Category Archive: visitors

A baby story: Week 20

Posted by Lisa On January 19th, 2012

Week 20: Baby’s the length of a banana!

It’s official…we’re half way there! Now that we’ve hit the 20 week milestone I feel like I can breathe a huge sigh of relief since there’s not as much to worry about now that we’re at this point. And we’ve got so much to look forward to in the coming 4-5 months too which makes it that much better!

We had our big 20 week ultrasound on Tuesday and although it didn’t start off the way I had imagined, it sure ended exactly the way I had hoped…

I was sososo excited in the months and weeks leading up to the ultrasound but then that morning, I started getting nervous. I was nervous that she was going to turn out to be a he. I mean, please don’t get me wrong…I would love nothing more than having a son and would have been ecstatic if, at our 13 week ultrasound, we were told we were having a boy…but after 7 weeks of excitement over the news we were having a girl, I knew I’d be at least a little disappointed and I did not want to feel that way. So that morning I was torn between being overly excited and nervous at the same time.

Kevin’s mom and sister Judith drove up over the weekend to spend a little time with us and to be present at the ultrasound which was a lot of fun. We entered the room with the ultrasound tech and the first thing she said, without introducing herself or anything, was, “Well, it’s going to be little crowded in here”–I could tell from the tone of her voice that she wasn’t happy we were +2 visitors but I had called the office to confirm they were allowed so figured it was just her own issue. Then she started asking me all of these basic questions that were already in my medical record and it seemed a little ridiculous and unnecessary to have to recall all of that information. Then she got started on the ultrasound and we couldn’t believe that she wasn’t narrating anything she was seeing. She kept looking at things and typing away and although we could figure out what some of her codes meant, it was weird that she wasn’t telling us exactly what it was she was seeing. At one point Judith asked if what we were looking at was something and the woman just said, “No, it’s such-and-such.” She seemed cold and uninterested in making it any sort of special experience for us and I was not happy in the least (comparing it with our amazing ultrasound tech at our 13 week appointment). The one glimmer of humanness we saw from her was when she commented on the baby’s heart and said how “pretty” it was.

I tried to make the best of it, though, and we saw a really cool view of the baby’s legs all stretched out and super long and lean (at least we thought so, not sure if they’re really long compared to other fetuses at this age) and it was so cool feeling the baby move and kick as I saw it happening at the same time on the screen…so amazing!

Towards the end she asked if we wanted to know the gender so she took a look between the legs but told us that she couldn’t confirm 100% if it was a girl or a boy. She said it looked more like a girl but couldn’t say for sure.

I felt so deflated at that point. I did not want to leave that appointment feeling less certain about the gender than we did at our 13 week appointment, it just didn’t seem right! But after getting a couple of photo print-outs and after she told us that was it, I didn’t feel like we could do anything more at that point.

Pretty little profile

Baby got back! See the ear at the top of the head on the right?

She said she had to go talk to the radiologist to show them her findings and would be back shortly. The four of us were left in the room and we were debriefing a bit…overall it was so great being able to experience the ultrasound with the family but Kevin agreed with me that the tech wasn’t nearly as good as the other one we met with and he was a bit disappointed with the experience as well.

When she came back she said that she forgot to do one thing so needed me to lie down on the table again to complete the ultrasound. Another brief opportunity to see the baby? Of course!! After she finished her task I asked her if we could get a printout of the long legs we saw earlier. She was trying to see if she could print out a previously saved picture but it ended up being a video she saved so she couldn’t print it out and had to go back in to see if she could get a good shot of the legs for us. It was at that point that the baby decided to sit at the perfect angle for the tech to see clearly what the gender was and…it’s definitely a girl!!

The only time I will ever post a photo such as this of our child on the internet! Come to think of it, I’ll probably end up taking this photo down in a week or so, haha!

We were sososo excited to hear (and see!) the confirmation..exactly what we were hoping for!

One last piece of fun news this week before I end this ridiculously long post…Sirena’s been kicking me like crazy all week! I feel her every few hours for about 10 minutes or so at a time. She just moves around in there so much and it always makes me smile. And the BEST part of it all…Kevin finally felt her move!! Tuesday night I woke up when he got into bed after work and I was feeling the baby move so, for the thousandth time, I put his hand on my stomach in hopes that he’d feel her. I’d ask him, “Did you feel that?” and he’d say “No”, then, “Did you feel that??” and again he’d say “No” but finally he felt a good jab! Last night he felt her again and it just warms my heart beyond belief knowing that he can finally start feeling his little girl move. 🙂

Belly shot!

