Our Wonderful Beach Vacation - August 2010

Sometimes you read about beach vacations that only people dream about. Our recent vacation to Long Beach, California was like that.

We spent two weeks enjoying the beach, Belmont Shore, pools, and the Bay in Belmont Shore, and the California sunshine, and also, we enjoyed family and friends.

The kids skated every morning at Westminster Ice (which was only about 15 minutes from our family's beach condo). We did also skate at Anaheim Ice two times.

After skating in the early morning, we had the rest of the day to just enjoy being on vacation. The kids went sailing with their cousin Drew, and everyone (except Jo Ann) got on kayaks.

One day we went to Marina Del Rey. The kids got to meet Uncle Bobby (Grandpa Arthur's brother) for the first time.

Jo Ann's best friend from junior high school, Bernadette McEwan Brake, drove from Irvine to Belmont Shore and spent an afternoon with us. Through Facebook, in the spring of 2010, Jo Ann found Bernadette. The two had not seen one another for over 40 years!

We went to the La Brea Tar Pits and the Los Angeles County Museum. We also too a wonderful boat ride in Long Beach Harbor and visited the Queen Mary.

We also celebrated Joel's birthday with Dan's mom, Dan's brothers Mike and Jack (and Jack's wife Wendy) and with the kids' cousin Adam.

We had our own celebration of Joel's birthday at our family's condo and at the beach.

Marion, Bruce, and Paul Curtis came down from Los Osos and spent a week in Naples just to spend time with us. We saw Jo Ann's sister Lynnellen. For the first time in many years, we got to see Lynnellen's son, Cody.

We also got to spend quality time with Karen Berzon who taught the kids ice dance every morning during our vacation. Karen had us to her beautiful home one afternoon, and we enjoyed a bbq and Karen's pool. We also got to meet her beautiful kids.

We got to see Dan's longtime friends, Alan Roberts and Randall Bradford and we had a wonderful dinner with our good friend, Stefano Stefan and his wife Huyen.

It was hard to say good-bye to all the people who love us and to the wonderful relaxed California beach lifestyle! Hopefully, we can visit again in less than a year...