southern cali whirlwind tour part 3: the summers-sandoval family

the third stop on our journey (after dropping off kay and anna in joshua tree again) was in pomona (another 2+ hour drive). tom and mindy have two kids, benito and lili. this was our first time meeting lili (who turns one in december), and we'd hadn't seen benito since we were all in hawaii together.

hana and benito hit it off.
a diaper explosion, and indian summer, left hana running around hillbilly style, in a shirt and a diaper. she didn't seem to care much, but i did break down and put some pants on her, lest she suffer another explosion and soil the rug... or worse, the good summers-sandoval same in the (historic) neighborhood.

although hana was generally pretty easy going throughout this whole road trip, she was clearly getting a little road weary... more specifically, she had been staying in people's houses who were "sharing" with her and she got tired of nothing really being "hers". so by the time she got to benito and lili's house, she just started claiming stuff. and she threw the mother of all tantrums at one point, over god knows what. as did benito. so i didn't feel quite so bad.

nevertheless, benito and "baby lili's" house was relatively relaxed because it was so kid friendly. at night night time, we got share hana's favorite story these days, "grumble bunny" with benito. he thought it was a pretty good story too.

the next morning hana, claimed this microphone as hers... such a diva. and then she got all naomi campbell about it when it was time to share, and bonked benito in the head. time outs ensued... cabin fever was setting in.

before we hit the road, we figured the better part of valor was to get her good and tired out and then take off around nap time so she'd sleep at least part of the way in the car ride back to oakland. this park was just a few blocks walk from tom and mindy's house. it was a beauty and hana had good time smelling flowers and picking up sticks on the walk over.

she really liked the swing. she did explore the slide, the jungle jim, eating the tan bark ("yucky!"), but she always came back to the swing. that's another thing she gets from her mama...

i don't know if this picture makes hana look big or jon look small...