Road trip Part II

After traveling down the Oregon and California coasts in our rented motorhome, we arrived in Santa Cruz about the same time as my sister and her kids....they were also on spring break.  My nephews came from Cal Poly along with a sweet girl named Julia.  We like her, S.P.!!!!  My sister and hubs rented a BEAUTIFUL beach house, with two master bedrooms.  A treat for sure after being in the motorhome for four days!

My sister had meals planned and so we just relaxed.  The weather forecast was rain, but we had beautiful sunny days.  God answered some prayers. We spent a day at the "Boardwalk". Fun to sit on the beach.......the kids (and Darrell!!) played volleyball. The boys actually did a little boogey boarding even tho the water was pretty chilly.  A great day

We had Darrell take some family pictures on the beach that evening.  During that adventure, THIS happened:

Little man's shirt said "will you be my auntie" and Kris dropped on his knee.  We are all so excited.  We love this girl and are thrilled to have her as our second daughter.  Well done Kris, you did good.  Aren't their faces just priceless??
Next day we spent some time at Capitola.  Such a fun little village on the beach.  We had to head out that day, on to Becky's B & B.  We spent two nights there.  Kris got to golf so he was happy, Brett got to wake board so he was happy.

I had a visit from my college roommate Jan.  We spent 4 years together at good ol Dordt College.  We had a great conversation, she knows just what to say.  You need to plan a visit up here Miss Jan!

We planned to leave California on Sunday.  My niece had a playoff soccer game so they were taking off for that.  After church and brunch our family all piled into the motorhome again.  This time we drove straight up I-5 and we decided to drive straight through.  Les drove California, Kris drove Oregon (he AGAIN got the winding pass...) and Brett drove Washington.  Topped off the trip with breakfast at the Hilltop.

How did Les do? He did great! His speech continues to deteriorate, but the boys were such a great help when they needed to be.  He does isolate himself a bit more because it's difficult to be a part of group conversations.  Les was also pretty tired the few days after we got home, but he kept saying "what a great trip". It truly was. Thanks to some of our friends who dropped off goodie baskets before we left - Lu, Rick & Pam, Barry & Doris, Dale & Gina, Dan & Kara - we loved it all!  I STILL don't know who the flower fairy is that filled my window boxes while we were gone..... Thank you to Lori and Emily for feeding us when we got back!  Thank you to our hosts, Darrell & Becky.  Thank you Sean, Mitch and Jenae for sharing your spring break with us! Thank you to our great kids and spouses for being such great travelers.  Thanks for the memories!!