February Field Trips

Here's Austin with his buddy Ronald Reagan. We visited the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library this week to see the Magna Carta Exhibit, and of course Air Force One and Marine One. The Magna Carta was amazing. The great thing was, the week after I signed up for this field trip, we just happened to study the Magna Carta in our history program, Story of the World. Perfect timing! It was pretty amazing to see the original document from 1215 preserved in such a way that you could still read the words. If you, uh, read Latin, that is.

Here is Vance in front of Marine One.

Here he is in front of Air Force One, the very plane Reagan would travel in. We were able to walk through the inside of the plane. I was surprised at the lack of "travel amenities" it had. It wasn't luxurious by any means. And nice wood paneling, I might add. I can only imagine what Obama's plane looks like.

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We also took a field trip to Fire Station #73 here in Santa Clarita last week. The firemen were so good with the kids, as they showed them all the features of the fire trucks, let them squirt water out of the hose, and dressed up in their full 135 lb. fire suit. We had such a great time, and it was a good opportunity to see what the life of a fireman is like and the great sacrifices they make to work so hard on our behalf.

Here's Austin inside the garage.

Our tour guide and firefighter/paramedic put on his whole suit to show the kids how he protects himself.

Austin squirts the fire hose!

Vance having fun shooting water, as well.

And Luke thoroughly enjoyed himself. He asked so many questions, and was so interested in every aspect of the job. Perhaps someday he will become a firefigher himself? I think it's a noble profession. We had such a great time!

A Recipe for Stephanie....

OK, so I love to bake. And it seems I am always able to find those absolutely amazing desserts that taste divine, but have no redeeming health qualities whatsoever. In other words, you had better go run a mile after consuming. Or just enjoy your guilt. It's your choice. I came up with this recipe because I wanted something that tasted like my favorite chocolate chip danish from Western Bagel that I love so much. So I thought, "hmmmm, I wonder if I could use my all-purpose homemade crescent roll dough to make my own version?" And since the internet is a wonderful resource, I was able to find a recipe that sounded similar to what I wanted. So I gave it a try a couple weeks ago to serve as dessert after my niece's play. I call this recipe "Chocolate Crescent Twist".

Ohhhhh.......my.............was............it..........divine. Evil. Just evil. And wrong. I truly believe things that taste that good should have no calories, and carrots should have thousands. But that's just my opinion. So on to the recipe: If you have a bread machine, it will make simple of this task. Here is the recipe for the dough (which by the way makes the most amazing crescent rolls.....my family LOVES them...see below for details):

2 1/4 cups flour (bread flour works best)
1/4 cup butter, softened
1 egg yolk, plus enough water to equal 3/4 cup
1 tbsp milk
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp sugar
1 tsp yeast

Easy enough, right? So if you have a bread machine, go ahead and load those ingredients in, and select the basic dough setting. If you don't have a bread machine....well, I don't know. I suppose you could mix it, knead it, and let it rise. Good luck.

After the dough is finished, roll it out into a 12 X 8 rectangle. Combine 3 tbsp flour, 3 tbsp sugar, and 1 tbsp butter in a bowl, and mix until crumbly. Set aside. Sprinkle the dough with 2/3 cup chocolate chips, 1 tbsp sugar, 1 tbsp cinnamon, and half of the flour mixture in your bowl. Starting at the long side, roll up the dough (as if you are making cinnamon rolls), and pinch the edges to seal. Join the ends to form and ring, and pinch the edges together to seal. Gently twist the ring to form a figure 8. Place in a greased loaf pan, cover, and let rise for 30-60 minutes, or until the dough has filled up the entire loaf pan, and has risen on top. Brush the top of the entire thing with 1 tbsp melted butter. Sprinkle with 1 tbsp chocolate chips, pressing them gently into the dough. Sprinkle remaining flour mixture on top. Bake in a 375 degree oven for about 30-40 minutes or until golden brown. Allow to cool at least 20 minutes. Remove from pan, and slice to serve. Have some coffee with it, trust me. Then put on your athletic shoes and run until you can't run any more.

If you would like to use the above dough to make crescent rolls, all you need to do is remove the dough from the machine, punch it down, and roll it into a 10 inch round. Brush it with melted butter, and cut into 10 wedges (like a pie). Roll up starting at the wide edge. Place on cookie sheet, brush with more melted butter, and let rise about 30 minutes. Bake them at 375 for about 10 minutes, or until lightly golden. Your family will love you, probably kiss you, and tell you to make these every week until you die. They are truly yummy. My bread machine can hold a 1 1/2 scale batch, but not a double batch. If you make 1 1/2 times the recipe, divide the dough in half and roll out into two circles. It works much better that way. Stephanie, I hope you enjoy making this as much as you enjoyed eating it!

Valentine's Day Camping Trip to California City

Does this look like the middle of nowhere to you? Well, it is. But what you don't know is that it is Nirvana to the dirt bike rider. There is even snow on those beautiful mountains.

See the trails leading out to endless possibilities of fun? See the trailer on the right? This is the ONLY way one would possibly want to go camping when it's 32 degrees outside and just snowed the night before. Yes, we are die hards. We bundle up. We load up the trailer in the pouring rain. All for the love of the ride. Well, the love of the ride for my three sons and my husband. And for the four other families who braved this with us.

