Brother John has come to visit! This week is the week of Teen Camp at Camp Maranatha, and he is the speaker for the week. It's extremely nice to have Tate kinfolk out to visit, and we have been playing a lot of cards, with Lisa as our fourth, this week. Today our friends Chad and Tricia Irving, with baby Isabella Ruby, come out to join in the fun. This is what I like best about summer.

In the car, driving home from picking John up in Palm Springs.
A rousing game of Bridge.

Lucy loves Uncle John, and always wants to sit in his lap. She usually brings a book, but rarely sits through more than the first page of it.

July 30, Sunday
Lucy and Bowden found a new diversion in wrestling each other. At first I worried that my tiny little flower of a baby would be offended at her brother's offense, but she loved it, so I just took pictures. Have I ever mentioned that my children love each other?

We went out to dinner at Fisherman's Wharf for some most delicious fish and chips... Lucy and Bowden displayed their very opposite temperments, with Lucy trying to touch the crabs in the tank, and Bowden refusing to let go of the pole to get any closer.

There are many fine things to do at Fisherman's Wharf in Oxnard, California, among them feeding the pigeons and seagulls, and playing with the old cannons. Lucy is an avid birdwatcher, and she enjoyed the scene we created of seagulls, while Bowden watched less and chased more.




And that is the end of our trip! We cleaned the house and went to the beach and visited with people, and it was wonderful.

July 29, July
Josh came up on Friday night to pick up the second load of Lisa's stuff...we hung out at the beach house, and I don't remember what else. It's been too long...but here are some from that day.
Lucy got a washable swim diaper, and a big sun hat in neon shades of pink. She is a girl, after all.


Timmy Lopez came down for a visit and slept on the couch.

Board books are really too easy for this kid...






July 28, Friday
Lucy Gates Paulson Tate turned one on Friday, and we spent the day relaxing out in the sun. My grandma, knowing that I love shopping, took me on an incredible shopping spree for Lucy at the outlet stores in Camarillo. Really, it was a celebration of my giving birth a year earlier.
We ate lunch at Chili's, the former workplace of Lisa Richard, and then came home, where I decorated the dining room while Lucy slept and Bowden played at the beach with Nanny and Rosie. My Grandma took a nap, too.
I made a really delicious carrot cake with maple sugar-cream cheese frosting from the recipe box of Martha Stewart- created for little digestive tracts. Lucy didn't know what ot make of it.
She got a little doll stroller, and a little doll, and a pink teddy bear, and a glow worm....way too much stuff, I guess, but it was so fun...I even had colors planned out, matching her little shirt (brown and pink and cream polka dots.)
It was festive, and delicious, and I am glad to have my little Lucy. It doesn't seem like a year has passed since the rain fell in the desert, and she was born, but there you go, evidence that I am getting older.