And I Remember the Day...when you left for Santa Monica...

I feel a personal connection to this cafe - they had fabulous Chai Latte's...OMG! I got one everyday on my way back from my workout...oops :)

Meghan and Jayme being cold in the ocean.

This is after our bike trip to Venice (2 miles down the bike path). Meghan and I learned that we weren't quite as bad at biking as we remembered.

Me rubbing the Budha belly in Venice.

Me eating Nutella. Okay, so Nutella is NOT vegan...but its delicious, and it was kind of my goodbye morning to my favorite chocolatey treat!!


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Sigh...back to real life.

Last week, I had the most amazing vacation in Santa Monica with two of my besties (I don't know how I adopted this word, but unfortunately it is sticking), Jayme and Meghan. I get to see Jayme pretty often because she lives in town...but my Meghan is all the way in Seattle, so it was SO AWESOME to see her again!!

Anyway, we stayed in a little motel in Santa Monica just a few blocks from the beach. We all had dreams of laying around in our swimsuits on the beach all day long. Remember Baywatch, when all the guys were shirtless on the beach and the women rollerbladed in their bikinis?? - that was what we imagined.

We were wrong.

California is freaking cold!! However, after the initial shock of this (and Jayme and I buying jackets for the evennings), we began to love it! The days were warm enough to walk around and hang out at the beach or walk on the promenade. The evennings we added our jackets and hung out some more.

Santa Monica might possibly be the greatest place ever!! In the mornings I got up early and ran or walked either in the sand or on the bike path. It was so fun to see everyone out and about getting their morning workouts in. There is something wonderful about the ocean that gets you out of bed to pound the pavement.

Then we ate. And ate. And ate. There were so many wonderful restaurants, and we banned any chain restaurants. There was Mexican, Italian, Vegan (a dedicated blog to follow), Asian, Fusion Food Trucks....anything we wanted. Everything was delicious. My awesome cousin and aunt even took us to this fabulous Carribean restaurant on our last night - SO DELICIOUS!!!

So much to tell, but I thought I would post a few of my favorite pictures. Then tomorrow or when I get time, I will post about my amazing experience at the vegan restaurant. Yum yum!!