Our Walk

(This post has Image Overload... You have been warned)

These were actually taken about a month ago... saved to be blogged and somehow I managed to skip over them. And today I was thinking where did these pictures go? I swear I thought I blogged them... but obviously not. So here they are.

On this particular day the weather was so nice, as it has been lately... and I took the kids for a walk. They loved it! They were so happy just being out on a walk. Seriously I never knew it could make them that happy... ahh the simple things in life.

I was happy too... I of course took my camera and I got some of the best pictures ever. Technically no where near perfect and some are even blurry... but they captured how much Diego and Alayna were enjoying each other's company and playing together. It was absolutely adorable.

And the light was so deliciously yummy I was in heaven.

(I can't wait to actually go through and edit these pictures to my liking)

All the while Arielle just was so excited to watch the water shooting up at our Island.

This is my favorite series... I got at least 50 pictures of them just doing this:

Diego says to Alayna, "Mama, love me like in the movies. The happy love." Alayna was confused so he takes her and puts her on one end of the lawn while he explains... "Okay I am going to go to the other side and when I say go, you run to me and I run to you and then we hug eachothers."

And that's just what they did... like 30 times.

Then he decided to teach her how to dance. Until of course she fell and scraped her knee and that was the end of that!

So I had to rescue her and nurse her back to health. Hence the funny look on her face... she was in "pain". (Sorry about my appearance in advance... but I wasn't prepared to be in pictures)

And that led to an impromptu photo shoot by Diego. You should have seen him carrying my big ol' camera and looking through the viewfinder to actually take all the shots!

Finally we were all tired so we decided to head back home. But of course a walk isn't complete without Alayna picking flowers...

We can't step foot out of the house and not have her picking bouquets of flowers for us.

Isn't she sweet? She just loves flowers.

We got the Golden Ticket!

Ok so not necessarily but we did get to tour a chocolate factory today!

::Ala Veruca Salt... "I want chocolate and I waaaannt it NOOOOOOW!"::

Some friends and I took our kids today to Cerreta's Candy Co. in Glendale. We got a guided tour and demonstration on how they make their chocolate.













The kids weren't too into all the facts and stuff... they just wanted samples!




Fortunately for them, we got to taste 3 pieces each! It was so good. And a good way to spend an hour.



Afterwards we took the kids to a local park for a picnic lunch. They didn't get to play on the playground. But Alayna who is afraid of birds... or chickens as she calls them... kept freaking out. So the boys had a blast chasing them away... then feeding them bread again so they'd come back and scare her. (Evil boys.) Then scaring them off and being the heros.







It was quite entertaining actually.

Times Change

When I was a kid my grandparents watched us (and our cousins) while our parents worked. My Grandpa walked us to and from school which was just down the street. When we got home we got to watch maybe and hour at the most of tv... but mostly we played. We played house, store, school... or made up games. We had talent competitions, we acted out pretend movies, and we did news shows. We even choreographed routines and practiced them. Our options were limitless. When we weren't doing that my Grandma who used to sew would let us into her sewing room where she gave us needles and thread and let us make barbie clothes. She had a box of scraps and we would spend hours there cutting our designs, sewing them (sometimes with help from her or her machine), and then trying them on our dolls. Man was that a blast! My Grandpa always tried to keep us busy too. He would play his guitar for us and sing, we read the bible or learned our prayers, or he'd have us writing or drawing on paper. And whenever he could we'd be outside.

Man was childhood simple and easy.

Now we have so much technology!
My kids will say they're bored if they're not on the computer, watching tv, or playing Nintendo DS, Xbox, or whatever else they have. They don't even hardly play with toys anymore!

The majority of this is my fault. I never forced them to turn off their things and just play. Alayna doesn't have a problem with it but Diego is still constantly telling me he's bored.

I've decided to make it a priority to not depend so much on these things. I have cut down their TV time. And now I am trying to do more things with them. We're hardly home during the day. We can be found at the park or even just outside playing. Diego is no longer allowed to play on anything electronic on Sundays. Sundays have always been our family day since it's Jr's day off. But now he's not allowed to turn on anything unless of course we decide to play Rockband as a family that day.

So I've been taking the kids new places. I've bought crayons, markers, stickers, paper, paints, in hopes of getting the kids to be more creative. And maybe learn a thing or two.

So our new thing is sidewalk chalk. And man do they love that stuff. Once the sun isn't so high I take them out and they draw for hours. Arielle even wants to get in there and get dirty.

I am glad they can see that there are other fun things to do besides internet, tv, and video games.