The Mother of All Posts

We have been doing our best to ignore moving issues and have some fun since we quit work on July 20. (Easier said than done -- I'd estimate half our time has been devoted to buying a new house, choosing benefits, figuring out a new budget, closing the old house, etc., despite a concerted effort to keep such to a minimum.) Initially, we thought we would try and travel to various parts of Northern California, but have found that we truly enjoy just hanging in San Francisco, doing the simple tourist things that we have never had time to do. It is a world class city after all. Recent events include:

A wonderful evening out with dear friends at Plouf, followed by staying in a hotel in the City (without kids!) and shopping at the Westfield Center (without kids!) the next day.




A trip to SF Moma to see a Matisse exhibit, followed by dinner at Gary Danko (seriously great food -- I had the bison and it was spectacular, as was the seafood risotto). On a separate day we took the kids into the Yerba Buena Center, which has a playground with a great slide, and lots of falling water, making it Alden's very favorite place in San Francisco.




Visiting St. Patrick's Church, one of San Francisco's oldest, dating from 1853 and a survivor of the 1906 earthquake. It has a wonderful lunchtime concert series, absolutely free, which Kate and I enjoyed as she pilloried me with questions about all the Catholic Saints (she was very interested, among other things, that a number of them represented at St. Patrick's were women).





Frequenting Golden Gate Park--it has been a serious oversight on our part not to have spent more time in this beautiful place. (I guess we were dissuaded by the fact that it sees actual sunlight about twice a year, but hey, its a great place anyway.) One recent outing included paddling around Stowe Lake with Cyrus, Annie and kids.




Visiting our friends Craig and Karen in the east bay, where Kate took quite a liking to their oldest, Jack. As we went to leave, Kate grabbed Jack's hand, marched over to Karen, and asked if it was alright if Jack walked her out to the car. Karen, to her credit, kept a straight face while giving permission, and then noted that it was clear who wore the pants in that relationship. (The first photo is courtesy Kate. The second photo says it all -- welcome to being a man, Jack).