A Saturday in January

Last Saturday Calvin and I enjoyed a day with grandkids.  We started out with a Sylvan and Ingrid and a trip to Virginia Lake to feed the ducks.The ducks are fine, but a flock of very aggressive pigeons terrified Sylvan.

We emptied our bag of peas and corn and abandoned the birds for the relative safety of the swing and play ground.

It was a little cold outside so we went to Chick-fil-A to enjoy the great indoor playground.  (Until Lucy introduced me to the delights of the playground I had never darkened the door of a Chick-fil-A) Sylvan and Ingrid split a kids meal enjoyed being together. You can't see in this picture, but Ingrid is sharing her treasured pacifier with Sylvan.

When we got home Clare and Nick came over for the afternoon while Garrett went skiing with his parents.  Calvin immediately took Clare off for a photo shoot. These two pictures are our favorites. The first is Calvin's favorite and the second is my favorite.

The question is, which one will go up on the wall?
While the photo shoot was in progress Nick and Sylvan helped me make some cookies. And Clare jumped in when she was done.

We did a little construction with blocks.  This is the house where Nick lives. He is still requesting pictures with his tongue out.

By this time the sun had come out and Peter had arrived so we decided to take an afternoon walk through the new subdivision behind our house. Big earth moving machines are everybody's favorite.

The kids also did a little jumping in the snow and mud and puddles.

Nick and Sylvan spent at least an hour throwing rocks into piles of snow and having sword fights with tumbleweeds. It is so fun to be able to share time with our wonderful, creative and fun grandkids.

A Superior weekend January 2019

We made a long weekend trip to Colorado to visit Butch's family and get in a little skiing.
Everyone but Lucy and I went skiing Saturday, so we got to hang out at the park and have lunch at Chick -fil-A.

After lunch Lucy happily played on the indoor playground with a pack of boys. When it was time to go one of the little boys gave Lucy a hug.  She is a lot of fun.  We got ice cream cones before we left and Lucy at the whole thing!

I'm not sure what happened on the ski slope that day, Calvin said it was too cold to take pictures.
Sunday after church we took a stroll to Dinosaur ridge.

It was not the most impressive dinosaur display I have seen, but it was a great walk and there were all kinds of things to climb and pictures to take.

Zach found a believable fossil in one of the rock slides.

Zach and Austin kindly pointed out dinosaur prints

and Lucy supervised from her perch on Butch's shoulders

Calvin and Austin inspect the bones

and Austin compares his leg to the dinosaur bone

a few more pictures of ourselves

 and finally a ski picture from Monday's ski adventure... you will notice that this is double diamond, skull and crossbones terrain. Great skiing Smith boys.

Sacramento

Our Christmas present to each other this year was a trip to Sacramento to see a play.  We arrived late afternoon and had a little time to wander around the city center before our play.  I thought it might be a little warmer in Sacramento than Reno, but the wind made 50 degrees feel cold. We had time to tour the California State Capitol.  It was interesting.

And I learned there that this lovely domed building in Auburn, that I always thought was an Capitol building is really just the Auburn Courthouse and was never the capitol! Sorry kids, I was wrong.

We toured the inside of the capitol and saw pictures of California history including the portraits of past governors. Most interesting was the first portrait of Jerry Brown, also known as Governor Moonbeam I believe.

The capitol has a beautiful rotunda

and beautiful grounds you can stroll around.  Sometimes it is just too hot in Sacramento to want to stroll the grounds, but even though it was a little cool it was a nice walk.  Calvin is standing in front of a cork tree here and the bark actually feels like cork.

I'm just wandering around taking pictures.

On our way back to the hotel we found the Governor's mansion which has been restored to the period of Governor Leland Stanford. The last tour of the day was just departing, so we jumped in and got a tour, but no photographs are allowed inside.

I like having a few hours to explore someplace that I have visited many times and discover something new.