The Last of Northern CA

Can't believe it's been almost a month since I've blogged! If I use the loose definition of vacation as in "away from our home", then I can blame my blogging hiatus on being on vacation...although, since we haven't been in our home since the beginning of June, I probably can't really count this as vacation. It's more like "living life away from home for an extended period of time". Vacations are usually more short-lived bursts of relaxation, adventure, hanging out, etc. In our case, we are just living our normal life, with the goodness of vacation wrapped up in it: -Every Saturday in Northern CA, Alyse and I dropped Brandon off at work and headed out in the car to explore some new town that could be a potential new home down the road. We always found a fun playground and then drove around the neighborhoods and ran errands to get a feel for the place. In Redwood City we found a wonderful playground with a water feature...hadn't planned on A getting wet, so I stripped her down and she had a blast.

-As I've mentioned before, since we were sharing a car, A and I pretty much ran everywhere we needed/wanted to go during the week. She got in the habit of taking her baby doll ("Mimi" as she's named her) everywhere! I pretty much wore my running clothes all morning every morning and would pop Alyse in the stroller with some snacks and run to the playgrounds close by, the train station, library time, to do shopping, etc.

--The last two weeks in Northern CA were a little light on the planned activities side...I got a little desperate for things to do with A that were close by and free, so we headed to the train station (not once, but twice!) because A loves trains. I didn't feel so silly when another mom showed up with her son to just wait and watch the train. A and I got some chocolate milk (and I got a donut!) at the train store and then just sat and waited. We ended up seeing trains on both sides of the track and I couldn't believe how happy she was-- seriously, pure joy as the "choo-choos" zoomed past us.

--We were able to celebrate my dad's bday, which was really nice since we are usually not around to celebrate events like that with family. My dad and step-mom are also far away from family, so they went all out with balloons (mostly for A to play with), a delicious lunch, and a yummy ice cream cake. Lish's family and us got my dad a great bday present (thanks to Brandon's recommendation!): paddle boarding lessons and a sunset tour around Newport Beach...AND my dad just used it this last week besides his trepidation and joking that he'd have to take out more life insurance before trying paddle boarding.

--We were able to squeeze on one last visit with Grandma Debbie before A and I left: went to storytime, she bought some new shoes for Alyse (because she's already grown out of the ones I bought her for summer!), and we went to my favorite Mexican place in downtown Burlingame. Alyse loves her Grandma Debbie, and I'm pretty sure the feeling is mutual :)

--The little one bedroom sublet worked out great for our 7 weeks in Northern CA. It was located in a beautiful complex that A and I enjoyed daily, either just on walks around the duck pond, playing on the little playground, or swimming in the pool. Alyse below sporting some of her new shoes and, of course, with Mimi.

We were really sad to leave Brandon (luckily the time seems to be flying by since it's already been two weeks since we left!), but in the long run it is for the best since he is so busy and needs to focus on his project for his internship and we were ready to be leave the one bedroom apartment and be around friends and family a bit more (i.e. we are currently "living" with my mom and step-dad in Utah-- can't get much more of family than that!).