Mother's Day Weekend in LA

Once Austin's fever broke, I told Patrick I wanted a hotel room in LA for Mother's Day weekend. I packed all of our food for the weekend, gave the kids their overnight packing lists, and headed to LA as soon as Amelia's Saturday morning ballet class was over.

We started our weekend at the Columbia Memorial Space Center museum. Originally I had chosen it because we had free entry with our reciprocal museum pass. But when we arrived, we discovered that they were having a free museum day with a special Radio Wave organization hosting multiple activities.

The afternoon was full of building and playing.

 

 

 

Overall, we are grateful the special program was there. The museum would have been a disappointment without the extra activities. But with the program, we ended up staying until closing time.

Hotel lobby dinner - photo we sent to Dad to show that we were safely at the hotel.

Pool time

We started Sunday morning off at the California Science Center.

The only A-12 trainer ever built

 

Watching the Blue Angels IMAX 3D movie.

 

 

In the afternoon, we started our trek home but made a stop at the mini-golf location in Ventura. The kids had BOGO coupons from last summer's library reading program.

 

Sending photos of our one food stop on the way home.

I love adventuring with my kids! So it made it a great mother's day weekend for me.

 

Puzzle Challenge

When chatting with some friends from church, they discovered that we love puzzles and often have one in progress. They shared with us that they have some puzzle competitions going on between friends - each person times themself completing a puzzle independently. Since Patrick had left for TX and we had a more open Sunday night, I completed the challenge on Sunday night, and Amelia worked on it on Monday morning. Amelia was so proud that she beat Mom by 2 minutes AND we both had the leading times on puzzle completion for the group of friends.

 

Austin started a fever at the beginning of this week so he was unable to attend the AWANA awards ceremony. But I took Colleen, and she accepted Austin's awards for him along with her own.

 

Amelia went outside to check the mail and came back inside hollering that there was a snake on our driveway. We watched the gopher snake crawl into the van tire and then back out again into the bushes. Our neighbor Murph confirmed its nonpoisonous status for us.

Amelia attended a babysitting course along with others from our homeschool group.

Amelia and I had tickets to the last ballet of the season - three different performances choreographed by Balanchine and Arpino as well as a modern piece. We had a lovely time!

Since Patrick had to stay in TX over the weekend, Greg & Mila watched Austin & Colleen during the ballet performance.

 

Polo Club & Ladies Tea

We started off this super full weekend with a Friday evening field trip. Amelia had mentioned to me shortly after I took over the Field Trip coordinator position for our co-op that she wanted to visit the Polo Club. I assumed it would never happen, but then I discovered that one of our moms used to work at the Polo Club. A few emails later, we had a field trip scheduled & an invitation to the free Friday night games.

Our tour guide started by going over the history of polo, all the equipment, and how they train in the cages.

Then he went over all the care and training of the horses - at least 42 per team!

Then we watched a game for the next couple of hours.

Then Saturday morning we had the ladies' tea in the Aijian garden. It was a sweet time.

I stole baby Emet for most of the tea so his mama could eat with both hands!

The garden was in all its glory.

 

Colleen has been spending a significant amount of her Saturday and Sunday free time riding bikes with our neighbor, Kinsley. The girls spend hours zooming between our houses and around the cul-de-sac.

Tadpoles

Bike ride to the beach for snack time

She is excited to work on her next sewing project - a pillowcase.

We headed to Ellwood to catch some tadpoles to raise.

 

We started pulling out the next season/size clothes, and Colleen found these heels of Amelia's. While they were still too big, she wanted a photo of them.

Push-ups with Dad whenever they remember to get a set in.

Sometimes they are kind to each other; taking long walks helps.

We had some friends over who pulled out nerf guns. Colleen discovered that she could tuck bullets in her belt loops. It was hysterical.

Friends came over for a playdate; Lucy and Hosanna love it when Amelia gives them a ballet lesson.

Amelia & I worked on this gorgeous puzzle for a few days.

Photograph taken to remember that this kid read the dictionary for fun before bedtime over many nights.