Ringing in the New Year with the Tims Family!

Better late than never...right! The Tims Family came to CA to visit us around New Years!!! It was so wonderful to get to spend some time with them and to share our lives here in CA with them a little.

While they were here we checked out the Exploratorium, which is an amazing, hands-on science museum. We all had fun playing despite the large crowd.

When we finished at the museum we walked to Fisherman's Wharf for some cookies and hot chocolate and to see the sealions. Then we continued on to Ghirardelli Square. It made for a long, fun-filled day!

The next day was New Years' Eve, and we headed across the Golden Gate Bridge to Muir Woods to see the Redwood trees. We had a picnic in the car at the park before going on a hike. The trees were big and beautiful, and it was a gorgeous day! Unfortunately, we discovered Jackson still gets car sick on this trip...

We were all exhausted from our adventures so we ordered some delicious food and spent the evening relaxing. We did an online countdown for the kids so they didn't go to bed too terribly late. I'm pretty sure Barbara and Heath didn't make it until midnight either. I took a nap and woke up in time to ring in the new year with Ross and then headed off to bed.

Our next adventure was back in San Francisco at another science museum on New Years' Day. This time we went to the California Academy of Sciences. Since it was close to Christmas, they still had some reindeer on display. I think Barbara made the best reindeer!

The kids had all kinds of fun checking out the aquarium, the rainforest layers, learning about earthquakes and more.

After we'd seen all we could take in at the museum, we took our scooters out of the car and explored the paths and park in front of the museum.

The next day we took it a little easier. We let the kids play at the park behind our house and with all of their new toys. Then we went to eat at a nice restaurant that evening. Sadly, the Tims headed home the following day. We wish we could have stayed longer!!!

There are more pictures of our adventures in the album.

Christmas in CA!

Both my mom and Ross' mom came for a visit to celebrate Christmas. They were able to join us Friday for Jackson's school assembly where he was named "Citizen of the Month."

Then on Saturday we made our way to Martin Ranch Winery for a picnic and some wine tasting. It was a little overcast and wet due to all the rain we've had recently, but it was still a lot of fun! The wine was wonderful too!

After the picnic, we exchanged gifts with my mom and enjoyed a delicious, pre-Christmas meal of gumbo! The kids were SO excited about their gifts. Jackson is blurry in the picture below because he was jumping up and down with excitement over his message bear, which he'd been wanting so everyone can leave him messages...we're still working out the bugs, but let us know if you want to send him a message. He'd love it!

We all went to church and brunch on Sunday morning. Then we split up to enjoy some different activities. Ross and Susan went to a bowling alley to watch the Cowboys game, which they won, and my mom, the kids, and I made our way to San Francisco to visit the zoo and Union Square.

My mom left early Monday morning. I took the week off with the kids and Susan while Ross worked most of the week getting ready for the Consumer Electronics show in January! We spent the early part of the week wrapping presents, finishing shopping, baking cookies, and playing around.

On Christmas Eve, we spent the morning decorating cookies for Santa. They were good!

We had a delicious meal cooked by Chef Ross before heading to the Christmas Eve service. Jackson said our prayer before supper that evening, which included thanking God for making Santa so we could celebrate Jesus' birthday in such a fun way...so cute! The kids loved both the music and the message at church, and they went to bed faster than I've ever seen when we got home! They are at such a fun age to enjoy the Christmas season right now!

Jackson was the first one awake, and he waited patiently in our room for Audrey to wake up. Once she was up, it was a mad dash to their stockings!

We were all pretty spoiled this year. It was so fun to see the pure joy on the kids faces as they opened their gifts, screamed in excitement, and jumped up and down in celebration over things as simple as a new bath scrubber!

The picture above where it looks like Jackson is choking Audrey is actually him hugging her for the gift she chose for him...a flying Iron Man! After the chaos settled out, Jackson and Ross both got to play with their new remote controlled toys (Ross got a car that drives and flies). We were impressed with how well Jackson did with it!

Audrey was most excited about her makeup set, which she quickly started using. I love that her first application included blue blush...after all, blue is her favorite color right now!

As the day progressed, some of the more complicated toys were opened. Jackson LOVES Snap Circuits, and he got two new sets for Christmas (lights and a rover). He put the rover together and had lots of fun recording and delivering messages on it, as well as shooting discs at Audrey!

Audrey put together one of her Goldie Blox sets, which was really cool to see! It teaches engineering principles in a way that engages young girls really well. She was so proud of her work!

At the end of the day, the kids were wearing their head-lamps from Grandmother and measuring things with Jackson's new measuring tape, which broke fairly quickly and provided entertainment for the adults and kids as we took it apart and fixed it. The adults ended the day playing games and laughing at ourselves. It was a wonderful Christmas!

If you didn't get enough, there are more pictures in the album!

10 Year Anniversary

Ross and I had our 10 year wedding anniversary on August 17th! We took a 5 day trip to California to celebrate! Nana and Pop split the time with the kiddos so we could get away, and we are so grateful! It was a perfect getaway for us!

We arrived in San Francisco early in the afternoon on Saturday. We dropped our bags off at the hotel and went exploring! We started in Union Square where we did a little window shopping. Then we wandered into Chinatown where we checked out more stores and bought the kiddos their own kid-friendly chopsticks. We'd made reservations at a small French restaurant called Cafe Claude, which was a perfect anniversary dinner spot. The food and wine were delicious, and they treated us to a glass of champagne to celebrate! From there we made our way to Magician Peter Morrison's show, which was very entertaining! He involved the members of the audience quite a bit. Ross managed to avoid getting up on stage, but I had to dance with him. The dance of course was a lot of silliness that ended with a never-ending trick! It was a fun start to our trip!

