San Diego Overnighter, Fun Run, and Bake Sale

Jim had a work event in San Diego in October, and we decided to make an overnighter out of it. Madison Sorenson came over Friday evening to babysit, and Jim and I stayed the night in a not-great hotel in a really ghetto area by Mission Bay. But first we went to La Jolla, walked around, and found a place for dinner. It was lovely.

Saturday morning, we went for a run around the bay, which would be a beautiful spot if the island in the middle had not been developed with a (now-abandoned) trailer park and the rest of the surrounding area weren't similarly undesirable. The trailer park was an eerie ghost town - broken windows, tipped-over furniture, wine glasses still scattered around inside and outside mobile homes. It was very odd. We would have liked to explore further and run a whole huge loop, but it's over 10 miles and would have taken forever even if my knees and I been in good enough shape to handle it. Someday we'll go back.

We cleaned up, checked out of the hotel, and headed down to La Jolla. It was a beautiful day.

We walked around some areas we haven't seen before and checked out the Sunny Jim Sea Cave. To get to the cave, you have to pay $5 to descend from a souvenir shop (The Cave Store) down a long set of stairs in a tunnel that was completed in 1903. I believe it's the only sea cave in California that is accessible by land. The tunnel was dug to allow visitor access but apparently was subsequently used by bootleggers and smugglers of illegal immigrants. There's not a ton to the cave itself, but it was a fun stop, and the tunnel was cool.

Of course we saw tons of seals and birds as we explored. 

So much bird poop. So much stank.

I've always known that I have freakishly long arms, and I feel that this picture confirms it:

We saw some people snorkeling, and Jim really thought we should rent gear and go. I knew it was the adventurous thing to do, but it seemed very time-consuming and hard, as we'd have to get to a Y to shower and clean up before the Kaiser party. He finally gave up the dream, and we just walked some more and had a late lunch at Duke's.

We went on a nice walk at Sunset Cliffs at sunset (appropriately). It's a very popular area to which we'd never been.  The stretch of cliffs is long, so at least the hordes of people can spread out a little bit.  We walked pretty much as far as we could go, and it was lovely.

We parked in a residential area to change into our party clothes. We killed some extra minutes watching a show on Jim's phone and then ended up hurrying to the Kaiser thing, having missed most of the early mingling portion. Shortly after we arrived, there was a motivational meeting/award ceremony. Then came dinner. It was very fancy, and Kaiser hired people to dress as flappers and help at the dinner party. We weren't hungry yet, thanks to our late lunch at Duke's (complete with giant dessert), but we ate anyway. Then, since socializing isn't our thing, we took off pretty early. We figured it would be nice to have some fun tims (show watching) after we got home.

In the day we were gone, Ever read this stack of books:

She did not inherit my slow-reading gene, and I'm so happy about that.

The following week, Ever had her school fun run. She got very generous donations from Tutu and Jim, and I took the littles to watch her run. Running is not her favorite thing, but she ran hard and gave it her all. I was really proud of her. 

Tiny collected dandelions. 

The super runner and the medium-sized sister.

Tiny held us up on the way out of school because she had to climb on all the things.

The stake did a Rise Against Hunger event on Thanksgiving weekend, where we packaged dehydrated meals to be shipped around the world. The Meagan and Pete Bunnells weren't going to be around for the packaging event, so Meagan organized a bake sale to raise money to donate to Rise Against Hunger. That way, her kids could still participate and contribute. Bake sales are my dream, and I got way too excited planning what to make.  

The bake sale was the Saturday morning before Thanksgiving. I texted friends to tell them about it. Anna promptly called with a question. Her brother-in-law had just passed away, and they were going to Orange County Saturday morning for his memorial. She wanted to contribute to the cause and wondered if we could spare some stuff for her to pick up and take to the memorial; then it would be like she was making a donation in his name. I talked to the other bakers, who agreed to make a spare pan of something to send. I ran around Friday night collecting baked goods and serving platters from the other bakers to give Anna. 

For our part, we made many cookies and pumpkin bars and I forget what else. We baked and baked. So much baking. Meagan and I were both crazed baking ladies late into that Friday night. It was fun before it became a little much.

We set up shop outside the Bunnells' and were open for business from 9:00 A.M. to 12:00 P.M. on Saturday. The kids held signs and waved at people driving by. We learned that 9:00 A.M. is too early a start time. Things picked up around 10:00. At first it seemed as if we had way too many goods, and I was concerned. I sent a couple mass texts to friends and acquaintances to drum up some business. But then a few really generous people came and bought a ton, and friends who got my texts showed up to find we had run out. We sold out of pretty much everything and raised over $400, I think, not including what Anna donated. 

Ireland: Hillsborough, Queens University, The End

On Thursday, October 3, we went to Hillsborough Castle and Gardens. Hillsborough is the royal residence in Northern Ireland. The grounds and residence were lovely. The last room on the tour was a more casual room that contained photographs of William and Kate, Henry and Meghan, etc.

