It’s official: John and I have booked our plane tickets for California! It’s going to be our big trip of the year, and we are very excited! We’re flying into Los Angeles and then driving up the Pacific Coast Highway. We’ll head east for two days to explore Yosemite, then finish up in San Francisco for two days before flying back to the East Coast. As thrilled as we are, the planning has actually been a bit stressful so far. As opposed to, say, our Nevis honeymoon, where we were staying on the same small island for seven days and could have done little advance planning and still had almost every option available to us when we arrived, there are SO many decisions that need to be made months ahead of time for this trip. And there are SO many amazing things to do and restaurants to try and places to stay that we’re feeling the pressure of choosing the BEST ones. Of course, it’s also a large financial outlay, so we want to feel we’re making the most of the money we’re spending. Finally, since we live on the East Coast, a trip like this is far less easily repeated than, say, a trip to New England or Florida, so we’re trying to check off as many things as possible — possibly too many things. When conversation snarled over whether to stay in Santa Barbara or Montecito last night (oh the difficult choices!), we had to take a step back and laugh — and remind ourselves that no matter what we do, even if we simply drive from point A to point B, it’s going to be a breathtakingly beautiful trip, and well worth our time and expense. And whenever we need a reminder, there are plenty of lovely