A Picture Perfect Day

I think we found utopia.  It's Balboa Island on 4th of July weekend.  Holy Cow this was a patriotic, idyllic little enclave of fabulous beach mansions...I mean super-sized cottages...and kitschy tourist shops.  Add in one great breakfast place, over-the-top holiday decor and a fun hotel stay and we had ourselves a perfect little weekend.  Julie met us there on Saturday morning and joined us for the fun.

Mils and Si are showing off their first-ever gummi-bracelets bought for them by Aunt JuJu.

Picnic lunch on the boardwalk.  Wish I could have captured the awesomeness of Si's stained lips and shirt after drinking this grape/berry concoction straight from the bottle.  

Here's what I'm talkin' about.  Cutest general store ever.  This is Millie's first ever motorized ride of this type.  My mom is (and therefore I am) convinced that these rides are just filthy enough for the kids to contract some form of flesh-eating bacteria, so we generally steer clear.  Not on this dream of a day, however

Just a cute house...my favorite, in fact.  What you can't see is the two gigantic golden retrievers sunning themselves on the front patio.  Heaven.

And we could call it a day in Millie's book.  She has discovered the magic of a candy necklace.  

Si's not as concerned with the beauty of it...he's more of a flavor guy.

Back at the hotel, Dad and the kids crashed for naps while Mom and Jules hit the pool.  Sometime before dinner Millie busted this out on us.  SHE WROTE HER NAME!  I might have cried about it.

What's a perfect day that doesn't end with s'mores?  I did a dance when I saw that the hotel had a big s'smore roast planned for that evening. 

We called them 'sticky deserts' and loved every messy bite.

The evening ends with some running around and rolling down the hill at the hotel.  

The next morning we headed back to the island for breakfast at Gloria's and a visit to our cow friend Bessie (The kids called her Betsy since I have two mom-friends named Betsy.  They must be so happy to have a cow name-sake.).  What an awesome final SoCal road trip.