First Baptism, With Pictures!

Hallelujah!! Peter sent 3 pictures this week with his letter! After a bit of computer time, we got the pictures opened- here they are:

This is a beach he went to on a Pday.I'm sure it was hard for him not to run out into the surf and do a belly flop or a Superman dive!
Not sure what this building is. Probably their "flat". I'm sure he's trying to catch the particularly nice sunset. Looks like a decent place, compared to other places in the world where missionaries have to live:
My favorite! Peter's first baptism! Here's what he had to say about it: "Now I thought that this week couldn't get any better, but I was wrong, you know that baptism that I told you about, well we taught her everyday this week so we could do the baptism on Saturday. And on Friday after the lesson we asked who she wanted to baptize her, and she asked if I could do it. And that's what happened!!!!!! Saturday I was able to baptize her and it was something that I will never forget."
He looks happy!! I love being a missionary mom!

Meat-Filled Sunday!

For all you carnivores out there, here's a really yummy recipe that we tried for dinner today. That White BBQ Sauce is so yummy!

Double Barbecue Bacon-Wrapped Grilled Chicken

INGREDIENTS

White Barbecue Sauce
1/4	cup mayonnaise or salad dressing
2	teaspoons lemon juice
1	teaspoon cider vinegar
2	teaspoons chopped parsley
1/4	to 1/2 teaspoon red pepper sauce
Bacon-Wrapped Chicken
4	boneless skinless chicken breasts
8	slices packaged precooked bacon
2	teaspoons barbecue seasoning
1/4	cup barbecue sauce

DIRECTIONS

1.	Heat gas or charcoal grill. In small bowl, stir together white barbecue sauce ingredients; cover and refrigerate until serving time.
2.	Wrap each chicken breast with 2 slices bacon, stretching bacon to cover as much of the breast as possible; secure ends of bacon to chicken with toothpicks. Sprinkle both sides with barbecue seasoning.
3.	Place chicken on grill over medium heat. Cover grill; cook 5 minutes. Brush with 2 tablespoons of the barbecue sauce. Cook 5 to 7 minutes longer or until juice of chicken is clear when center of thickest part is cut (170°F). Turn chicken; brush with remaining barbecue sauce. Serve chicken topped with white barbecue sauce.

Meatless Monday

Last Monday, as I was sitting at the hair salon reading a magazine, I found an article about Being Green. I'm all for being green, within reason. For instance, I love my reusable shopping bags. I try to turn off lights, turn down the heat, (which, by the way, is become much easier, the older I get!), and if my town had a recycling program, I'd join. One of the Green tips in this article was to go meatless for dinner on Mondays. Ok, I can do that, even though I'm not sure if that will make a big difference for the environment. Here's what we had for dinner last Meatless Monday. It was wildly popular and I will definitely make it again. Thanks to Sandra Lee and her Semi-Homemade Cooking:

Barbeque Roasted Potatoes with Sour Cream Bacon Sauce

Ingredients

For Potatoes:

• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 tablespoons barbeque seasoning (recommended: Grill Mates)
• 1 tablespoon crushed garlic
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice
• 1 1/2 pounds baby white potatoes, quartered

For Sauce:

• 1 cup sour cream
• 2 tablespoons crumbled bacon
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tablespoon dried chives
• 1 teaspoon hot sauce

Potatoes:

Directions

Preheat grill to medium heat.

In a large bowl add olive oil, barbeque seasoning, garlic and lemon juice. Mix well to combine. Add potatoes and toss to coat.

Place potatoes in an aluminum foil pouch and seal. Place on the grill or in a preheated 400 degree F oven for 20 to 25 minutes until potatoes are tender.

Sauce:

Combine all ingredients in a small bowl. Put the potatoes into a medium bowl and pour in the sauce. Toss well to coat the potatoes or serve the sauce on the side.

I didn't use baby white potatoes- just regular ones, cubed.