See one happy boy? This is one happy eldest boy of mine who, after being "encouraged" to try the bigger motorcycle ended up falling in love.

Can you see the love in his eyes? Of course not silly. He has a helmet and goggles on.

Speaking of love, there's the man that makes my heart skip a beat. He LOVES motorcycles. And it brings so much joy to my heart to see his three boys learn to enjoy them so much as well. It makes me smile to hear my little 7 year old say, "Daddy, can you take me on a trail ride"?

There's my youngest operating a real motor vehicle so well, you'd think it was in his blood. Oh yeah, it is.

Riding for hours and hours on end, only to stop for food.....what more could a boy ask for?

Now, for some details on this trip:

We had planned on leaving Friday afternoon and caravanning with my sister's family and the Berggrens. It was POURING rain all day. It was snowing up the 14 freeway. It was not looking good for the drive up, so my sister called and said they were going to drive up Saturday morning instead. We were a little worried about the weather, as they were predicting rain all weekend. The Berggrens were going to brave it, so we decided to brave it with them. What an absolutely gorgeous drive up. The mountains up the 14 freeway were completely covered in snow, and the rain and snow had stopped. It was really just breathtaking. The travel up, praise God, was uneventful. We set up camp (albeit in the dark) in a nice big spot and ate our dinner and went to bed.

The next day brought perfectly clear skies, and beautiful crisp and cold weather. We were ultra prepared for the cold and rain, so we were completely comfortable. Thermals, beanies, jackets. The rest of our friends (3 families) were to arrive somewhere in the late morning. The kids rode, and the adults watched the road for our arriving friends. Time passed and passed and we wondered why they had not arrived yet. Cell reception was touch and go, but I finally got a call out to my sister. They had broken down! A bearing went out on their trailer, and it took hours to get it to the repair shop, where they had to unload everything into our other friends' trailers because it would have to be in the shop for a while. But my brother in law, Rich was determined to get to out to the desert to ride his new bike. Nothing was going to stop him!!!! Finally, everyone arrived and the rest of our weekend went smoothly. We had a wonderful time of fellowship with the Harasicks, Berggrens, Tubbs, and Jensens. Our group dinners together were so much fun. We even had a special Valentine's Day meal, complete with red placemats (thanks Sabrina!), heart napkins (thanks Luci!), and heart shaped brownie sundaes for dessert. Mmmm.....The kids had so much fun riding. The dads had so much fun riding. The moms had so much fun sitting around a warm fire talking. We thank God for the sweet time with our friends and the amazingly beautiful weather. It was sad to leave. Wish we could have stayed two more days!

One for the books...

This is a picture of beautiful Malibu Creek State Park. It did NOT look like this yesterday. Read on to find out why!

Have you ever been to Malibu Creek State Park? I've been wanting to go for some time now, and when my friend, Megan invited us to go on a day hike and picnic lunch, I jumped at the chance!

A little history about the park: It once was divided into three parcels belonging to Bob Hope, Ronald Reagen, and 20th Century Fox before the State of California acquired it in 1974. It is over 7000 acres of hiking and biking trails, streams, trees, and wildlife. The former filming site of M.A.S.H. is there, too.

It was forecasted to rain yesterday, but I had no idea what was in store for us. I figured a little sprinkle, a little drizzle....no big deal. After all, being a mom of three boys has taught me a bit about being adventurous. I mean, come on, it's just water. We hiked a beautiful oak lined trail that looked like it came straight from a movie scene (it probably did). We saw deer, lots of ducks, and a family of parrots along the way. Megan was quite familiar with the park, so she knew all the places to go. We hiked to a large swimming hole (of course, we weren't planning on swimming at this time of year), and it was just breathtaking. The kids had so much fun playing on the rocks nearby, and getting a little wet. There were even some crazy (OK, NUTS) people that were in their shorts jumping off the rocks into the water below. Yes, in this weather. They must be from Minnesota or something. We enjoyed our lunch by the lake, then decided to hike to another destination. We really wanted to see the former M.A.S.H. site, so we followed a trail uphill for a while. Megan commented that the trail seemed unfamiliar, but we kept going anyways. As we were hiking uphill, our feet began to accumulate mud. The rain began to increase in intensity, and before we knew it, we were in the back roads of Malibu Creek State Park, probably 2 miles from the car, in a torrential downpour. With no jackets. Or a change of clothes for that matter. At that point, we thought it would be a good idea to turn around and head back. Do ya think???? As we were walking, our shoes were all collecting layers of mud underneath, so much that it pushed out the sides and seemed as if we were all walking with skis attached to our shoes. It was hilarious. As time went by, we all got progressively wetter, until we were all literally soaking wet, as if we had just taken a shower in all our clothes. For some reason, all I could do was laugh uncontrollably. And shiver. It really was so much fun. Until we had to get into Megan's car all soaking wet and muddy. She cranked the heat and the bunwarmers (that's my word for heated seats), and we were all "comfortable", or as comfortable as one can be soaking wet in a pair of jeans. But it made it one of those experiences you will always remember. The kids had so much fun, nonetheless, and we all decided we would love to go back again someday. In the sunshine. Footnote: You will never know how good it feels to change into warm dry clothes if you didn't first soak yours to the bone. So there you go.