A Last-minute Adventure

Did I never tell you guys how our winter break ended? It was bananas, even by my standards. I figured we couldn't let the break pass without doing something adventurous, so decided to head out to the Jelly Belly Factory. It is quite a drive, so before we left I told all the kids, "Hey, why don't you guys pack some pajamas, swim suits, and extra clothes in case we don't make it back tonight." I texted Joseph and told him we were headed out, not sure when we would be back. And then we left.

The Jelly Belly Factory is in Fairfield, a good 1.5 hours away. We made it there without incident, but were very happy to finally pull into the parking lot.

We entered just as a tour was beginning, so we put on our hats and jumped right in.

There were all kinds of pictures and sculptures made of jelly beans. And, apparently, Jelly Belly owes a large part of its success to Ronald Reagan, so there are tons of portraits commemorating him.

Super cool to see the process, and all the robots and machines involved.

A fun interactive computer game that the kids loved.

Apparently, two other families from church were there at the same time, and they saw the kids but I didn't find out until Sunday. :(

After the tour we bought some treats and Belly Flops and then sat at a table to figure out what to do. It was pretty cool to see all this, but not really exciting enough for the kids. I was on the fence about traveling further, but they really wanted to so we decided to go for it. We piled back into the car and headed to Fort Bragg. It got dark quickly and who knew the road would be so treacherous?

Beautiful, but so scary at night time. And long! Like 20 miles of this. Thankfully we made it all in one piece and checked into a room, which I had hastily reserved while still at the Jelly Belly Factory.

We went out for pizza and then headed to bed. The kids settled in, and after a lot of horsing around finally fell asleep. I slid in between Jacob and Elinor to sleep afterward.

The next morning we ate breakfast (gotta love the complimentary continental breakfast!) and then checked out of the hotel. Next on the agenda was Glass Beach. It was so great to be at the beach again after several months of not going.

We wandered around for a bit, not totally sure of what to expect.

We asked a local who was out walking his dog and he pointed us in the right direction.

I was honestly underwhelmed, but the kids could have stayed there all day.

And the glass was pretty cool.

It was a crazy last minute adventure, but so fun. We headed home that afternoon and were home in time for dinner with Joseph.

It's always a treat to drive across the bridge!

I've gotta say, these kids of ours are at such a perfect age right now. Everyone buckles their own seatbelts, dresses themselves, can communicate, can walk, and can eat regular food but they're all young enough to be enthusiastic about family adventures. They were all such good sports for coming along with me on this hair-brained spur-of-the-moment trip.