A Taste of Heaven

Here is the view that I woke up to this morning. Ahhhh vacation!

Fireflies, mixed berry pie, 4 bean salad, ham and turkey spread, Michigan strawberries, chocolate drizzled rice krispy treats, struen bread, water sports, jumping into the lake off of the dock, sitting under the willow tree reading a book, relaxing on the deck looking out at the lake, fireworks, a pirate boat ride, and did I mention fireflies? This is a tiny slice of heaven.





I'm blessed that my mother and father-in-law live in a beautiful home in Marcellus, MI. The house is right on the lake and from where I'm sitting I have a view of the water, the homes on the other side of the lake and blue skies with of course white puffy clouds.

Our flights yesterday were amazingly easy. Both boys did extremely well, Miles even slept for 3 hours on the flight to Chicago. When we arrived at the house we migrated to the kitchen. The spread of food is always incredible. The comment from Matt's dad was "how come we always have such great food when Matt and Laura come to visit?" hehe I'm sure it's like this most of the time which is what amazes me.




Miles, who is happiest outside, just keeps going up to the doors and making his sounds to be let outside. Mason is playing with the "Little People" toys that Matt played with when he was a boy. How cool is that. Mason loves it to. This proves that there is no need for new, fancy, technology based toys around here. Mason is happy as a clam delivering old letters and taking the large boat out for a spin. It's nice to see that he can adapt to any environment and that his imagination is really all he needs.

I'm sure I'll blog a little bit more while away. It's too good not to share. But, I'll put in the caveat that if I'm enjoying myself too much to remember or the lazy days take hold of me I might not be back until we're home. ;-)

Father's Day and the San Rafael Italian Street Painting Festival

On Father's Day Matt had this awesome idea to spend a little time with each of the boys and myself individually. It was a nice thought since most weekends we try to spend as much possible time together as a family.

First he took Mason to the park. They loaded up their gear and hopped on their bikes. They rode down the street to the park at the nearby school where they played Ice Cream Man. Here's the portrait Matt took of Mason as..."the ice cream man".




When their time was done they rode home so that Matt could take the lunch packed in the cooler, pick up Miles and head to the stream behind the park at the Marinwood Community Center. Miles LOVES to throw rocks into the creek. They spent their whole time playing in the shallow water and throwing rocks. What a great Father's Day moment.




While Miles and Matt were tossing rocks into the stream, Mason, my mom and I headed to the Italian Street Painting Festival. My mom was visiting that week and when she and I went to do a little grocery shopping the day before we literally stumbled upon the festival. It was the perfect way to spend a few hours in the afternoon.







According to Wikpedia, street painting has been recorded throughout Europe since the 16th century. Street painters in Italy are called madonnari (pronounced: mah-doan-are-ee with madonnaro being the singular form) because they often created pictures representing the Madonna. Maybe this is why my mom and I enjoyed it so much. Being Italian, I think we must have it in our blood. I come from a line of artists, my mother being no exception. In fact, growing up, she was my art teacher at the grade school I attended. This festival was right up our alley. Wonderful art to experience and the best part was, well there were two best parts. The first was that we were able to watch the artist creating. Some of the paintings were completed but many of them were in progress. It was wonderful to see the artists at work. In fact, Mason and his friend Milo sat down to watch one of them. That should tell you something. A four and a five year old boy, parked on the street, watching art being made. It was amazing.



The second best thing was that they had a children's section. For $12 you could buy a 2' square and create your own masterpiece. It included the square to color in, a box of chalk for you to take home and a polaroid of you with your completed drawing.

My mom bought Mason and Milo each a square and it was so much fun to watch them create. Mason is more of a line artist than a color in the lines type. This may change as he gets older but I worked with his strength to create a really cool piece. In fact, Maya and I had as much fun as the boys. We both let them put the foundation of the painting down on the ground and then embellished the drawings with their direction.



