Evie's portrait

We met Joel's friend Dew in San Jose this weekend. He's there as a percussionist for the band Chicago. I think Joel travels a lot and then finding out Drew is gone half the year doesn't seem acceptable. At least he loves what he does. He just came off a three year tour with the Foo Fighters. On our way to lunch Evie spotted this artist drawing portraits and quickly started a conversation with him about wanting to be an artist also and told him she was in art classes. He was a sweet man. He offered to draw her portrait after lunch.

Evie would sit absolutely still and then jump up and look at his work and give him the thumbs up and then sit back down. He got a kick out of her.

Ethan, Joel and Dew went to the Tesla car showroom a few doors down. When they got back Ethan had to get in his words too.

Evie admired her picture all the way home.

morning at the pump track

Ethan and I met his little friend Jaden from his preschool class at the pump track this morning along with her mom and brother. Jaden rides a run bike and is pretty daring. She turns three next week.

Ethan is still getting the hang of his big boy bike. He can barely stand over the bike but when he's riding he seems to have good control. He loved the track and riding the whoops.

Video: Ethan on the lower part of the pump track. He can barely stand over his bike so going up some of the hills are hard. It was cute to see his little tiptoes working over time.

Video: Ethan on the whoops at the pump track

Video: Ethan on the whoops at the pump track. Ethan told me to say Green (for go).

Little lovers...

I gave the kids a bowl of frozen watermelon the other day and sent them outside. Six chairs around the table and they share a chair. It funny that they love being so close to each other. I know that will change as they grow but I loved looking out the window and seeing them in the same chair.

Evie's schoolwork

Evie brought home her first classwork the other day. Nothing has been said yet, but I suppose I'll have to direct the little artist inside of her to keep it separate from schoolwork but I did enjoy her creativity. These feathers belonged to little Indian girls.

The horn was making noise

This girl was ringing the bell and in the overall picture below you can see a person sleeping too.

The park after swim lessons...

After swim lessons the kids get to play at the park next door. They have a typical park with slides, swings and sand but the kids seem to spend more time running around in the trees behind the park. I love the tall redwoods here. (Amy, this is the spot where I was talking to you on the phone)

The park with swings, etc. is just to the right of the train. The swimming pool is just behind the train.

I was trying to show just how micro the kids are next to the tall trees but this isn't even half of the tree. They are just soooo tall.

So after the park we stopped at Costco for a few things and the kids got a hot dog the size of them. I can't believe this didn't give them a bellyache.

My big helper in the school garden

Ethan was my big helper at school as we got the life garden ready for the kindergartners to plant. The playground is near the garden so he would play and then help me weed, etc. It was fun.

After we were done in the garden we stopped by to see his teachers in the PS room. Ethan showed one of his teachers an old ouchie he had and she pulled out this box of cool skateboard bandaids. This screaming hand is actually the graphic Ethan has on his skateboard at home. He was stoked.

Being a goof and showing off his bandaid..

Blu - from the movie Rio...

We just watched the movie Rio via Netflix and Evie is pretending to be Linda, Blu's owner. Blu is perched next to her drawing there...only he's white. Anyway, she got these crazy glasses from a parade we went to a while back but they work perfectly for Linda's big round glasses.

Ethan is busy drawing too. It's funny where I find them playing. Most often they don't sit at their little kid table to draw or play...they are almost always on the floor or under something somewhere.
Evie's self portrait as Linda holding Blu. She is so quick with her pen. I think I heard her pen for about three minutes before she popped up from under the desk to show me her work.

Evie's Clifford project

Evie's class project is taking clifford home along with a bag of books, clifford snacks and a juice box with clifford on it. The kids are supposed to write in a journal how they spent their day with clifford and enjoy the treats while they read clifford books. It was pretty priceless to pick Evie up and have her run from her room excited to show me that it was her turn with clifford.

Evie got to take Clifford to swim lessons after school.

And to the park after swim lessons

At home, Evie pulled up a chair for clifford as she ate her snacks. She actually took really good care of him and took him everywhere.

This was Evie's journal page. A few pictures and sentences from our afternoon and a picture drawn by Evie.

Evie's picture is of her throwing a Frisbee to clifford

This was taken in the morning as Evie was off to school. Good bye clifford, until next time.

My birthday evening

We had planned to go to the boardwalk on my birthday evening because just randomly the date was the same day as a whole bunch of great deals at the park. Usually rides are $3 a person and they were $1. They also had food and drink offers for a buck. Unfortunately, when Joel got home from work he wasn't feeling well. It was a good think the kids and I went with out him. He called us not long after we left and was getting sick...he thinks it was food poisoning. Could have been a touch of something also but it hit him hard. He didn't sleep much that night but woke up feeling better.

The kids are stoked - this was their first time with cotton candy. Of course they loved it.

Beautiful Evie and aggressive Ethan at the wheel...

It got late fast. The kids had a blast and as any parent knows, when your kids are happy...you are happy. I had a fantastic night too.

San Francisco - Friday

This is an old post that I'm just getting around to. Joel surprised me the Friday before my birthday by taking the day off work and to spend the day (and Saturday) in San Francisco. It was a wonderful weekend full of lots of new adventures as Joel planned ice skating and a Ferry ride for us.

I really admire Joel that he is always into trying something new. He really encourages the kids to try new things and almost always, they totally have a blast. I'll have to admit I thought the kids might be a bit young for ice skating and not be able to do it but I was wrong. With our help, they did it and they had a fantastic time. We all did.

Joel and Ethan off for their first go around.

Evie loved it immediately. She said she felt like princess Belle dancing with the beast in the Christmas movie we have.

Ethan focused, and running.

We took a small break for ice cleaning. The kids thought it was cool.

Cleaning the ice

Ethan's curls

My family, taking a break while they cleaned the ice.

Right out side the ice rink was a park and it's a good one. It's attached to the children's museum which we visited on our last trip to SF. The museum is okay. Surprisingly not as good as the one in Lincoln. It's the only one in SF too. Ethan is showing me he can do the fire pole all by himself. And as sketchy as it looks he actually did it. I held my breath but he often surprises me.

They have this super long slide that is so fast. Almost too fast to get a picture.

When I found Evie she was laying resting on the ground. She said she was tired but her tummy hurt. We had the stroller with us that she used as we walked back to the car. She wound up feeling better later but seemed pretty tired most of the morning.

Ethan found a buddy to slide with. The slides were so fast the kids shooting off the end and on to their bottoms.

Later in the afternoon we went to the apple store to get Joel's phone fixed. To our surprise they gave him a brand new phone for free. Love that deal. While Joel was at the apple store Evie and I walked around the block to the cheesecake factory. My favorite!! Evie stopped to smell the flowers on our way back.

Ethan fell asleep in the stroller holding his peach. We told him we were on our way to dinner and he could have it after. He wasn't about to let it go.

Ah, China Town. Our favorite area in SF for food. Almost anywhere you eat is good. Joel uses Yelp a lot for recommendations on where to dine. Most of the time they are right.

Ethan woke up and wanted to snuggle daddy. But he wasn't about to let go of his peach.

Cheers.

My baby boy. A bit grumpy. I wanted him to put his peach aside until after dinner but he didn't want it out of his sight. He did eat dinner and he nicely shared his peach with all of us.

Evie, coloring on the placemat. I guess I didn't take a picture but it was our whole family. Her drawings always make me smile.

Video: Ethan running on his ice skates. This is about how he skated too. It was so funny to watch. He was so fast, almost running on ice. No grace at all but full throttle, Ethan style.

Video: Ethan at the ice skating rink