Happy Birthday Randy

This past weekend we celebrated Randy's birthday! We (his work friends and I) attempted to surprise him with a dinner out at The Public House (a great Irish pub at Granite Park), but apparently our 30-something crowd is getting too old to remember how to keep a secret. Really, it wasn't a big deal. I just found it funny that practically every part of evening (from the who, to the where, to the cake) was "leaked" to Randy inadvertently over the 48 hours preceding the dinner! So anyways, we had a great dinner out with some of Randy's friends, home-made tres leches cake and apple crisp for dessert (the crisp was for Rocky, pictured above, whose birthday was last week also), and then headed to the theater just in time to see the last showing of Slumdog Millionaire. It was a very good movie, with creative storytelling, and smooth transitions between past and present. And even though practically half the movie is in Hindi, the subtitles were hardly a distraction. I would highly recommend this movie...although, a word of caution, there are some scenes that may be hard to watch (related to poverty and child abuse/extortion).

Saturday, to continue the birthday celebration, we packed up the Subaru and headed to the snow for the day. It rained on us the whole way up the hill, and two miles outside the park we were starting to get worried that it would never turn to snow, but it did! We drove towards Sequoia National Park (it was slushy rain/snow at Kings' Canyon, and the Sequoia side is higher elevation) and about 8 miles down the road found a great spot to pull over and trek around. We had lunch in the car, then piled on the snow clothes and got out for a fun time of snow ball throwing and sled-runs! After the kids got tired of that (and the snow let up a bit), we put on our snowshoes and headed down a trail nearby. Violet did it all on her own! All five of us on our own shoes! We didn't even go a mile, but it sure was fun walking, and getting into a small meadow that had a great echo! The powdery snow there was perfect for flopping down on your back and making snow angels! I couldn't help but think to myself (as the snow fell softly on my own little angels) that the "snow" in Disneyland is but a poor, human re-production of God's amazing natural wonderland. I had to hold back the tears as I formed another huge snowball to chuck at my son's backside! By the time we made it back to the car, the snow started coming down in piles. We took off our wet bibs and piled back in to enjoy some hot cocoa we'd brought along in a big Thermos. And now, heated inside and out, we headed home for a relaxing evening together. Yum! Hot chocolate! Isaac likes it too! Look at all that snow!
Happy Birthday Randy! We love you so much!