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 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.
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