Jon and Allison's Visit

At last! Our good friends Jon and Allison made it up from LA for a weekend visit. Highlights included catching up on each others lives, eating some yummy meals around town, taking Spencer on his longest ride yet on his Skuut bicycle (3 miles on Sawyer Camp Trail!), playing Spencer's new board game (a gift from Jon and Allison), and a rare night out with Adam and Rachel at Bistro Luneta and Dessert Republic (while the boys were home with a babysitter), followed by a game of hearts by a cozy fire. Thanks for coming out, guys - we just hope it's not another 4 years before we see you in the Bay Area again!!! :) See below for details, or click here for a slideshow!

Click here for a slideshow

Tahoe Weekend

What's makes a great spring weekend in Tahoe? Assemble a great group of old and new friends, find a house with a great deck and views of the lake, bring up some fantastic food and wine, and maybe even squeeze in an afternoon on the slopes. That was our recipe for this weekend with Lee & KB, Nara & Tracy, Charu, and our new friends the Chappellet's, from Napa. See below for details, or click here for a slideshow!

We spent a lot of time hanging around the fantastic house that Eunice found on the North Shore in Carnelian Bay. We assembled an enclosed cruising circuit for Tyler in the living room, and used the coffee table for crazy lego creations. The house had enough quiet corners to allow Lee to study for his CFA exam, enough games to keep us entertained at night, and a great kitchen for cooking up all sorts of fine creations.

While Nara and Ryan were off catching their last day of skiing for the season, the rest of the crew explored the area, going for hikes, checking out Tahoe City, playing miniature golf, and instigating snowball fights with the remaining snow around the hosue. The snow on the slopes was a little better, but it definitely felt like spring skiing. A beer and some great funk music on the deck at Alpine made skipping the afternoon session of skiing seem very tempting! (We skied, and were very sore the next day as a result!)

It was also Ryan's birthday weekend: we surpised him with a birthday cake and chocolate covered strawberries, washed down by a fantastic bottle of Cabernet from the Chappellet cellar (they're in the wine business... another helpful ingredient to a great weekend in Tahoe!).

Here's the full group on the grass behind our house: Jon Mark, Colleen, Owen, Tracy, Charu, Nara, KB, Lee, and the 4 Nichols..... a great crew for a great weekend!

Click here for a slideshow...

Easter 2009

Easter madness! This was the year Easter went from being a laid back time of reflection to being an insane holiday for the kids. Spencer participated in not one, not two, but three different egg hunts, starting with the largest in the Peninsula at our very own San Mateo Central Park. See below for details, or click here for a slideshow!

Nancy and Donna came down to join us for the celebration... highlights included arts and crafts tables all over the park, sitting with an enthralled Spencer watching a little girl sing Anne of Green Gables on the community stage, and eating yummy Thai food for lunch upon learning that there was a 1 hour wait to do the Easter Egg hunt. The hunt itself was a well oiled machine: batches of 100 kids line up, fetch all the eggs in 5 minutes, and line up to return the eggs as they file out of the baseball diamond.

Egg hunt #2 was at church, and egg hunt #3 was over at the Gates house, where we went for Easter dinner. This was a much more laid back afair: the dads hid a bunch of eggs around the Gates' backyard.... including several in perches with shell-dropping views of the bay.

Easter Dinner itself was a lot of fun: we brought over our enormous rib-boiling pot to cook 6 racks of ribs for the assembled masses, and whipped up some Nichols-family margaritas to complement the mexican-themed dinner.

Spencer and Tyler were both in fine form. Spencer and Ryan had gone shopping that morning for supplies, and Spencer kept his Heidi's Pies and Safeway stickers on all day. He had a ton of fun playing with the other kids.... finally winding down under a blanket with the others watching a video while the adults cleaned up. Thanks for hosting, Corey and Maggie... what a party!

Click here for a slideshow!

Dinner Chez Canada

To help welcome Adam and Rachel to the Peninsula, Grace and Alonzo hosted all of us over to their place for a true gourmet meal.

Spencer and Theo ate together at the "big boys" table, took a bath together, and went down without a peep (as did Tyler).

To celebrate, we made a run to the corner grocery store for more wine (they had a great selection), and broke out the poker chips! See Adam and Rachel-- life on the Peninsula can be wild and crazy, too!

Gifts from Nara and Tracy

The last time Nara and Tracy came over for dinner, they brought gifts for the boys. Here's a video of Spencer's reaction to his very, very cool gift.



In fact, we were getting ready to head out to a festival at our neighborhood park (which Spencer had been talking about all morning long) when he spied the unopened gift. Spencer's excitment after opening the present delayed our departure for another hour. Nara and Tracy, thanks for getting Spencer his first real train set, complete with tracks! He LOVES it! We got some photos of Spencer playing with his trains for the first time, as well as Tyler enjoying his fun gift: a set of soft blocks, which he loves chewing on and throwing around. :)

Hiller Aviation Museum

On Friday, Grace and Eunice took the boys to Hiller Aviation Museum, just a few miles from home.

It was the perfect place to spend the morning: tons of antique airplanes on display and full-size aircraft for the kids to board and explore. To top it off, there was a special model train exhibit as well... truly a boy's dream outing.

Spencer particularly enjoyed the flight simulators where he could practice crashing helicopters into the ground.


There was a great children's play area, too, where Tyler had fun climbing on a cool airplane rocker, while Theo zipped around on an airplane scooter.

The Perfect Sunday

Today was a perfect Sunday for us; a perfect "day of rest." We woke up and it was gorgeous outside. So we walked downtown with the boys to eat pancakes and omelets at Bay Watch Restaurant and then strolled over to Central Park for a morning romping in the playground. Then we walked from the park to our church (located at Aragon High School), listened to some particularly inspired music, reflected on a particularly relevant sermon, caught up with some friends, and connected with some new people. This was followed by afternoon naps, reading in the sun, and then some hang-out time with Tyler in the backyard while Spencer was still sleeping.



Spencer woke up at 4:30pm, and just when the day seemed like it could be winding down, we weren't quite ready to give up a beautiful day in the sun... so we packed up the car and within 15 minutes were on a gorgeous beach in Half Moon Bay with the boys.


Tyler explored the sand with much interest. Spencer ran around like a mad man, building sand castles, jumping in holes he dug out for himself in the sand, splashing in the ocean, and scavenging driftwood from the beach. We poured ourselves some white wine and snacked on cheese, grapes, and fresh-made bread. The day ended with sunset at Princeton-by-the Sea where we chowed down on our favorite clam chowder at Barbara's Fish Trap before heading home. It's days like this that remind us why we love the Bay Area!

Click here for more photos from our perfect Sunday.