Mason did this great line drawing of some flowers which turned into monster flowers. I colored in the shapes that he drew with the colors that he wanted. I only made a couple of suggestions along the way and WOW, I love his picture, our picture. It was a really cool thing to create a piece of art with him. He absolutely loved it and was so proud of it. We did have a couple of meltdowns along the way. One was because his chalk broke and the other was when he realized that this wasn't a permanent addition to the streets of San Rafael. But, all in all it was an amazing time. Thanks mom for buying the squares and letting the boys express their creativity!



Milo was really into drawing a house. It became a monster house, hence the monster flowers. ;-) Maya took the structure and made it such a great piece. All of the little squares of color were so great and the creatures in the windows were awesome. Yea MIlo and Maya! The photo of Milo holding up his polaroid is a Mason photograph. A super shot!



This festival will definitely be on our agenda next year and I would highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys outdoor festivals and wonderful art. I'm sure street painting is something that comes to a lot of areas and I would highly suggest finding out if and when one is coming to your town. It's like going to an outdoor museum that won't exist in a day or two. A transient treasure for those fortunate enough to experience.

Father's Day wrapped up with time at home which was really nice. We played in the backyard and bbq'd burgers. My mom spent time with the boys, Matt and I spent some time together and the boys got in a healthy dose of dad time. I ran and grabbed the camera while they were literally attacking him. It was fun to see boys just being boys. All three of them!






I hope all the dad's I know had a wonderful day in celebration of the love you share with your children.

Graduation and the Start of Summer

Mason attended pre-school this year and unlike most, it closes for the summer. It's at the local community center so there are camps and events during the summer that prevent the pre-school from staying open. So, even though we haven't officially hit "school age" I'm in the cycle of summer vacation. I can see that this time of year is going to take on a whole new meaning. I'm now beginning to understand why my sister would call me near the end of August singing and dancing over the phone because school was about to start. She still calls me on that first day of school, happy as a clam, telling me how it's her favorite day of the year. I think I'm starting to see why. ;-)

Today is the first day of the start of summer vacation. Thankfully the day is planned out for me since my mom was visiting and we need to take her to the airport today. That's a few hours right there. Then there will be a Target stop for new shoes because every time I look down, Mason's feet are squeezing into the new shoes I just bought him. ;-)

But, all of this is to share the photographs from the "Graduation" of Mason's class. He can't attend Kindergarten yet because you need to be 5 by a certain time, but because of his ability to relate to older children, he was in the 4's class this year. What that means is that his class with the exception of Mason, graduated and is moving on to Kindergarten. I can't complain because I LOVE his teachers and Susan who is the head teacher of the school is absolutely amazing. She is so sweet and kind, artistic and loving. I can't think of a better place for Mason to be as an introduction to school.

I want to thank all of the parents who I've become friends with over this past year. We moved to San Rafael in September of last year and each and every person I met through the Marinwood Morning School made our transition easier. Not only has Mason made wonderful friends through his class but I have as well. We will miss you as you move onto Kindergarten but for those of you going to Mary Silveira, we live just down the street!

So, here are some photo's of the big night. When Mason was given the choice to either watch the graduation or participate, he chose to participate, of course!

Enjoy!








His teacher Debbie.


His teacher Susan. We love you!

Take Me To The River

Matt and the boys and I went camping this past weekend. We were invited to go on an annual group camping trip that some friends of ours organize. This was year 5. They pick a different spot each year and this time it was Richardson Grove. We went there last year with Shaun, Maya and Milo and loved it. It's right off of the highway which can be a little weird but once you make your way to the river, life is good! Living so close to such amazing beauty is truly a blessing.



We packed our car, to the brim, and headed north three and a half hours to the beautiful Eel River. (If I thought Mason or Miles could have lasted holding something for the ride I would have packed another bag or two. ;-) On our way we passed the Real Goods solar living store in Hopland, CA. At the entrance of the location is an incredible sculpture that I had to stop to photograph. There was a similar piece at the 2007 Burning Man. The one I saw there was of a woman and child. It was amazing. Water poured between their hands by day and fire by night. Simply amazing. They were built by 180 people over the course of 2 years. This piece in Hopland's name is Eileen and she along with the 7 other figures this team created stand 38 feet tall and weigh between five and ten tons each. It's definitely worth seeing if you're passing that way.



