Who’s ready for some travel recaps?  (Meeeeee!)  I spend a lot of my spare time scheming and dreaming up my next travel adventure, but some years it seems that trips just happen, and this was one of those years.  Many months ago, we learned the happy news that my oldest friend in the world (seriously, our moms started putting us together in the same playpen when he was ten months old and I was six weeks) was getting married!  Adam moved out to California after college, and he and his bride, Kristin, live in Huntington Beach – outside of Los Angeles.  Obviously, we started looking for plane tickets immediately, and once we realized that we’d have to buy four tickets – since my parents and brother and sister-in-law, a.k.a. all of our potential overnight babysitters, were also attending the wedding – we decided that it only made sense to stay for an extra week after the wedding and turn it into our vacation for the year.  To Cali we go!

First things first – the plane ride.  I was very skeptical about the idea of five hours in the air with a two-year-old, as you can see from my face.  We did the old divide-and-conquer – Steve and Peanut were sitting together on one side of the aisle, and Nugget and I sat on the other side.

Steve had the easy job.  Aside from a temper tantrum for the first ten minutes of the flight (because she didn’t get a window seat) Peanut sat with her headphones on and watched downloaded Disney movies on the iPad for the entire flight.  Color me jealous.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the aisle, I was pulling every trick out of my bag.  Lollipops for takeoff and landing (to help those little ears pop), Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (lasted twenty minutes, and oh, he hates his toddler headphones), toys and books and snacks.  Nugget and I lucked out with the world’s best seatmate – a sweet and patient grandma (she had nine children of her own) who adores children.  She even let Nugget sit in her lap to look out the window, and she didn’t bat an eye when he spent 90 minutes of the flight without pants on.  (Don’t ask.)

Eventually, we landed in Los Angeles, and got down to the business of vacation!  Wednesday was devoted to traveling, taking care of logistics like rental cars and hotel check-ins, and frantically trying to get a work submission out via my phone.  But on Thursday, we headed straight for the BEACH!

Huntington Beach is a big surf destination, but early on Thursday morning we had the place almost to ourselves.  That is, until a junior lifeguard camp turned 500 baby lifeguards loose on the beach.  At one point, there were twenty of them clustered around a mermaid.  Yes, really.

First toes in West Coast sand!  The water was a bit chilly, but Peanut and Nugget came with their game faces on.  We stopped by the grocery store on the way and picked up a cheap set of sand toys that provided entertainment all week.

And it wasn’t long before – look who showed up!  My parents were staying oceanfront (lucky ducks!) and spotted us while out jogging on the boardwalk, which might be the most California thing ever.  The kids were beyond excited to see their grandparents on the beach.

Running shoes were shed, and the sand castle building began.

Beach hair don’t care.

At one point, I was meditatively making a zen garden with the rake from the kids’ sand toy set.  Peanut plopped a turtle mold down onto my nice straight lines and Nugget shouted, “Uh-oh!  There’s turtles in the zen garden!” prompting Steve to comment, “If that’s not a metaphor for the last five years, then I don’t know what is.”  Haha!

Nana changed into a swimsuit and beach coverup and returned to bury Peanut in the sand.  Nugget wanted to be buried too, but he didn’t quite get the concept, and kept popping back out again  as soon as his legs were covered.  Eventually, we had to clean up and get ready for Adam and Kristin’s rehearsal dinner.  Before the dinner, we hit the famous Huntington Beach pier for a quick walk and some sightseeing.

Very important sightseeing.

Way too gorgeous.  No pictures from the dinner, but we ate an absurd amount of tuna tartare, and I cried through the speeches (which would become a theme of the wedding).

Friday morning found us back at the beach, and we had company!  The parents of the groom (my parents’ best friends, and practically a second set of parents to me – love them so much) stopped by, and we also hung out with Adam’s aunt and cousins, and waved hello to a few other wedding guests.  The most exciting Friday morning beach companions, though, were…

Dan and Danielle!  My brother and sister-in-law flew out from Colorado.  It was so wonderful to see them – we don’t see them nearly enough!  They hadn’t seen Nugget since he was eight months old and we visited them for Thanksgiving in 2015.  It had been way too long.  They dove right into aunt and uncle funtime.

I mean, really – they dove in.  Literally.  Nugget enjoyed probably half an hour of being tossed up and down by Uncle Dan.  (Who was sore the next day and compared Nugget to a medicine ball.  We tried to warn him that Nugget only looks tiny.  The kid is dense and deceptively heavy…)

Anyway, after a few hours of fun uncle playtime, we all headed back to our respective hotel rooms to clean up for the main event – Adam and Kristin’s wedding!  The kids got to attend the ceremony (Peanut was taking mental notes as she watched the flower girl walk down the aisle; she’ll have to make that walk in September) and then Kristin generously paid for a babysitter and bought pizza for all of the little ones, so they could hang out in the hotel while their parents danced and toasted downstairs at the wedding reception.  I was a broken record, but I couldn’t stop repeating how very grateful Steve and I were that the bride not only thought of her guests’ kids, but went out of her way to craft (and finance!) the perfect childcare arrangement.  We were a little stressed about what we were going to do with the kiddos during the reception, and Kristin’s thoughtfulness completely took that stress away.  It seems like a little thing, but it was a big thing to us and it meant so much to us (and I’m sure to the other guests with kids) that Kristin considered our childcare needs.  Of course, throughout the wedding people kept emphasizing how much family means to Adam and Kristin – and the wedding childcare was a perfect example of that for me.  Adam picked a good one!

Also – hopefully he won’t mind my sharing just a couple of pictures; it was such a beautiful day.  Is that a happy groom, or what?

Such a perfect day.  We were all in tears throughout the ceremony.  Adam is such a wonderful, special person and so deserving of happiness.  I’m glad he found his perfect match in Kristin, and we all felt so honored to be invited to share in their joy.

Also, do we clean up good, or what?

My people!  I’m biased, but I think we are a pretty cute fam.

As we sipped our celebratory cocktails, my mom took me aside and pointed out the gorgeous sunset over Huntington Beach.  It was truly breathtaking, and definitely felt like a sign that the universe was also wishing Adam and Kristin much joy in their life together.

Wedding dates!  Love this guy.  And love California!

More to come…