on sunburns and the in-laws...

Ohhh, sunburn. How you pain me.

Although, you may be asking why a white girl like me must continually live in a state of fair skin denial. I guess I always have this hope that one day I'll become one of those people who can acquire a nice, bronze skin tone with one day at the beach. When I see these people, I always feel as though they taunt me. "Sunscreen-schmunscreen," they cry out in victory. And there I am, sitting on my towel with my freckled joints (no, really: my elbows, knees, knuckles - it's fun, I tell you) and glossy sunscreened body.

My friend M and I live for our beach days. And it's always the first one of the year during which we will tempt fate and say, "Awww, peaches. We'll be fine. It's just a couple hours. We'll get a healthy glow. Let's just forget sunscreen altogether today. Who needs it? Live on the edge." You'd think we'd remember the consequences of that fateful conversation year-to-year (i.e. nearly needing skin grafts on our shoulders and scalp after a long bike ride). I'm not sure why we don't think of this in the moment. But, whatever.

I do maintain the fact that I can get tan, but it's just not brown tan. I call it pink tan. I know, it sounds disgusting, but it's really not that bad. Think olive skin tone vs. peaches and cream complexion. Anyway, I'll take what I can get, people.

Can I get an "amen, sister" from all my fellow fair girls out there? This one's for you! Holla back!

Okay, so, moving on.

I was lucky enough to spend a good part of three days with Jay, his parents, and three of his brothers. His parents and brothers were in town to celebrate his college graduation. I adore spending time with his family; I am lucky enough to have been blessed with some amazing in-laws. His family dynamic is so much like my own, so I truly do feel at home when I'm around them. It's the comfortable, familiar feeling of just belonging. Have I mentioned how we're nearly the same, family-wise? I'm second born in a family of five girls, he's second born in a family of five boys. Both from Washington State, both raised Lutheran. It's crazy. To me, at least. Especially because I met Jay here in California.

(I like to think our love was written in the stars. But that's just the romantic in me talking.)

In any case, they were in town for a few days, and I was lucky enough to take enough time off of work to be there for most of it. We spent time at his aunt and uncle's, enjoyed a day at Disneyland (which led to the first round of sunburn), spent a morning in Laguna Beach (which led to the second round of sunburn) and the rest of the day shopping (spent no less than an hour browsing Anthropologie with Jay's aunt and mom - I love these women!), and enjoyed a barbecue and a church service yesterday evening.

It was such a refreshing time. I hardly looked at my cell phone once in three days. I ate a ridiculous amount of calories without suffering from debilitating food-guilt. I was out and about the whole time, and was able to get some much-needed Jay time - and "second family" time! Jay's brothers are absolute gems. They each have such different personalities, but at the core they're the very same (much like my sisters and I, actually). They make me laugh like nothing else. And his parents? So incredibly kind, encouraging and loving. I am so glad whenever I get to have some quality time with all of them.

It reeeeally makes me eager for the day we move back to the Northwest.

So, I had a good three days. Now, the question is: how are you doing?