Sisters' 2010

Here's to sisters: short and tall, young and less young. I am blessed to be a part of this group of girlies who met, this year, for fun in sunny southern California.

We are Janelle, Janis, Lynne and Kris. We hail (currently) from Charlotte, NC., Kansas City, MO, Kokomo, IN, and LA. Our annual....we need a new name for Sisters' Weekend...rotated us to California this year. Sister Kris' daughter will attend Westmont University this fall so we drove up (the coast! surfers! sailboats!) to Santa Barbara, about 2 hours north of LA.

Santa Barbara and its neighbor, Montecito, boast perfect weather. Well, actually, they would not boast as THAT would be gauche, and not fitting for this little gem of the settlement.

Sister Jan now pastors a church (!) so we chose mid week for our get-together. I'm just going to call it SISTERS or maybe SISTERS'; wanna vote?

By now (8 times) we have a system. Janis serves as chief financial planner and treasurer (she can have president, vice president and secretary, too. I'm just sayin.....)

We pool a set amount of cash and then plan our lodging, outings and, of course, our meals which turn out to be a treat, no matter where we go. Saying that, in Montecito, we supped, drank, dined, snacked, desserted, on fashion food: each and everything, down to humble oatmeal, sported garnishes of fresh fruit, chocolate straws, squiggled sauces, and, (often MY favorite) etc.

"What is that???" "Oh, look what they did with the...."

Personally, I LOVE fashion food. The delight starts as the waiter (always very cute, where do they get them?) swoops a plate or cup or bowl in front of each of us. Many ooohs and ahhhs as we eyeball each offering. Then, eventually we grow weary of just looking at the food and onto the sampling: each to her selection and then, the eyeballs travel along with a spoon or fork and before you know it, voila! All is consumed. We dab our mouths with napkins, smile at each other and on to the next adventure.

We stayed one night at the Montecito Inn and, to balance to account, the other night at Kris' house. We dined mightily in Montecito and, to balance the account, grabbed some In and Our Burgers in LA.

We all have our talents: Janelle has a eye for framing photos so all of these are hers. If I have only wetted your whistle for our fun, you can see more by scrolling through several blog entries at her site: http://www.showandtellblog.typepad.com/

We enjoyed breakfast at Juliana's, a quaint sidewalk cafe that boasted a full French pastry case.

(Photo taken by very cute waiter, so not framed as well but then, he was very cute)

There is much to do in Montecito. You can eat. We did. You can ride bicycles. We did. You can shop. Of course.

And rising to the north are several foot hills with well-marked paths so we took a short hike that became a 3 hour hike. All good: we carried water and, as I mentioned, we were well-nourished.

Janelle shot us from the rear.

So, distance shot.

We also grabbed this shot sitting on "Kevin's Bench," meant to be a

landmark in case one gets lost.

While technically, we did not get lost, we DID take a bit longer to find our way back to the car.

Later, in LA, we toured the Getty Museum on a beautifully clear day so the panorama of Los Angeles was part of the show.

Soon it was time to mount our various steeds (metal, pressurized) and move on. Next year? We are planning........