The busy summer continues

From 2009 July 31 - Birthday celebration with family

We are already well into August and the busy summer continues. Last weekend I drove down in the desert to bring Christine and Abby home after their long two month vacation in Pennsylvania. We arrived to a big "welcome home" sign for the girls and birthday decorations up in the house for me. Since it was too hot to be outside, Saturday I planned a scavenger hunt for the kids at the El Centro mall. They had fun trying to find all of the items on the list. Afterwards we got some smoothies to cool off. That afternoon I drove to Yuma to enjoy a BBQ and the pool with the Myers and Frank. We had a good time together. Sunday morning we all went to church and then I was off to Imperial again for lunch. This past week began with our annual office fun day. Since we didn't have any budget to spend this year we decided to go for a day in the park. We all met up at Irvine Regional Park and enjoyed the $2 zoo, a fun little train ride, and the paddle boats.

From 2009 August 3 - Office Fun Day

Everyone brought food for a picnic together. I enjoyed the afternoon playing bocce. Click here to see more photos! Friday at noon after getting off work I was packed and ready to go camping with my Grace Group from church. This is our annual camping trip and our second time going to Camp Mabel French near Lopez Lake. The drive was long (about 5 hours) but after I was there I really enjoyed the relaxed peace and quiet of the camp (even with the 17 kids under the age of 6 running around!). The scenery is quite beautiful and I set up my tent under a giant oak tree.

From 2009 Aug - Camping Lake Lopez

We all pitched in for meals and it was fun to get to know some of the other families that came. I spent the week sitting around the campfire playing hinky pinky, relaxing, napping, hiking, and eating. I am glad I went even though the getting ready part was quite stressful. Saturday afternoon we drove into town (Arroyo Grande) and walked around the famer's market where I bought some delicious locally grown peaches and then had some fabulous ice cream at Doc Bernstein's Ice Cream Lab...mmm good!! I had the coffee flavored ice cream with crushed espresso beans & caramel bits. Sunday after breakfast it was time to pack it up. All in all it was a very good weekend!