Girls' Weekend - San Francisco

Editor's note:  I composed 99.9% of this blog post the week after I returned from my trip to San Francisco.  Some sort of distraction - laundry to be folded, dinner to be made, my 2.5 year old needing help with Percy the train (the possibilities are truly endless) - kept me from adding the final sentence before posting, and then life happened, and now it's more than a month after my trip.  Sigh.  I guess I can relive my trip while reading through this last time before posting.  :)

My best friend from high school lives in the Bay Area (although not for long! sniff...sniff), so we decided to have one last hurrah out there together.  This was actually my 4th time to go to the Bay Area, with my first time being to visit her when we were in college, the second time with my family for a summer vacation - although we managed to spend an afternoon together as well, the third time was for her wedding, and this last time was the farewell tour.

My sweet husband insisted that I take this trip as a thank you for being a supportive wife during his Ironman training (which I most certainly was) :), so I took him up on it.  I left for San Fran on a Thursday night and was there all day Friday - Sunday, and came back first thing on Monday morning.  It was the longest I had been away from my boys, but J did a marvelous job of holding down the fort, and I enjoyed some much-needed time where I was only responsible for me...ahhhhh. :)

When I arrived in San Francisco, it was around 9:00 west coast time, meaning past my bed time central time...but I couldn't just go to bed without eating something. :)  Justine loves a variety of foods, so she introduced me to Burmese food!  YUM!!! :)

Friday morning I slept in (meaning I woke up at 6:30, and it felt like 8:30...ahhhhh...and then I went back to sleep! :)), and then we got up and got ready to go and hang out at the beach in Santa Cruz.  Our first stop was a little french bakery for some treats to take with us. :)

After grabbing our lunch to go at an awesome little place on the boardwalk called The Picnic Basket (where I got a KILLER salad with roasted chicken, greens, stone fruit, red beets, pickled red onions, dried chilies, and toasted almonds tossed in a red wine vinaigrette - divine!), we made our way to Natural Bridges State Beach where we enjoyed an afternoon of...nothing....except for relaxation and beautiful weather. :)

The view from my towel.  Not too shabby.

Here I am being forced :) to feel the freezing Pacific Ocean...and there's the natural bridge that the beach is named for.

It's ridiculously cold.

Us and the natural bridge.

After relaxing on the beach we went for a nice walk along the coast.

Yours-truly out on our walk.

After our walk we got in the car and went for a quick tour of UC Santa Cruz which is the most ridiculous college campus I have ever seen.  Here is Justine showing off some of the trees in front of one of the college residence halls...crazy.

And then time for dinner...Thai food! :)  YUM!

Saturday morning we enjoyed a wonderful breakfast at a cute little eating establishment called The Crepevine, and then were off to enjoy the absolutely GLORIOUS weather.

We headed out to the Marin Headlands to visit Point Bonita Lighthouse.

Ahhh...to be wearing a sweatshirt at the end of June is glorious!

Point Bonita Lighthouse.

Standing at the new suspension bridge with the Golden Gate Bridge in the background.

Lighthouse 2.

Lighthouse 3.

Check out the seals on the rock below.

Then we went over to the Marine Mammal Center which rehabilitates marine mammals from the surrounding area.  Here we are watching them feed some elephant seals.

Here I am with Elmo, the full-size replica of an elephant seal.  Kind of terrifying.

The center was redone about 4 years ago, and it is beautiful.

Cheese.

:)

View 1 on our way back down from Point Bonita.

View 2.  Again, the weather was unbelievable!

Driving across the Golden Gate Bridge.

Then we headed over the the historic Cliff House and Sutro Baths and hiked along the coastline.

Stunning view.

Our view while eating our lunch.  Not too shabby.

On our way back from our hike we climbed down a million stairs to the beach.  Cool to see.  Not cool to have to climb back up! :/

And then for dinner...we headed over the the Berkley Bowl - a little grocery store that first started in a bowling alley...hence the name.  It has the most unbelievable produce section!  I'm talking there were 12 kinds of sweet potatoes, and 30 kinds of apples, and fruits and veggies that I had never heard of before!  In fact, I ate lychee fruit for the first time.  YUM! :)

Sunday was kind of cold and drizzly.  We started out the day by going to Justine's gym and doing the Body Pump class that she normally goes to.  Thankfully, I chose to do Body Pump Lite - using rather wimpy amounts of weights - but boy am I glad I made that choice!  Two days later I was doing the jerky robot walk because my legs were so tired from all the squats. :)  After the class we went for a walk along the Alameda beach, which we had to follow up, with what I might claim to be the best ice cream I have ever eaten...

We went to Tucker's Ice Cream in Alameda and had macapuno (which means young coconut) ice cream and salted butter caramel ice cream.  It was killer.

