My Last Visitors

This past weekend I had my last visitors in California before I move back to the Midwest! And of course we got to cross a few things off my California bucket list.

My mom, Heidi, and Calvin arrived in Thursday night (really Friday morning), I took off work Friday, and then they just left this Monday morning. Things got off to a bit of a rocky start when their flight was delayed FIVE HOURS on Thursday night. They were supposed to leave at 6:45 but didn't get out until 11:30pm from Chicago. At that time they should have been arriving in San Francisco but instead were just leaving. I set an alarm to wake myself up at 1am so I could go and get them when the flight finally landed at 1:30am, feeling to them like 3:30am, and feeling to Calvin like almost time to be up for the day!

On Friday we went to Muir Woods to see some Redwoods! I have been wanting to see them since I've been here but just haven't. Lazy ole me.

These trees were huge. Obviously we knew that going in but they were just SO TALL and really straight for being so old/tall. There was also charring on the bark of many trees so we asked a park ranger when the last forest fire was. 150 years ago. ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEAR OLD CHARRING. That's just bonkers.

To do the walking around the park Heidi had put Calvin in this Mobi wrap thing so we didn't need the stroller. We had him facing outwards and with some cute little sunglasses on. He was the star of the park that day. I felt like I was walking with a celebrity. Everyone was laughing and "aww"ing at this adorable little baby with sunglasses.

Best picture from the whole weekend

Muir Woods was great and afterwards we headed back to my neck of the woods where we grabbed dinner and a movie from Redbox and called it an early night after the not very restful night before. We mostly watched the movie because 6:30 was too early to go to sleep and the sun didn't set until 8:30pm...

On Saturday we headed out to my favorite stomping ground, Livermore, to do one last wine tasting! Before we got to that we met up with my mom's friend Val for lunch and it just happened to be her birthday! Then with a full belly we set out to add some alcohol to top it off. We first went to a place I had been once before, Page Mill Winery, because it is pretty and nestled in with the grape vines running along the driveway up to the tasting room. Since it was Heidi's first time I wanted to go somewhere that we could see the vines up close. You could even see the little grapes starting to grow! And of course my mom was enamored with the little kitschy stuff you could get at their shop so we got Calvin this souvenir: 

"I'll have a glass of the house white"

Then we went to my favorite winery, that I'm also a member of, and I always take people to, Ehrenberg Cellars. I got to say goodbye to my buddies there, and I am just now realizing I should have taken some pictures. The first woman who greeted me and made me feel at home wasn't there so they called her up so I could say bye. We ended up buying a ton of wine and changed my address in their system so I can still be a member via shipments 3 times a year. We even upped the level I'm at so it's 4 bottles instead of 2 and Mom and I are going to split the costs since I can no longer be her supplier. If I ever come back here for whatever reason some day I will be sure to stop by and say hello again.

While we were at Ehrenberg one of the ladies suggested we go to a local brewery, Working Man, to try the craft brews they make there. Mom and I aren't big beer drinkers but I enjoy it enough and Heidi had been tolerating the wine for us so we went to the brewery for her. We met a nice middle aged couple who are bout to be grandparents for the first time so they were drooling over Calvin. The beer was good, I'm not a huge beer person but there were a couple that I could see myself enjoying. 

Then as the day dwindled we made our way back to my apartment, got some fried chicken on the way, and watched a bit of Netflix before all falling asleep by 9:30pm. We are party animals. 

Sunday was a day we didn't really have solid plans for. We had originally thought maybe making it a pool day but it wasn't very warm and the breeze was strong so we vetoed that one pretty quick. After lounging around all morning we got hungry and headed to get some lunch. While at lunch I remembered hearing about a lake with a park nearby called Lake Elizabeth. We took Calvin on a walk around the lake, about a 2 mile loop, and said that was good for our outdoor activity. We then got some veggies at the grocery store and cooked ourselves dinner to try and use up some of the frozen chicken I have. Then that night we lounged again! It was great!

I took them to the airport this morning and said, "see you in 3 years!". We had been joking this entire weekend that I was never going to get to come home because my background check for the new job was taking FOREVER to clear. It took almost 2 weeks! Finally this morning I got the all clear and was contacted by the relocation company to schedule a time for them to come and whisk my things away. 

It's finally becoming more of a reality now that I have less than a week to prep for this road trip and move. Thankfully the movers are packing most of my things but I still want to clean most everything and decide what I want to take in my car with me vs what the movers can take. I've started to contact my utility companies to disconnect service and am sitting at my desk here thinking of what exactly I want to tackle tonight in terms of organization. 

Tomorrow is my last day at the current job. This is all moving so quickly but I am so thrilled that it finally is moving at all! There were times where I never thought I would leave this state. This job has been a great first stop in "adult" life but I cannot wait to get started at the new place! 

Of course I'll be blogging along the way on the road trip but don't want to post our plans beforehand in case of psycho stalkers. Stay tuned next week for lots of fun and updates!