Fabian came here on the 16th and the rest of the family got here two days later because from the beginning Fabian had planned to come earlier and leave earlier as well to get home in time for a big ski race called “Vasaloppet”. After further consideration he decided not to participate due to lack of preparation and training this season, which gave him more time here! During my family’s stay here we spent a lot of time together, the first Saturday we had a big party with all of the birthdays of January, February and March. That was a fair amount of people; Frank, Julie, Jack, Cirrus, Sofia, Fabian, Mary Sue and Anne. They all got their name on the chocolate birthday cake! I took a couple of days of school so I could go with my family on their tourist-trips. We went to Zuma Beach, one of the largest and most popular beaches in LA County (crowded in the summer time). We bought sandwiches at an Italian deli and sat down and had picnic at the beach.
We also went bike riding to the beach, Marina Del Ray and Venice Boardwalk. We certainly did plenty of shopping at stores and outlets. I had told Sofia in advance to bring an almost empty suitcase for a couple of reasons; first of all so that she could have room for as much clothes as possible that she would buy here, and second of all some of my clothes and things I don’t use very often, for God knows how I will ship all of my belongings home when it is time for my return.
The last weekend of their vacation here we went up to Palmdale to visit Julie and Jack. Fabian went ahead of us, on Wednesday so mom and dad, Sofia, Kieran and I went together after school on Thursday in the car we had rented (a Toyota Prius, a very comfortable, quiet but a little bit small hybrid). During the four day weekend we went shopping even more, visited Fabian’s old high school and went walking in the mountains every morning except Sunday when we (my family plus Kieran and Julie) went on a memorable trail ride on horses. The ride was in the late morning and lasted for more than two hours in the beautiful terrain and enchanting scenery. We all agreed later on that it was a better adventure than Universal Studios or even Disneyland (which we had considered to visit before).
This pictures is from our little "photo session" in palmdale, using whatever we could find, we got some pretty pictures.
On Monday and Tuesday I went full days in school to catch up with what I had been missing (which was surprisingly little, despite the large number of days I had been absent). I’m so glad my family could come and visit me, because when they had to leave again I realized how much I had missed them before. I loved having my siblings sleeping in my room even with the few hours of sleep I got every night (for some unknown reason).
I loved waking up in the morning to be as generous to my family as Mary Sue and Josh have always been to me, to make them breakfast as I usually eat it to introduce them to my morning habits. I loved having my mom help me on the days when I was stressed and late to get everything together and pack my lunchbox whereupon my dad would drive me to school eager to learn all the street names in the neighborhood. It was hard to say good bye at the car rental/transfer station as they headed for the airport. It was the same car rental place where we had said good bye, crying, to Fabian about four years earlier, but it was soon to get easier; I had to go straight home to pack for my trip to San Francisco which was a great opportunity for me to get my mind on something else!
