Aunty Cheryl's Home, Jelly Belly Factory, KOA Watsonville, and Manresa Beach

~July 2014~

Vacaville and Watsonville, California

Uncle Bob got this "GROUND UNDER REPAIR" sign from a golf course, and thought it would be a perfect addition to his front yard.  You gotta love it!

 Aunty Cheryl and Uncle Bob live in Vacaville.  Their home is laid out a lot like my grandparent's home, and it's pretty cool.  We loved touring their home and garden (that will be a different post). 

I was particularly fond of the family heirlooms Aunty Cheryl had in her home.  My Great-Grandma Adelman apparently had a rooster theme running throughout her kitchen.  Now Aunty Cheryl has her kitchen accessories.

I had never seen one of these.  What appears to be little drawers are actually hinged doors that hide rolls of aluminum foil, plastic wrap, etc.

You can see the rooster canisters and Salt and Pepper shakers.

 My Great-Grandma and Grandpa Lauret owned these rustic salt and pepper shakers.

Aren't they cute?

Apparently they are originally from Shasta dam. 

 My Aunty Cheryl collects Crayola.  She has an entire room displaying her collection.  It is remarkable.  I remember her collection from when I was a kid, and it is so cool to see a whole room displaying it now.  My kids, of course, loved it.  Steve and I slept in this room on a hide-a-bed. 

 My Aunt's pets made my girls so happy.  Buffy, their dog, was a major favorite with Lily.  They also have 2 cats, Frieda and Frisco, and fish.

 After breakfast, we went to the Jelly Belly Factory for a tour.  Aunty Cheryl and Uncle Bob joined us.  They had artwork everywhere that was completely created using Jelly Bellies.

 At the factory, they have a tasting counter where you can try any 3 flavors you'd like.  We picked gross ones, just for fun.  My brave girls tasted Rotten Egg, Dog Food, and Moldy Cheese. 

 Ew.  Lily hated rotten egg so much she wouldn't try the others.  Amara tried them all and said the worst one was rotten egg.  According to her, the least yuckiest was Dog food.



After the Jelly Belly Factory, we bid farewell to my Aunt.  She was off to take care of my grandparents 2 hours away, and we were off to the beach, 2 hours away in a different direction.

We set up our tent at the KOA in Watsonville, and got changed into swimsuits to hit the beach.  Manresa Beach is not even a mile away from where we were staying, which was really convenient.  We could've walked there if we wanted to.  Once there, the sand was warm and soft, and the beach was pretty much all ours, there were a few surfers in wetsuits, but really no one was there.  It was pretty cloudy, yet warm outside, and we had a blast.

We played in the sand and built sand castles, fairy houses, etc.

There were a few sand dollars that we found.

A couple walking on the beach showed us how they feed popcorn to the seagulls, and they shared some with our kids.  The seagulls will catch the popcorn midair.

 We spent 2 or 3 hours just hanging out in the sand.

Burying my little mermaids.

Showing off our tiny stash of sand dollars.

As you can see, it was cloudy, which was actually really nice.  It wasn't cold there (the water probably was), the sun wasn't burning us or overheating the sand.  Just perfect.

I found a cool hermit crab.

 We were pretty happy beach-goers!

 When we got back to camp, it was so nice that we had access to warm showers to get all the sand off.  We got showered up and into our PJs, and went out to eat at a gas station Wienerschnitzel.  It was the only restaurant we could find nearby (Watsonville is largely farmland for strawberries) and we were about out of gas.  P.S.  The gas prices were outrageous!  Everything was between $4.15 and $4.50 per gallon.  Eeek!

 There was still a little daylight, so we let the girls go play at the playground.

 And they got to jump on this big bubble thing.  They loved it.

This is an optical illusion.  Lily isn't standing on a magic carpet.  That pink thing is someone's jacket on the sand in the background.

Our tent site wasn't very private or anything like the mountain camping we're used to, but since we had respectful people around us, we slept fine.

 

The bathroom was just down a little paved path that was across from our tent site.  Only a short walk.

We would stay here again.  It had good proximity to the beaches, and with the showers, and activities, it would actually be fun to spend more time here than we had available on this trip.