Building Memories

I’m just gonna toss these up here; it’s Legoland, you’ve seen it before.  This time Erik and Rach were with us.
                                                                          
                    
                              
     

Capistrano Encore (Encore)

Yikes, if I don’t hurry up with posting Rach and Erik’s visit, I won’t get through it before Henry and Janet are here!

                          
You wouldn’t keep coming back if you were tired of looking at pictures of my favorite people, right?

                       
I’d like to say that it’s a nice, quiet place to contemplate, maybe gain some perspective, but the gang I travel with doesn’t really do “quiet” or “contemplative” all that well.  At least not for long stretches.


On the other hand, maybe they do look a little contemplative here in the chapel.  Or maybe they just look bored.  Hard to tell.

                                                 
The flowers, meanwhile, are glowing in the sunshine . . .


and the architecture is silhouetted against a brilliant blue sky. 

                                                     
Which brings us to the fountain, yes THAT fountain.  No, they weren’t allowed to walk around the edge of it this time.  

    
The boys are looking towards the cemetery, not sure what was so interesting over there just then.  But on either side we have an olive tree and some odd-looking flowers.

     
The first picture, for me, reflects the impressive grandeur of humankind’s creations; whereas the second shows the ultimate splendor of God’s.

Family pic!  Here you go!

        
           
A few more flowers and we’re done here.  Moving on . . .

Capistrano Encore

Rach asked about a botanical gardens down in San Diego but we opted, largely due to travel/nap conflicts, to go for the more local next-best-thing, which is really pretty good after all.  So the gardens were the main photographic focus of this excursion, and not just for me!  You see Rachel buried in those bushes, don’t you?  The kids, meanwhile, were entertained by the audio tours again.

           
So many new things in bloom this time; orange blossoms and irises were just the beginning!

 
Here are those two goofy, gorgeous kids of mine, along with a quartet of the fabled swallow’s nests.

                     
The “curiosity cart” was set out with squirrel pelts, arrowheads, corn husk dolls and other touchable Juaneno artifacts and toys.  Nearby, the hollyhocks stood more than six feet high.

             
Since it was only a couple days after Easter, the message of this inscription (trans: I shall rise again) was particularly powerful.

                    
I didn’t catch this until just now as the photos came together somewhat coincidentally, but look how the colors of the fish echo the colors of the flowers.
 Best aunt ever?  Logan might think so.

                               
Glorious beauty everywhere you turn.

My favorites among the flowers.

                         
This is as good a place as any to cut it off; I’m going to go ahead and break this post up.  Partly so that’s it’s not as massively long as the last one, partly because I want to go to bed!  G’night all!