was pleasantly surprised by their flawlass musical engineering.

We'll see them again when we can.

Bye Brent ~ Have Fun in Europe

Here is a picture of the family the morning before Brent left for Europe. He left on Sunday the 29th of July. He will be gone for three weeks! He returns the day before school starts, August 20th. In this picture (Saturday morning) he is ready to leave for work and we are just preparing ourselves for an overnight trip to L. A. to see The Ditty Bops live!

Free Groceries?

Weird.

Today I went grocery shopping early for a Saturday. 8am. As I was completing my order the bagging clerk gifted me with a bag of groceries! I have a whole new appreciatiation for grocery shopping, which I'm sure was their intent. Of course I thought the grocery bag was going to be filled with stuff I could not use but, look at this . . .

Stuff I can use . . .

paper towels,

rice vinegar,

spaghetti sauce,

shampoo,

4 spice packets (1 for making turkey gravy),

refried beans,

enchilada sauce,

band aids,

markers,

hair gel,

tuna,

diced green chiles,

Hawaiian bread,

cheese sauce,

hot sauce,

cheese and peanut butter crackers,

cough drops,

2 toothbrushes,

fajita tortillas,

and I that's it.

Thanks Stater Bros.!

Happy Birthday Mom!

Wish I was there shopping with you.

Happy Birthday Teresa!

Sunday I was surprised by a phone call from Linda. We made dinner plans for Monday. The deal was they would bring all the food and all we had to do was barbeque it, eat and take them swimming. And they did. They brought all the food including the cake. It was fun seeing everyone. Thanks for coming over.

Water Skiing with Brent Teeter

The weekend after our birthday and baby meeting trip was spent water skiing with Brent Teeter on Lake Meade. Thanks Brent!

Check out the video of Kevin skiing.



and here is one of John.



We all had fun skiing (I got up for about 3 seconds), trying to ski, swimming in our own personal lagoon and just driving around the lake in the boat.

Nathaniel Scott Boberg

Born June 20, 2007

Continuing from June Lake . . .

John and I drove up to Fremont the Sunday after his birthday to meet our new nephew Nathaniel. Check out Michelle's blog for some pictures. Nathan was so anxious to meet us he didn't sleep all day. We had a nice dinner together, a peaceful night and a gloriours walk around Fremont Park in the morning. David's first day back at work was that Monday, so he missed out on the walk in the park, but he did get to treat his co-workers to a Hershey's chocolate bar announcing Nathaniel's arrival.

Looking forward to seeing you again soon.

Seven Seven Seven

John turned 43 (4+3=7) on July 7, 2007.

For his birthday he planned a hiking trip for us in the June Lake area. So, Friday after work we headed up to Mammoth, checked into our room then went out for a nice dinner at Whiskey Creek. Saturday morning after breakfast we made it over to June Lake for a nice "flat" hike. Not. The trail was not flat! And it was bloody hot! I hate hiking. I didn't give up though even when John said "Let's turn around", many times. Happy Birthday John, I Love You. It was beautiful at the "top" and half way up to the "top" was beautiful too.

We didn't make it as far as we intended, not because I was complaining, but because we ran out of water. So, June Lake hiking is beautiful. I will do it again even if I do hate hiking. After a brief landing at Schat's in June Lake for lunch

we visited the Double Eagle Resort in June Lake for spa treatments and relaxation (a Christmas gift from Mom Bullard, thanks Mom!). After a nice relaxing evening at the spa we drove back to Mammoth, had dinner at the Chart House then went back to our room. The next leg of this particular adventure was driving to Fremont on Sunday to see our new nephew Nathaniel Scott Boberg born June 20, 2007 and gift him with a baby quilt I made. The first one ever!

My Newest Favorite Drink

I've been wanting to try one of these for a couple weeks, but have had not looked very hard. The one store I did look in did not carry them. The timing was right to purchase one on the way to David's this weekend. As you can see it's vitaminwater with natural fruit flavoring. The first one I had was passionfruit. It was so good. It's sweet, but not sweet like soda. According to the label they are sweetened with crystalized fructose. Their labels are quippy too; fun to read. I like that. The second flavor I tried was guava and the third was grape. So far my favorite is passionfruit. They come in fifteen different flavors and vitamin mixtures. The one on the left in the photo is flavored with dragonfruit and according to the label has very much vitamin C, the one in the middle is called tropical citrus for energy and the one on the right is fruit punch fortified for revival. I want to try them all, but they seem hard to find and when I do find them that particular store does not carry all the flavors. So, I may be at it for awhile. To check out all the flavors (maybe you'll want to try them too) I've included a Glaceau, the producer of this drink. I think I'll try tropical citrus tomorrow for energy.

Let me know if you try it.

Ta Da!

French Toast Casserole
Photo as promised.

I made this casserole again when George and Jane were here visiting last weekend. That was Saturday morning.

Friday afternoon when they arrived we all headed straight to the pool and swam around cooling off. Friday night we sat down to a yummy dinner of grilled salmon and salad topped off with blondies and vanilla ice cream. During the preparation of dinner Jane sat down and treated us to some piano music. After dinner we took a short walk though the park.

After the casserole on Saturday we visited the Naval Armament Museum to see the product of the project John works. Then off the the theatre to se Ratatouille. I think the movie inspired John and George. They came straight home a began to make bread. John has been dreaming of recreating the bread his grandmother and dad used to make when he was younger. John was able to do that with the new bread machine he aquired for his birthday. Happy Birthday John! While "the boys" were creating their favorite treat Jane and I and Natalie and Kevin made sandwichesto take to Lake Isabella where we watched an early fireworks show. Happy Birthday Kevin!

Sunday morning we enjoyed homemade bread with butter and jam for breakfast served with grapefruit halves. Off to church we went followed by lunch at Cafe Potpourri. The afternoon took us back to the pool to cool off, naps, then pork tenderloin for dinner. After dinner we celebrated the birthdays of John and Kevin with Baskin Robbins cake and presents. More flashlights have been added to our collection. One solar powered and one that floats while sending out a life saving red flashing beam. Heather even popped in for a visit. Jane was able to capture a picture of the four kids all together.

Monday morning John and I were back at work, but Grandma and Grandpa came over in the morning to pick up the kids for a McDonald's breakfast.

Thanks for the visit Jane and George!

Come back soon.

Maybe when it's not so hot . . .