Tag Archives: Camilla Downs

July 2016 Date Day with Lillian

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August 10 2016:

July’s date day was delayed due to our travels to and from the 2016 Chromosome 18 Conference. So we did something different for this date day.

After dinner Lillian and I headed to Whole Foods to pick out a cookie from the “Cookie Bar” … cheapest dessert ever …. and made with real food ingredients!

Next up we took our cookies to Audrey Harris Park so we could eat with a lovely view. When we got there, we saw the park was closed due to an event down below at the Bartley Ranch stage. We decided to go for a walk around Bartley Ranch and have our dessert later.

We enjoyed a wonderful time looking at the old equipment and buildings, trees, sky, and sunset. After our walk we enjoyed a slow, quiet, and peaceful drive the long way back to our end of town. I just love this drive of taking in all the farms and older houses and simply how peaceful it seems.

Next up was to head to Geiger Way Lookout to enjoy those cookies with a view. It was dark by the time we arrived so the pictures our fuzzy, yet they capture some of the beautiful essence. So incredibly wonderful.

And, last we enjoyed another slow and peaceful drive back home. I’d rank this one up there with one of our most beautiful date days. Simple and wonderful. xoxo

Blessings,
Thomas, Lillian and Camilla = Team TLC
See It. Share It. BE IT … Spread Love Everywhere You Go!

Wonderfully exciting news! We’ve completed the first book trailer for Thomas’ upcoming book, Biggest Little Photographer. You can learn more and pre-order here.

The Sunset and Empty Bench

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July 26 2016:

These are two of the prints that I will be listing in the Mystique Boutique. The Sunset will be an 8X8 and the Empty Bench an 11X14 as either a high quality print or mounted canvas.

Each is accompanied with or without the custom poem created for it. I keep getting asked so here and there I’ll poll for the most popular photos via here and instagram. Thanks for the support and encouragement!

Blessings,
Thomas, Lillian and Camilla = Team TLC
See It. Share It. BE IT … Spread Love Everywhere You Go!

Wonderfully exciting news! We’ve completed the first book trailer for Thomas’ upcoming book, Biggest Little Photographer. You can learn more and pre-order here.

Peace and Bliss of Walking

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July 22 2016:

Last nights walk = Words cannot even describe the feelings of peace and bliss that filled my heart. Walking with these two, listening to song birds, looking at flowers, trees, and clouds, watching Thomas and Lillian play with reed grass, and taking pictures …. Beyond perfect! xoxo

Blessings,
Thomas, Lillian and Camilla = Team TLC
See It. Share It. BE IT … Spread Love Everywhere You Go!

Wonderfully exciting news! We’ve completed the first book trailer for Thomas’ upcoming book, Biggest Little Photographer. You can learn more and pre-order here.

Library Day and an Outpost

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July 22 2016:

Library day!!! Thomas built an outpost that brings energy from the ground to fuel robots and airplanes. Ok! Plus, we got some cool books and movies! xoxo

Blessings,
Thomas, Lillian and Camilla = Team TLC
See It. Share It. BE IT … Spread Love Everywhere You Go!

Wonderfully exciting news! We’ve completed the first book trailer for Thomas’ upcoming book, Biggest Little Photographer. You can learn more and pre-order here.

The Celebration of Life

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July 22 2016:

We’re reading Norman Cousin’s book, The Celebration of Life, out loud together. When I began reading the section about mesons, atoms, the neutrino, and Galileo’s infinite instants; Thomas was glued to the book and didn’t want me to stop.

We only read a few pages a night. He loves mesons (which I have never heard of or don’t remember learning about) and when I was describing infinite instants, he yelled, “I know what that is”, before I got to the section with the term in it. I am so incredibly blessed by this young man, his spirit, his heart, his light … xoxoxo

Blessings,
Thomas, Lillian and Camilla = Team TLC
See It. Share It. BE IT … Spread Love Everywhere You Go!

Wonderfully exciting news! We’ve completed the first book trailer for Thomas’ upcoming book, Biggest Little Photographer. You can learn more and pre-order here.

Twenty Eight Shadows

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July 21 2016:

Walk with Lillian on Tuesday evening and she found 28 shadows to stop and look at/play with. HA! I love our walks. xoxo

Blessings,
Thomas, Lillian and Camilla = Team TLC
See It. Share It. BE IT … Spread Love Everywhere You Go!

