Hello from Sunny CA!

We are enjoying beautiful days in Long Beach ... high temps of 78-80 and all sunshine since we arrived. Our flights on Tues were good ... but our bags didn't make it on the same flight. We hung around the airport for about an hour and waited for the next flight in, picked them up and headed for the hotel.

There is a beautiful harbor area here with lots of neat shops/restaurants within walking distance. The "Queen Mary" is permanently docked in the harbor as a floating hotel, and there is a neat lighthouse and *huge* marina. So lots to look at and enjoy.

Wed & Thurs Lisa had meetings in the morning and Mitch and the kids have been venturing out for breakfast and hanging at the pool. Wed afternoon we drove about a half hour South of the hotel and spent the afternoon on Huntington Beach. It was a beautiful beach, and not super crowded since it was a weekday. Mitch, TJ and Abby had fun playing in the waves as you can see from the pics and You Tube video. Not long after they were done playing, we saw people pointing and looking out in the water and lifeguard whistles started blowing, and everyone came dashing out of the water ... but luckily, it was a pod of dolphins swimming and playing and rolling in the surf and nothing more threatening. There were probably 8-10 dolphins and they moved up and down the shoreline for us to enjoy for quite awhile. Sometimes they would do some small jumps and rolls and you could just about see their whole body, it was really neat.

Last night we walked up into a neat area of Long Beach for dinner with restaurants, bars and clubs. We ate in an outdoor patio area and TJ got a real kick seeing some fancy cars cruising the strip.

Not lots of pics so far, just of our excursion to Huntington Beach ... but more to follow!

If you can't click on the You Tube window below, you can see the video at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bubNDXq33Fk

Summer Fun at the Sprayground!

We had fun today meeting Traci, Katie & Bethany at the "Sprayground" at a Bloomington park! Bethany and Abby are both from Zhuzhou, Hunan and are only 3 days apart in age. Traci traveled with us to meet the girls in January, 2004 ...

Happy 9th Birthday, TJ!

TJ had a fun few days celebrating his 9th birthday! On Sunday, he had best-buddy Jared out for a boat ride. We went to dinner Monday night at one of his favorite places, Pizza Ranch. Then we were too full from dinner to eat his birthday treats when we came home, so we held those off until Tuesday night. Not bad, stretching those birthday celebrations out over 3 days!

This year TJ wanted a "big cookie" instead of a cake ... so I made a 9x13 pan of chocolate chip cookie bars. Last night the kids had fun topping the cookie with ice cream, chocolate sauce, carmel sauce, whipped cream, nuts and cherries! Abby treated TJ to a very special and unique rendition of "Happy Birthday" and TJ sat there like a typical 9 yr old big brother, not sure if it was cool to smile or not. HA

The slide show at the top has pics of the boat ride and the cookie feast! The You Tube video below is Abby singing to her big brother!

If the You Tube screen below won't play for you, you can see the video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXcJX-krkd0

July 4th in Peoria

We usually sit on the dock at the marina and watch the fireworks from there, but last night we ventured to downtown Peoria to take in the riverfront activities. Listened to a favorite band and enjoyed dinner at Old Chicago ... finished up just in time to walk out and see the fireworks. Nice display, very beautiful ... but then it took an hour to get out of traffic! Oh well, it's once a year, right? :-)

Cell phone camera to the rescue again! We were up on a deck outside the restaurant and could look right down on the barge on the river that was launching the fireworks. Great spot! I heard there were 200,000 people on the riverfront last night and I think we were behind them all driving home!

Beautiful Weekend, Beautiful Sunset

It was a gorgeous weekend, which offered us some family time at the marina. This beautiful sunset greeted us when we were heading back to the boat from dinner Sat night ... who says you have to be at the ocean to see the most beautiful sunset ever?

The orange and reds that were in the sky and reflecting on the river reminded me of one of the most beautiful sunsets I have ever seen, when we were on a sunset catamaran cruise in Maui three years ago. This one was definitely up there in the most gorgeous I've seen! I wish I would have had a better camera with me ... these were just taken with my cell phone, but still show how beautiful it was.

Turkey Festival Weekend!

It was a beautiful weekend for the Tremont Turkey Festival ... here are a few pics of the kids enjoying the carnival, the parade and Abby getting hugs from all her favorite costumed characters, and one of Mitch working in the food line area. Drew's band isn't a big competitive marching band, but they had fun today in casual tshirt uniforms being part of the parade. They always stop playing right before they get to my camera, and today was no exception, as you can see from the You Tube video! HA

If you have trouble viewing the You Tube video box below, you can probably go straight to the site, here ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbEtUk5xf7o

Diva Alert!

Abby had to get herself all prettied up this morning to go outside and play ... skirt, necklace, rings, earrings ... and to top off the ensemble, her light up Cinderella shoes! Kind of hard to play basketball with TJ in those shoes, so at one point she had to switch to her sequined flip flops! I think I have created a monster ... a frilly one! :-)

THS Band & Chorus Trip

Drew and 52 other kids from THS are on the road to Toronto, Ontario tonight ... TJ, Abby and I went to see them load up and head out tonight. They have a great itinerary planned for the kids, and even have a blog set up for friends/family to follow each day and see what they are doing ...

http://www.thsmusicintoronto.blogspot.com/

Sat morning they arrive at Niagra Falls and will have a boat ride and tour. Sounds like fun ... of all the places we have been, we have never been there!

Abby's spring pictures!

Abby had these great pics taken at daycare, by a woman who lives in Tremont and is getting a great start at a new photography business. She took the pics of the kids last summer at the river ... and I'm going to have her do Drew's senior pics too!

Driving Skills for Life

Drew had a great opportunity to participate in a school program funded by Ford Motor Company over the past few weeks ... and it concluded this week with the announcement that Tremont and one other area h.s. tied for first place in their school's development of a safe driving campaign. This means the school gets additional funding from Ford, and all 25 kids on the THS Safe Driving Team receive $500 savings bonds. There were 7 area high schools in the competition.

Kids from all 7 schools had the chance to spend a 1/2 day with professionally trained drivers from Ford behind the wheel of the "Skid Car" ... which is specially designed to help them learn how to correct a vehicle in a full skid situation. The pics in the slide show are of Drew driving the skid car, which just happened to be a beautiful red Mustang! It was a great experience for all the kids, and it's great to see such a large corporation be a good community partner. They have already stated they will return again next year to work with the kids again.

Here's a link to the Ford Motor Company "Driving Skills for Life" site that explains the competition and prizes. Congrats Tremont!

http://www.drivingskillsforlife.com/content/view/68/17/lang,en/