Focused together

Skating Away

Zoe sure has come a long way! No complaints, no crying, no clinging, no whining... only gliding! Okay, choppy gliding, but she begged us to take her skating, and she really enjoyed it. She just kept at it, going around and around. She'd fall, and get right up and keep on going. keep on going, Kitten, keep on going.

Swim Class

It's tedious. It's chaotic. It's stressful. It's crowded. It's warm, it's exhausting, it's routine, it's engaging, it's not lonely. Sometimes winter can feel endlessly dreary, cold, dark and lonely. Our twice weekly swim class (not including the extra swims that Daddy does on the weekends) really help us to get through the dark months of winter. The boisterous Berkeley Y full of families (with seemingly much better behaved children) can feel like a familiar routine that gets us out of the house and nicely exhausted by the time it's over. The pools are like bathwater, the Kindergym gets the wiggles out, and everyone gets a shower and is ready for dinner and bed by the end. For a few months, we spend a LOT of time here.

Wrestling on the grass

Leprauchans & Fairies

Time marches on, and it could be set to a cadence of holidays ticking by. Sure, Christmas (Winter Solstice, Hanukkah) New Year, Easter, Thanksgiving are some obvious ones, but let's face it- in the long stretches of "the dark" months of winter, we can use all the festivities we can come up with. Presidents Day? Why not? I need another 3 day weekend! MLK day? Shu-hya! That dude deserves a week in my opinion. Heck, we should use the whole month to memorize one of his wise quotes for every day. Valentine's Day? Yes! We need to douse ourselves in cheery red & pink, hole up with glue and scissors and papers for weeks, then drown our sad hearts in wine and chocolate. And the true love of family. St. Patrick's Day? Sure, spring is coming and I need a little green in my life! Not to mention an excuse to get bombed in the name of being Irish, or knowing someone who is. Ah yes, St. Patty's day. But being Irish (or getting drunk with someone who is at least 2/100's Irish, and really, who isn't) isn't enough! Can't we spruce that baby up a bit? I mean, we can't exactly take the kids to the pub for green beer, and they sure as hell aren't eating any haggis or corned beef concoction. So how can we make this a family holiday? Add snarky little people in green suits who like to play hide and seek and horde treasure. Now we're talking. Kristi sure is great at making the most of each child's birthday, half birthday and holiday. She doesn't miss a beat. She celebrates each tick of the calendar- waffles and maple syrup when the cold sets in (waffles made in class, and drizzled with her father's home made syrup), rakes, wheel barrows and orange leaves in the fall. Snow in the classroom at Christmas time. Egg dyeing and hunts at Easter. Valentine trading in February. A dip in the pool in early June. In March, the kids go out in the garden to follow the trail of tiny footprints leading to a tiny pair of fairy shoes and a pile of golden coins.

Rainy Day

Today it poured rain. I asked Julian what he wanted to do. "I want to go to Jack Yondon Square and watch the tains." O.k. So we went. We parked in a parking lot right next to the signal light that "DING DING DING"s when the train comes. The lights flash, the bar goes down and the train roars by, honking it's earblasting horn. And while we waited for the trains to go by, Julian sat in the back, watching Thomas movies on the DVD player. And after an hour or so and a handful of trains, the rain stopped, and we walked across the street to see the ferry boat and watch the huge harbor cranes lift their boxes, loading and unloading goods to and from the container ships, ready to brave the roiling sea.

Trains trains trains

Blossoms in white

Little Elton

Spring Portrait

Our Week With Sharkie

Today while picking up Zoe from school, her teacher Nick helped her into the car and then handed me a blue tote bag. "It's your turn to take home Sharkie for the week".
This was news to me. I'd heard of Sharkie, the class mascot. Zoe made a valentine for him, but we had never met.
I asked Zoe about our responsibilities concerning Sharkie, and when we got home I opened the bag. Sharkie is a big blue stuffie with giant red mouth filled with sharp felt teeth. He comes with his own overnight bag. Contents of said overnight bag include:
-One blue shark with giant mouth and large eyes
-One journal, filled with hand drawn pictures and stories about his weekly visits with each child's family.
-One sack of valentines, given to him by each child in class
-Instructions on Sharkie's care, including a half hour visit to the dryer at the end of the week.
And so it began, our week with Sharkie. Together we read Sharkie's journal and enjoyed the pictures of Sharkie with each of Zoe's friends. Sharkie having dinner with families. Sharkie playing cards and video games, watching favorite TV episodes. Sharkie flying through the air in a backyard. Sharkie playing with siblings. Sharkie going for car rides. We filled out our own journal pages, Zoe coming up with descriptive tall tales of our adventures together, from eating up all the pizza at Lanesplitter, to scaring other children at the park. He slept up on Zoe's top bunk with the elite crew including Rapunzel From Disneyland and Mr. Bear. That Sharkie is living the life.

Familiar faces & places

Today we met up with some great old friends at Golden Gate Park. The kids had a blast playing in the sand, on the playground, then walking the trails over to Stow Lake to feed the ducks. The kids loved seeing Miles, Casey and Liam, and it was wonderful for me hanging out with some of my favorite mommies. Of course, no trip to GGP is complete without a slice or two of our favorite pizza, Escape From New York. After that it was a lovely walk through The Haight on a gorgeous, warm, BEST WINTER EVER day.

With Daddy on The Seaswings

Would you like to hear a CD?

At the blackboard

Family night out at Lanesplitter Pizza. It's our usual stop after swim class. Pizza being one of the three things that Julian eats. They are really nice to those of us diners with children, and they painted a big wall with chalkboard paint and keep a big bucket full of colored chalk to keep us busy. Tonight, while waiting for our pizza to bake,
we drew some Totoros, and Julian drew a sun. This may not seem special to the casual observer, but The Mommy recognizes that this is the first time Julian's drawing was representational- you can tell that it isn't just "scribble scrabble" (as Zoe refers to his drawings) but that it is actually a sun. Super cool.

Just a little moment

We were driving to the freeway after swim class, and we saw this park with a huge slide, and the kids were relentless in their hounding me to pull over despite the fact that it has been raining and it's cold and we are trying to go get dinner. I found a place to park, and the slide was surrounded by teenagers who quickly scattered when they saw that The Mommy and her pack of children would not be deterred from enjoying that slide. Except, as the teens warned us, it was so yucky and muddy at the bottom, that even Zoe relented, and we walked back to the car. There, next to a colorful wall, the sun had finally dipped below the cloud cover and came pouring out, a river of liquid golden light. The Mommy would not be denied her photo op, and the kids, ready to bounce out of their skins and ready to frolic were game for a quick shoot. They danced, Zoe did a handstand, but the light was fading and dim, and the actions shots blurry. I said, "time to go" and they gave each other one last look as if to say, "what can we do now to escape the car, and run away into the last moments of daylight?" Click.