Dinosaurs!

On the way home from an amazing staff retreat in Palm Springs today (which I will blog more about later) we decided to stop at the Cabazon Dinosaurs. Ian had never been so we took the Cabazon Exit and declared it time for an adventure.


Much to my surprise, there have been a lot of upgrades since my last visit ten years ago. First of all, there is a museum now with robotic dinosaurs. There is a huge covered sand area where you (kids and adults) can dig to try and find a piece of quartz. Bring the quartz to the gift shop and get a prize.

There is also a place to mine for precious stones where Ian found a sharks tooth and I found a little ruby.



It was seriously so much fun. There was also an addition of about ten other dinosaurs you could follow a trail and see.

The other thing we noticed were signs explaining creation with references from the Creation Institute and reasons on why it is important to believe in God. We went back into the gift store and asked the women inside about them. It turns out the dinosaurs are now owned by a Christian couple that lives in Orange County and the people working inside attend their church, Calvary Chapel in the OC. Who knew those dinasaurs were apart of a ministry!!

Anyways, you can check out their website at http://www.cabazondinosaurs.com. For us it was worth the stop!

'Living Robertson'

Watched a short clip of a new show 'Living Lohan' last night and realized that will not be a show that I will be getting addicted too. It is basically about a mom looking for ways to promote her teenage daughter while scrutinizing websites and magazines complaining about bad press and the poperazy. Just not something that intrigues me.

Though today I experienced a bit of the 'ole poperazy myself. I took Darby out to do her business this morning. As I was walking to the grassy area I noticed out of the corner of my eye, three men running behind the bushes. When I turned to look at them, they were standing tall which their camera phones pointing straight at me. I kept walking cautiously realizing that I left my cell phone in the apartment. Then I hear their laughs and giggles. At that moment looked down to make sure I didn't forget any appropriate clothing articles when I hear the word "gigante." The sudden attention and cameras had nothing to do with me (at least I hope) and everything to do with 'Darby the Giant.'

I guess I have more in common with Dina (mom of the Lohan's) than I thought. I may have to add to my daily routine searching the internet and reading trash-talk magazines to make sure no one is misrepresenting my little girl.

think...play...create

The children's museum in downtown San Diego just reopened. My 6 year old niece and I went down there a few weeks ago and it was incredible.



First of all you can't beat the price. $10 is the admission price with the only down fall being that it does not include parking. If you decide not to pay $10 for their parking or arrive late and it is full, the next closest 'deal' is Horton Plaza. That was the path we took, but the walk back after a few hours at the museum is tough on a six year old's little legs.

When we arrived arrived to the front patio I knew it was going to be great. There was an old Volkswagen Bug with a dozen children surrounding it with globs of paint in their hands just smearing it all over. Walking throughout the museum spurs on creativity. Every exhibit allows kids to create something. There is a clay area where the kids get to take home whatever they form. There is an area where they can make a shadow puppet using just paper and popsicle sticks. This is an empty room that has projectors showing action underwater scenes onto the walls.

My personal favorite was the 10 minutes in the 'pillow room.' There was a room that was lined from the floor to the ceiling with mattresses and tire pillows for the kids to crawl in or throw. It was fantastically chaotic.



If you know a young kid or want to check it out yourself, it it definitely worth in my book. I wouldn't take more than child in at a time just because you may be tempted to express yourself as well.

For more info about the museum check out their website at http://www.thinkplaycreate.org/

a picture is worth a thousand words...

Ian: What a nice picture you are drawing.
Caitlyn: Do you know why I am drawing a picture?
Ian: Why?
Caitlyn: To give you time to think of somewhere fun to take me.

Cheese Puffs vs. Cupcakes

The last few weeks we have had our 6 year old niece stay with us on Friday Nights. It has been fun because we bring her to church and she really enjoys the children's program. Tonight, in effort to get her to finish her dinner and detour her from asking for snack foods, I told her I would give her five cheese puffs if she was good at church tonight. It worked! She ate the rest of her dinner.

Nothing was mentioned about those cheese puffs on the way to church so I thought I might be off the hook for later. While I was working a student ministries table, Ian went to pick her up and had this closing conversation with the children's pastor:

Children's Pastor: Earlier tonight you said you really liked something?
Caitlyn (yelling of course): CHEEEESE PUUUFFS!
Children's Pastor: More than cupcakes?
Caitlyn: CHEEESE PUFFS ARE BETTER THAN CUPCAKES!!

So we came home, gave the kid 6 cheese puffs, watched "Yo Gabba Gabba" and called it a night!

"Shoe Repairs"

I have never entered a pizza place because I saw a guy spinning an arrow. I have never been drawn to go see a condo for sale because someone had the ability to break-dance while waving a sign. I have never bought a cell phone because someone waved "hello" to me on a street corner. I have always been entertained by them (at least most of them) but not really motivated to make a u-turn and follow the arrow. Today that changed.

I was driving near San Diego State today and genuinely wished I had a pair of shoes that needed to be repaired. On the corner was an elderly man holding a piece of cardboard that had the words "shoe repairs" spray painted on it. Just across the parking lot from him was a little shop with the same simple title, "Shoe Repairs." That shop has been there since I can remember. In fact, I did a little research on this shoe repair store and learned it had been there since 1950's. I found an old article in the San Diego Tribune referencing the little shop when discussing the development plans for the "collegetown" that is on the books for San Diego State. Here is a clip:

Not so lucky is Pablo Serrano.

For 25 years, he has run Pablo's Shoe Repair on Montezuma Place, in a little shop that has housed a cobbler for the campus community since the 1950s. Though he repairs all the nice shoes of the big shots at the university, that doesn't give him any sway. He still faces eviction, and he says he has been unable to persuade the developers to make room for him in the new urban village.

"I talked to the guy, but he says they don't need a shoe-repair shop," said Serrano.

Still, he's not panicking, or for that matter, packing.

Gentrification has been threatening to shove aside College Area businesses like his for as long as he can remember. Yet he's still there hammering away, fixing SDSU President Stephen Weber's shoes, he says, as he did the presidents before him, and the footwear of deans and professors.

So why the tug on the heart strings? Why this man and why this sign? I think it is because of what it represented. I have always been a huge advocate for small business owners. When you go into a small business it's personal. You have a window into someone's heart and soul. You are now apart of something that a person worked hard to get. You now get to be apart of someone's dream.

Behind that spray-painted sign was heart. It is hard for me to believe that the young kid spinning the pizza sign has as much pride about his pizza as Pablo has for his craft. I don't know if the elderly man holding the sign was actually Pablo. I don't know how much longer "Shoe Repair" will still be in business. I do know that today he touched my heart by unknowingly sharing part of his story.

Pablo also won free advertising on the "ian and stina blog" ...
If you need "fine shoe or leather repair", go see Pablo at
5120 Montezuma Place, San Diego, CA 92115.
(619)265-8927

To punish or not to punish...

Today, each of us come home to the same senario two different times. We open the hall way door and Darby runs out, not to greet us but to head straight under the dinning room table. Usually she runs under the table when she has done something really bad and is trying to avoid our wrath. We go into the bedroom to find what she has chewed up and then we bring the item(s) out and say, "BAAAAD!" in our harshest tone possible. Today though, there is no evidence. No torn pillow or chewed bed post. The only evidence we have of her doing something "baaad" is the look on her face.



So do we we punish her because in a weird way she is telling us deserves it. Or do we spend the next day or so fearing for what she may or may not have eaten! Oh the days of parenting will take years off of you!