August 22-30th • Papa’s 89th Birthday Week
On Sunday’s my brother and his family normally go to Papa’s house for Pupus(Hawaiian for “appetizers”) with Papa. It was the day before Papa’s 89th birthday and we were all excited to spend the day with him. We planned this entire trip around this date so we could be there for Papa’s birthday. Kyle and I got together the pupus and papa made some strong cocktail sauce for the shrimp. Then the best part was we all hung out with papa on his porch to chill. We are so blessed to be able to spend this time with family.
The last time we were in California we took Papa to his favorite restaurant for oysters and we wanted to be sure to take him there to celebrate his birthday. Kyle, Daisy, Kevin, and I picked him up and took him out on Thursday night as it is the oyster night at The Harbor Grill. It is always fun taking papa out and watching him be Santa Claus to everyone he meets. He talks about the wooden toys he makes and the events that he does as Santa Claus. I will have to be sure next time I’m in California to get pictures of his workshop and all the toys he makes to deliver every Christmas season. He also makes toys and donations to orphanages around the world. After some awesome oysters and a fun birthday celebration, we called it a night.
I know I have to get better at taking pictures since that is the only way I remember exactly what happened. The rest of the week was busy, we went to papa’s house, my brother’s house, the beach, I went to supper with my sister Melissa and then we ended our week having an adult supper with Kyle and Daisy. We also hit up quite a few coffee shops. My brother has an obsession with good coffee and even though I try to limit my caffeine intake I still have to try all the amazing coffee around the Southern California area.
Although this was an amazing trip it also marked the time our family got covid. We knew it would be a matter of time before we got it, truth is it doesn’t matter how careful you are these things just happen sometimes. I was exposed to Covid and went to go get a test which came back negative but, since I was showing symptoms we decided to stay away from family the last couple of days of being there. We had planned to spend a week in Las Vegas but, it was quite apparent that we in fact had covid. Our trip was cut short and we started our journey back to Iowa.
Unfortunately, Kevin and I were both sick by this point and we just wanted to get home as soon as we could. It seems that when things happen it is a snowball effect and I will share in the next blog post about how the toterhome caught on fire and we ended up being stuck in Grand Junction, CO all while being sick. We had to do our best to not have contact with anyone all while dealing with a broken-down vehicle. One thing I always tell Kevin is that we put on so many miles it is inevitable that we will have some sort of car trouble but, when we do have trouble it always seems to be over the top.
