Wandering through Berkeley

Alright! Birthday adventures continue. On Friday night of the GREAT BIRTHDAY WEEKEND, Brittney and Nicole joined the festivities. I am the luckiest. <--fact. These girls drove from LA and Santa Barbara, after full days of work, to join in the merry making. I hadn't seen Brittney and Nikki for years... way too long. much, much too long! Let me tell you, there was a serious amount of laughter and general frivolity upon the arrival of these two. .. and lots of hugging!

After a rowdy evening of catch up we wet off the next morning to explore Berkeley. I wanted to take them up to College avenue. I bike down college avenue at least once a week on my route to church. However, I never get to stop and meander around all the shops... this was our destination.

I took this picture for my friend, Rob, who lives back in Chester, UK. Rob was born and raised in Somerset and does the finest Somerset farmer accent and drinks cider like a champ. So I thought, how do I honor my friend? Taking a photo with a vague reference to his home town. Here are you Rob. Miss yah! You would have fit right in with ladies weekend (okay, not right in exactly, but you would have laughed a lot and would have been fun.)

One of my birthday wishes was to find a pair of skinny jeans that looked good (see I'm fairly easy to please. I didn't ask for a unicorn or a million dollars.) We were successful! At a store recommended by my friend, Kara, called Slash Denim. Pretty strange place, really. You walk in and say what you want and then they pull out a few pairs of jeans and magically they work. I think it helped that I had a group of gals to give honest feedback and one random stranger's approval. Bought them. done. not looking back.

After lunch, we headed to the donut shop. I love how donut shops smell.

Look how happy this part of the crew is for their donut treats. I don't even recall who purchased donuts (I didn't, they didn't have maple bars or tiger tails and this girl has specific donut tastes) and how many or what happened, but I do remember that they made fun of me for capturing this moment in time. Jokes on you! This photo below is great! I know the ladies in it won't think so, but I do. It is great, because they are great. I know it is not up for any photography contest or anything, but I just love these gals. I will take as many photos as I please. :)

Which apparently for the day was... three. The three that you see above. Shame Nikki didn't make it into this picture, but you get the idea. Friends reunited with nothing to do but enjoy the sunshine, food, wine and each other. That is a recipe for wonderful if I ever knew one.