California Vacay

Here are the rest of the highlights from our trip to California!

Friday morning we were jet lagged so we woke up at 5:45 and watched the sunrise on the beach. It was so pretty and was a perfect way to start the day.


The plan for the rest of the day was to hitch a ride down to Long Beach with AJ's parents. They ended up needing take his grandparents, so we decided to rent a car and take a fun little road trip. And that is exactly what we did....we drove from Pismo Beach to Long Beach with just a map. We were so tired the night before that we didn't charge either of our cell phones so we had no phones, no internet, no GPS. It was such an adventure!


We decided to go inland and stop at a winery we found somewhere in Santa Barbara county (I think near you, Chiada) and while we were there Alson got a call from one of the law firms in my hometown and was offered a summer associate position for next summer!! So then we hit up four more wineries in the Santa Ynez Valley to celebrate! Don't worry, we shared tastings to avoid a DUI. How happy does my husband look?!


We also ate lunch at one of the wineries that doubles as a culinary school. We shared a wood fired pizza and it was delicious.


Once we hit the coast again we took the Pacific Coast Highway down through Malibu and Santa Monica. So beautiful!


Saturday morning we woke up and went to a bar at 9 am so that we could watch the ECU game. We're hardcore like that! Luckily the bar caters to the east coast football crowd and had mimosa specials all morning. It was a lot of fun. I'm so excited for football season!

Sunday we went to the beach and did a lot of walking. We also had some fun playing in the sand.


In the afternoon we went to the harbor area for lunch.

That night was the "reception" which was more like a beach party. It was very casual, but it was very close to the ocean so it made for an amazing atmosphere.


So that concludes my California trip recap. It was definitely nice to get away!

SIL's Wedding

And we're back! The trip that I had been dreading for months (I don't really enjoy traveling....I don't like flying, I don't like sleeping in unfamiliar places, and I don't like uncertainty) is now over and it actually was a lot of fun and almost everything went smoothly!

I was mostly stressed about flying out Thursday morning and arriving on time for the wedding festivities Thursday night. Props to United! Our flight into San Francisco arrived 40 minutes early and our flight into San Luis Obispo arrived 10 minutes early. It was only a 15 minute ride from the airport to Pismo Beach, so we had plenty of time to get ready and take pictures with the rest of the wedding party. Phew!

The wedding was very small; only 19 people, including the bride and groom, were in attendance. It took place in a gazebo on a cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Very beautiful!




My MIL was born and raised in Hawaii and their family still adopts a lot of Hawaiian traditions, as you can probably tell from the pictures. Instead of carrying flowers, we all wore leis that were shipped fresh from Hawaii.


Flashback: My MIL had us wear traditional leis at our rehearsal and dinner too.

Okay, back to the current wedding....

We also took pictures down on the beach. I love this one of my SIL and her MOH.

After the ceremony we had dinner with the wedding party and guests.


By the time we ate it was almost midnight on the East Coast, so we snuck back to our room shortly after eating to get some sleep. We were exhausted!

I was planning to do my entire California recap in one post, but I didn't realize how many pictures I wanted to post. Stay tuned for more recaps and some exciting news!