Week 37

Monday, Sept. 10th

Another season of dance kicked off.  This is our 15th year at Northstar, but our first year doing it without Maddy.  Ugh!  That place isn't the same without her.  Her presence is missed.  Trevor and Renna are both taking multiple classes.

Renna's favorite so far is jazz with Sienna and multiple other friends.

Tuesday, Sept. 11th
Renna was freshly showered and asked Trevor to please brush her hair for her while she and I played Rummy.

Hours and hours went into searching Orange County Craigslist for a car for Maddy.  We quickly learned a few things about buying in California: many of the cars deal with 'sun spots', the equivalent to our New England 'rust' issue.  Also because of intense heat and sun, many of the leather seats have cracks in them; a common mention in ads.  And ALWAYS, always the A/C is mentioned as one of the top reasons to buy their car.  A/C is obviously very essential.

 Reality setting in.

Maddy began choreographing Renna's lyrical solo.

Wednesday, Sept. 12th

Maddy took Renna with her for a little sister time and a few errands, including picking up a suitcase Kandie was lending her.  No surprise it took Renna no time to make friends with Miss Kandie's husband and dog!

Rainy day fun.

Maddy's sweet friend, Madalynn, had come over the previous weekend and helped Maddy pack.  Went through her entire room and closet.  This day she came back and helped Maddy rethink some things and repack.  What a sweetheart!

 Trevor and Renna, side-by-side, are in the same acro class.

After across, we met up with the rest of the fam for our last family dinner before Maddy's departure. It was sweet and bitter and hard and exciting and sad.  Many tears this night and I'm working on a separate journal entry/post that I will share, at least in part, at a later time.

Thursday, Sept. 13th

Off to Cali, bright and early!

Friday, Sept. 14th
We celebrated with a baked goat cheese, apricot jam, pistachio, and fig appetizer!

Enjoying the Dellars for the evening.

Saturday, Sept. 15th
Crossfit for me, struggling to clear my head and fix my attitude.

 The BIG move-in.

We sat and waited for her car to be detailed.  Since the car was several hundred less than we budgeted, we splurged to have it detailed and deep-cleaned.  It had been there for several hours and when we went to pick up the front desk girl let us know they were finishing up, but they found a tarp with a bunch of dirt in the truck. Huh??!?!?!?  She walked us back to show us.  I have no idea what was up with that!  A bit later, a youngish kid (20) came into the lobby and innocently asked if we wanted our tarp back.  We laughed til tears rolled down our cheeks!  You had to be there...there and with us for the entire car-shopping saga!!!

 Sunday, Sept. 16th
There it is!  Leonardo DeCarlo, affectionately called 'Leo'.

 Renee took us out on the Duffy.

 I can't even fathom what this 1st Birthday party cost!!!

 A floating, motorized tiki bar.

We had lunch at the yacht club and then went back to Balboa Island for a little street fair they were having.

Happy to have good reports from those helping with the kids back home!

 Little Balboa at night.