Lola was right in the middle of the mix with this shoot! Can’t blame her, she’s so darn cute and I’m sure she knew the blogging world wanted to see her, it’s been too long.

Other pregnancy updates

Total weight gained: 0 pounds (again)! I’m back down to my pre-pregnancy weight which is strange. One of the pregnancy websites I follow said for this week that “you should have gained around 10 pounds by now”…umm, unless your name is Lisa? I knew I wouldn’t gain too much weight in the beginning since I’m not super skinny or anything, but now it seems a little ridiculous being half way there with little to no weight gain. Let’s see how we do next week…

Our forties photo shoot

Posted by Lisa On December 8th, 2011

As most of you know, Kevin and I went back in time for a forties-themed photo shoot the weekend after Thanksgiving. A little background on how this came to be: Lindsey, a friend from high school, is now a professional photographer and I’ve followed her blog for a while now. Some time last year she had a little contest that if you commented on the blog you would be entered to win a free photo shoot…and I randomly won! I never win anything so I was surprised beyond belief. Soon after winning the contest she moved back down to Southern California and I was afraid we may never get to have our photo shoot. In early October, Lindsey e-mailed me letting me know that she’d be in the Bay Area for a few other photo shoots and luckily we were able to schedule a session! I thought it would be so fun to do a forties-themed photo shoot (instead of us dressed in matching cardigans, haha) and we spent a good month or so researching outfits and putting things together piece by piece either through online stores or local thrift shops. We were pretty happy with the final result.

And of course I enlisted the help of my amazing sister to do my makeup and hair (because goodness knows what I would’ve turned out to look like if she hadn’t been there to make me over!) I can’t thank that girl enough for making me look damn good. 🙂

Sisters all done up!

We were pressed for time and were extremely nervous leaving our apartment with only 30 minutes to get to our destination in the city. Without traffic, we could be there in 20 minutes. But it was a Saturday afternoon and traffic can be INSANE getting across the bridge at that time. We got so lucky and arrived to meet Lindsey only a few minutes late.

Our adorable chauffeur

My hope was to take some fun photos on Embarcadero near some of the piers, I thought it would look very timely for our 40s shoot. But I didn’t realize that at 4pm (my favorite time of day to take photos in the soft sunlight), all of the tall buildings downtown would cast shadows along the piers. Boo! But Lindsey made it work and had us take our photos in Levi’s Plaza Park, a great little garden area (Kevin and I took Lola to this park once and had a great time).

We had Coit Tower looming overhead as we readied ourselves for an hour session in the cold (I hope my goosebumps don’t show in the photos! Hahah).

Dorothy and George came along for the ride (or was it for Zante’s Indian pizza we promised them that evening…hmmm?) and Dorothy snapped some good shots over Lindsey’s shoulder…

Leaning in for a smooch!

We had a bit of an audience throughout the shoot as well

I was afraid Kevin might drop me, haha! Luckily, we both survived.

We had SUCH an amazing experience and cannot thank Lindsey enough for her generosity. I am beyond excited to see the final photos once she’s finished processing/editing them (fingers crossed it’ll be before Christmas!) If you’re in Southern California and want some amazing family photos, maternity photos, baby photos, wedding photos, or even a fun boudoir session, all you need to do is spend five minutes perusing her portfolio on her website to see her work speak for itself. We highly recommend her! 🙂

Fall visitors & a mostly vegan Thanksgiving

Posted by Lisa On December 8th, 2011

A pre-Thanksgiving visit

We were privileged with a visit from my lovable, adorable, stinker-of-a-brother Derek the week before Thanksgiving. We spent a lot of time together, just hanging out and eating our way through Oakland and San Francisco. 🙂

We made a couple of visits to Fenton’s Creamery in Oakland, a cute ice cream parlor, for some delectable ice cream.

We also discovered this awesome ale house in Oakland called Cato’s that Derek likes to describe as a “classy dive bar”. Even though I couldn’t partake in the beer (boo!) the food more than made up for it.

And we spent an evening at Jessie’s pad eating some amazing food and a game night.

