Tahoe the Beautiful

We went to Reno this past weekend plus a few days. Silly me, I never even thought to take a picture of Katie and Casey while we were there. We did have a nice time with Katie on Saturday evening. Casey worked late, so we didn't see much of him. Katie showed us her downtown bicycle beat and we met her partner who was on duty (she was OFF duty and got to spend time with her parents and little brother!). The River Walk in Reno is beautiful. Lots of water features and statues, fountains, etc. We went to church on Sunday with Katie and then after watching an afternoon movie (and Katie napped through it), Mike and Eric and I headed over to Lake Tahoe to check into our hotel. It was very "lodge" looking with log furniture, etc. The pool was great!
Mike and I went to hear the time share presentation on Monday morning while Eric slept in and ate, then we had a bite to eat and went to Zypher Beach to paddle around in a canoe for a while. It got kind of rough and nearly tipped us over! Back at the hotel, we swam in the pool and relaxed.
Tuesday, the three of us headed over to the South West side and visited the Forest Service visitor's center, saw a really cool fish chamber viewing thing like an aquarium. We wandered through some historic sites that are either restored or in the process of being restored. Playgrounds of the rich and famous who were some of the first to recreate in Tahoe during the summers. Beautiful places! We drove on in the afternoon towards Emerald Bay and took in those historic sites and nature and beauty, too. It was a mile hike down into the shore of Emerald Bay, but Mike did it--sore knees and all. Eric and I left him waiting while we went on another shorter hike to see Cascade Falls and Glacier Lake. It was all so beautiful and green and pretty. We only saw one small area of forest that was burned, but it was VERY close to the town! Whew!
I'll attach pictures. Wish me luck. You can see them all at yorkphoto.com.
E-mail me for the password or with your e-mail to see them and I'll share.

How Many Librarians???!!

Twenty thousand. Yep. 20,000 librarians in one spot for many days at the American Library Association Conference in Washington, D.C. June 21-27, 2007. And I was lucky enough to be able to attend! I went with the Library Director from my library, and the Associate Library Director. His wife also came along. So there were four of us there from Cedar City. I heard the Cedar City public library director was also there, but I never ran into him. I was there for Friday, Saturday, Sunday and part of Monday.

I've never been to Washington DC before, so I was really looking forward to it. I thought I might have a chance to see a few sites, and luckily I did. I also spent many hours in workshops and presentations. I learned a lot and had a lot of fun. I ate out with my associates, shared a room at a lovely hotel with my boss, Diana, and just had an over all great time! I also walked and rode a lot of miles around the downtown area and am almost confident about heading in the right direction--that's saying a LOT for a directionally disfunctional person like I am.

I'm just going to post a few pictures of me enjoying the sites. Till later!

This is me on the bike tour at the WWII Memorial. Very nice spot. I did manage to see a few sites and enjoyed them all. It is a great city.

Below is the Smithsonian "Castle." Pretty flowers. Some more of the Bike Tour. (Bike the Sites--nifty company!) Yeah, well. I don't know quite how to move the photos around to make them look better. The top one is a statue of Einstein. They say that if you rub his nose, some of his knowledge will rub off on you.

This last one is of my favorite sculpture (well, one of them) at the Renwick Gallery, one of the Smithsonian Museums I stumbled across on my walk one day. It's a solid piece of walnut, carved to look like it is coverd up in white cloth. Really.

Is there a Doctor in the House?

Yep, now we have one. Damian received his degree from Western University of Health Sciences, College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific on Friday the 11th of May. We are very proud of him. I'll try to add a picture or two on to this blog, but it's still a challenge for me to do things like that.

Mike and I also attended Damian's Military Commissioning dinner on the night before. He has risen from being an Ensign in the Navy to a Lieutenant (sp?). He will be doing his internship at the Balboa Naval Hospital in San Diego, California. He'll report in June sometime. But in the meantime he has to find a place for his family to live! That's what he's doing now.

We were going to spend Saturday at Magic Mountain, but Mike got sick and we came home instead. He's still kind of sickly today, even a day later. Eric and I both had a bug last week, but it didn't affect us for nearly so long as Mike's has. Poor guy.

We had a really fun luncheon after Damian's graduation in Pasadena. The graduation was held at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium (very classy place and quite old and ornate), and across the street is a new and trendy mall. 45 friends and family members gathered for a fun lunch and visit time at the "Yard House" restaurant in the mall. Damian and his friend and classmate Brian both continued to wear their graduation robes, so folks walking past our huge group on the way in could see what the party was about --those two young men, and about three or 4 others not in robes still. It was most of the LDS classmates who got together. Lots of kids, babies and grand parents, siblings. Damian had all 4 of his siblings there to see him graduate. I was the lucky one who placed the hood over his head in the ceremony. His college has a long tradition (the school itself is only 30 years old!) of allowing family members to "hood" the graduate. That was fun for me. It was a busy weekend, but now I know the Pasadena freeway really well because I drove/rode it 6 times between attending the Military banquet, the graduation and swimming afterwards.

Mike and I the the kids who came with us (Gail, Nick, Eric and Caroline) stayed in Chinatown. It was. . .ummm...shall we say adequate? An adventure? I'm glad we didn't have any babies with us. Caroline and Gail's room seemed a bit cleaner and less smokey-smelling than mine and Mike's and the boys. And those boys are boys. Well, I should have stayed in the Girls' room! Katie was there for one night, too. She spent a few days in Disneyland with Damian and family, and even met up with her mother-in-law, Michelle, for a while because Michelle was there, too.
It was so fun having all the kids around. Friday afternoon, Gail and Katie and I all went shopping in Chinatown for a couple of hours. I didn't bring my camera to that, so they will have to share pictures at some other time. Soon, we hope.

Congratulations, Damian!

Ninja Turtle?

Someone suggested that the Turtle Cake looked like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle cake. Ha!
Or, as Nick would have said as a 4-5 year old, "Teenage Butane Engine Turtle."

Turtle Cake

Nick and I baked a cake for Alexa's 4th birthday. I baked, he decorated. It's a turtle, in case you can't tell. Eric called it an "Asian Turtle." Because of the almond-shaped eyes.
:-)