transition to mallrats, stage 1

another one of our annual traditions that i love is getting together with my friends and their kids around new year's.  we've done this every year now for quite some time, and i hope we always find time for it.

this year we decided to take it back to california pizza kitchen, an old favorite - thanks to facebook memories, which pulled up an old photo of one of our first GTGs.  it was at the mall, which we all found to be incredibly busy - and i don't know why we were surprised, since it was at the tail end of christmas break and on a weekend to boot.  we were quoted almost two hours for a table, so the bean and i ran a couple of errands and then met up with the gang in front of the restaurant.

the kids are definitely growing up.  they asked to go as a group to walk through a few stores nearby, and it struck us all how big they've all gotten even in the last year.

when they'd done all they could in the radius we allowed them to explore, they joined us on the bench outside the restaurant and hung out until our table was ready. is that a bunch of surly tweens, or what?

but look at the difference between one of our first playdates, back in 2013:

and now.  they really do like each other, i promise.

when we were finally seated, the kids sat together on one end of the table, allowing us adults the chance to get comfy and caught up.  it's always fun when you add a sangria flight to the mix:

it's not even on the menu anymore, but my go-to at CPK will always be the BLT pizza.

when we were finally ready to leave, we got the kids to take a group picture of their ol' moms.

so much fun!  and we even managed to nail down a date to do a quickie vegas girls' getaway in a few months.  good times.