Thanksgiving weekend

Unfortunately he couldn’t stay for Thanksgiving, but fortunately for us we had another couple of visitors right on his heels: Kevin’s parents, Dorothy and George. Dorothy flew up a few days ahead of George to spend some time together (and to prepare for the big feast that we were going to make and eat later that week) and it was nice having her around!

One evening that week we drove up to Richmond to visit Point Isabel (where Lola experienced her first open water swim!) so Lola could stretch her legs and so that we could watch the sunset over the SF city skyline.

We were so happy when George arrived from his long drive up from Long Beach and it was doubly nice that Kevin got four days off for the weekend as well! We spent one of those evenings revisiting Fenton’s Creamery for some ice cream sundae goodness (or, in Kevin’s case, pie).

My idea of heaven (and don’t think for a minute that I didn’t scoop up some of that hot fudge from the plate)

George taking a good, long look at his and Dorothy’s chosen treat

Me, Kevin and George ready to dig in!

This was our third Thanksgiving spent up in the Bay Area (the first was spent with the Julian clan and last year’s was spent with Jessie in San Jose) and it was great having the Edmonds family in town to celebrate. Dorothy and I got a lot of the work done the day before but we still got an early start on Thanksgiving day to make sure we were ready in time for our other guests (Jessie, Carleigh and Scott) to arrive. Since Jess and I are vegetarian and Carleigh is vegan we decided to make it a mostly veg-friendly meal. There were only two things that the vegan of our group couldn’t indulge in: the turkey (obviously) and my Aunt Tina’s infamous corn (made with lots of cream cheese and butter). But other than that, all of the sides (including one of the pumpkin pies!) were made with no animal products whatsoever!

Kevin and George spent some time working on Kevin’s bike so that they could go mountain biking together later that weekend.

And Dorothy put the finishing touches on the dead bird…I mean, the turkey.

The group arrived and were ready to chow down!

The group minus George

The group minus me

Overall I think it was a pretty successful Thanksgiving meal, especially given that we were cooking for seven in the teeniest kitchen ever!

We had a really busy Friday, starting off with a long hike through Joaquin Miller park (a place Kevin and I have frequented many a time and were excited to share with his parents).

Dad, son and grandpup

Can you spot Kevin and Lola?

K + Lola braving the log

Beautiful trails!

Surprisingly beautiful mushrooms on a log

K + me

George + Dorothy

We rushed home so that we could meet with up our favorite friends from Irvine, Alison and Seth! We hung out at our apartment for a bit (or until Seth’s stomach yelled at us to leave, haha) and then took them to one of our favorite Mexican places, Taqueria Monte Cristo in Berkeley. It was SO nice seeing them, even if only for a couple of hours!

The Redlands gang (minus Seth!)

That night we were off again…to the Christmas tree lighting in Union Square! Kevin and I had gone in 2009 with the Julians and we knew his parents would enjoy it as well. I think once every two years is about as much crazy Christmas crowds I can handle. 😉

Macy’s all decorated for the holidays

George + us

Dorothy + us

Dorothy + me

It was surprisingly not as cold as it was two years prior but it still warranted my winter fuzzy hat.

This kid had it made: a helmet with straws feeding into two Starbucks’ hot cocoas! Hahahah!

The main event!

Kevin and George ended the weekend off right by spending a morning mountain biking in Joaquin Miller park with Lola. I was a bit nervous about Lola going out with them but apparently she kept up pretty good! Kevin hadn’t gone riding in a looooong time and I’m hoping it becomes more of a habit for him (hint, hint!) 🙂

We had a great 10 days full of visitors and we couldn’t have asked for better people to spend the Thanksgiving holiday with! And now we’re sooo looking forward to Christmas…only 15 more days until we drive down to LB for a week full of family, friends, and food!

Our forties photo shoot

Posted by Lisa On November 27th, 2011

A friend from high school who now owns her own (amazing) photography business advertised via Facebook about a contest to win a free photo shoot with her after looking over her updated website and sharing our thoughts. Somehow I actually won!! I was ecstatic. She was traveling to the Bay Area after Thanksgiving and had a small window of opportunity to squeeze us in so we took advantage and within a few weeks had planned for our 40s-inspired photo shoot. Dorothy and George were in town for the holiday so they tagged along. I bought a vintage dress on Etsy and bought a cute hat and shoes from a hat store and a thrift shop in Berkeley. We bought Kevin’s outfit both at thrift shops (pants, shirt, vest), the hat shop in Berkeley, and online (bow tie). My amazingly talented sister did my hair and makeup that day (thank goodness!) We met Lindsay on The Embarcadero at Levi’s Plaza.

