I Took a Quick Little Jaunt to California

August 5th Liz and I drove back to Columbus from New York, and then on August 10th, after a few blissful days together in Columbus, I flew out to California alone so I could go to Aunt Louise’s big 100th Birthday Party (it was Liz’s first week of the new school year so she kind of couldn’t miss that, hence I traveled alone, and she was quite missed in California).

Arriving at LAX, my legs felt like they needed a stretch. So I started walking. And before I knew it (or after an hour and a half) I was nearly to Collin and Mallory’s house! BUT Mallory picked me up on her way home from picking up Blair and we went over to the pure heaven that is Brother Cousins tacos. And a few hours later, Collin and I would go to El Idolo but circumstances conspired against our circumstances and I don’t have any photos of that nice place or their nice tacos.

August 11! I went and got my haircut in Alhambra from the lady that does such a good job, test drove some cars, and came home and took a walk to check out the Caltech Turtle Situation. The Caltech Turtle Situation was major! I counted 99 between the 3 pools!

And then, that evening, after Mom, Dad, Afton, Katharine, Kristen, and Rachel had arrived (Frank and Emily were in San Marino before me), it was time for Louise’s big party. We got there a little early and admired the majesty of the In n Out truck (sometimes “food truck” really means “food TRUCK”), the party decorations, and I had never been inside the old Alhambra chapel so I had a good look around at the old Alhambra chapel.

Proud granddaughter at the wall of bishops

and amidst all the excitement (and wondering where she was) the Birthday Girl materialized in the lobby, holding court and telling people where to put Family History binders. At last the party was beginning for real! At last it was time for our In n Out!

Louise got a little time on the mic to impart some brief words of wisdom before sitting back and enjoying the entertainment of watching her grandsons and great grandsons dance the haka for her (the MC had taken my brothers and me for Louise’s grandkids, not nephews, and I’m glad that was cleared up by the time the dance was organized.)

And soon the party was over . . . but you know what comes after the party? The afterparty! Many game family members came with Greg and Me for a little Chengdu Taste while the two of us Chengdu Dug-In to that famous Alhambra Sichuan goodness. V. glad to have it finally checked it off and tried the famous toothpick lamb, I miss Lucky Noodle King.

August 12th: I got everyone to come down to Ditroit for lunch and you know it was a giant hit! Those suadero tacos are a forever classic forever and the fish taquito also totally amazing. A smaller contingent came with me over to Mariscos Jalisco and then I took the deluxe contingent to Dover Street Market and Kang Kang food court. (We were taking it easy on lunch because we had a big dinner to eat).

That night we celebrated Dad’s birthday with dinner at Malbec, our favorite Argentine restaurant in Pasadena, followed by hot fudge sundaes at Twoheys’. There was a bit of a wait for a Twohey’s table, so a few of us took a little walk. And then most of the group went to cross a bridge they weren’t supposed to cross, so Emily and I stayed on the sidewalk and respected the signs and tape. Everyone survived crossing the bad bridge and everyone enjoyed eating their sundaes. Which…I didn’t get any photos of? Well, if you’re actually reading this, you probably know what a Twohey’s sundae looks like.

Sunday the 13th: Church. Big family dinner. A game of Poetry for Neanderthals. A family walk to Cal Tech with a Facetime with Liz (not pictured) and a Facetime with Owen (shown here).

Monday the 14th: With the clock ticking, we go check on this house that’s being moved around its yard and another house where they’re going to build an underground 5 car garage and then I paid one last little visit to the turtles. Then I go with Mom, Dad and Rachel to Home State and, well, few hits hit quite like Home State hit with them. What a nice breakfast taco time we had before picking up Roma sandwiches and catching one last flight (plus a Chicago layover) back to New York (pilot blessed us on the right side of the plane with a slow ride up along the whole side of Manhattan, tip to tip. Thank you, pilot, it looked real good even if the cell phone picture doesn’t.

We Spent April and May in Wedded Bliss In Columbus

So after our neat Hawaiian honeymoon, Liz and I drove from Chicago to Columbus to start being married people together. With Cornelius!

This will be a post about things we did during April and May in Columbus, but it will also be pictures from walking around in the neighborhood, something we and I did quite a bit of.

