Art's Birthday - April 27

We celebrated Art all day on April 27th. Cousin Greg came up for L.A. for a visit, Shu Shu was here - a party was eminent. Art left as usual early for the pick-up delivery day a lonesome task indeed. We tracked him down and joined him for an Indian feast at Zante's. YUMMMMM. We parted ways, the boys continuing the laundry route. Susan and I embarked on "Operation Birthday" runnign errands around the city for a feast.

The children returned from school, Avalon asking if she could stay for a playdate. The weather was unusually warm so the crab pool was inflated. So of course Divo and David were invited to the birthday feast - but some vegetarian options needed to happen, Divo brought some tofu and I whipped up a second vat of sauce that we marinated the ribs....Next, Nancy, Matt and Cabot arrived, then I called Naomi, David and Leon - it was a PARTY! The children ran wild. Of course as soon as it was time to eat the wind picked up and it got too cool for an outside event so we quickly made an indoor picnic. Art felt properly feted and fun was had by all.

One of our buildings.........

This was a collaborative effort between Eva and Eli.

Riding in Golden Gate Park

our new family activity is to ride bikes in Golden Gate Park - usually on Sunday afternoon when they block off MLK drive. Eva loves her bik and Eli - at this time lives his mini-bike. He is actually a little too big for it but man-oh-man can he move on this thing. He gets moving so quickly with this froggy-like motion. He gets many heads turning and smiles across faces. The little sticker on the front was from a police man that made Eli and Eva honorary members of the SFPD.

Senior Center

Eva studies ....

I was cooking dinner in the kitchen and it was awfully quiet in the house. Eli was in the living room playing quietly and I discovered Eva on the back porch studying the bible.

a little snickering from the secret tent....

Eli likes to drag along toys where ever we go.....

Easter Day

Easter was months ago but it certainly deserved space on the blog. The children were awed by the gifts from the Easter bunny: marshmellow eggs and more jelly beans then they'd ever seen in their lives, plus lots of little wooden toys. Also grandparents added T-shirts from Disney World and goodies from Shu Shu.

We joined a small crowd at Old First Church for the annual pancake breakfast. The output was slow but we just kept hovering until we each had our fill. The problem with Easter is that there is candy EVERYWHERE. We kept getting more and more of our stash.

After church we went to the annual Easter egg hunt/lunch at the Yamauchi/Faggler residence. It was nice seeing everyone. Eva and Eli cleaned up in the treat/goodie department. You'll see Eli running along the path. I decided to just let the children have their fill of candy. It was pretty funny when neither one of them could finishe their caramel/chocolate bunny. Both of them helf their bellies and passed it along to their dad.

Easter Eggs

Old news here but I wanted to document some of the PAST! It's been so long since I've blogged and I got news today that our audience is getting bored....here is the email from Sydney:

Okay, you know where I'm going with this. But first, let me emphasize that if a blog entry has to stay up for weeks and weeks, seeing Eli's beautiful face on the opening page is a thousand times better than some picture of a failed crock-pot dessert. I still feel bad about that. Also, Felix kind of looks like Quinn, so I can imagine that Eli and Quinn are hanging out together at Golden Gate Park.

But Jan, I'm ready to fully embrace your brilliant idea of having our kids follow each other's lives through the blogs, and so far, Eli has done nothing but hike. And hike. And hike. With Felix. Like kitties in the woods.

I love you. Update your blog.

-S

So I'm going to try to catch-up on times past and make some new entries as well...

Below is our annual egg dying festivities. Eva and Eli cranked through two dozen eggs in mere minutes. This news is relavant to our current goings-on in that Eli found a basket in my bedroom last week with three hard boiled eggs in it. I caught him just as he was ready to crack it open saying, "look mommie I want to eat this egg...." yikes!