Friday, October 1, 2010

Girls Trip: Sept 2010

Cyndi Lauper knew what she was singing about. Sometimes, all us girls really want to do is have fun.

(me, riding my bike along the pier & beach in Santa Barbara, CA)

A couple of weeks ago, I spent four days over in Ventura Beach (about an hour north of LA) with my dear friend, Stephanie Fillmore, my SIL, Shari, and some of our girlfriends. It was such a good time to relax, decompress a little, and truly - just to have fun. I have gone to BYU Women's Conference a handful of times over the years, which I have really enjoyed, but this was my first non-church conference girls trip ever! Over the past 14 years that we've been married, Ryan and I have been blessed to take a number of trips together sans kids (thanks to fabulous grandparents who were willing to help with our precious peeps), but we very rarely travel apart.

Hmmm...actually, now that I'm reflecting back over our life together, I am remembering Ryan being gone without me quite a bit...a number of times over the past few years for his father and sons outings and myriad of scout outings (just doing his fatherly and scoutly duties, I know), and I do seem to recall a few trips over the years with his dad and/or brother to see concerts in Chicago and Vegas and LA and to watch baseball games in other cities, like Boston, and visit his grandma in Ohio a number of times. And then there were those visits to see Ted in Cali and to do off-roading with Kendrick in Mexico...Ya, I think it was my turn.

He was super supportive of me going. He and his buddies are going on a backpacking trip in Northern Cali next summer and I know he's already looking forward to that. And I definitely couldn't have done it without my mom, too. She was so great to help out a couple of extra days while I was away.

So, back to the trip. We didn't take a ton of pictures because we were just too busy talking, talking, talking the whole time, but I did capture some of our trip on film.

In a nutshell, these are some of my favorite things about our trip:

Cool weather, LOTS and LOTS of good talks, sitting on the beach laughing and crying and laughing some more, playing counselor to each other, eating the best chicken fajita burrito of my life at Johnny's - a little hole in the wall joint that Steph turned us on to, crisp morning runs along the boardwalk and by the marina (and running fast - still sub 8:00's at 5 miles YAHOO!), shopping with no kids, eating out, the fabulous little donut shop that was truly a slice of heaven, getting a pedicure, having LOLA on the GPS to guide us around the streets of Cali, our day trip to Santa Barbara where we rented bikes and cruised around the beach, shopped our hearts out and ate Kung Pao Spaghetti while not caring that our breath smelled like garlic and onions since we knew we wouldn't be making out with our husbands :), more talking, talking, talking, laughing, laughing, laughing, sleeping in as late as we wanted (which was really only 'til 7:30, which seemed like a dream compared to the norm), reading a little Mockingjay (but only a very little since we just kept talking...)

It was all good. Thanks, girls, for the memories! And a big thanks to Steph for letting us stay at your beach house on Camden Lane. I can't wait to go back! Of course I missed Ry and the kids so much, even only being gone for four days, but it was a good missing. The kind of missing that is not too long, but long enough to remind everybody that we all need each other and that our family functions so much better with all of us playing our roles. The kind of missing that makes you hungry for your next date night and excited to cuddle up and read a book with your babes.

Shari, Tricia & I enjoying our huge Yogurtland delights in Santa Barbara

Cruising up and down the Pier in Santa Barbara

We fell in love with this deep seated leather sofa at Restoration Hardware. I think Shari was trying to figure out how to get it back to AZ with us...

Tricia, Laura, Shari, Me, & Steph on the beach in Ventura (Val flew home the day before)

I couldn't resist posting this one. Right before we left to drive home on Saturday, we walked down to the beach to snap a couple of pics. Shari was cracking me up as she did her mock "cat walk" up the road.

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