The Fun Never Stops

A week after getting back from Vegas, I head off to California for two weeks! What a fun summer. All this traveling and getting around on the West Coast. I was mainly going for Girls Camp @ Camp Ritchie but I also really miss my hometown of Woodland & my relatives. The housesitting job I had fell thru but luckily my work let me work away from home on the laptop so that was really handy. Yeah! I made the 12+ hour journey with my trusty car "Joemariaye" and even though I got off work an hour early on Friday, I didnt end up leaving until 8:30pm at night! I made it to Riverside to meet my friend Solomon about 2am. We went to Denney's and ate dessert and talked for about an hour and then I slept in my car in front of where Solomon is currently living (gated community so it felt safe enough) til about 7:30am when he woke me up by knocking on the window. Oops! I guess I was more tired than I thought - I overslept and totally missed my 6am alarm. I went on my way again and stopped by the Redlands temple which was pretty neat because I had never been there before.

I made my stay there somewhat short because I needed to keep driving. Around 2pm I got to Tracy and met up with my friend Kokob. We went to the mall in Tracy and got food, then she followed me to Woodland. After unpacking some of my stuff at my aunt's house I headed over to the Bringhursts to see Betty and to wash my car. We were neighbors for a very long time and my sister and I would go thrift store shopping with her, on walks, etc...she was like my second mom. I was so excited to go over and visit her and I thank her so much for letting her wash my car in her driveway! Next I headed over to Linda's for a bit and catch up on my emails. It was so awesome to see her again and later that evening we went to IN N Out in Davis! The one in Woodland is still not open yet.

The next day at church it was fun to see a lot of familiar faces in the ward and catch up on the newsy news. Funny that for combined PH/RS after a presentation by Rebekah W on the ward website, the Bishop got up and was saying some words about the ward and being on time to mtgs, stuff like that. Then he brought up the "Skinner family who used to be in this ward for a very long time..." and then he went on to make some comments on how impressed he was that my family was so well behaved at church, etc. Then he said "in fact, we have a Skinner here with us today" and he looked around for me and I sort of raised my hand but I was so embarassed. Haha O well. My friend Kris invited me to the singles ward in Davis and so I went, just for sacrament mtg. It was so small..about 20 people there. SO small!

Later that day I ate dinner at the Valentine' s plus their son Joe and his wife Dawn and their kids came. Matt was there as well. It was great to sit and eat in their home again, I miss their family a lot. After eating I stopped by the Castillo's for awhile to visit them. I used to work with Traci at Gemini and Hugo at Color Supply and I have babysat for them quite a lot so it was awesome to go say hi to them and see how they are doing. Then I headed back over to Linda's for the rest of the evening.

Monday! My first day working from "home". It was nice. I woke up and opened the laptop and started working on my excel spreadsheets. It wasnt too hard to focus since I didnt have many plans for the day. That evening I ended up going to FHE in Davis with the ysa. They had a lesson by Joy Brooks and then we played a game outside. There was so many girls (ok like 8 or 9) and a few guys. I was all to eager to leave and I came back to Woodland and of course, went to Linda's! Haha

Tuesday inbetween working, Betty & I went shopping at a few thrift stores! I found some good deals on some clothes and shoes, plus hid a few items that I wanted to pay 1/2 off of for the 4th of July. Hehe. I am sneaky like that. I found a dress at My Sisters Closet that I thought would work well for the wedding I am supposed to be in for Hillary and Ben in August. Betty came and approved of it PLUS it was 1/2 off because it had a purple tag so hooray for that! We got taquitos at El Patio <-- one of my favorite places to eat in Woodland. That evening I went to Sacramento/Roseville area and ate with Grandma and Grandpa at Applebees. I miss seeing them as often as I saw them when I lived in CA so it was great to catch up and eat and talk. I went to Ross afterwards, then headed back to Woodland. I'd also like to say a shoutout to Jose and his wife who detailed my car (and my uncle's truck!) that afternoon. They did a fantastic job and my car smelled so good - like cherries of course! when they were done.

