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Tag: homemade rock climbing wall

September 25, 2014June 29, 2024 Blog homemade rock climbing wall, rock climbing wall

Wordless Wednesday – What's in My Garage

Wordless Wednesday – What's in My Garage

There are so many random things in our garage – baking equipment, bikes, books – but what my husband and two boys

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yvonneinla

Did you know that the Minneapolis shooting that ki Did you know that the Minneapolis shooting that killed two children, injured 17 and traumatized countless others wasn’t the first school shooting this year?

“There have already been four shootings at K-12 schools this school year — not including today’s shooting in Minneapolis. So far in 2025, there have been at least 57 shootings at K-12 schools,” according to Everytown for Gun Safety.

It wasn’t the first Mass Shooting either. There’s been 286. As of today, 833 kids 17 and under were shot and killed, 2,236 were injured. Total number of gun deaths is 9,801 and that doesn’t include suicide. Source: Gun Violence Archive.

I’m sharing this because I don’t know what else to do. We talk and talk about making America safer but America will never be safe when about 1/3 of the country owns a gun (PEW Research). Today’s news will be added to a long list of terrible things that happened this week, this month, this year.
Vegan, vanilla tie dye cake! #losangeles #vegancak Vegan, vanilla tie dye cake! #losangeles #vegancake
I know worse things are happening in Los Angeles, I know worse things are happening in Los Angeles, but kids and young people are going without birthday cakes. I’m an occasional volunteer for the nonprofit For Goodness Cakes, where volunteers bake homemade birthday cakes for kids in foster care and children and young adults overcoming adversity. Since the ICE raids started, one of the participating organizations I’ve baked for has stopped requesting cakes because it’s not safe for their community to pick them up. So kids who are already going through a scary time won’t get the simple pleasure of having birthday cake on their very special day. It’s not the worst thing, but it really sucks.
I wrote about L.A. Taco this week for the Washingt I wrote about L.A. Taco this week for the Washington Post.
I wanted to share what I saw in Downtown Los Angel I wanted to share what I saw in Downtown Los Angeles yesterday. I went with a friend and our two adult kids. We got to LA City Hall after 2 pm and the first thing we said to each other was that there weren’t that many people there. Nothing like the women’s march or BLM protests. 

Demonstrators peacefully marched to the detention center. Police came in riot gear and after a little while they shot flash bangs. Later, we went over to the freeway overpass and saw protesters on the freeway get pushed back toward the onramp and arrested. Police shot flash bangs and used what I think was tear gas. 

We saw a guy spray painting, a few people throwing things at police, and we saw two Waymos on fire. Most people were peaceful and it definitely wasn’t a riot or heading that way. People were passing out water and masks. 

The only time I felt like it could get unsafe* for us was late in the day when people started walking quickly toward us. Police on horseback and some walking were pushing protesters back to clear a street. One officer was shooting what I think were rubber bullets at people walking away. A guy walk/running by stopped when he saw me standing there and said, “protect yourself.” My son and I were thinking about staying but that’s when I said we needed to go home with our friends. 

A couple of blocks away there was no evidence anything was happening in the city. We got on the freeway easily and were home within 25 minutes.  Again, there was no rioting, police weren’t overrun as far as I could see. 

*not that I didn’t flinch every time a flash bang went off. It was the loudest, most nervewracking noise I’ve ever heard.
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