The view outside the gates:

The Hillsborough house:

After Hillsborough, we met up with Lucy, who took us on a brief tour of Queens University. Cool place. 

We went to the Ulster Museum, which was great but also huge and overwhelming for me because I feel as if I have to read and understand everything. Anna rested her suffering feet while the rest of us looked around. 

We walked through an English/Protestant neighborhood on the way back to downtown Belfast. So fascinating.

I enjoyed this last e-mail from Jim before I left:

My flight out of Dublin was at 9:20 A.M. Friday, which seemed reasonable when I booked it. Bags and I discussed going back to Dublin Thursday night so I could more easily catch my flight. Her flight wasn't until closer to noon, however, and it would have been sad for her to miss out on time with Rob and Anna and Lucy in Belfast Thursday night and Friday morning just to accommodate me (although she was willing to). We decided we'd both stay in Belfast until Friday morning, and I set my alarm for 4:30 A.M. Friday morning to get an Uber ride to the bus station and catch a bus to Dublin around 5:00. As I got up that morning, however, I realized what a completely terrifying plan that was. I did not have any international cell service, so I could not make any phone calls. Once I left the condo building, I would be locked out and would no longer have wifi to use the Uber app. I couldn't tell where the Uber driver was or when he would arrive. If we couldn't find each other, we would have no way to call each other, and I would be locked out of the building and unable to reach Rob, Anna, and Bags. I was pretty freaked out as I realized all this and headed out into the predawn blackness with no means of communication. I was so grateful I spotted the Uber driver without a problem, and although he was not friendly, he got me to the bus station. I wasn't sure I knew what I was doing at the station, and I couldn't get any information about where to wait because nothing was open. But I went outside at the right time and caught the right train, and everything went according to the harebrained plan. Thank heavens.

It was a lovely trip, and I'm glad Rob and Anna let me tag along, dead weight that I was. I did no research and helped with nothing. I didn't even take out any money the whole time. Rob and Bags paid for everything for me, and then we settled up when we got back. So lame of me, I know, but it was quite amazing. Ireland is a wonderful and interesting place!

I was happily reunited late that night with Jim and the girls. They had a good week together. Anna took Ever a lot, and otherwise the girls just ran free while Jim worked on the house. He killed himself to get our master bathroom and bedroom done so I'd have a big surprise when I got home. It was amazing. He did so much work - tons of drywalling, which made a huge, huge mess. (He figured he had to do that when I wasn't around.) I thought he was maybe going to pick me up at LAX, but when he didn't offer to, I figured he wanted to get the kids to bed or something. Instead, the girls were still up when I got home and he had just finished frantically cleaning everything up and getting things in order in our room. Super surprise! He's the most hard-working husband around.

Ireland: Dunluce Castle and the Marti Way

After Giant's Causeway, we went to Dunluce Castle. Magnificent ruins. There was an old story about the kitchen falling into the sea, but I think we learned that wasn't exactly what went down. (No pun intended.)

The view from a window:

We ate dinner at The Cloth Ear in Belfast and had the most wonderful waiter in the history of the world. He was British and super nice. We asked for recommendations, and he detailed exactly why the meat pie was incredible. So all five of us ordered a meat pie (Rob, Anna, Lucy, Coco, and I). He said the kitchen would laugh when he put in the order, as his tables always order the meat pie because he talks it up. He said once he sang its praises to a table of six until they all ordered it. He went into the kitchen to put in the order, and there were only four left. He went back out to get two orders changed, and by the time he returned to the kitchen, all the meat pies were gone. Fortunately they had enough for all of us, and it was delightful.

We did a street-art-and-pub-music tour that night with a super eccentric guy named Marti. The group gathered in the courtyard right by our Airbnb. The tour got off to an awkward start when Marti tried to make everyone pose for a picture in this mirrored sculpture and no one wanted to. 

We saw a lot of street art. Marti didn't totally have a handle on artists' names and other facts as the DC Tours guide had, but his oddity made the evening quite amusing. He kept talking about doing things "the Marti way." That was his trademark. Anyway, there is lots of fun street art in Belfast. 

We paused for a second at Oh Yeah Music Centre, and I learned that I don't know a lot of the most famous Irish musicians.

As for pub music, Marti took us for a brief stop at one pub where a guy and girl played a bit of fun traditional music. Later we went to a really busy pub where I had a hard time not feeling as if I were in the way. Marti apparently intended to find us more live music, but some places happened not to have any that night. 

We went through the club pictured below, where mixed (Catholic/Protestant) couples used to go. The left side of the place is all booths with high walls for privacy. Also there's a tile on the floor just outside one of the doors that contains a picture of a crown. If you were a Catholic, you'd walk on the crown on your way in as a sign of disrespect. Protestants could use the other door and avoid stepping on the crown. Fascinating.

After the tour ended, we hung out in another pub for a while and listed to a really fun band play. There was a chatty American couple there and an odd, drunk Irish couple celebrating their anniversary with the girl's odd, drunk mom. So there was fun people watching.