pa-jammy
I wrote a post about how the fires in Los Angeles affected my family. I don’t really want to rehash it here, but in a nutshell, my brother and his family are safe, but they lost their home in Altadena.
Jenny and I set up a GoFundMe for them.
They were on the news on Saturday.
I do want to post about my birthday celebrations that happened the weekend before, because they were excellent, but I’m not quite in the mood yet.
2025 can suck it.
June was a busy month! So let’s get to it.
It started with a trip to California for my niece Eleanor’s high school graduation. Just me, not the boys or George.
We went to UCLA (that’s where Ellie is going in the fall) and walked around (after having In and Out for lunch.)
Before the trip, my brother said, “bring hiking shoes.” I said, “do I look like the type of person to own hiking shoes?” so it was in my sneakers that he tried to kill me the next day. We hiked up to Echo Park on an extremely damp and foggy and misty day, on a very narrow trail, and I was 100% convinced that only one of us at most was going to make it down to the bottom in one piece. Thank god I was wrong. I wouldn’t have wanted to mess up Ellie’s graduation week.
I’m not kidding, it was grueling (at least to me, someone who lives in a very flat place) and even my brother said later that he was nervous for me. Sheesh. Here are a bunch of random pics, including none of the view because you couldn’t see anything! But, in spite of that, I felt very accomplished, and it was nice to spend time with my brother. (Don’t tell him I said that.)
I googled this hike to get some info about it, and if I’d read “The majority of the trail is along the side of the mountain with some narrow switchbacks – it may be difficult for those that have trouble with heights” (emphasis mine) then maybe I would have rethought this decision. This is a good post that has pictures of, wow, what it might have looked like had I been able to see anything! It’s fine, it’s fine. Probably best that I couldn’t see how far I would have plummeted to my death.
The rest of the trip was hanging out with family, eating, going to Paper Source, Ellie’s graduation, going back to UCLA, seeing Pawnee City Hall, shopping at Mood, and basically spending a lot of time in electric cars.
I was really excited to give Ellie her graduation gift, a quilt I made for her in UCLA colors. I hope it keeps her warm and cozy while she’s at college. Sniff, sniff. She was just a tiny baby, I can’t believe she’s off to college.
Okay, so then I went home, and the day after I got back, George left for his long-awaited trip to the UK. He was going to be gone for two weeks, and little did he know that I had big plans while he was gone. Kiki came to visit and while she was here, we redid his bathroom downstairs. It’s so much better! (Of course I posted a ton more pictures and details here.)
He came home last week, and since then, life has gotten significantly quieter (that’s good.) Oh, I made this (Selwyn by Cashmerette) shirt early in the month, but I haven’t been able to get a good picture of it, so after a few glasses of wine, my friends stuck me in a bathtub to get some.
hee hee
The boys are finishing up driver’s ed today, so expect the July recap to be full of danger and intrigue!
The boys and I went to California last week to visit my brother and sister-in-law and niece, and I will never be able to spell “niece” right the first time.
It was a tough decision to go, after we found out that Molly’s services were being held while we’d be away. She was never far from our mind during the trip, especially on Monday.
We arrived Wednesday evening, and were pretty exhausted, so we had some pizza and went to bed. I slept terribly that night, for some reason (oh right because I’m old and have insomnia) but fortunately, we didn’t have a ton planned for Thursday. Ellie and I went for a walk, where we did a little light celebrity stalking. Later, we went swimming in the neighbor’s pool and hit up Target for supplies because Friday we…
went to Disneyland! We got up super early and were on the road a bit after 6 so we could arrive around 7. In the cars on the way there (I was in the girl car with Jennifer and Ellie, and the boys rode with Uncle Evan) we all were on our phones at exactly 6:59:59 to get reservations (or whatever they call it) for the new Star Wars ride. I managed to get them for us, yay!
We spent the entire day at the park. This should really be its own post. We rode a bunch of rides (the Rise of the Resistance was completely worth the stress of getting on it, and we didn’t have to wait in any line at all, which was nice) and walked a zillion steps and had dinner at a Tiki restaurant (so good) and my feet are still disgustingly blistered, but it was worth it.
Oh, and Linus is now obsessed with Dole Whip. Hard to blame him, it was delicious!
Saturday we mostly rested, except we went and got some famous Italian sandwiches from a place down the road for lunch. In the evening, Evan and I took the boys to a LAFC (Los Angeles Football Club) game. It was fun. The food was good. I got a jacket which will come in handy during football season here (they have the same colors as the Saints) and the boys got jerseys and as usual when we go to pro soccer games, the score ended us 2-2.
(I guess we have a streak of draws too.) (When we got home, we watched Season 2, Episode 1 of Ted Lasso.)
Sunday, the kids and I went to visit my friend Robyn who used to work at Automattic, and I made a new best friend who is three years old. We had delicious ice cream after hanging out at her house and eating pizza.
Monday was the day of Molly’s service, and I still needed to take the boys to the beach, so we stopped for some flowers on the way and made a little tribute to her at the beach. Now, she probably preferred a more tropical beach, but I like to think she would have appreciated it, even if it was cloudy and the temperature was hovering around 68 degrees.
The boys filled their bathing suits with sand and Miles swallowed half of the Pacific Ocean, so we left after a couple of hours before heading back to Evan and Jennifer’s to relax and pack. (Boo!) A few of us went to the Huntington for a sunset stroll, which was stunning, but also, my feet were still killing me. So kind of painful too.
We came home yesterday after a long day of travel to a heat index of 105 after a week of 70s, but Daddy and Ziggy were very happy to see us!
Except this time it’s a step.
The last time we took a bench pic was 2019. You can see the previous five pics here.
I have let so much time pass, and I haven’t finished blogging about our trip to Los Angeles, so I’m just going to drop a bunch of pics in here and consider it done.
Flying there, In n Out, visit to Uncle Evan and Aunt Jennifer’s office, monthly pic (with Ellie.)
Train to the beach! Santa Monica Pier, Ferris Wheel, playing in the water.
Dave & Busters, Oliver hits the jackpot, everyone gets stuffed animals, I got a Pikachu! Trip to the park Evan and Jennifer designed.
Only one kid wanted their picture taken. Guess who?
UNIVERSAL! HARRY POTTER WORLD! SO FUN! Even with a 2 hour wait in line for the HP ride. Butterbeer. Minions. Simpsons. Donuts. Good times.
Last day, boo! Lunch at Pink’s with my friend Robyn. Trip to the Grove for ice cream and a trolley ride. More cousin time, then back on the plane to go home on the redeye.
And finally, the traditional “Uncle Evan with Ellie and the boys.” See the others here.
I can’t believe it’s been ten days since I last posted. It’s been an extremely busy ten days, so I’m going to start trying to catch up with posts about our trip to Los Angeles (which was fantastic.)
First up, pics from our hike from the Griffith Observatory to get a good view of the Hollywood Sign, which the boys were fascinated by (mostly because of the sheer size of it.)
We went about a mile out (and then back), and I was impressed by how much the boys enjoyed it (and how little they complained.) We got pretty high up, and the nervous mom in me was freaking out only slightly. (Can’t you tell by the look on my face in this pic?)
Posting from atop a mountain. (Possibly “mountain.”)
The boys and I are in Los Angeles, visiting my brother, sister-in-law, and niece. We’re all loving the mild weather, and I love that Ellie made another appearance in the monthly pics.
I really wanted to use one of the pictures I took against the hedge wall they have alongside the driveway, but this is the kind of tomfoolery I had to deal with.
So. Sitting on the front porch, it is.
pyjammy dot blog 