Our Torrey Pines Connection

When my mom was moving out of her house, she gave away a lot of family things. This painting was something I got. It was painted by my Grandmother Good:
I mentioned that it looked like Torrey Pines, a beautiful area by La Jolla, just north of San Diego. Mom said that it was Torrey Pines, and that her mother had spent some time there in the 20's. Fast forward to Easter, when Brian, Lindsey, Bruce and I hiked along the beaches and bluffs at Torry Pines. Here are some of the trees that are now protected at the Torrey Pines State Preserve:I made everyone sit down and listen to what I could remember about my grandmother's story, which sadly, wasn't much. When I got home I called Mom and asked for a few details. Grandmother Good was in her early 20's when she came to La Jolla to stay with her sister, Mary. They were having art lessons, and this was one of the painting done then. That's about all that Mom knew. I imagine what a beautiful and unspoiled place Torry Pines was then. It's still amazing, with the protected Preserve, a championship golf course and the most amazing Craftsman-style Lodge that inspired the architecture of Disney's Grand Californian.

There is a tag on the back of the painting: 1st place at the 1924 Calgary Stampede Art Exposition! Neat family history!

Way Too Many Kids/Pictures!

Today I worked at Eagle Bay Elementary, the biggest school where we take pictures. We did 36 classes, including 2 autistic units, which comes out to over 900 kids. Way too many kids, way too many pictures. It's a bummer when I start taking pictures before school even starts, and we barely get the last class done before the end-of-day bell rings. Today that meant 6 hours on my feet with no lunch and no breaks, cajoling those little angels into big, bright smiles. Thank heavens it's a nice school where the kids really know how to smile! I'm beat!! Here's what I've been perfecting for the last 3 months:Welcome to the country! This set-up is actually my favorite of the the 3 Spring seasons I've done. The kids look nice and relaxed, hanging all over that fence. (Yes, we assemble a vinyl fence every day.) One boy asked me if I had a piece of straw that he could hang out of his mouth as a prop. I think he was serious. *eyeball roll* Besides better photography skills, I've also improved my crowd control skills. Today I experimented with getting entire classes to line up from across the gym, in a single file line behind a piece of tape on the floor, just using hand signals. Sometimes it worked. Things I love about my job: impromptu hugs from Kindergartners, perfect looking little girls, 12 year old boys that like to tease (in good taste!), kids who say "thank you", taking all of my equipment down at the end of the day and teachers who control their classes. Things I don't like: dirty, sticky kids, teachers who send their classes down but don't come with them, parents that don't speak English, school secretaries that ignore me, moms that are mean to their kids, Hispanic boys who raise their chins in a challenge towards me, no potty breaks, teachers who want me to "use that lens that makes me look like (fill in the blank) or that lens that takes of 20 years and 40 pounds' (If I had a dollar....) and parents that insist on "just one more" picture of their screaming 2 year old who obviously doesn't ever want to have their picture taken. Whew! Sorry, that turned into a bit of a rant! Only 3 more workin' days till my summer vacation starts!!

Catchin' Up

I'm so far behind on all of my postings, so I'm just going to be putting random things on as I have the time! This is the professional picture from the Scottsdale horse show- it makes my happy. :)

One more change.

Ok, so this whole email scam thing is such a pain. I'm not using an msn or hotmail accounts ever again. Here's my new, new email: barbara@stratfordlegal.com. Hopefully, this will be the end of the changes. Thanks for putting up with all this drama! Luv ya!

Nope, I'm not in London.

So sorry, but someone has hijacked my email. I'm trying to fix things, but there are no real people at MSN. In the meantime, I set up a new hotmail account: rockosmom2010@hotmail.com.

Where The River Meets The Sea

Right before the earthquake hit, we took a little stroll, (Brian called it the Batan Death March), along the beach at the Torry Pines Reserve. Lindsey likes to take long strolls at a fast pace and we all do our best to keep up. I'm sure she thinks we are all a bunch of wimps! Anyway, it was a beautiful Easter Sunday and a lot of people were out taking "strolls" too.

