Eli's birthday - HE'S 4! photos to follow later

We had such a nice birthday. The weekend before was the big party. This included a co-celebration with our dear friend Felix who's birthday happens to be the day after Eli. It took a while for Eli to warm up to the idea of sharing a celebration but the reality of the event was perfect. It started out with a bit of a scare from Helen. The night before I got the phone call that Felix has a low grade fever. After an evening of what to do's on our end we decided to carry on. We were more than elated to get the call in the morning that TEAM- FELIX was on board.

Careful choreography got washing duties tucked away, a trip down to the Ferry Building to pick up the sheeshee cupcakes and to get the van from the Nadal Zarrow family. We were then able to pick up David, Naomi and Leon for a van-full of fun to Felton. We arrived happy and ready to enjoy the day. It was definitely the off-season as it was almost empty. The leaves had a bit of color, the weather was cool, it fooled this East Coaster in to believing it was actually Autumn.

Helen brought a wonderful spread of food - salads and tortilla wraps (egg/pesto, procutoo/fontina...) the children played, adults talked and then it was time - TO RIDE THE STEAM TRAIN! It was a fun ride. We've done this trip before but it was more fun with friends.

After the trip we celebrated they boys with cupcakes. We got them from a fancy bakery called Miette. I kept the order simple and just got chocolate with vanilla icing and the reverse. I wish I'd branched out and gone for the 6 other flavors. I just had images of wee ones fighting over the few coveted ones.

After the treat we took a nice walk through the redwoods. It was cool, dark and fun.

The ride home was so much fun. The men sat up front discussing politics and no doubt philosophy with David along. Naomi and I took task at keeping the boys awake. They were so tired they were punch-drunk. Naomi and laughed so hard that our stomachs hurt. If we were to imitate Leon clapping today we'd probably return to a fit of hysteria. They spent the night with us and the adults ordered Indian food. The next morning we made pumpkin pancakes.