Here are my favorite shots!

And a photo of the little guest of honor <3

Here’s a link to Lindsay’s blog post about our photo shoot

All photos taken by Lindsay Cahill Photography

Moaning Cavern adventures

Posted by Lisa On September 19th, 2011

On Saturday, Sept 9 we left at the crack of dawn (5:30am) to meet Brianne, Brian, Judy and Lisa near Sonora for some cave spelunking and exploring! Brian and Lisa were planning on doing an adventure tour of the Moaning Cavern and invited Kevin along (which was perfect timing since Kevin’s birthday had just passed so it was his birthday present!) and Judy, Brianne and I settled for the walking tour (which was about as adventurous as we were ready for).

It’s not often we see the sunrise!

Moaning Cavern Park

We had anticipated a 3 hour drive but it only took us 2 hours (I was driving, go figure 😉 ) so we got there before the park even opened. We entertained ourselves with a furry little critter that became a close friend for a half hour or so…Smokey the cat.

Yawn! It was early for Smokey too.

The gang met up with us not too long after the park opened and we made our way to our respective tours.

Judy took this photo of the group before we went underground: Brianne, me, Brian, Kevin and Lisa

Damn, I forgot to buy my commemorative Moaning Cavern hard hat.

We asked if it’d be possible for our walking tour to start earlier than their adventure tour so that we could meet them at the bottom of the cave after they repelled down and luckily that worked out! So Judy, Brianne and I followed our tour guide while K, B and L anxiously waited for their tour to start.

The first stop was in a little back room which had the above map posted on the wall. If you click it to enlarge the image you can see blue arrows and green arrows–the blue ones were where K, B and L went repelling down the 165-foot drop through the earth and the green arrows were where Judy, Brianne and I went walking down the stairs (like sane people) to meet them in the middle of the cavern. After we met up, K, B and L continued their tour farther down the cave and came back up a couple hours later.

The hole through the ground that K, B and L were going to be dropping down into. Crazy!!

The narrow and steep staircase that J, B and I went down.

Spooky.

We stopped for a bit after the narrow staircase to talk about the cave and the different formations found there and about all of the people who, over thousands of years, had fallen to their death and whose bones were discovered recently (creepy!) This is the platform we stood on and the 234-stair spiral staircase you see to the right is the one that Judy and I went down later to meet K, B and L after their repelling adventure.

Can you spot Brianne?

Judy braving the staircase! It was really creepy, I was gripping the handrails like nobody’s business.

Kevin was the first to volunteer to go down, he made it look so easy!

Kevin, aka “Cliff”

Then I decided to go back up the staircase so that I could take photos of Lisa and Brian as they repelled down. This photo was taken mid-way up the stairs looking down at Judy and Kevin.

Lisa making her way down, she looked like a pro!

Brianne and I holding down the fort

The view from the very top of the staircase. You can see my shoes in the bottom part of this photo and the two orange blips are Kevin and Lisa, the white/green blip is Judy. I’m getting spooked just looking at this photo.

Brian making his way down

Judy took this photo of the three of them finished rappelling.

After the three of them got untied from the rappelling ropes, they continued even farther down below the cave through crawl spaces. Kevin said that they had funny names of some of the crawl spaces: Godzilla’s Nostril, Pancake Room, Meat Grinder, Black Hole and, my personal favorite, the Birthing Canal. He said that there was one point where you had to lie on your back and pull yourself through this extremely narrow space, it was so narrow that the tip of his hardhat was hitting the top of the space at times.

While they were crawling through the earth, Judy, Brianne and I made our way back out into the open air to do a little bit of exploring but mostly just chatting and waiting for our adventure trio to return.

The Moaning Cavern Park has quite a few activities including panning for gold and a zip line.

The park even had a cockatoo named Cuddles! He was super friendly and he entertained Brianne and I for a good half hour or so.

Pretty bird.

One other park visitor encouraged me to pet him (even though the signs said “DON’T PUT YOUR FINGERS IN CAGE”). It was a little freaky at first but you could tell he was totally in love with being pet on his neck.

Me and Cuddles sharing a moment.

After 1.5 hours or so the adventure trio made their escape and met up with us.

The tired, but happy, adventurers!