Brian pointing out a spot where a river flows into the ocean. Notice where his eyes are looking. Yeah.
A beach squirrel who was completely unafraid of people. This squirrel later tried to trip Brian in a quest to beat up another beach squirrel:Have you ever seen sea foam? It's gross. Lindsey thinks that it's full of people skin. Having it covering slimy seaweed makes it even grosser:Lots of para-gliders and para-sailers were out enjoying the wind:I almost died trying to follow Lindsey around this point to where the good sea shells were. We'll have to go back when the tide is out next time. So we don't die.A nice lady took our picture- good thing were weren't sitting here, under the sea cliffs, when the earthquake happened! Brian is looking at the camera now, because is mom isn't taking the picture.The hike continued up to the bluffs where the spring flowers inspired Brian to frolic:
Dad and Lindsey took a time-out to figure out the exact direction of New Zealand from the beach, and Brian pointed the way. Hi, Peter!! (I think Brian is actually making eye contact with the camera in this one- must be a fluke!)Weird old Torry Pines lizard. Yuck.See that curvy road just to the right of the center of the picture? With the cars parked in a row? Yeah, our car is way over there. By the river that meets the sea!

Scrambled Easter Eggs?

What could be the perfect ending to an Easter Sunday in San Diego? Well, and earthquake might be a good place to start! It was pretty exciting when the whole building started to shake and rumble while we were making Easter dinner. I got to teach one of the "earthquake basics"- learned from my childhood in Southern California: One of the safest places in an earthquake is the doorways, because they are reinforced. Here's a re-enactment:We were a ways from the epicenter down in Mexico, where there was lots of damage from the 7.2 quake. The lights, blinds and mirrors were really rattling and swaying! Where we were, it felt more like a 4.0, but it lasted for about 30 seconds, with a pretty noticeable aftershock during dinner. Bruce was in the parked car outside and he thought Brian was jumping on the bumpers.

It made for an Easter we won't forget! The Easter Bunny also finds my kids, wherever they are- he even knows about Brian's passion for all things garlic. Here's Brian with his garlic seasoning assortment. If you look at most of my pictures with Brian, you will notice that in most of them he's looking not at the camera, but over my shoulder- never making direct eye contact if he can help it. For some reason he thinks this is funny. I find it mildly frustrating:And Lindsey showing off her shark and bunny gummies:

Star Parties, Off-Roading and Biker Bars

Last Saturday we took a little adventure, (all Brian's idea!!), to Mt. Palomar to see the big telescope there. Things started out nicely with a side stop at the Pala Mission- I love old Spanish missions!There were 2 roads to the telescope, and we took the road less traveled. Very less traveled! The Nate Harrison Road starts out innocently enough, winding through the avocado and blossoming orange groves in the valley (our favorite part, right, Lindsey?), then turning into a steep dirt road that climbed up the mountains in switchbacks. Bruce "didn't trust the dirt" but drove up just fine and we made it up just fine. Here a shot of the groves from our moving car:
It was cold at the top, but colder on the tour inside the observatory, since they keep it a chilly 36 degrees inside! Maybe it seemed even colder that that as we listened to an enthusiastic, but lengthy lecture on the history of the telescope! The lighting was dark inside, but I pulled off this picture by steadying my camera on a railing. There's a 30 foot wide mirror somewhere in there:Then we got to walk around the outside catwalk- we're about 40 feet up. C would never be able to pull this one off:
Of course we had to have a posing shot. I thought Brian and Lindsey were trying to be like the Angel Moroni in honor of conference, but they were really pretending to look through telescopes.
We took the more traditional way down the mountain, stopping at Mother's Kitchen for lunch. Lots of bikers at this sprout and what bread-friendly spot.A typical Brian pose- either he's pulling a face or purposely looking away...sigh.A fun day- finished with the menfolk going to the priesthood session and we girls watching:

Yep, There Are Sunsets There.

Bruce and I spent the Easter weekend with Brian and Lindsey in San Diego- what fun!! We got there Friday afternoon- just in time to check in at our hotel and run to Sunset Beach. What a great place to spend an evening! Spring has definitely arrived in San Diego- there were flowers everywhere. The cliffs at the beach were covered with what I call "Sea Wheat", blooming Ice plant and Stattice:We soaked up the last rays of the day:Watched the surfers and creative beach-goers:And a catalog photo shoot:There were big birds riding the wind currants and one seal in the water:
Bruce was very concerned that we'd all pitch off the edge of the cliffs:
But the sunset was the best of all!