Later that afternoon we ate crazy good pizza from this place that only makes one kind of pizza a day.  I wish I had taken a picture...it was on a sour dough crust and had mozzarella, ricotta, spinach, caramelized onions, and walnuts, with a lemon oil drizzle on it.  SO GOOD.  Then we went and saw the movie MUD, which was a good movie, at a little theater we walked to.  So fun!  On our way home I stopped along the way and took lots of pictures of all of the beautiful flowers because I knew my Grammy Sue would love to see them. :)

These were all over.

Monstrous trumpet vine.

 

 Beautiful hydrangeas in Justine's front yard!

 Close up. :)

And more flowers...

And more flowers...

And a trumpet vine over-taking someone's house...

And more flowers...

And more flowers. :)

After a fantastic trip, I started Justine's week off right by having her drop me off at the airport at 6:00 AM.  Ugh.  That was an early morning wake up call! :/  Thankfully, if I had wanted to do my early morning yoga, I could have done it in the SF airport.  Only in California. :)

I had the most wonderful time relaxing, enjoying great food, beautiful weather, gorgeous scenery, and quality time with one of my most favorite people in the world!  Here's to our next adventure together in the cornfields of Illinois... ;)

Zoo!

A couple of weeks ago, P and I headed to the zoo with Share Share to spend a morning checking out the animals.  The last time I went to the zoo, P was only 15 months old and not even really walking, so needless to say, this was a very different trip.  P definitely loves animals and can name a ton of them with an accompanying animal sound.  I was interested to see how he would respond to seeing all the animals this time...let's just say he was not disappointed. :)

We started out in the bird sanctuary, where I unfortunately did not take any pictures.  P was a little unsure about the birds swooping down and landing on him, but he seemed rather entertained by the bird that made itself comfortable on my head.

From there we checked out a bunch of farm animals - pigs, a horse, some bunnies, some owls, and donkeys, all of which were greeted with a "Hi (fill in animal name here)!" Followed by a fabulous animal impression, of course.

 After the farm animals we got up close and personal with the fish.

 These koi were HUGE, and P thought they were so cool.

 Going to the zoo with Share Share means you get to do the extra things - like feed the fish.  I don't know who was happier about it...Parker or the fish. ;)

 

 Analyzing these seemingly starving fish with mouths as big as his!

 Feeding the fish.

 After checking out the monkeys, tigers, and penguins, we headed over to the African savannah exhibit.  The first thing we saw were the elephants.  It was pretty hot, and there was a covered area with a mister under it.  P proceeded to slip and fall in a muddy puddle, and we had to change his clothes. :/ Thankfully I had an extra set.  We would have been in trouble!  Then we were off to feed the giraffes.  This is SUCH a cool exhibit at the zoo, and P couldn't wait to see these guys up close.

 Giraffes truly are majestic animals...and have really long black tongues! :)  P was a little unsure of that long black tongue, so he ended up watching Share Share feed the giraffe instead.

 A blurry picture, but his face says it all. :)  He was just in awe of the giraffes.

 Isn't that just the sweetest face!?

 After we finished feeding the giraffe, he proceeded to run around and watch other people feed the giraffes, as he repeated, "Hi, Giraffe!" over and over with some gusto. :)

 Seemingly overwhelmed by the sight of them. :)

"Hi, giraffe!" :)

 Taking a closer look.

 After checking out the cheetah and the zebras and the elephants, it was time for lunch.

 On the menu...almond butter and jelly.

 And again, because Share Share was there...a favorite treat.  Gingersnaps! :)

 After lunch we quickly checked out the crocodiles, gorilla, and chimps, and then P started to get sleepy.

 But before we left, Share Share suggested that we check out the carousel.  P had never been on one before, so I didn't know what he would think.  Here he is waiting to get on.

 And here we are waiting to start.

 Slowly speeding up...

 Loving the carousel!!!  He was saying things like, "It's fun!"  and "Wee!"  and "Yea!" :) 

And then we had to get off the carousel, which did not go over well.  Here, he was saying things like, "Oh no!" and "All done."  When we got in the car to go home, Share Share was sitting in the backseat with him and asking him about things we did.  With tears in his eye, he just kept saying, "All done." :(  Bless his little heart.  Guess we'll have to go back! :)

8

Today, J and I celebrate 8 years of marriage...so much has happened since we said, "I do," but it really does feel like yesterday!  A few pics down memory lane...

 

Here's to the next 8 years and many, many more...

 

Colossians 3:12-17

(read at our wedding)

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.  

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Read the Signs

A quick little post to share the posters I made to cheer on our own Ironman (as well as the others who were out there that day).  The competitors really seemed to appreciate them...especially #8. :)