They weren’t kidding about wearing old clothes.

We were all starving afterwards and took up the suggestion of one of our tour guides to check out The Pickle Barrel for lunch in Angel’s Camp. My favorite food in the whole entire world is sandwiches and after going vegetarian I felt like I haven’t been as excited to eat at delis because generally the only veg option is Subway-esque (yuck). But The Pickle Barrel actually had two delicious options and I was as happy as a clam getting my sandwich fix. And I don’t think the meat eaters of the group were disappointed either. 🙂

The little downtown area of Angel’s Camp was pretty cute so we spent a little time exploring.

I think Kevin might have a chance to get into the “Independent Order of Odd Fellows”, what do you think?

Creepy statue in one of the antique stores.

Photo of the sidewalk tile commemorating the 1983 frog-hoppin’ winner “Johnny Jumper” (that’s the year me and K were born so I thought it appropriate to take a photo of this one).

After getting cleaned up at the motel we stayed out (thanks for letting us crash with you guys!) we went out to try the “best pizza in Sonora” at Mountain Mike’s. Not too shabby! We spent the night playing Phase 10 (an awesome card game) and then before saying our goodbyes the next morning ate at the “best breakfast joint in Sonora” at Woods Creek Cafe (super cute place covered in cow memorabilia and pretty good food to boot!)

It was so great seeing the gang for the weekend and I couldn’t have asked for a better birthday gift for Kevin to land in my lap! 🙂

Bay to Breakers 12k

Posted by Lisa On May 23rd, 2011

My brother Derek and I ran in the centennial race of the Bay to Breakers 12k on Sunday 5/15–it was the first time that we ran a race together and I was so excited when he decided to run it with me!

The day before the race Derek, Kevin and I headed over to the B2B Expo to pick up our race bibs.

We saw Dean Karnazes! He’s the “ultra marathon man” who recently ran 50 marathons in all 50 states in 50 days!!

It was so cool seeing our names right next to each other

We had fun in the historical exhibit, showcasing 100 years of the race…

Me and Derek next to the infamous pink gorilla costume

Posing next to the 1983 shirt (the year I was born)

Derek not so happy about the lavender/pink 1986 shirt (the year he was born)

On the way back to the car we noticed this frightening sight…a random woman’s photo in a drain pipe. Wtf?!

Race morning! We were up bright-and-early to jump on the BART downtown to meet with all of the other runners. It was really cool being on the train full of runners, some even in costume.

Beautiful morning! Luckily the rain stopped for race day.

Sun breaking through the clouds over the Bay Bridge, minutes before the start of the race

Derek’s race number (out of 55,000 participants…he JUST made it!)

We felt like cows being herded to the starting line. Some folks decided it would be a good idea to bring bags and bags full of corn tortillas to fling amongst the crowd. Nothing like flying tortillas to pump up a crowd, I guess.

The aftermath

Starting line! Only 7.5 miles to go…

There were TONS of characters I saw along the way…

A group of people dressed in tighty whities

Flight attendants along the road directing the traffic

Smurfs

Escaped prisoners from Alcatraz

Muppets

Salmon (running upstream)

Mahna Mahna muppets

Up the awfully steep Hayes Street hill…

But at the top I was rewarded with the smiling face and the cheers of my co-worker Jayme! She even made me a sign saying “Go Lisa!”, so sweet! She and her husband came down from Marin County to visit with a friend who lives off of Alamo Square park so had front row seats to the race.

Me and Jayme

The “Up” characters

Bumblebees

Oompa Loompas

As I was nearing Golden Gate Park I finally saw my sister Jessie! And within a few minutes of our visit we saw my brother pass us by too! What perfect timing.

Running through Golden Gate Park

Mile 7!!

Self-portrait

The ocean, so close to the end!

The finish line!

Derek finished in 1 hour, 6 minutes and I finished in 1 hour, 34 minutes. Go us!

You can see our finish line photos here (my bib # is 47906 and Derek’s bib # is 54982).

You can also see a video clip of us crossing the finish line here! For some reason the first video clip shown isn’t of us, but if you just wait it out for a minute or so and let the video refresh on its own you’ll see us cross the finish line about 30 seconds later! You have to look us up individually by our bib numbers.

