West Coast 2019

Our family was privileged to take a trip to Oregon and California later this summer. I'd been wanting to take Seth to the LA area where I vacationed and visited family often through the growing up years and lived for several months as a companion to Grammy in 2014. Then a close friend told me she was getting married in Silverton at the end of August so we decided to combine an Oregon trip with a California vacation. After we bought tickets I emailed family to let them know when we were coming and most of the family was going to be traveling. Thankfully Dave and Nel were able to keep us a majority of the time and it turned out being a really good thing. There's definitely more to do in CA than IL so that helped! In detail, here is the story of our time:

Flying with a 10-month-old seemed a bit more daunting than the last time we flew with her to Texas because she is much more mobile and busy. At the same time, it's so fun that she is more interactive and easier to distract with snacks :D Overall, she proved herself to be a great airport/plane traveler as long as we let go of germophobia and let her crawl around. Yuck.

We got to Silverton just in time for the singing Saturday evening. The wedding was beautiful and our host family made us feel right at home. In fact, the mom--already busy with her own 5 kids--offered to watch Lizah during the wedding. That was a blessing!

The diversity of crops grown in Oregon is astounding and taking it in with my ag man was special. Bright fields of flowers, groves of hazelnuts, fields of sod, and hardly any corn in sight! A nice change from the Midwest for sure.

After the wedding, the happy couple went on to Bali. Poor things. We, however, headed over to Eugene to be with my cousin, Paula, and her family for a few days. Seeing as I had never met their second child, Eli, it was exciting that this worked out. We spent our time taking walks around Eugene, eating wild berries on a hike, reading books with Sam, and playing at the park. 

Our diaper buddies, only 1 month apart!

Tuesday afternoon we headed down to LA. Before getting off the plane our flight attendant warned everybody to stay off the 405. Of course, that was the highway we needed to take so Seth's first impression of California was traffic. Good thing there were adventures awaiting! We unloaded at Uncle Dave and Aunt Nel's which was our lily pad for the next several days. Most of our daily trips were within an hour, sometimes a little longer. Lizah caught on pretty quickly that she might as well nap in the car so most days she stayed caught up on naps and we didn't have to plan around that too much.

Wednesday morning we went exploring on the coast. There was a specific beach area I wanted to take Seth to and Nel had recommended a nearby hike so we had a full day.

Started off with In-N-Out. The freshest fast-food burger chain I've ever met. They even slice fresh potatoes before your eyes. I may have talked it up a little (imagine that) but overall I think Seth was impressed ;)

Made a quick stop along the coast to let Lizah crawl in the grass and to tickle our noses with the salty air.

Onto Pirate's Cove. Lizah loved playing in the sand and was quite wet by the time we left. 

From there we went to Will Roger's State Park. He was a cowboy back in the time and had a beautiful home and horse facility. There was also a hike up to Inspiration Point that was the perfect length to do with Lizah B.

LA in the distance

View of the pastures from the hike

From there we headed to nearby Santa Monica pier. It's an iconic location and far more touristy than the beaches I went to growing up but a few years ago on vacation some of my family biked there and enjoyed the change of atmosphere. This time it was more of an evening crowd and there was a summer concert series happening that evening which made it even more crowded. We found some really yummy fish tacos nearby but were less impressed with our overpriced dessert waffle...you never know until you try something. I'm glad we visited Santa Monica but would not consider this a highlight of the trip.

I'm truly shocked there was this much open space on the pier!

The following day was Thursday and our main day to spend time in Pasadena/Altadena. We went to the canyon first thing in the morning and this was one of the most meaningful parts of the trip to me. When I lived with Grammy I walked to the waterfall in the canyon probably 85% of the mornings I was there. It was a time of spiritual growth in my life as well and that place heard many prayers. 

And the view just got better <3

Back on selfie-rock!

We made a quick visit to my aunt and got some lunch before our tour at JPL. My cousin is literally a rocket-scientist and works for NASA so he kindly took over an hour of his afternoon to show us around and explain things at a very basic level. Ha. One of my favorite parts was seeing the 2020 Mars Rover being assembled. I'll admit that I'm not fascinated by mars, but the precision and detail going into that rover is mind blowing. The rover is on a steel "table" in the picture below. Another part I really enjoyed was seeing my cousin in his element and hearing the various projects he is a part of.

