Field Trip : Icons from St. Catherine's Monastery

Today we drove from San Diego to Los Angeles to the Getty Museum. We left at 10 a.m., stopped for lunch at 12 and then we were on the Getty's Tram at 2. The Tram takes you up the hillside from the parking lot to the gorgeous museum. The parking is $8 and the museum is FREE. There 4+ buildings of amazing art and sculpture, beautiful gardens to explore, fountains, an amazing view of LA and a couple places to get food.
We were there to see the Icons from St. Catherine's Monastery at the foot of Mt. Sinai.
It was quite crowded, but that was to be expected. The last day is Sunday for the exhibit. I thought of it as my pilgrimage. Driving 3 hours with 3 kids to a museum. We were barely there when they were asking to leave. I cheered them, taught, read, encouraged, scolded, demanded and everything else to make it through.

There is a Family (children's) room we went to next. There they colored masks and can touch and look and be kids.
While the kids colored, I looked over the maps and remembered the Van Gogh - Irises. I said we had to at least see that painting so that we could tell dad about it. Geoff and I went to the Getty before kids (and before it was in this location, It used to be only at the Malibu Villa). We purchased the poster of Irises and it hangs in our dining room.

So they moaned the whole way over to the west building. There were several other Impressionists in that area. Monet is my favorite. Then I coaxed them into the North building 2nd floor to see several galleries with pictures from the life of Christ.

Finally we were on the tram ride down and Derek says "can we come again?" Of course at first I was stunned, but then knew that there was another motive......... "Because next time we come I'm sitting in that front seat of the tram to look out the window!"
Well I don't know when we'll be coming back 3 hours to ride the tram??

Traffic was terrible! We were stuck in LA bumper to bumper - - but it was 5:00! We had a schedule to keep and the next stop was the American Girl Store. It was only 11 miles away, but it took an hour.

Katherine was excited to be back at the store. We went in November for an early birthday present with a girlfriend and grandma. She got her first Doll - Jess. Today she got Coconut and a dress that was on sale. We probably would have skipped the side trip, but we were picking up Nicki for her best friend so they didn't have to order it online and wait.

We would have had more time, but we left and hour later than I wanted and we actually stopped for lunch in a restaurant and that took an hour. So we were a couple hours behind schedule.

NEXT stop......... Knott's Berry farm. We were to be there by 8 p.m. for a special visitor........

Snoopy came to tuck the kids in.

We barely made it in time.

Derek liked seeing Snoopy in the hallway, but once he was inside our room, he was nervous.

He kept his distance and chose to be on the pull out bed. Snoopy was great about taking pictures. Dad was running the video camera. Snoopy gave the kids chocolate "bones". Derek dropped his and Snoopy tossed it to him and it hit him in the face. SO Snoopy felt bad and gave Derek some extra hugs, kisses and a tickling on his tummy. (When you go to the Knott's Resort Hotel, ask for the Snoopy rooms. They are all down a Peanuts decorated hallway, and the rooms have Peanuts artwork and bedspreads.)

And after he left we went to dinner at TGI Friday's.

The next morning Snoopy came to visit everyone at the breakfast buffet.