Begin Spring Break! Ben's cousin Jeff was in town for work and wanted to meet up with Uncle Dan and us for dinner. So we headed up early to beat the traffic (taking 6 freeways in the process) and visited this place, and got a tour. They make one of the most popular video games on the planet.
While waiting for Uncle Dan to get off work, we played around on Uncle Dan's fat bike.
The only person who could really ride it was Dad, because the rest of us can't reach. The day prior to this, Ben had ridden his bike up Onyx Summit, a 7200' climb, with his cycling buddy Chuck Bramwell and others.
With Saturday came General Conference, and out came the Legos. Ben and I are able to listen, but the kids don't, so I think we'll need to remedy that a little bit come next conference.
Easter morning, keeping it simply and lower-sugar. Bike jerseys for the kids and a little egg hunt around the house.
Funny candy courtesy of Grandma Chickens.
More General Conference. I think at this point Jilly was whining about why there was so much of General Conference, as I had told them they couldn't play with Legos during the Sunday morning session. That was the session I remember sitting through as a child when everyone had to go to the church building to watch the sessions.
Later in the afternoon after conference had ended, we had an Easter potluck with neighbors and the kids had an egg hunt. Lots of candy and even a few $1 bills.
During Priesthood session, I met up with our friend Emily and her kids at a park where the girls discovered how to fly off the swings and Jilly created this "natural food" dinner. Emily had made little rice crispie treat bird's nests with chocolate eggs inside for the Easter holiday.
The ward Easter egg hunt was held on the last weekend of March, and the kids had plenty of fun with that one as well.
Our friend Talia tagged along too.
The week of Spring Break we hung out at home, rode bikes to a local community park, and Evelyn became a royal homebody who only wanted to build with Legos all the time. I did get them to practice some music and do some workbook stuff during the week. When I told them it was time to help with chores they all told me at various times, "But it's Spring Break! We're supposed to have a break! Why do we have to do chores?" I replied that a "break" from school only meant time away from school and homework, and nothing more. Grumpy faces and short lectures on "you live in this house and mess it up, so you can help clean it up too" ensued.
This last weekend Ben and his friend Mike, who recently moved south towards San Diego, planned a big bike ride up Palomar Mountain. We drove down on Friday and decided to meet Mike and his family for tacos at Tacos El Gordo, Ben's favorite taco joint. We were stuck in far more traffic than we had planned for and didn't make it to any touristy stuff except for what follows below.
Traffic began clearing the further south we headed, so we decided to go see the international border between the US and Mexico. The above picture shows Tijuana in the background. There's a bull-fighting arena on the hilltop, and to the right of it, the International Park. We didn't have time to walk to it, (it would have been about 4 miles round-trip), so we took the path headed for the beach.
On the right side of this picture, you can see a road winding its way up the hillside. The fence is to the right of that road, which the border patrol uses. There is a road to an international park that is right next to the fence where it goes into the ocean, but since 9/11 they only open it on Saturdays and Sundays.
One of the Channel Islands out in the distance.
There's Tijuana in the background again, and the border fence going out into the ocean. The kids had questions about why there were two border fences, and why you can't just go back and forth across the border. It led to a conversation on passports and what it means to live in a land of opportunity.
The beach was really soft here, more so than in Orange County.
It was a nice walk, and we passed several horseback riders on the way. The path cuts out through the Tijuana river estuary, and this area is a natural preserve. On the way back, we encountered the first mosquitoes we've seen since last summer. Ben and Gordon both got bit.
Yum. Except we forgot to leave off the spicy green salsa on the al pastor tacos, so the kids wouldn't really eat them. They drank a lot of horchata instead to wash the heat away. Then Ben ordered a quesadilla, and they wouldn't eat that because it was too cheesy. We just rolled our eyes and ate too many tacos. Later in the car, Ben made up a song in spanish about how the kids were complaining about the cheese and the kids rolled their eyes and laughed back. "¡El queso, el queso, se queja del queso!"
Good taco shops always have long lines!
While Ben and Mike went on their long bike ride on Saturday (77 miles and a 8,786 feet of climbing) the moms took the kids to the Miramar area and walked around at the Flying leatherneck aviation museum. Lots and lots of airplanes, helicopters, fighter jets, along with some tanks and artillery equipment.
The girls were kind of bored by the end, but the boys really liked it.
This was one of the stops on Ben's bike ride. It's at a gas station outside of Harrah's Resort Southern California, on the Rincón Valley Reservation. He took the picture because that big mountain back there is Palomar Mountain, and he was about to go up it.
A mexican coke, which tastes amazing on a long ride. Especially after a brutal climb.
They rode up to the observatory we visited last year on our camping trip. Such a crazy amount of climbing to get up this mountain!
Ben's friend Mike.
Atop Palomar Mountain before an 11-mile descent on bumpy roads.
They made it down the mountain in one piece and we all met up in Santa Ysabel at the Julian Pie Company. They make some seriously good pies. I think the secret is in their crust, and it's the best pie crust I've ever had. Even my kids ate it, and liked it.
Ben is really tired and relaxing in the surprisingly comfortable chair. Or maybe he was just so tired that sitting in anything was nice. He said he was really glad to see us at the Pie shop. They had originally planned on riding further, but by the time they got to the top of Palomar, the decided that they would call it quits in Santa Ysabel.
Two dutch apple slices, one dutch apple with caramel sauce, and one apple mountain berry slice. Yum!
We headed back to our friend's place to eat dinner and so the men and the kids could hit the hot tub before heading home. They had a nice elliptical machine in their front room, and my kids couldn't get enough of it. If we end up in a cold, snow-bound area, we're going to have to get one of these for them to burn some energy off on.
We got home kind of late, and the kids crashed really hard. It was a fun little trip and a great way to end Spring Break. Back to the grind tomorrow!