We ended the tour a tad early since Lizah was getting tired. The timing worked out well because she slept for our drive to Claremont. In California, places that are 20 miles away can easily take an hour and a half to drive to if there is some traffic, longer with heavy traffic. But it was totally worth the traffic to spend time with the Mills family.

On Friday we took an excursion up north to Santa Barbara. There was an old mission that we stopped at briefly and then we headed down to the wharf. Lots of seafood restaurants made it a little difficult to decide where to eat but we found one with outdoor seating right by the water. Lizah stayed entertained by the birds and when she's occupied during meal time we all enjoy it so much better :D

Little trooper

That afternoon we got back in time for dinner with Dave and Nel's family which was really fun. We were trying to decide if we should try to go somewhere after that or not. I had mentioned Griffith Observatory as an option but it was a good forty-five minutes away. Finally we decided to just make the most of our time there and do it. I'm so glad we did because they had a few telescopes out to look at different planets and we got to see Saturn! We made an "earthquake" by jumping on the ground in front of the seismometer. It was pretty small compared to the earthquake that rocked the state earlier this year. Lizah hung in there really well so it was a fun little family night outing. 

Saturday was beach day. Not scenic beach day but get-your-boogie-board-out beach day with the Klotzle family. We went to Zuma which is known for having hard breaks. A surfer would probably laugh at that, but I'm speaking from the perspective of a family beach where you want to play with kids and boogie board. That particular day the waves were not spectacular but we did get some good rides and the water was actually warm. It was really fun to spend some time in the water with Seth while Aunt Nel watched Lizah. This was also the day that cousin Seth and I swam out to a lifeguard boat. We had always joked about doing it and this day there was one anchored closer in than ever before so we kicked and paddled out there on boogie boards and got a tour of the boat. It was uncomfortable to be in thirty-foot ocean water but I was so glad to finally do it!

After another dinner with the Klotzle family we put Lizah down and took a little ice cream date. That was our final evening in Simi Valley.

Sunday we headed to church and enjoyed a day of worship in Altadena. It was a very small Sunday as nearby San Diego had baptisms and it was Labor Day weekend. Besides missing some of the regular congregation, we enjoyed the fellowship of a small church and I spent more time in the baby room than I ever had before :D After church Seth was a complete trooper and hiked back down to the canyon in dress clothes for a family picture. 

I wanted to get a nice picture at some point for our Christmas card and had the brilliant idea to do it after church when Lizah was getting tired. I bravely brought along a tripod thinking we'd just set it up and snap a few. What I was missing is the fact that the canyon is much busier on a Sunday afternoon than any morning that I usually went. People took beach umbrellas down and set up camp. The trail was busy and finding a spot with no people was difficult. Realizing a tripod would not be a great option we snagged a couple to help us out. The man took pictures while the woman jumped around with a toy cow we'd brought along to make Lizah smile. What kindness. Thanks to Jim for photoshopping some people out of the picture for us. What kindness.

nap time

From Altadena we headed down to Hermosa Beach and spent the following two nights at Uncle Joe and Aunt Sue's. She was in the midwest visiting her mom but Uncle Joe made us feel right at home. We walked out on the pier Sunday evening and saw a sealion (not sure if it was a seal or a sea lion) right below the fishermen. And a little later there were some dolphins swimming further out.

Fun *different* toys!

The following day was our last full day and also Labor Day so the entire Dave Klotzle family came to Hermosa Beach. It was so special to be with all 5 boys at the same time! The waves were not breaking well so we didn't do tons of boogie boarding but it was still relaxing and refreshing. I walked back to Uncle Joe's early to let Lizah nap. She fell asleep in my arms so I laid her in the crib all sandy and she took a great nap. Later on a somewhat random assortment of people came for burgers. Aunt Sue throws great shin-digs but this time I realized that Uncle Joe can do a pretty stellar job himself :D

Because Uncle Joe lives so close to the airport, we had some time to take one last excursion Tuesday morning. We headed down to Palos Verdes and made two stops. One at a lighthouse and one at the Trump Golf Course. There we took a trail down to the water for one last feel of the ocean.

On our way back to Hermosa we stopped at my favorite chocolate shop. See's Candies is a tradition in the Klotzle family and a great way to end the trip. Also, a great way to savor vacation once we were back home :D

We made it home safely in the wee hours of Wednesday morning. Lizah woke up with a fever and we were welcomed back into reality. But we were refreshed and I'm so so glad that Seth can now understand more of what California means to me. Because now it means something to us.