Wednesday I met up with Andre who works at Color Supply and Martin who works at Auto Craft, in Vacaville at the bowling alley so we could all eat lunch together. Good times good times. Martin and Andre are so super nice and it was fun to reminisce on our memories of working together. For dinner I went to Ono Teriakyi because they were having a fundraiser for fallen Deputy Sheriff Jose Antonio (Tony) Diaz because he left behind three kids. It was really sad but the line was out the door and all they were taking were donations so I dontated the $10 I had and loaded my plate with some food, buffet style and took it back to Linda's to eat. Went and visited Amada Saragoza for awhile after that, perfect timing because she and her husband and son Adam with his gf Kelsey were going to Oregon for a wedding! It was so awesome to see her again and catch up on her life and whats been going on in her family. For those of you that dont know, her daughter Andrea and I met in 2000 at WCC and became really good friends. We had the best times together until she passed away in March 10 2006 at age 24, due to complications from her scoliosis. I still keep in touch with her family though, they are amazing people. Later Linda and I went to Natomas to go to the See's candy store and to the Jelly Belly store.

Thursday morning I picked up Sis Valentine and dropped her off at the airport so she could go to L.A for the 4th of July and meet up with her family down there.

Stopped by The Cookie Co and got 3 cookies! They are the best!! Linda took me to The Old Spaghetti Factory that evening in Sacramento for my bday dinner. Its tradition with her!! Sadly the place was not crowded at all and we got seated fast.

Goes to show that the tough times in the economy are taking a toll on people I suppose. Our food was delish though and we had spumoni ice cream of course afterwards! Then we were so so so full. But full of great food! Around 9pm I visited with old neighbors, Ron and Cindy. Miss them...they are funny people to talk to. The only disappointing thing of the day is that one of my favorite dance groups ...

- Jabbawockeez - was performing in Elk Grove that night and tix were only $20 and nobody wanted or was able to go with me!! I'd have gone by myself but its not the safest area to be at night and I didnt really know the area either so I opted not to go. It was still a fun evening though.

Friday! 4th of July!! Woohooo! No work! I went to the W2 ward breakfast and flag raising ceremony at 8pm. The program was good and the food wasnt bad either. It was cool to see more familiar faces from the other wards and people who were in town visiting. Went to some thrift store sales and got some GOOD stuff for 1/2 off plus the stuff I had hid a few days earlier was still there! Yay! Met up with my online friend Ozzie for lunch at In N Out in Natomas. Then I went to Andre's house where they were having a pool party and BBQ. Hung out with them and their company who I had previously met in Vegas and it was fun times. Checked in at Linda's to catch up on some emails, then met the Curteman's and Familia's at Woodland High School around 8:30pm for the city fireworks show.

Saturday I slept in a little bc I had been up and out late the night before. I wanted to go to the beach really really bad but again, nobody could go with me. My friend Kris could almost go, but she had to take care of her dad who has cancer, so we ended up just talking on the phone for awhile. I went and did some shopping and got some things I needed for Girls Camp that I was headed to on Monday. My uncle and aunt left to go to Alaska for a week. Kokob came to spend the night again which was fun as always!

Sunday was church again! No singles ward today. Went to Linda's for Sunday dinner and helped get it ready because Janie, Martie and her cousin were all coming for dinner too. We had chicken, salad and potatoes and cherries for dessert! I went to the Sacramento airport to meet up with David and Ben Icely who were driving back to Tucson AZ from Portland.

Went to Natomas to visit Ashley and meet her husband Aaron. I met her on myspace a year or so ago and we met up at some YSA activities and went to the YSA Labor Day Wknd at Camp Ritchie in September. She got married in December and I havent seen her since I moved to AZ so it was awesome to see her and Aaron is really nice & we watched some of their wedding DVD and ate cheesecake.

I wanted to go to bed early bc I had to be up at 5:30 the next day to be at Sue McCloud's house to get a ride to camp around 6 but as always I remember something I need last minute, so I went on a Walmart run with Kokob about 1am. Yeah...