Best of 2005

Our fondest memories from 2005...

Our fondest memories of 2005: Long ride home from Baja, diving back into work...

Ryan's 30th birthday-- celebrated with family by swilling vodka and dancing to Russian music at Fandorin, and with friends during a weekend trip to Sonoma (competing for who gets what room through an olympics of board games?? "hey, its my birthday!").

Eunice's 30th birthday-- started with a bittersweet trip to Tahoe cut short when we heard about the death of our dear friend Tess, continued with a backpacking trip in Santa Cruz, and culminated in an evening boat cruise on the Bay with friends and family (Dad said to the captian: "I want to go under that bridge" as waves crashed over the front of the boat!).

Terry's 60th birthday-- celebrated with family in a beach house in Galveston, Texas.

The celebrations continued all summer. We danced: under the dome of City Hall in our evening-wear finest at the Black & White ball, under the fireworks to Big Bad Voodoo Daddy at Stanford's July 4th celebration. We swam: jumping into the Pacific with Jesse and Lee during a trip to LA, at night in Lake Sonoma from a camping spot accessible only by boat. We even flew: finally collecting on a fantastic wedding present of a "flight to Monterey for hamburgers" from Alexander and Sheryn.

Ryan also finally saw something other than SAP headquarters during his frequent business trips to Germany-- an afternoon of wine-tasting in the Pfalz, and a weekend hiking the Swiss Alps around Wengen. And then there was the stop-over on the way home from Germany to join the Sabato Boy's annual outing to the US Grand Prix in Indianapolis.

The big trip of the summer was to Indonesia. We remember evening strolls down Kuta Beach, the terraced rice paddies and magical Hindu temples on the mountains of Bali, the charming artist's town (and monkey hangout!) of Ubud, the open air luxury of our bungalow at the Alam Jiwa, our first glimpse of our catamaran (the Moggy) and quirky Captain Don, the sun setting over the volcanoes of Lombok, diving into the magical colors of the coral reef, breaking down cultural barriers with the Muslim children in a beachside fishing village, and finally arriving at Komodo and tracking real-life dragons through the desert.

Upon our return, we connected with long-lost family at Pohley's wedding and bid Adam and Rachel farewell to San Francisco as they headed off to New York. Eunice even had payback for all those boys weekends as she headed to Utah for a girls weekend at a Green Valley Spa.

Back in Indonesia, we had spent some of the long hours between the Indonesian Islands deciding that we were as ready as we were ever going to be to start a family-- two months later we discovered that we were expecting a child!

We wanted to celebrate the holidays sharing our news with family and friends-- it was too soon to spill the beans during a Thanksgiving trip to Vancouver to visit Eunice's family, but we finally told Ryan's Bay Area family in person over Christmas by giving our parents "grandma" and "grandpa" frames containing our first ultrasound.

What better way for us to celebrate pregnancy than with our favorite kind of travel: a big roadtrip-- we spent a couple of dusty days camping in an old miner's cabin overlooking Death Valley, and drove into a posh Hollywood hotel for New Year's Eve... Our last one we'd celebrate with a family of 2!

We're expecting!

One of the joys of the holidays was sharing our exciting news with family as Eunice neared the end of her first trimester. Eunice is due on July 19! Tough to tell much from the above photo, but doc says baby's head size takes after dad... :)

Christmas 2005

The Christmas season started with the SAP holiday party at the SF Design Center. The party was held in a 4 story open courtyard with a burlesque band on the floor 1, gambling on floor 4, and drinks and food in between.


Adam made a trip home from New York for the holidays. Rachel was with her family on the East Coast, but contributed a wonderful ornament to add to the Nichols tree.


Decorating the tree at the Nichols pad with eggnog and Christmas music... what a tradition. The tree loosened up so much over the coming days that most of the ornaments fell off!


That night we headed to a holiday cocktail party at Jesse and Eileen's in Berkeley. Once again we outlasted all of the wild-and-crazy Hass business school folks and shut down the party with Grace and Alonzo.


Mom and Jim came into town on Friday... To celebrate Mom's birthday, we took her to SupperClub, an "uber-hip" dining club featuring performance art, brought to us straight from Amsterdam. The first performance was the highlight-- "uber-flexible" acrobats performing to the pulsing beats of the DJ.


We ate dinner while reclining in huge beds laid out around the performance space.


This was the night we told Mom that we were expecting... she doesn't look like a grandma, does she?


There was a Victorian theme to the night-- here Ryan contributes a branch to a human Christmas tree. Very strange.


We spent the night at the Hills in Oakland, and recovered the next morning through a rousing game of badminton with Eddie and Nate in the backyard. The younger brothers vanquished the older brothers in hand-to-hand combat. Here, Ryan is about to whiff a put-away shot.


