On Valentine's Day we decorated sugar cookies with friends. I had thrown away my food dye and forgot, so I used beet powder to dye the frosting a really pretty magenta and felt super granola. As we were decorating cookies and chatting, my friend asked me what our Valentine's day traditions are. They're pretty limited, but I said that decorating sugar cookies is a tradition. And my girls were like, no it's not! And then I realized that for the last 2 Valentine's we've been in a Spanish speaking country, not decorating sugar cookies. I had a good chuckle over that.

I love the fourth of July! Most years that we've lived here in CA, we've gone to the Rose, White and Blue Parade - a local parade that's really close to where we live. It's so fun and I think I love it the most. When the army reserves come rolling through, I barely hang on from bursting into tears. My heart is so grateful to live in the USA. I love living here. I love the people, I love the diversity. I love the opportunity. I don't fully understand what a big deal it is to have lived in North America my entire life, because I haven't experienced any amount of my freedom being removed from me. Undoubtably I take it for granted to some degree. It's a white woman's luxury that feels a little uncomfortable to type, and yet I'm so grateful.

Obviously, if we're going to camp at a State Beach, we're going to play on the beach lots. We spent some time there Friday night and then a big chunk of time there on Saturday. It was a lot of fun. I just love the beach! And having all those kids together - they just played and played and didn't want to stop. It was a really great trip!

This weekend, we went camping for one night at our favorite spot with some of our favorite people. It was a lot of fun! We have this little tent that we currently fit in perfectly. There's enough room for our mats and sleeping bags and our duffle bag and then there's a tiny bit of space at the entry and that's it! I love that we all fit in there so perfectly right now.

Camping with little kids really is all about making memories and it's definitely not about getting beauty rest. We had a little friend poke her head into our tent shortly after 6am (we were all awake anyways), and then another little friend came in and it was all giggles and laughs and so much fun! A fantastic way to start the day!

It was a beautiful weekend. And Conor commented that camping is a great use of the weekend. Lots of friend and family time.

We just took a 4-day trip to The Sea Ranch, which is about 3.5-4 hours north of us. It is a really beautiful place to be.

It was rainy and wet for the first couple of days. We did our best to enjoy the outdoors, but our girls were tired and grumpy. I keep forgetting how hard traveling with children can be and then I travel with them and ask myself, "why is this so hard?!" But we want to travel so we need to figure some things out.

Taking photographs helps me to remember the good and forget the bad and ugly. Thank heavens for cameras. Because there really was a lot of good. My favorite was the lighthouse at Point Arena. California is so jaw-dropping in its beauty. I just can't get enough! I feel so blessed to live in such a beautiful place!

More posts to follow, you know, once I catch up on sleep and laundry and life!