Memories of spring breaks past

During the last week or so you've probably been on spring break - that week long vacation from school that usually occurs around Easter.

During elementary school, I didn't have spring break! We usually just got a day or two off of school around Easter, typically Good Friday or the Monday after.

When I was in high school, my school started doing spring break. I kind of liked having the break from homework and classes, but after a couple of days I always missed my friends.

In college, we always had spring break. For me, it was a great chance to catch up (and even get ahead) on schoolwork I had to do. That made the rest of the school year easier and gave me more time to have fun once all of my friends got back to college!

How did/are you spend/ing your spring break?

Remember hiking into a volcano?

Do you know where you were standing four years ago on Monday? You were in the middle of a volcano!

We went on a hike to the Amboy Crater, a famous extinct volcano in the Mojave Desert near the historical Route 66. As you were very young, I took you up into the volcano on my back in a child carrier, and when we got to the middle of the it, I let you out. The picture at above right shows you playing in the cone.

The black rock is called basalt and was lava that flowed out of the cinder cone and hardened. Lava last flowed out of the volcano some 5,000 years ago.

Here's a whole bunch of photos from our hike!

My email to you for March 23, 2013

Here is my email from March 23, 2013, just in case you do not receive it.

Hi Kieran!

How are you today? I love and miss and very much. The good news is we get to see one another again in just six days on March 29! I can’t wait. Grandma and Grandpa and Uncle Chris and Aunt Susie have some Easter presents for you, and of course I’ll be bringing some surprises, too!

Did you have Spring Break this past week or do you go on it next week? Your cousins Bryan and Rebekah were on Spring Break this past week. While getting a week off of school was nice when I was a boy, it also got boring real fast for me! I always missed my friends and learning about new stuff. Before going home on Spring Break, I always made sure I brought home lots of books from the library!

Do you get to go to the library and check out books? I miss not being able to go to the library with you. When we were together in Lancaster, we went to storytimes at the library and always checked out books to read at home. Some days we read 10 books! Some days you liked a book so much that we read just that book 10 times!

Easter is coming up soon. What do you plan to do for the Easter holiday? I think I mentioned in my last email that you I was eating at Grandma and Grandpa’s house, where Uncle Chris, Aunt Susie, your cousins Bryan and Rebekah, and Aunt Susie and Uncle Mark will be getting together for Easter dinner and the afternoon. We are having ham and prime rib for dinner. Yummy!

I don’t believe you’ve ever met Aunt Sandy and Uncle Mark (If you did, you were just a baby at the time). Aunt Sandy is Grandma’s sister. They are very nice and have a big house in Stillwater. They also have a dog, a very old black and white border collie. They have seen pictures of you, I’ve told them lots of great stories about you, and they can’t wait to meet you!

In addition to editing and writing books, I have taken up snowshoeing! As you know, I like to hike, yet hiking in the snow is too difficult – but it’s not if you have snowshoes! You then can walk almost anywhere. Snowshoeing does take a lot of energy at first, though, but seeing new things outdoors is a lot of fun – and so is the steaming cup of hot chocolate you enjoy afterwards when you go back inside! Would you like to go snowshoeing one day?

Have you read any good books lately? I have. It was called “Ruthie and the (Not So) Teeny Tiny Lie,” by Laura Rankin. It was about a little girl name Ruthie who finds a teeny tiny toy on the school playground. Even though it’s not her toy, she tells everyone it is and then tells more lies so she can keep it for herself! Will she get caught lying? You will have to read the book and find out! I bet you can find it at your school or city library.

Well, that is all for now. You have a good week, and I will see you Friday afternoon!

Love,

Dad

Your two big trips to Palm Springs

Donning the trainer's helmet
at Palm Springs air museum.

Last night while watching a "Six Million Dolalr Man" DVD, I noticed the episode was filmed in a place we'd gone before: the desert road north of Palm Springs where the tram goes to the top of the mountain.

You may not remember visiting Palm Springs, as you were very young, but we went there twice. The first time, we visited volcanic features on the Salton Sea and then enjoyed dinner downtown. I purchased a captain's sailor cap for you in the hat store.

The second time we went was to visit the airplane museum. The weekend was very rainy and cold, an oddity for Southern California, and the only place I could find that was moderately dry (though it was a little cloudy) was Palm Springs. We ate lunch at Ruby's Diner downtown.

I actually lived in Palm Springs for a couple of years and worked at the newspaper there as its editorial page editor.

Our hike across 'another world'

Three years ago today we hiked through a very alien setting, but one that's right here on Earth: the Trona Pinnacles!

The pinnacles are mineral spires that sat at the bottom of a lake during the last Ice Age. Several science fiction movies have been filmed there.

You wanted to walk through it, so even though I had a child carrier on my back, I let you down for most of the hike. The air was very dry and had a distinct alkaline scent.

Here's a whole bunch of pictures from our adventure!

How you got your name

Do you know how you got your name?

Your mother and I came up with four names - two for girls and two for boys (just  in case we had twins). The first name had to be Celtic in honor of our ancestry (She's opart Scottish, and I'm part of English). The middle name had to be that of a British king or queen - though the middle name of our favorite boy's name also was the name of your great-grandfather on your mother's side (or her grandfather). Actually, we started with her grandfather's name and because it also was the name of a British king, decided all of the other names also had to be of British kings or queens.

We mainly picked the first name because we liked its sound. But in your case, the name did have a special meaning - Kieran means "dark" and my first name means "bright." I thought that our names having the opposite meanings was kind of neat.

Your middle name, Edward, means "wealthy guardian," by the way.

What were the four names we selected? They were:
Boy
1. Kieran Edward
2. Keegan Arthur
Girl
1. Kelsey Elizabeth
2. Kenzie Anne

So if youwould have been a girl, we would have named you Kelsey Elizabeth!

'The Clone Wars' going off the air

I read yesterday that the Cartoon Network plans to take "The Clone Wars" off the air at the end of this season. It's been on for five years, and our time together certainly has touched upon that series a lot.

We began watching it together on Friday nights during the second season. Then we began collecting all of the action figures and assorted toys associated with the series - and boy, were there a lot of toys! Soon, though, we had virtually every action figure, and so we started looking online togther at when new ones would be released during the months ahead!

You even had a blue clone wars bedspread and sheets in your room at the green house! There's a picture of it at left.

We also caught up with the first season by buying it on DVD. Hopefully you still have it and the second season. If not, do not worry; I shall repurchase it andthe other four seasons for us to enjoy one day.