The next morning we found a great place for breakfast called Stacks, which seemed to be a popular place for the locals. We got there just in time to snag a table. By the time we left there was a long line of folks waiting. It was good that we got there when we did because we had big plans for the day! We had signed up for a 10 mile Streets of San Francisco Bike Tour. Our tour guide, Beebe, was awesome! We got to see Golden Gate Park, Haight-Ashbury, funky street art in the Mission, Victorian architecture, and a historic “wiggle” route used by the city’s founding missionaries.

The street art was pretty impressive! Almost every piece had a very clear message. Beebe explained how the artists are responsible for maintaining their pieces. They will often get "tagged" by other folks, and it's up to the artist to fix it or even choose to leave it if they think it adds to the message. These were a few of the ones I found to be the most interesting.

Here are a few more pictures from the tour. I had the best bike...it was pink! It was a lot of fun to ride through the different areas of the city. We were amazed at the temperature differences in different neighborhoods. The fog, obviously, made a huge difference in the temperature, and it was much thicker in some neighborhoods than others. We learned a lot about the city's history and how it has become so well known for different eras. One of our last stops was at the Victorian homes in the picture, which are called the 7 Painted Ladies. One of them was the house from the show Full House. The park we stopped in to see these homes also gave us a great view of the city!

After grabbing a late lunch, we hoped in the car and headed to Healdsburg. To get there, we drove across the Golden Gate Bridge. I managed to get a few photos from the car. The close up foggy pictures are actually from the drive back, but I think it's pretty interesting that the far away pictures with the fog covering the top of the bridge and the picture with the clear sky were within a few minutes of each other...

We got to Healdsburg just in time to check out the square and visit our first tasting room, Topel. The wines were great, as well as the staff. We talked about our plans for the trip, and they gave us some great advice! The lighting was gorgeous when we left Topel, so we had our own mini photo session in the square where I got to share some of the tips I learned in my mentoring session. We ended up with a few really nice pictures of each of us.

The next morning we walked to Wine Country Bikes for a 25 mile bike tour of the Dry Creek Valley. We were both a little nervous about doing this long of a ride especially after a decent ride the day before. It was great though! Our first stop was at Dry Creek Vineyard, which was beautiful. They were celebrating their 40th anniversary, which meant we got a good deal on some great wines! We also enjoyed a delicious snack on the property before hitting the road again.

Our next stop was the Zichichi Family Vineyard, which is a much smaller operation. They don't do a wine club and sell most of their wines before they're made, which we learned is called selling "futures". The most memorable part of this stop was getting to do a barrel tasting of the future old vine zinfandel, which we decided to buy a bottle of!

Our last stop on the tour was at the Quivira Vineyard. This vineyard also does some biodynamic farming and raises some animals, so they have a beautiful garden at the front of the estate with vegetables and flowers, as well as a pig, a chicken coop, and honey bees. We got to wander through the estate and take a few pictures of the giant sunflowers before enjoying lunch at one of their picnic tables. Our tour guide was amazing through all of this! He was the perfect host for the day, and we felt like we'd made a new friend by the end of the day.

We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening checking out more of Healdsburg, trying a few more wines, and enjoying another delicious meal. We actually joined our first wine club too! We really enjoyed several of the wines at Thumbprint Cellars, and decided joining the wine club would be smarter than trying to find a way to carry MORE wine back to Houston with us.

The next morning we hopped back in the car and made our way to Sonoma Canopy Tours in Occidental where we did a little zip-lining through the redwood trees! We had to pass "ground school" to be able to go up in the trees, and unfortunately, one of the sweet ladies that was signed up for the tour wasn't able to join us in the trees. She was 87 and was there to celebrate her 91 year old friend's birthday! The 91 year old got to join us. They were both such an inspiration! Apparently, they try something new every year.

They called the first of seven zips the "bunny zip" like a "bunny slope", which was a perfect way to get rid of any nerves you may have!

The next few zips got progressively longer. The longest was over 800 feet, and the highest point was 200 feet when we zipped across a gorge. I think the highest platform was 94 feet. We learned a lot about the trees and how they grow to survive there, as well as that they sway in the wind! The views were gorgeous, and it was incredibly fun!

We also walked up a spiral staircase around one of the redwoods to a couple of sky bridges. I loved the structures and was impressed with how they managed to construct them in a way the trees accepted them.

To end our adventure we rappelled from a platform to the ground. One of our tour guides was nice enough to take a picture of Ross on his way down since I went first! Did I mention I was the first one to zip and the first one to rappel? I was impressed!

We drove back to San Francisco after having lunch in Occidental. We were depending on our phones for navigation at this point. However, we weren't getting a good signal, so we just drove. We ended up seeing more beautiful scenery and eventually got our navigation going again and found our way to our hotel near Fisherman's Wharf. We walked from Pier 39 to Ghiardelli Square and back while taking in the sights, sounds, and smells of this major tourist attraction.

We wandered through a few galleries and shops before deciding we were ready for a break! We found a spot to rest and enjoy another glass of wine on Pier 39 and did a little people watching. Once we found some energy again, the sun was beginning to set. We caught a glimpse of the Alcatraz prison and the sea lions before stopping for a bread bowl of clam chowder for dinner.

When we headed back to our hotel we stumbled into one of Rodney Lough's photography galleries. We were both in awe to say the least. It was inspirational in so many ways to me and a great way to end our trip.

We had an incredible time but were also eager to see our kiddos when we returned! I think back on our wedding day, and one of the things I remember is my mom reminding me that the wedding day wasn't intended to be the best day of our lives. She reminded me that this was just the beginning and the hope is there will be even better days to come. After 10 years, I can say there have definitely been even better days, and I look forward to many more!

If you managed to get all the way through this lengthy post and are interested, there are more pictures in the album.