January Shmanuary...Winter Shminter!

Last Tuesday, Noah and I went over to Santa Cruz, all bundled up ready for a winter day in The Cruz. Ummmm no! IT WAS 73 DEGREES! We met up with some dear friends for our lunch. Jess, Vicenta and I used to have lunch at I ♥ Sushi on a weekly basis...now we are all living and working in different cities so when ever we all end up in town, we meet up and eat entirely waaay too much! Last time we met up, Noah was in my belly and taking up prime sushi room and I wasn't allowed to eat sushi...this time, I ate sushi and Noah was trying to swipe it off my plate!

After luch, Noah and I were thinking we might die of heat exhaustion, so we pulled off our sweatshirts, changed into some t-shirts and headed for an air conditioned building where Noah could meet some of his fans! We went to the county building where I used to work at Friday Night Live. The building was air conditioned, though it was a bit empty, we got to have a nice visit with Xaloc and Noah was sure to pull out all his tricks and show off a little bit! After a diaper and a whole bunch of drool we headed out to meet visit some more friends.
We haven't made it over the hill as often as we would like so we were trying to cram in all the visits we could. Starbucks in Capitola to visit Tara and the new little baby growing in her belly :), and over to King Paint and Paper to see Tom (and hear the great news of his July '09 wedding with Jo CONGRATULATIONS!) and had to cancel our visit with Rachelle and Nate due to a missed nap. Our one last stop was also a bust, but it worked out just perfectly....

Noah and I ended up down at Twin Lakes Beach. It was B-E-A-UTIFUL! My intent was to find a nice relaxing place to nurse and change Noah's diaper before making our way back over the hill. Umm yeah, we ended up there for about 2 hours! We had so much fun...in January, the middle of winter, barefoot and on the beach surrounded by oodles of others soaking up the rays. January, Shmanuary!

Noah loved it! He couldn't hold his little head still. It darted back and forth, up and down and diagonally pausing just long enough to store what ever he was seeing in that ever growing little brain of his. The sea gull, the group of high school kids playing tag, the fly on the blanket, the girl in the bikini (such a boy!), the crashing waves, my red toe nail polish, the sand, the dog...he took it all in!

We spent a lot of time down by the water and even more time trying to keep the beach out of Noah's mouth. He was not too sure about the sand at first, but once he had his little hands squishing away in it, he was determined to get it all and get it all in his mouth! Despite my best efforts, the kid managed to eat some sand and made the face, we all know so well. As we started to pack up, the sunset started and we were delayed another 30 minutes or so. It was so beautiful, I couldn't turn my back to it and leave. So we watched and we played and we had some strangers take our picture, and we took more pictures....and then Noah slept.

Gotta love "winter" in Santa Cruz!