{{SF}}

Fall break means a trip to Nor Cal in our family. We load up the car, and drive up to Sacramento for a couple of days so we can see Grammy and friends. Too bad I didn't find my camera until after we left there, so it is undocumented. Oops. (but is was so good to see you Desi and Jeppesens!) At least we do have these sweet pics from our drive up.

Check out Drake. He picked this outfit, if you couldn't tell. Because what goes better with red shorts than a slightly different shade of red for a shirt? And then the cherry on top is the Cowboy boots. And he wore them for the entire 12 hour drive!

These kids conked out for a lot of the drive. And I'll bet they now regret picking the small booster seats rather than the ones with backs and head rests.
We had so much fun playing with the Taylors. We did the usual, parks, parks, parks. While it was incredibly warm for San Francisco (85º), it was much cooler than the 105º it was back home.

This park in the city has these super high slides the kids loved. Here's Gwenny at the top.
And now all the way at the bottom!
Aubrey's turn! This little girl is so stinkin' cute! We drove with her in the car with us, and she busted out with just about all of the words to the Maroon 5 song, Mooves Like Jagger, especially the part where Christina Aguilara does the solo.
And these best cousins were so happy to be reunited again.
A trip to the pier to see the STINKY sea lions. The kids didn't believe that they were sea lions. Because they weren't covered in striped fur. Silly babies.
Here they are checking them out.
Alcatraz. I will do that swim some day you know. I don't know when, but some day...
And here the kids are checking it out too. And just after this picture was taken, Aubrey climbed all the way up on the railing, and teetered almost over the edge before a man hurried and pulled her back. Holy cow. We all almost had a heart attack! Let's face it, Tara and I probably BOTH would have dived in after her. All the way down into the cold water, with nowhere really to swim to but onto the docks that the sea lions were on. So thank you kind sir, thank you!
Pier 39 also had some high quality entertainment for us. Enter Jack Spareribs. For two boys who LOVE all things pirates, and a 7 year old who loves learning new jokes, this was a dream come true! And imagine their excitement when Ryan was called up on stage to participate. He participated by giving Jack a $20 bill that he proceeded to cut up and burn only to later pull it out of a box, inside a box, inside a box. What the?? That's impossible! No, not for Jack Spareribs!! The kids were astonished. It was pretty cute.
I also have to give a shout out to this delightful pizza place.
All left full and happy.
We love getting to come to San Francisco and spend time with the Taylors. Thank you Taylors! (and yes, those are my sunglasses Ryan's wearing thankyouverymuch)
And thank you Grammy for driving out to San Francisco to spend one more day with us!!

...California tripping...

This is the story of a vacation. A spontaneous vacation. Because we wanted to not be a distraction to Ryan while he was studying for the bar, and the kids wanted to see their cousins, and I wanted to be able to run in cool weather. So I decided I'd take the kids up to NorCal to play while Ryan could be home studying in peace. But that'd mean he'd miss Drake's birthday. So luckily Grammy came up with a good plan. He could stay at her house in Sacramento, while the kids and I would stay with the Taylors in the bay area. Genius. Then he'd be close enough to come over for Drake's bday. Done. After a 12 hour drive that I might have fallen asleep while driving a few times before finally pulling over to sleep! DUMB!! I just can't drive like I used to... now that I'm three oh.

First day, Gwen and Aubrey with their running cards.

They get a punch for each lap ran. Aubrey completed her 5 mile mark, and Gwen ran two that day!

Berkley Rose Garden park.

That's a huge cement slide that you slide down on pieces of cardboard!

It was chilly.... in July!!

Jelly Belly Factory.

A must.

Stinson Beach.

Yep, that's sand drool.

The boys were on bird patrol.

Karate will take care of those pesky birds.

And sticks.

Meanwhile Gwen and Aubrey dug a whole.

Then the boys were able to celebrate their fifth birthday together.

Tara made Jack this sweet pirate cake.

Drake wanted an angry bird cake - until he saw how cool Jack's pirate ship cake was.

Tara put together a darling pirate party at the Jungle.

Then afterwards we went home and played Angry Birds. Real Angry Birds.

Drake and his ice cream birthday cake in Sac.

We had a good time.

Apple Hill

Okay, here's the dealio. Alotta updating to do, and alotta Contracts reading to do. The blog wins, my grades will suffer.

Last Monday, the kids and I made the llllloooonnnngggg drive up to Sacramento. We had fun though. I love road trips! I mean come on, who doesn't love eating junk food all day while jamming out to Bon Jovi and Let's Play Music songs, and seeing how long you can go with the gas light on?


Then Tuesday we went with Grammy up to Apple Hill. It's this darling area in the hills where there are a whole bunch of apple orchards. And of course my little monkey had to climb a few apple trees.

Could you just die? Look at my sweet little boy with his puffy hair all a glow.

How about this one, look at Drake's face. He was surprised when he realized that he was actually holding the horse and the horse was trying to walk away.

Santa Cruz!

Ryan's family has a tradition of spending Memorial Day weekend camping in Santa Cruz.  That is actually where he proposed to me 6 years ago, and he hasn't been back since!  I went again with Gwen when she was a baby but that was 4 years ago.  And over time we both forgot how cold Santa Cruz is.  (It doesn't help that we were packing for "beach camping" when it was 108 degrees here)  So I packed only one pair of pants/long sleeves for each of the kids and I.  We wore the same thing everyday!  

It was really fun this year because my mother in law picked up Tara and her two kids on the way over, and then Andrew joined us on Friday.  

We got there Wednesday and set up at our spot on top of the cliff overlooking the beach.  The view was gorgeous, but the ocean breeze was brutal!  We froze Wednesday night and when we heard there was an empty lot behind the trees we jumped on it and threw our tents on top of a truck and moved locations.  The new one was soo much warmer.  

So we spent Thursday at Capitola beach and had yummy Pizza My Heart.  It was cloudy and cold, but the sand was nice and warm.  

Friday our beach, cold again, Andrew came!

Saturday packed up, Oniel sidewalk sale, Pizza My Heart again, and then the Santa Cruz boardwalk.  And the sun was finally out!!  It was so nice!

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weekend whirlwind

We had a crazy busy weekend! Thursday night we packed up the kids and flew out to Sacramento! Molly and Darren have moved there recently, so Gwen and Drake had SO MUCH fun getting to see Grammy and playing with their cousins. They are such busy bodies and always on the go!


Gwen and Claire are "BEST FRIENDS" and Laurel had such a fun time keeping up with those two. And Gwen and Drake were just in awe of baby Marie! While we were there, we got to watch Jack while Tara had her baby!!!!!!!!!


Saturday, April 12 at about 4:00 pm, Aubrey Taylor was born. She was 8 lbs 2 ounces and just beautiful!! When we took Jack to the hospital to see the baby and his mommy and daddy, you could tell he just had no clue what happened. Oh poor Jack, how your world has changed! All in all we had a wonderful trip. It was so good to see family and I also got to see one of my BFF's Desiree. Thank you all for the wonderful weekend!