Adventures in Santa Cruz

Note to self: Traveling with a puppy is a great way to make friends.
I mean, who can resist this face?

Jake and I got an awesome Living Social deal that put us right on the ocean front at the Casablanca Inn. Our relaxing vacation in Santa Cruz involved a lot of resting...

Staring at our twin in the mirror...

Playing with toys in our hotel room...

And walking the downtown streets of Santa Cruz. Human walking that is. Diego has not quite mastered the art of walking with a leash.

He likes to sit and stare at you like you're crazy when you take a few steps. So ridiculously cute.

After some intense training (and by intense, I mean 10 minutes. That's like 2 days in puppy time), he started to get the idea.

All that puppy training worked up our appetite, so we ate at a few delicious restaurants including Las Palmas.  Delicious Tacos and a Vegetarian quesadilla for under $10!

The living social deal came with a voucher for dinner at an adorable German restaurant, Tyrolean Inn, in a small town called Ben Lomond about 20 minutes from Santa Cruz. I've had some German food in my life, but nothing as delicious as this!  It was a real treat!  I highly recommend it if you are in the area!

Yes, I am one of those dog owners.  Don't judge.

True Story!

As much fun as we had in Santa Cruz, we know that all good times must come to an end.  Yesterday we left Santa Cruz and drove to Northern Cali where we will be enjoying wine country at its' finest for the next few days!  Have I mentioned that I love being done with grad school yet? :)

Welcome to the Family, Diego!

On Monday our family grew from two to three!

We made the 3 hour drive to pick up our little friend from his breeder.  I said this before, but I cannot say enough positive things about his breeder at Cee Cee's Puppy Palace.  The kennels are spotless, the breeder is extremely knowledgeable, and the dogs are loved.

We were originally going to pick up Diego next week when we leave for Alaska, but we couldn't wait a minute longer!

Jake was nervous about their first meeting, but that quickly faded away when Diego came running up to him!

The breeder even said, "Diego doesn't usually give a lot of kisses!"  That was before he met his Daddy.

It's love.

I like to think he remembered me from last week.

I can't imagine the emotional rollercoaster he must have been going through as we drove away from his mom & dad, friends, and first home in Reedley, California.

However, he tolerated the drive well and before we knew it, we were in Santa Cruz to start our first family vacation!

He got to see the ocean for the first time, hear the barking of sea lions, and look at all of the fun rides along the Santa Cruz boardwalk.

Tuckered out pup.

He is the best puppy and only cried once during the night to go to the bathroom, then he sleep until 7am without a peep!  We are so blessed!

A Running Tour of Santa Cruz

Today was the best day.  I know I say that a lot, but today really was the best day.  Janae and I took it upon ourselves to visit Santa Cruz on what happened to be the most beautiful day in history.  Sunny, blue skies, and a light breeze.  

We wanted to do a run together on the beach, but we were torn because we also wanted to see the entire city.  (And by see the entire city, we mean stop at all of the Candy stores).  The perfect solution?  A running tour of Santa Cruz, complete with stops for pictures, seal viewing, candy and ice cream. 

We started out by running to the Wharf.   

I'm not sure if this was a usual occurrence, but there were tons of seals hanging out just asking for their pictures to be taken!  It was so much fun to see them splashing around.  

We then ran to the boardwalk and looked at all of the fun rides and amusement park foods.  I learned that they are now frying things like Bacon and Twinkies.  A perfect solution to the nationwide obesity epidemic, don't you think? ;)

Downtown Santa Cruz is lined with all sorts of fun restaurants, like this one:

We were sad to discover that all of the foods weren't cooked with Chocolate. A bit of a misnomer if you ask me.  If anyone knows of such a restaurant, please let me know.

Then came the fun.  Candy stores...

And $1 scoop ice cream.  I mean, can you turn that down?  Sometimes a lactose-intolerant girl has to live on the edge.  

Brooke was jealous of my treat.

Janae had been talking about a place that serves the best Fish'n'Chips in the world, so we drove up the coast to a cozy little town called Davenport.  It is situated across from a deserted, beautiful beach.

Love this little girl.

There are about 4 buildings that comprise this town, but the important one was Whale City Bakery and Grill:

We split the order which turned out to be just right.  I wish the picture did it justice.  Moist, flaky, buttery fish in a perfectly crisp coating.  Homemade fries were the perfect match.

Jake gets here tomorrow for graduation on Saturday, so I'm excited to take another road trip to Davenport for more deliciousness.  

If any of you have favorite San Francisco Bay area restaurants/day trips that Jake and I should do before leaving in 2 weeks.... please let me know!

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In case you didn't get enough puppy love yesterday, I wanted to share the cutest video ever that I took while visiting him.  I brought him a toy to play with and let's just say... he liked it.

So adorable. Only a little while longer until he gets to come home with Jake and I!  

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Redwoods, Santa Cruz, and Alice's Restaurant!

I know my life is incredibly exciting since 97.23% of the time it consists of studying, studying, and more studying.  But... little known fact: I do get out and have fun every once in a while!

Last weekend I went on a hike through the beautiful Redwood forest with two of my classmates, Liza and Jay.  There is something so peaceful and inspiring about the giant redwoods that I just can't put into words.  Trust me.  The trees tower over you for what feels like miles into the sky.

And then there's the smell of the forest.  Love.

My favorite part of the hike was when we were walking along and Liza all of the sudden gasps... It took about 0.0239 miliseconds for me to go into "freeze-in-place-and-look-frantically-around-me-for-a-Grizzly-bear" mode afterwhich Liza calmed me down and showed me a cute little Banana Slug on the ground. Apparently it is normal to gasp at the sight of a Banana Slug in California.  You can't the the Alaska out of the girl.  :)

This weekend, between hours of studying, I got to have some fun too!  Saturday I drove to Santa Cruz to visit my bestest San Diegan friend, Carrie.  She was visiting her parents for the Easter weekend and since she was so close, I HAD to go see her!  An hour down a twisted, foggy road and I arrived in misty, beautiful Santa Cruz!

We went on a nice long run in the rain along the coast, followed by a delicious breakfast at a local cafe.

It was so good to catch up and see my favorite girl!  Luckily I get to see her again in just 3 weeks when I go visit San Diego for Becca's wedding.  Cannot wait.

My Easter Sunday consisted of early morning mass, studying for 6 hours at a bakery, then... the fun began.  We drove to pick up Nana, the Griffin's amazing Irish Grandma, and we all headed into the hills for an early dinner at Alice's Restaurant.

Best sweet potato fries I've ever had.

Dinner was a phenomenal Fish Salad and more of those yummy sweet potato fries.

After dinner, I had a big task waiting for me back at the Griffin Household. The Easter Bunny's Alaskan assistant had come and visited the Griffins early in the morning on Sunday while they were all sleeping, so they had an exciting Easter egg hunt when they woke up.  Somehow, the Easter Bunny's Californian assistant decided to come back and rehide all of the eggs so that I could find them too!  After searching high and low, I finally found all of the eggs and proceeded to overdose on Starburst Jelly Beans and Whopper mini eggs.  To complete the night, we watched a marathon of Disney movies.  I don't know if you remember, but I have an obsession with Disney songs.  Is it just me, or does your voice sound spot on when you sing "Be Our Guest" (especially when you haven't sung it for 12 years since the last time you watched Beauty and the Beast.)  It was the perfect Easter.