Having a quiet house is somewhat unheard of.  I have 3 boys (12, 8, and 2), so there is never a dull moment.  This morning my 2 older boys left for a 9 day vacation with their grandparents.  So I sit here in a quiet house while the baby naps.  So what do I choose to do, well I choose to go over my daily lists and to reflect on the last couple weeks.  Yes I have lists…I love them.  Although I have to admit I don’t always finish what is on my list, even though I still manage to get lots done.  I tend to start a task and remember something else that needs to be done first, so I switch tasks only to find I am completely off task.  And that is with the lists. :/

A couple weeks ago, we took a mini vacation from the desert heat, work, etc. and went to the beach.  So we piled into the car and headed for Long Beach (to check out 31 Bits jewelry), then Santa Monica.  On our trip we also visited the Hollywood Sign, Hollywood Blvd, we drove by Dyrdek Enterprises, and Venice Beach.  Yep we were tourists for the day! The boys thought it was hilarious that Bugs Bunny and Mickey Mouse had stars.  Tristan got a kick out of embarrassing Sam by loudly saying hello to the people dressed as Mickey, Yoda, and Michael Jackson, to name a few.  After Hollywood Blvd we headed over to Venice Beach.  That was a blast!  They boys all loved the water.  Even Bray liked playing in the waves.  Some of our beach highlights were the waves, burying each other in sand, and pouring sand on my legs.  It was a perfect mini vacation and just what we needed to reconnect as a family.

Once we got back, life was back to the normal craziness.  Between the 4th and getting the kids ready for their trip we have been super busy.  Hence the lack of blog posts.  Although I am back on track now. 🙂  I hope everyone had a great 4th.  Our was nice, even though we could barely only see the fireworks.  Check out the last photos below…the ones with the boys having fun with their glow sticks.  You can barely see a hint of them in the background partly behind a tree.

So what is my point to this post?  Well, I have no idea.  My goal was to reflect on the past 2 weeks and to end with a point.  Well it looks like I have no point.  So, let’s just get to the photos. 🙂

Until next time,

~Ann

P.S.  The 1st set of shots are taken with Instagram on my iPad.  I am in love with that app!