Frisbee in a local park: Nate runs through the muddy field to make an amazing diving catch.


See Adam, we have fall colors on the West Coast too.... and you get to enjoy them in late December while wearing shorts!


Christmas Eve Family photo: Eddie, Ryan, Kathy, Nate, Bob, Susan, Jim, Eunice, and Adam on the Hill's back porch.


The expecting parents with Grandma Susan and Uncle Adam. Craziness!


The highlight of Christmas Eve at the Hills is a 30 person white elephant with all of Kathy's family. Here Joanna (Kathy's mother) becomes the proud recipient of a walking, talking minature bull that charges across the table to the chants of "hey, hey, hey, Toro!" Beleive it or not, el Toro was later stolen by Bob and then by Adam, making it one of the more contested gifts of the evening.


Nate's musical talent's were another highlight of the evening: we started by singing christmas carols and Green Day by the piano downstairs, and later got a little guitar performance upstairs once the crowds had gone home.


Christmas morning: just what we'd always wanted-- a rolling cooler to hold our frosty cold Kern's nectar! Was this Santa's work, or the work of the new head of Kerns, Uncle Bob?


Have yourself an absurdist little Christmas: A photo of Bob opening a calendar of Bob opening a calendar of...


The next stop, later on Christmas morning: a brief but very special visit with Valerie, Melody, Jennifer, and David at San Fransisco Airport. They happened to have a 2 hour layover on their way to Tawain, so we stopped by to wish them a Merry Christmas. This was their longest trip with the little girls-- and it got off to a rough start when Melody got a nosebleed before boarding in Dallas!


Are you ready to have a little cousin, Valerie and Melody?


Bye-bye, Melody... there's now way you'll get lost tagged as carry-on!


The final stop of Christmas day was the Nichols pad. Abby was the most enthusiastic present opener by far, and ended up flinging her gift across the room, breaking a wine glass.


Adam in his dapper new hat.


Ryan in his dapper new scarf / sweater / belt combo.


Uncle Tom with one of Nancy's new paintings.


Dad gets teary-eyed over a mini-version of Abby... just wait till he gets a grandkid!


Merry Christmas everyone!

Thanksgiving in Vancouver

This fall marked 10 years since the death of Eunice's dad, Santa. Ryan, Eunice, and Eunice's mom Terry flew up to Vancouver to visit Santa's grave and to spend time with relatives. Click here for photos.

Bay Area WCF Reunion

Two weekends with Williams-friends! It all started with the Williams/Amhearst game being broadcast via satellite at Jillians (The Ephs kicked butt). Then came lunch at Eunice's favorite Vietnamese restaurant (Yummy Yummy, in the inner sunset) and a stroll through Golden Gate Park to the new DeYoung.

Here's the Williams gang eating dinner at a Burmese restaurant in the Richmond: Franklin, Ryan, Eping, Nathan, Mac, Abby, Eunice, Adam, and Steph.


And enjoying decadent chocolate cake afterwards!

The next weekend was the wedding of another William's friend: June Wang. Here's the bride with Eunice and Nathan.

The Williams crowd with the happy bride and groom!

Jon's Visit

At the threat of being dis-owned as a friend, Jon came for his first visit to the Bay Area 3 years.

His main goal was to cook us his famous Lasagna. Eunice is amazed as his technique!


The finished product looks fantastic. Thanks Jon!

Random hike in the foothills with Ryan's b-school classmates Paul and Dave (out visiting from London!)

Girls at Green Valley

Eunice's all-too-brief stay at Green Valley Spa in Utah with old college friends Kristin and Faith. They haven't hung out together since Williams, so this was a pretty special treat. Click here for photos.

Oktoberfest

Oktoberfest in San Francisco starts with breakfast at Mamas and a walk out to the Golden Gate Bridge. Here we are with KB, Lee, Jesse, and Eileen.


KB and Lee under the bridge.


Enjoying an afternoon beer at the party in Fort Mason


Don't fall in!


Nice headscarf Lee...


Eunice gets down to the "German" band (McDonalds, McDonalds, Kentucky Fried Chicken and a Pizza Hut!). Who is that in the back checking out Lee's butt? Beat her up, KB!

Big Basin Camping

Jesse and Eileen organized a weekend camping trip to Big Basin with us, Grace and Alonzo, and Jesse's b-school friends Remco and Sarah




We went on the famous12-mile Berry Creek Falls hike.. here we are near approaching our destination in front of Golden Falls.

Ryan and Jesse in front of the waterfall

Mineral deposits give Golden Falls its distinctive hue.

The falls are surrounded by towering redwoods

Our destination! The gang gathers in front of Berry Creek Falls.

Later that night, enjoying the warmth of the campfire after some delicious steaks cooked over the coals.

Farewell Big Basin!