Surf Cup - Day 1 (Part 1 of 3)

Gage's soccer team planned to travel to two major tournaments this year (Surf Cup in San Diego in the Fall and Jefferson Cup in Richmond in the Spring.  With San Diego being such an awesome destination, Gavin decided to join me for a full guy's weekend.  After an early morning flight, we had to seek out some breakfast food on the way to our Airbnb and the Leucadia Donut Shop was the place to go.  This tiny shop is a supper classic, old-school deal where once they sell out, they are done for the day, and they only accept cash.  The donuts were awesome, and Gavin was already loving San Diego.

It's also hard to wait too long before getting right to the beach, which happened to be just down the street from the donut shop!  Here is Gavin as we see what's down this walkway towards the beach.

We ended up at Grandview Surf Beach, which was new to me.  There were quite a few surfers in the water, but (as always) the water is pretty chilly here and even the day was a bit overcast still with it being late morning.  We walked along the shore, and Gavin took his shoes off to dip his feet in the water, but it was actually a rock beach so not tons of sand in this particular spot to make a relaxing walk out of.  After an hour or so, we headed back to the car and took off in search of some lunch.

Gavin was eager to get to In N Out, so we found one on the way to check out where the weekend's games were going to be played over in Del Mar.  The fields looked great, though it was a bit windy for this day.  Hopefully, things settle down a bit for when the soccer starts.

Damage Assessment

Following up on my earlier rain/basement flood post, in the end, we did have to cut out the drywall directly below the windowsill.  It was clear that while most of the water came down over the sill and onto the carpet, this area had wicked up some of the moisture into the drywall and was feeling a bit spongey.  I got some help from my friend/neighbor on how much to cut out so we made sure to get everything that could be compromised.  We dried this part out and made sure to mitigate any future mold growth in the area and could then work on figuring out how to patch this newfound feature in our basement wall.

Peak 2 Peak

 

Now this was a great day of cycling together!  I had always wanted to take Tara down one of my favorite stretches of mountain road to ride.  The hard part it usually to get here involves about a 2.5 hour climb up to ward and then traversing over a bit via Peak 2 Peak.  We had climbed to Ward once before, but Tara wasn't in for a ton more after that portion.  So, for this ride we actually parked at the base of Lyons where this loop would normally dump out and road up the canyon just past Raymond for a loop and then turned around for the amazing winding ride down next to the river.

As you can see above, we were both in good spirits just before the turn around point and then ready to enjoy the amazing descent.  Overall, the ride was a still a solid three-hour ride, so we got our money's worth.  Tara was also rocking my other pair of glasses to ensure she looked "pro enough".  Hopefully we get to do this ride again some time!

Pasta J's w/ Grandpa T

Soon after the guys got back from Washington, Grandpa T and Sandra were visiting from Arizona and took us to a great lunch at what Tara calls "The Garlic Factory" or by its formal name Pasta Jay's.  This also happens to be one of my favorite restaurants in Boulder, so I was clearly up for it.  

We got this nice front table with a view of the walking mall straight behind the me, but this picture is looking inward toward the whole crew.  It's always awesome to see these guys and we never seem to run out of stories to share.  All sorts of things that we never quite knew about either Tara's childhood or her Dad's former adventures seem to come out.  Thank you for lunch and the great company!

Washington Trip for the kids

Never to stay put too long in once place over the summer, Gavin and Gage headed out to visit Grandpa and Grandma Mike in Washington for a week in the middle of July.  They had quite the agenda and were actually joined for much of the trip by my Aunt Crista.  Here they are picking berries at a farm.  I am wondering how many berries made it directly into their mouths vs. into the buckets...

This is a picture from in front of the farm with this really cool, old Firetruck.

Another one of their favorite things to do while up there is to go island hopping and jump around on the various ferries to places like Widbey Island.  This picture is from the ferry on one of the days.  You can see them rocking their Uncle Adam's old football sweatshirts from his High School football days.

This is another picture from the benches on a ferry but was taken on a different day with Grandma Mike and the boys.  These guys came home with great stories of adventures and jokes.  They also always come back from a stay at Grandma and Grandpa's and let us know how good the food is there compared to what we have at home.  All good fun and I am grateful that they could spend the time up there making memories and having great experiences!

TK & GK

If there is one thing that rises to the top of Tara's value list, it is quality time.  This picture is from a rare lunch date with Gavin and Tara getting to spend some top-notch time together.  Times like this are becoming much rarer these days as both of our guys get older and are surely treasured!

Jokesters

Over the years, these two have had a love-hate relationship with each other.  The sometimes just love being together and then something will go south, and it moves over the hate side for a bit.  Perhaps that is just the normal brotherly love give and take.

However, we certainly enjoy them together much more when they are cracking each other up.  They always seem to have some sort of inside joke rolling and sometimes we can't even tell what is so funny...but at least they can.  It's awesome to see these two grow up together and have each other to lean on.