Wonderfully exciting news! We’ve completed the first book trailer for Thomas’ upcoming book, Biggest Little Photographer. You can learn more and pre-order here.

Walking and Mud Pie

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July 20 2016:

Taught Thomas how to make a mud pie on our walk Monday night. He was so excited to see the water level had gone down a bit to expose this little area. Great mud!!! xoxo

Blessings,
Thomas, Lillian and Camilla = Team TLC
See It. Share It. BE IT … Spread Love Everywhere You Go!

Wonderfully exciting news! We’ve completed the first book trailer for Thomas’ upcoming book, Biggest Little Photographer. You can learn more and pre-order here.

The 2016 Chromosome 18 Conference: Arriving Home

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C18 Trip July 2016 #134

(I wrote a blog post about embracing my fear on this trip. You can read about it here … “A Rapturous Dance With Life”.)

July 17 2016:

I did it. I did it. I did it. The Journey Home … Arizona to Boulder City to Las Vegas to Reno … Arrived home a few minutes after midnight. We arrived late as we spent about an hour and a half taking a closer look at Lake Mead and The Hoover Dam.

Car is unpacked. I am sitting on the couch and my head is spinning ….. Last Thursday through Saturday I drove Team TLC 1,700 miles. This Thursday through Saturday I drove Team TLC 1,700 miles …. 3,400 miles roundtrip …. to attend the Chromosome 18 Conference – Reno, Nevada to San Antonio, Texas .. A conference Thomas and Lillian have their hearts set on attending every year.

I’m kinda tired. I’m headed to bed and in the next few days I’ll respond to all of the beautiful comments and posts that I have not gotten to over the past week. xoxo …. I DID IT!! … xoxoxo

I forgot to thank Rosey, the car, too. She DID it!! This trip most likely took a year or two of her car life, yet she got us there and back. She had problems with wanting to overheat and nearly lost the driver’s side mirror …. She came through though!! xoxo

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July 18 2016:

… And now that we’re back, I’ve got until next Sunday to decide the next chapter for us. Lease renewal time and there’ll be a huge rent increase if we stay. Whatever is decided will be decided as a team and it will be perfect.

We already know we can joyfully and peacefully live in a small space and now that Lillian has conquered stairs, we won’t have that limiting us! First, a day of rest for me … and then we’ll move forward … xoxo

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July 21 2016:

Something I learned this morning to share …. A timer is NEVER going to go off if one fails to actually set it!

Something else I’ve learned …. It takes 4 full days to recover from two 1,700 mile road trips completed within 4 days of each other. I’m alive .. I feel like me again! Thank goodness!

On another note, now that I’m no longer a recovering road trip zombie … I’ve got to make a decision by Saturday if I’m signing another lease where we currently live.

We had a family discussion about it and thought I’d see if anyone has thoughts. We brainstormed different ideas as the rental rates are so inflated.

The moment a place is listed, that’s reasonably priced, and I call about it, they already have 4 applications! So … different is what we are thinking, swimming the other direction, not following the pack.

We actually really like the small space we’ve lived in since last August. It’s an 810 sq foot 1 bedroom/1 bathroom condo.

These are the 5 different options we settled on today:

1) Stay where we are (We will have to make other adjustments if we do this).
2) Move to a different and cheaper place in this same area, yet we are open to other areas.
3) Buy a camper and travel around Nevada and surrounding states.
4) We love the tiny houses so if we were to find land that would allow and accept rent for parking a tiny house on it, we’d do that! (or renting one that someone already owns).
5) Housesitting (and pay rent to the homeowner) for those who don’t spend all their time here. I know of at least 2 families like this, but don’t know if this is something of interest to people.

Would love to hear thoughts and ideas and some good juju our way would be fabulous too! Oceans of love, blessings, and smiles … xoxo

The 2016 Chromosome 18 Conference: Joy in the Journey

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Joy in the Journey …. Moments of Loving-Kindness During the 2016 Chromosome 18 Conference ….