A great thing about Columbus is driving over to Katie and Joel’s for a meal or for a hang. Right off the bat we were there right away.

Just a few days after getting to Columbus, Mitch & Niall and Co came through town as part of their great American road trip and we met up with them for Mexican. It was wonderful!

Also right away it was Easter and Katie and Joel hosted a big Hawaii-themed Easter dinner where we made kalua pig and showed a honeymoon slideshow. Also Cornelius had to wear his Hawaii outfit but didn’t have to come to dinner.

As you might know, we got a cat carrier backpack so I started taking Cornelius on walks around the neighborhood. He doesn’t love it. But he does love sitting in the carrier out on the patio. He understands that that’s the way he gets to go outside so when he sees me come down the stairs in the morning he runs full speed and leaps into the backpack. And also here are some pictures from walking around outside, not always with the backpack.

One afternoon I was helpful and picked some stuff up at the church that Liz had left there.

There was this evening where we walked to the Giant Eagle grocery store.

April 14th we had a real fun night — we went out to Marion, Ohio to see their High School production of Mean Girls as one of Liz’s intern Alyx was handling percussion for the show and the show was just great! Amazing star power they’ve got out in Marion. And equally amazing was the Stewart’s Root Beer Drive-In they have in Marion. They hang it right on your window, just like in the movies! Great stuff.

The next day (Saturday the 15th) I got to go watch Liz play songs for old folks at their home and then we did some furniture shopping before my niece-in-law Carolyn came over to eat noodles and watch Champions with us while outfit-coordinating with Liz.

Here are miscellaneous photos from April 16-20th…

On the evening of the 20th I got to go see Liz play with ORB (the Obscure Reference Band), a video game music band.

Then the next night I went with Liz and her (our?) friend Claudia to see this band Snarky Puppy. Always interesting when a band you have never, ever heard of before turns out to be very popular.

Then the next day, April 22nd, I had an early birthday party with the adults from Liz’s family at the 94th Aero Squadron by the Columbus Airport. I had my 15th birthday dinner at the Chicago Aero Squadron so it was a lot of fun to return to one again, even if it was about to close in a few weeks and definitely acting like it.

A few days later we had a picnic dinner before helping clean the newly renovated Columbus Temple

Another performance by Liz for old people … this time at a really fancy retirement community

And then on the evening April 28th we drove down to Nashville and got dinner at the amazing Joyland before crashing at Jeff and Noelle’s

Saturday the 29th started with Benji’s football game, a visit to the Buddy Bench, and tiny donuts before a visit to the new Prince’s Hot Chicken (I miss the old Prince’s) with Cousin Katharine joining us before it was time to say adios to the R*smussens.

Then we went to Loveless Cafe with Annemarie and Adam before spending the night at their place. And then I woke up and it was my birthday! Which began with country livin’ and chickens before the drive back to Columbus (with a stop for a little birthday lunch at Skyline Chili!)

Here are pictures from around the neighborhood and of Cornelius and a second ORB gig from another during the next space of time before our big Columbus reception and the visit from my folks.

After the reception weekend and after my parents had left there was a big gathering of Liz’s family at a very fancy Dairy Queen. And after this there are nice pictures of things we did before our trip out to Utah for our big third and final wedding celebration, like making cavatelli at Katie and Joel’s or going to Target a few times or taking Cornelius out in a stroller he didn’t like very much and stuff like that.

Oh and something really fun we did before the Utah trip was go on a little taquito tour of our neighborhood, enjoying a little meal at Las Carnitas and Super Torta before getting dessert at a very busy Culver’s.

Oh! And the Saturday morning after that there was a surprise birthday party for Anne, Liz’s mom, who is also my mom now, too.

And then we went to Utah and came back from Utah. In the tiny little bit of time before we left for New York I got my neighborhood pool pass and went swimming once. What a life!

Ok, now I just need to make a blog post (or two?) about our Summer in New York and then I think we’ll be all caught up? As long as we don’t do anything else, like drive back to Columbus or fly out to Aunt Louise’s birthday party.

We Had a Honeymoon!

Ok. Finally. I am starting this blog post about Liz and my Hawaiian Honeymoon!
Our flight out of Midway left EARLY, so early we had to leave our hotel at, I don’t know, 2:30am? This isn’t a photo of us leaving at 2:30am, but it gives you the idea of what Liz and me being in our hotel lobby was like.

