We stayed with our good friends Kristen and Tom, and their two adorable girls Cyanne and Maritt. They live on a ranch, so Henry had a ball enjoying the scenery and picking (and eating!) tomatoes, carrots, green beans, and oranges:
Cyanne and Henry picked right up where we left off after seeing them in Cooperstown this past June and were fast friends.
(yes, Henry is modeling a very short, girl's bathrobe)
On Friday, Mike and I took Henry down to Stearn's Wharf:
Where we met my good friend Karen and her daughter Anna at the Sea Center:
That afternoon, we got all the kids together at a park:
Saturday morning, Kristen and I were up bright and VERY early for the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer!
It was very foggy to start the day - fairly typical for Santa Barbara:
We walked past one of my childhood playgrounds:
And the Santa Barbara Mission:
Kristen and I did the half-marathon - 13.1 miles on Saturday!
We decided not to camp out on this Walk for various reasons - lots of young kids at home, me flying 3000 miles in part to be able to spend time with people who were not on the Walk, etc. I admit to missing the experience, but feel better knowing I will be camping out next May when I Crew the Boston Walk!
So, on Saturday after walking all day we had dinner at Karen's parents house, and the kids went nuts playing in the backyard together:
Sunday morning Kristen and I headed back out very early to meet the Walkers at the Wellness Village (held at the Polo Club) and start the day's walk:
Henry met me at the lunch stop:
And we got to walk along the beautiful bluffs of Carpinteria:
And after another 13.1 miles, we made it to the finish line:
The Santa Barbara Avon Walk had 2800 walkers and raised $6.4 MILLION to help the fight against breast cancer:
This was the seventh Avon Walk I have participated in (3 times as a staff member, once as a Crew member, and 3rd time as a Walker) and as always it was an amazing experience - I am so glad I got to share it with one of my best friends.
After Closing Ceremonies we recuperated by watching the kids play at the beach:
Monday, we took all the kids to one of my favorite places - the Santa Barbara Zoo. Those who know me know of one infamous story:
This picture should give you some perspective on the distances involved:
Henry was not impressed:
The kids had a lot of fun looking at the animals:
And playing on the "anthill" at the kid's playground:
Of course, the highlight of the trip was the train ride:
In the afternoon we took a final trip to the beach(Henry got to walk Lucky the dog, and was very excited):
That night we had a last dinner together and laughed as the kids chased each other outside:
Henry did a great job on all flights. Yesterday was a touch dramatic as we were delayed in Santa Barbara for a few hours and had mere moments to catch our connection (we landed in San Francisco at 11:14 and our flight left for Boston at 11:30). Thanks to some luck and a nice sprint through the airport, we actually made it, as did (miraculously) our luggage! None of the drama of previous flights was repeated. Henry pretty much did this the whole time:
A huge thank you to Kristen, Tom, Karen, and Zach for being there with us this weekend. We loved being able to spend time with you, and seeing our kids play together was a truly wonderful experience that I hope we are able to repeat soon.
I took hundreds of photos - anyone interested in seeing the full scope of our trip can see it HERE:
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