Gorilla dad and kids at the finish line

So unfortunately Derek and I hadn’t come up with a meeting place for after the race. I had my cell phone on me so was able to get in touch with Jessie but we had no way of getting a hold of Derek! And with 55,000+ people there, it was proving almost impossible to find him. We searched for at least an hour and Jess and I decided to just sit on a rock on the side of the road in hopes that we see him…and within 10 minutes guess who came walking by!

Proud finishers with our commemorative medals…

We then shuffled our way to breakfast at the Bashful Bull diner.

Derek and Jess

Such a beautiful day! The view of Bernal Hill from our apartment.

Lola getting some lovin’ from her Auntie Jessie

I was so incredibly sore after the race so after taking showers we all took a nap (in typical Delmar kid style!) It was so much fun running the B2B race, especially since Derek was there with me and Jess was there to cheer us on! We’ve got plans to run it (all three of us, and hopefully in costume) next year! 🙂

Heather & Gabriel’s visit

Posted by Lisa On April 27th, 2011

So in my hastiness to update the blog with two months worth of happenings and visits I completely forgot to write about our visit from Heather and Gabriel! I didn’t take any photos while they were here so I blame that for my negligence. 😉 I used to work with Heather at the OC Girl Scouts and we’ve been close friends ever since. These two knuckleheads were in town for WonderCon 2011 and paid a visit to us on April 3rd.

Since I didn’t take any photos I had to improvise…

We took them out to one of our favorite places in the city: Goood Frikin Chicken in the Mission

GFC

Gabriel & Heather enjoying a delicious dinner (hahah, sorry Gabriel that I put your head on an old woman’s body! It was the best I could come up with 😉 )

Basically what some of our plates looked like (except mine was sans chicken, duh)

Then we walked a few blocks to one of my favorite ice cream shops in the city: Mitchell’s Ice Cream

Basically what it looked like that night, except add about 25 more people outside waiting in line

H & G patiently waiting in line (did you notice Gabriel’s amazing ability to turn his head 180 degrees?? He’s pretty talented)

Just replace that cone with a giant milkshake that took 20 minutes to make for Gabriel 😉

It took ’em almost two years to come up and see us 😉 but we’re so glad they did!

Dad & Mysty’s visit

Posted by Lisa On April 26th, 2011

The evening of the same day that we said bye to Thomas and Ashley, we welcomed my dad and his pup Mysty for a few days! They drove out from Las Vegas and got in around 8:30 pm on Wednesday April 20th. After catching up for a bit we hit the sack because we were all feeling pretty tired and Kevin and I had work the next morning.

Mysty was a little suspicious of us at first, haha!

While Kevin and I were at work on Thursday, my dad and Mysty made a trip down to San Jose to visit with my sister Jess and check out her apartment and her wine bar. That night the three of us went to dinner at our favorite Salvadoran restaurant Balompie. It was my dad’s second time having pupusas (but only the first time eating them at a restaurant) and I think we made a fan out of him! After stuffing ourselves silly we made our way up the street to El Rico Pan, a Salvadoran bakery, for some goodies and coffee. The pound cake was TO DIE FOR as well as the churro that Kevin swears by now so we’ll definitely have to make a trip (or two) back here.

All the yummy goodness within El Rico Pan bakery

Me and my dad with our pound cake!

On Friday while I was at work for a half day, Kevin and my dad took the pups to McLaren Park in our neighborhood to get the girls some exercise. They then made their way to Pier 39 and walked around a bit while I finished up things at the office. Once I was able to tear myself away, I jumped in the back of the car with the pups and we made our way to Golden Gate Park!

Me with barely enough room to sit with those two doggies in the backseat!

We made our way to (you guessed it!) Strawberry Hill and Stow Lake to take in the scenery and give ourselves and the dogs some exercise. Lots of nature to be seen…

Ducks, seagulls and a turtle

Two ducks and a whole group of tiny ducklings!

Lola was a thirsty dog by the end of the hike!

A super random little character tied up in the tree. Not sure what to make of it but felt the need to take a photo!

