This past weekend I traveled about an hour and a half north east of San Diego to Riverside, California for another NAMI Connection Training. Arrived late Thursday night after facilitating my NAMI Connection support group back in San Diego and was ready for training the next day. On Friday, I was so excited to see Anthony H., one of the national trainers that trained me about a year ago and it was such an honor to be able to train with him. I also would be training with Debbie Z. again from North Coastal who was such a joy to work with before. The first day went great. We were exhausted after a long day.
Some of the trainees and myself decided we wanted to go out on the town which is supposed to be beautifully decorated this time of year. We walked to the Mall, or Main street where many people congregated around a jazz band. They lights all around the trees, funnel cakes, hot chocolate, and even an ice skating rink! I couldn’t believe it! I immediately wanted to go. We made our way down to a small gallery called Art Works, where a couple of the trainees work was featured. Along the way I gathered the group for many pictures…which of course they were all very excited about.
The second day of training was even better than the first. Everyone learned, hopefully came away with more practice and knowledge. After the first day you would think that I would be exhausted and ready for bed. However, my heart was set on the ice skating! After a great dinner at the Taco Station, myself and a couple others literally ran too the rink to make the 7:00pm session. We were there just in time, yet they informed us we wouldn’t have much time to skate, its only a 30 minute session, come back for the 8:00 session. So we went to listen to this awesome band for a while and I entertained myself by light saber fighting with Timothy. You can’ t see them well in the pictures but I was wearing light up glasses with money signs on them.
By the time we arrived back in line for skating all the tickets for the 8:00 show were sold out. I was pretty bummed. Danny cheered me up though, he said, “it just wasnt meant to be!” So we walked around Mission Inn to look at the lights. Security was keeping tight watch over the front entrances. We were walking through the arches crowded with people. I decided we needed to have some fun. I told Danny and Richard that I was going to jump the 4 foot hedge and land on the opposite side near where security stood. I ran, jumped, and luckily did not injure my foot nor get escorted off the property. It was fun while it lasted. To end the night we went to the historic museum of the Mission Inn which was very cool.
So the last day I was sooo tired. Not getting any sleep the night before, I decided the best thing to do is get up at 530 in the morning and go for a 3 mile run. So I did just that. It was quite peaceful on a Sunday morning, and surprisingly warm for December. These pictures I took along my run:
To close the training we always celebrate with cake, pictures and handing out certificates. This took awhile to coordinate everyone…but here is everyone together at the last day of training:
The Seascapechronicles 