Beautiful and Meaningful Bracelet

…. Then there was the mom who gave me this bracelet and said, “Y’all bust your butts to get here every year, and I want you to have this. I love you and your kids. I thought of you as I was making it.” This caused my eyes to sweat …. xoxoxoxo

C18 Trip July 2016 #122

Offered a Place to Stay + Embarrassing Moment for Me

I did not plan the driving part of our trip, except for the route we would take. I had decided that I would just drive until I was tired or about 7 or 8 hours and just get a room wherever we were at that point.

When we reached Las Vegas I thought we might make it to the Phoenix area. So I sent a text to an 18p- Mom friend who lives in the area as she had said to let them know if we are stopping there for the night.

After we left Vegas, I had no reception until we reached Surprise, Arizona which is on the outskirts of Phoenix. As I was inquiring about a room, all of her texts and messages came through on my phone (that had not come through over the past 5 hours).

She and her husband have a standing room at a Scottsdale hotel and offered to let us use it. I was so wasted and absolutely could not make a sound decision at that point as I had been driving since 7:00 am and it was about 9:15 pm.

I didn’t think I could figure out how to get there in the dark and Thomas and Lillian were so tired. It would have been 45 minutes without taking any wrong turns so I decided to take the room where we were.

I am incredibly grateful to them for offering and for texting and talking with me in my delirious state only to have me not take them up on their wonderful offer. I was quite embarrassed with myself … 😉 ….

After we were in our room, we received 2 more offers for a place for us to stay the night (which could be used on our way back through). One in Surprise, Arizona and one in Yarnell, Arizona.

National Parks Employee

There was the National Parks employee at Lake Mead … I saw that it would cost $20 for us to enter the park and drive down to the lake. I also knew we would only last about 15 – 20 minutes since Lillian has a tendency to overheat .. Big time.

Overheating so badly that she throws up for an hour. So, I explained about Lillian and she said .. “You want to go ahead and get her a lifetime pass and you can enter all national parks for free.” …. xoxoxo

Ticket Gifted for Ladies Night

The moment we arrived in San Antonio I had a message from another 18p- Mom that she was looking forward to seeing me and had bought my ticket for ladies night. She didn’t want me to miss out and wanted me to have a night out with the other moms. I had not planned on going due to the costs and had not shared that with anyone. xoxoxo

Duct Tape

Before we left I asked the hotel if they had any duct tape. And what do you know .. they had the engineering/electrical department bring some up to the room! Wonder if they’ve ever had that request? I had to make a little Rosey repair before we headed out. xoxoxo

Hotel Manager Kindness

Before the hotel ran the charge for the entire stay on my debit card, I forgot to tell them that we’d be checking out a day earlier than planned. They also added in $40 a day for incidentals. We were on this trip on a very tight budget, so I needed that extra night reversed and not to be charged the $40 incidentals.

The manager on duty went way out of her way to correct the charge. It took us two days but she got it reversed so we could run the lower amount through and they did not charge me the $40 per day incidentals.

In talking with her about parking and how I had looked online for less expensive parking while there (cost $40/day for the hotel parking), she shared with me how I could park for free for our entire stay .. just steps outside the front door of the hotel. xoxoxo

Painted Rocks

There was the mom who asked about commissioning Thomas to paint 10 rocks for her so that she can give them as “thank you” gifts. Thomas is so excited and he will save most of the money for conference next year. He’s finished the first one .. a shell with pearls on the backside! He wants to create seasonal themes. xoxoxo

Thomas Painted Shell Rock July 2016

Chatting and Veggies

During the ladies night dinner, I had a pounding headache. I rarely get headaches but something I ate at lunch didn’t agree with me. A beautiful and amazing 18p- mom sitting across from me, noticed my distress, and invited me outside onto the patio.

It was extremely loud in the room we were using due to all of our voices echoing and that was doing a number on my head! We stood outside and admired the river and chatted and took pictures. Later she ordered a plate of steamed veggies and shared half with me as everything except the rice had meat in it.

Here’s hoping you find the Joy in Your Journey. It’s there. Trust me. It is.

Walk With Me Camilla: Turtle and Pelicans

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July 19 2016:

During my walk on the morning of the 18th, I got to see the turtle again! He was sharing the rock with a duck and a cormorant before I took this picture. Then I got to see seven pelicans! Cool! xoxo