Santa Barbara

On the way home we stopped in Santa Barbara for lunch. We hit a casual eatery on the pier and Parker got an introduction to peanuts still in the shell. The first one probably wasn't that great because he didn't know he was suppose to shell it. But after extricating the initial peanut remain from his mouth, he had a shelled nut...and loved it. He then proceeded to hoard the nuts, making sure the pigeons didn't get any of his treasure.

After lunch, we continued down the pier to the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History: Ty Warner Sea Center. It's small but still pretty cool. Parker got to see a lot of marine creatures up close...and if he chose to (which he didn't), he could touch many of them. I think his favorite were the decorator crabs which pull elements from their surrounding environment to camouflage themselves. To demonstrate this, they had one crab in an aquarium with a ball of red yarn. Unlike the other crabs, that were covered in seaweed and other ocean debris, this one was covered in red fuzz. Totally adorable!

All in all, I would say that three out of three Trillos would agree...this was a great get-away weekend.

So long, Morro Bay!

So the next day we had breakfast and then hit the road...but not before we stopped at the pier for last chance sweets. I had to get salt water taffy. Chris got his favorite fudge, penuche. And Parker got a lollipop that was calling to him.

Morro Bay

Yesterday, we arrived in Morro Bay. After getting settled in our motel room, we headed out to dinner. Chris found a Parker friendly restaurant called The Flying Dutchman,which was sort of pirate themed. Nice!


The next day we hit the beach. First we went to explore around Morro Rock. Parker made ''mud castles'' and sand angels. Later, he and Chris explored the tide pools and found a hermit crab, which they brought back to Mommy, who was relaxing on the beach, reading a book. After Parker and Chris returned the crab to the water, we headed over to the other side of the Rock to check out the Strand.

On the Strand, Chris and Parker fly a kite. They did pretty well and were able to get all the string out. But after a while, the ocean called to them so they reeled in the kite without crashing it into the beach or into me. Then we took a walk on the beach.

On the beach we chased the waves, avoided slimy seaweed, and looked for shells. Chris found a live clam and we watched it bury itself back into the wet sand. Heading back in for the day, Chris also found beached jellyfish, to which Parker exclaimed, "Gross!" (Smart Boy!)

Solvang

We decided to take a long weekend and head up north to Morro Bay. But before that, we HAD to stop in Solvang.

When I was a kid, my mom took my sister and me there and I remember it being kitchy and fun. A little bit of Denmark. No passport required!

That said, we had lunch under a windmill. I had a Danish meatball sandwich and came to the conclusion that the Danes aren't know for their food for a reason. On second thought, I guess we should have hit a smorgasbord...but that would mean a buffet and Chris HATES buffets.

I bought Parker a Viking helmet. Plus, we had to get a tub of Danish butter cookies.

I really wanted to reproduce a picture my sister and I took with a statue of a Viking who was chilling on a bench. But, after asking around, I discovered that when the town got a facelift a while ago they removed the statue since it was kind of falling apart and they didn't want to fix it. BUMMER!

Oh well, we did find a big clog for Parker to sit in...I guess that will have to do.