Bagels with cream cheese, cheesy eggs, and fruit, then we're ready to start our day.
Our first stop is Dennis the Menace Playground. It was founded in 1956 and was funded by Hank Ketchum (the comic creator) and a local community center.
Jon and Jess discovered this place on a previous visit and knew that it would be perfect to let the kids burn off some energy. We arrived right when it opened at 10am and had no problems finding parking.
Posing with the statue of Dennis the Menace.
This park is huge and there's so much to play on here!
The boys ran straight to the back of the park to the giant roller slide.
Looks fun.
Ian taking a turn.
Looking back towards the entrance of the park.
Right now he's short enough to run right through these tunnels. I, on the other hand, was hunched over trying to keep up with him.
There was just a wee bit of static electricity generated by Emma going down this slide.
Ian going down one of the longest, steepest slides he's ever done alone.
"Uncle Joe, chase us!"
Yes, I did get a few looks as I was chasing little kids around the park...
Posing just long enough on the suspension bridge for me to take a picture. As soon as the shutter snapped, he took off running to make sure I didn't catch him.
I snuck up on Isaac as he tried to duck under the suspension cable.
Eli making a dash for it.
Making their escape down the double slides.
Shout out to the parents.
Lookout! You're about to be swallowed by a lion!
All that running around was making them thirsty.
Yet another cool feature of the park was this rock climbing wall. Eli was showing us how it's done.
Ian enjoyed running around the park, and the swings are one of his favorites. T must have spent 10 minutes pushing him on the swing, and every time she asked if he was done, he'd signal "more".
You try getting 5 kids in one place to pose for a photo. After an hour at the park, we were starting to think about lunch.
After grabbing lunch from Subway, and a drink from Jamba, we had all the makings of a perfect picnic lunch. Now where can we enjoy it?
Jon and Jess had previously visited Monastery Beach and really enjoyed it. The sand here was quite a bit different than what we have back home. It was more like small pebbles than sand. This should have been called pebble beach, but I suppose that name is already taken.
Initially I don't think they were supposed to get wet, but that didn't last too long.
Look out! It's a shark!
Sitting still just long enough to eat some meatballs from my Subway sandwich and drink some of his mini Jamba Juice.
The frisbees came out and were fun to play with. They also made a good projectile to keep the seagulls away from our food while we were off playing.
We were all by the water when a seal swam by not 20 feet from us. And me with my camera over on our towels. Oh well.
Hi Mommy.
Playing in the water with his Uncle Jon. Lookout! Here it comes!
Brr. It's cold water and Ian loved it so much. We'd take him back to the towels and he'd wander back down to the ocean. He'll have to start swim lessons soon so he can be a little safer when he's around water.
All too soon it was time to say our goodbyes. It's a long drive back to Los Angeles and we don't want to get in too late past Ian's bedtime. By 2pm we were on the road and headed home.
Fifteen minutes into the drive, Ian was passed out. He must have been really tired from the day because he ended up sleeping over 3 hours!
Let's check in with my brother.
Ha. They were all worn out too.
Thank you Jon and Jess for organizing everything. We had a great time, even though it was a short visit.
Please don't ever go back to monastery beach with your kids. You might not know. So many people died there. You can't be near the water at all. Google it. Read the news.
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