Friday, October 5, 2012

Summer Vacay Part 2-California-Hill Family Reunion

For some reason, the picture taker-Kevin, didn't take as many on the second leg of our trip.  I think he gets too cool in front of his family or something, and I just forget most of the time.  So, this post will be significantly smaller.  
Since Kevin has kept me sequestered in Chicago for the last 3 years, it had been that long since I had seen his family, so it was so great that EVERYONE was able to be there.  It was the year of the baby, so everyone had their little ones except me, but Klaus will be here soon enough, we aren't rushing it. I also got some great tips, which I will certainly need. With all the vacationing and moving, I hadn't, and still haven't done much to prepare for our little ones arrival. 
One of our days we got to go out to Half Moon Bay to go deep sea fishing. It sounded like a fabulous idea to me, so the boys, Lianna, and me went off to catch ourselves some rock fish and link-cod. Most of us fared pretty well, we caught our maximum number of fish, even without the help of Art, who spent most of the day with his head overboard.  Maybe that was the bait that kept the fish coming and poor little 4 year old Kaden.  He got sick early on, but was an amazing sport on the fishing trip that never ended.  I think we were out on the water an extra 3 hours. 
 Kevin, trying to look the part of a fisherman.  He ALMOST nailed the look. 
 I think Lianna caught the most fish, but the men just claimed to be after the big fish. Whatever. 
 Kevin caught a Jellyfish, but he just wanted a big link-cod so bad!
 We won't mention that this was actually Trace's fish, but Kevin wanted the picture with it so people might think he caught it, Trace was gracious enough to consent.  So let's critique his fisherman outfit one more time.  From the waist up, he nailed it.Grizzled beard, flannel shirt, toque, and a good neutral jacket.  Unfortunately, I didn't take a good enough picture.  If you could look down, yup, those are Jordan shorts and Puma sneakers. Maybe next time if we get him the real look, he'll catch some real fish.
 We also got to go down to Monterey, one of my favorite places in the whole world. We went out wandering in the piers, went to the beach, and since we mastered kayaking the week before, ventured out in the open water kayaks.

We went out with Kevin's brother and his little 4 year old.  It was chilly, but we were all bundled up.  We saw lots of marine life, seals, otters, and sea lions around the harbor, but, it was super windy, and  those sea lions were foul smelling, so we weren't out too long. 
We got to spend lots of time hanging out with the family, and playing with all the new little spawn, but I am terrible and didn't do a very good job of documenting all the fun we had, but Tina had the foresight to schedule pictures. 
 What would a family reunion be without family pictures?  Here we are! 
Here is the baby train.  All within a year of each other.  
And our mini family pic.  Kevin was a terrible sport, and he kept making me laugh commenting on how the photographer wanted us to get so intimate in public. It is amazing that we don't look entirely distorted from me laughing and hitting him to get him to quiet down.

It  was such a fun trip.  Hopefully we can all get together again soon! Luckily we are closer now that we are in California.  Oh yeah, I neglected to mention that didn't I?  We moved out to Mountain View so Kevin could start his new job as a lawyer.  We have been here almost 3 weeks now. Let's hope he ends up loving it and forgets all about wanting to be a Geologist!

1 comment:

Gina said...

You look gorgeous. I love reading about your adventures. I wish you lived closer! Miss you