And So It Begins......

Today we spent a few hours in the pool at Jessie and Nigel's place. It was a perfect day for the pool; a hot-ish 85o with a slight breeze. The water was cool and lovely and the kids splashed and played, racing each other from one end of the pool to the other. Then Ava decided she wanted to visit the "hot pool", so we moved the party over there. Even though the day was hot and the water was even hotter I could have stayed in there all day. I do love me a good hot tub.

Jack was inching in, dramatically wincing at the heat. He stuck his feet in, then went to his knees, then mid thigh, then the water hit his crotch and he straightened back up quickly. I asked him if he was okay, to which he replied "My penis doesn't like the hot". "Oh?" "Yes. My penis doesn't know if it wants to come in. It's deciding".

Apparently his penis has a brain. I related the story to Jessie, who said "Well, at least he acknowledges it. Admitting it is the first step". So true.

Sea Crags #3

Woodland children.

Ava on the swing.

At the river.

Mimi and the Guncles.

Another wonderful trip! We are looking forward to heading up again at Thanksgiving! The old house is coming along, and with a few more improvements we should be able to stay in it. That will be a great day.

Sea Crags #2

Lame! Blogger is only letting me post 4 pics at a time! So, I guess I'll have a few more entries:

Wood Nymphs

Denali and John at the beach.

Getting down at the Dancing Table

Preparing for battle.

Sea Crags #1

So, instead of telling stories about our trip to Sea Crags I figured I would post a mess a pictures instead. We went up for a whole week, and had a wonderful, relaxing time. Although we had planned to work on the old house, it turned out that most of the guys counldn't make it this time, and all the ladies had children in tow, which makes it hard to get things done. So instead we spent the time relazxing, playing at the beach and the river, picking blackberries, making jam and cooking for the masses. At the high point we had 27 people, 19 of whom were kids from the ages of 1-15. Whew!

This year there were a ton of seal lions hanging out on the big rock just off the beach.

Ava and Henry at the river.

Finding tadpoles at the river. That's Sofia in the black hat, leading the expedition.

Jack on the rope swing.

San Jose Children's Museum

This time on our way up to Sea Crags we stopped over in San Jose instead of San Francisco. We did this because we have been wanting to visit their Children's Museum, which was recommended very highly to us by our good friend Shannon, who grew up in San Jose. Well, I must say that all her raving did not do this place justice! It is one of the the *best* kid's museum I have ever been to, with so many cool hands-on activities that we could have easily spent the entire week-end there. John and Stephen came on the trip with us, so they had a chance to explore the museum as well, and I think if you asked them they would tell you that it sucked. But that is only because they are 15 and -beyond cool- and would never admit to having a total blast.

Slow boat to China. Kidding, it's actually Vietnamese.

The arch that Cate built. Really. How cool is that?

Hanging out with Curious George. It was actually a pretty cool exhibit and I learned a lot about H.A. Rey.

Making "rainbow" pizza with Uncle Steve.

Who Knew?

Brian decided that the kids were ready for "chapter books", so the other night he picked out one of his childhood favorites, "The Boxcar Children" to read to them at bedtime. When he came out of their room I asked him how it went and he said "Well, they seemed to enjoy it, but I had to do some quick doctoring of the story as I was reading it". ??? See, it turns out that the Boxcar Children? The children who live in a boxcar? THEY'RE ORPHANS. BECAUSE THEIR PARENTS DIED.

After we finish up the Boxcar Children series, we are going to read them Titus Andronicus and then perhaps The Silence of the Lambs.