But the nice thing about leaving Chicago so dang early in the morning is you get to Maui around, what was it, noon or 1 or something? I hadn’t been since I was 15 and the airport was mostly like what I barely remembered it being like. When I came to Hawaii as a 15yr old I noted how everyone else had rented convertibles so this time I decided: Convertible!

We zipped over to our hotel to check in and drop our bags off before zipping back over to our first Hawaii attraction…
(Here are hotel establishing shots)

Hawaii Attraction No. 1? The Maui Tropical Plantation tour!

Then followed that up with dinner at the plantation’s Mill House restaurant

And then back we went to our hotel.

Day Two, or Full Day #1 — we wake up in Wailea and walk from our hotel to the ones next door, past the White Lotus, and to where the condos started then turned around and came back, had some breakfast, explored our hotel a bit more, and then had pool time!

Then we drove up to Lahaina and ate lunch at Cheeseburger in Paradise, which I had eaten at on my trip to Maui when I was 15. Seemed about the same! Walked around Lahaina a bit and saw some sights I sort or remembered from that 1992 trip.

Then we drove up to what I’m going to ignorantly call “the north coast of Maui” and took a walk along the coast all the way to the Ritz before coming back down to the Lahaina area for a wonderful dinner at King Noodle. During the walk we sure saw lots of people getting their sunset beach portraits. Beach portraits like crazy! Oh and we also popped into a grocery store and wound up buying a box of Kraft Instant Spaghetti Dinner which we would later eat in Columbus.

Day Three: Had a traditional Hawaiian McDonalds breakfast to get us the energy we needed for our next big activity: a visit to Haleakala national park where we learned it is a LOT easier to hike down into a volcano crater than hike out of it. Holy smokes! Don’t let the smiles totally fool you, it was a lot of work!

After our hike we had an absolutely bangin late lunch at Da Kitchen — really wish we’d “found” this place sooner and gone there more—and then took a nice walk around our hotel and the coast by it before calling it a Maui night one last time.

Day Four — Saying goodbye to our hotel, overrun with runners, then grabbing breakfast at a nice place the name of which I cannot remember or find right now, then returning our car and catching a flight to Oahu.

Get to Oahu, deal with a rather curious car rental situation that turns out to work out quite well, and head straight for the last Pearl Harbor tour of the day

Then we decided to grab a little dinner at an L&L Barbecue since we loved our dinner at Da Kitchen the day before.

Then we took the super beautiful drive up to Laie (no pictures) and got milkshakes from the place the Obamas go. Angel’s Ice Cream. I think that’s it. And we also noted that there was an L&L in that same shopping center.

And then we went over to our home for the next few days: an amazing cliffside condo leant to us by Carol and Geoff. Holy smokes! What a place! What a view!

Day Five — got up, walked around our neighborhood, checked out the private beach and then had smoothies and loco moco at, uhm, the nearby L&L Barbecue!

Then we drove down to the Macadamia Nut farm store before getting lunch with Carol and Geoff (HUGE mistake: did not get a picture from this) before making a visit to the Laie temple AND, well, getting dinner at L&L Barbecue.

Day Six — We heard the thing to do was watch the sunrise at the end of our little peninsula so that’s how we started the day. Then I went over to the grocery store to check things out and we spent the morning at our local private beach before some general Laie activities like eating fried fish, corn dogs, visiting BYU, going to the part of the Polynesian Cultural Center that’s like Downtown Disney, and taking a hike up to a World War II pillbox that turned out to be a little more demanding than we had expected. Then we enjoyed the North Shore a bit as it got darker and darker and, uhm, got L&L Barbecue for dinner (No pics)

Last Day: And the honeymoon ends like it began: Early! Got up early, drove to Honolulu, dropped off our rental in a really odd manner (but everything worked out) and enjoyed a nice and easy flight back to Chicago with a nice and easy layover in, I don’t know, Phoenix or something? All I know is wherever it was, they didn’t have L&L there.

Okay, now I just need to blog:
-Misc April-June Columbus Stuff
-New York Summer Stuff (including visitor posts!0