That night we took it easy, ordered in pizza from Pizzeria Sophia (it was our first time ordering from them…holy moly, such good pizza!) and watched some of the Laker game. It had been a couple of years since I saw my dad (and a few for Kevin) so it was great spending a few days with him. Hopefully a visit to Vegas is in the cards for Kevin and I in the near future! 🙂

Thomas & Ashley’s visit

Posted by Lisa On April 26th, 2011

Right on the heels of my trip to Napa with Jess, Kevin’s brother Thomas and his girlfriend Ashley came up for a 2-day visit! They were here early the morning of Monday 4/18 and left super early Wednesday morning (ahem, 4:30am wake up call!) but it was an adventurous two days to say the least. This was Ashley’s first time visiting SF so we pulled out all the stops for her visit. 🙂

We spent the afternoon enjoying the concrete Seward slides (see our first visit to the slides here) in the Castro. At first we only had a few scrap pieces of cardboard to slide down and they weren’t too useful when the slides were dewy so we were actually on our way back to the car when we spotted a brand-spankin’ new computer monitor box in all its glory just calling out our names. So after some slick maneuvering by Thomas (who, in essence, rummaged through this random person’s trash for our sliding enjoyment) we were on our way back to the slides to get some extreme sliding in.

Thomas and me

Kevin and Thomas (check out Kevin’s signature arm placement in this and the next photo, haha!)

Kevin and Ashley

The sliding was so extreme that on one ride down Thomas was propelled to his feet and then flat on his face! The craziest part was that none of us even noticed Thomas flying through the air and all we saw were his arms and legs flailing up while on his back as the end result. I’m still not quite sure how it happened.

There’s Thomas lying down in the slide! “Help me, I’ve fallen and I can’t get up”

Me and Kevin

Awesome action shot of Thomas mid-slide

We then took a drive to our favorite part of Golden Gate Park, Stow Lake and Strawberry Hill. It was a bit drizzly and foggy but we made the most of it with a walk around the lake and a hike up the hill.

Thomas and Ashley sitting on the bridge over the lake (this was taken with a “miniature” mode on our camera, so cool!)

The green, green lake and its surroundings

Well hello Mr. Squirrel! He was anxious for some treats, too bad I tricked him and only wanted to take his photo.

Ashley & Thomas

Me & Kevin

Kooky brothers

Geronimo!

Thomas and the waterfall

Bluebird amongst the fire red leaves

We then made our way through the Presidio and ended up exploring some of the abandoned bunkers on the coast.

Great view of the Golden Gate Bridge in all its foggy glory

So apparently our camera also has a fish-eye lens mode–didn’t realize Kevin took this photo in that mode until later, hilarious!

Ashley, Thomas and the GGB

See how drizzly it was? Water was covering Kevin’s glasses.

We had a lovely evening introducing Ashley to the world of Indian Pizza at Zante Pizza. YUM!!!

The following day while I was at work the three amigos went to explore the Marin Headlands. They were trying to find the entrance to an underground bunker that apparently hasn’t been sealed shut and only a handful of people have been successful finding but, unfortunately (or fortunately?) they didn’t find it. Kevin is determined to find the thing.

Green, green everywhere in Marin!

One of the bunkers they explored

They met up with me at work and we went to dinner on Pier 39 at Wipeout Bar & Grill (just “okay” food, nothing to write home about…luckily I get a discount there because I work so close to the pier). We then had a nice long walk along the piers and made our way to Ghirardelli Square so that Ashley and I could share a super delicious chocolate fudge/peanut butter sundae. Mmm, mmm!

Thomas had to get an obligatory sourdough bowl and clam chowder; Kevin in front of the Chowder Hut

The “Penny Mist” boat docked near Fisherman’s Wharf

Two old(ish) men playing checkers on the corner of Beach & Hyde

We had to drop those two knuckleheads off at the airport at 4:30 in the morning the following day (yikes!) but we wish they could’ve spent at least another day or two exploring the city with us! Until next time (hint, hint!) 🙂

Sarah’s visit

Posted by Lisa On April 25th, 2011

Kevin’s sister Sarah came up for a shotgun trip on April 10 and it was so good seeing her even if it was for only a few hours! We met up with her and her friend Dave who lives in SF at Toad Hall bar in the Castro for some drinks (and a few new friends as well).

Beautiful flower on our stroll to the bar

After throwing down a few drinks on such a lovely Sunday afternoon we took a quick cab ride to Chilango (yes, the same Mexican restaurant Kevin and I had gone to just the week before with my mom and Steve–it’s THAT good!)

Dave and Sarah

Me and Kev

D & S

We ended the evening afternoon at Blackbird bar for some final swigs. 🙂

Beautiful mural on our walk back to the car

Even though the trip was short and sweet, we had a blast catching up with Sarah since her move back to LA from New Orleans!

Adventures with Lisa & Kevin