On this camping trip there were 17 of us all together. 11 adults and 5 children. Our family arrived a day later than the rest of the gang so we had some making up to do. I think Matt played that out by eating his fair share of toasted marshmallows and s'mores Saturday night. I spent my time by the river enjoying the sun, watching my boys play and catching up with my friends. Mason had fun playing with his friends, eating and rafting with Matt and Miles spent his days throwing rocks into the river. The boys were in heaven.

The rocks were SO beautiful. Mason came up to me on Saturday and gave me a heart shaped rock. That seemed to be a theme for the weekend. It was fun to look for them hidden among the ground. It was like finding a gem each time. Here are the photo's of the one's that we collected. I love finding love in nature.




It wasn't super hot but the river was cool, clear and refreshing. There were a few spots of "rapids" that you could cruise down. Easy enough to take the little ones down the river a bit. Plenty of rocks to collect and skip. In fact the guys skipped stones for a while on Sunday.




The photo's I'm posting were taken with my trusty point and shoot. I have a Canon Power Shot SD750. I really love the size of this camera and it takes really great pictures for being an itsy bitsy camera. On the post production side, Light Room is my new best friend. Once I download the images, I just import them and make my adjustments and wow, the images look amazing. Praise to the developers of Light Room!

All in all I have to say, there's nothing quite like spending time with friends, laughing, soaking up the sun and sleeping under the stars. (I must also send a special thank you to Cassandra for, uh hum, how shall I say, the creative way that you ate your s'more.)

Thank you, thank you, thank you to the group, for your time, your laughter, your helping hands with watching our boys when we were doing other things, for organizing the trip and of course, for your friendship.

See you next year!

Click here for the slideshow if you want to view.
(For those of you tracking Mason's development as a photographer, the last shot in the slideshow is his. He just keeps blowing me away.)

Let's Go Red Wings!

For all of you who don't know and don't follow hockey, yes, the Detroit Red Wings won the Stanley Cup last night. It's a time to celebrate, a time to cheer and a time to wear your Red Wings jersey if you have one.

When I met Matt, one of the first things I asked him was if he was a sports watcher. If Monday Night Football was part of his routine. Luckily, his answer was no! That was definitely a prerequisite of mine. No Monday Night Football watching in my house. What he did say was that he would watch an occasional soccer or hockey game. Oh, and March Madness which was fine by me because I always liked to watch those games and make a small bet here and there on who would win. ;-)

I didn't think soccer and hockey would be that big of a deal since they were practically NEVER on tv. Little did I know that he would watch games that were 2 or 3 years old just because they were on! Ha! But, really it's been a nice blend of sports in the house.

I can get behind soccer. Matt's still on two teams as he's nearing that "over something" league and is in great shape because of it. I can't complain about that! And Mason is playing soccer already. He has a ton of fun and is meeting new friends through the game. Even little Miles is showing signs of becoming a soccer player when he grows up. Pretty much since before he's been able to walk he's been kicking a ball. He would hold our hands to walk and kick any ball or anything that was in his path.

As for hockey, it's been on tv, off tv and finally back on tv. Matt came home yesterday after shooting the NBA playoff teams with Rick and Garrett and immediately turned the tv on. It was game 6, the final in the series. The Detroit Red Wings vs. the Pittsburgh Penguins. We don't have any sports type of clothing for our kids but they each have a redwings outfit. Thanks uncle Scott. ;-) As the game was being played, I loved the little informative visits from Mason that the Wings were winning and how the puck flew through the air and in the goal. Very sweet.

Congratulations Red Wings! Nice job.

One final thought, as a mother of two boys, I'm learning to appreciate the connection that father's and sons have and how sports can be a part of that. It provides an outlet for their competitive nature and is a fun and social way to get out that energy that is bursting from them. A way for them to relate to each other, to bond. Hopefully Monday Night Football won't creep into the agenda as the boys get older. I may just have to opt for the bigger cable package that airs more soccer and hockey!




I HAD to throw these two photos in. After I took the pictures of my boys in red, Mason wanted to take a picture. I think he's got the bug and we definitely want to encourage that!


Nice photo of daddy Mason. Keep up the good work!