Another school year begins …
Logan: Kristi & Sophie
Malina: Betsy & Susan
Author Archives: jessica
Malina, no longer a baby, is SIX
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Yep, our baby girl isn’t a baby anymore … she is a strong, fearless, curious, loving, spirited, confident, adventure seeking SIX year old!! We couldn’t be more proud of her!
View photos of our family weekend in Santa Cruz to celebrate Malina’s birthday and Mother’s Day.
Been so long … it’s not even funny …
Yeah … it’s been about 2 years.
My excuses? We moved. We settled in. We moved back out and renovated. Then we moved back in. I got a new job, a way harder job. We’ve just been too busy “being” and “doing” to reflect as much as we’d like. The good news, we never stopped taking photos. So we’re going to take a broad sweep, get some photos out there, but never “catch up”.
2013
View photos of the end of Malina’s 2nd year of preschool!
View photos of Logan turning 2!
View photos of our Father’s Day Hike!
View photos of our fun times play with blocks, our bikes, and riding trains!
View photos of us playing, hanging with friends, and petting chickens!
View photos of us traveling around Colorado! These photos are totally out of order, but include a wonderful family reunion in Montezuma, CO, a few days in Telluride, a trip to Estes National Park, and visits with friends in Denver.
2015
We spent spring break 2015 in and around Mt. Shasta – check out our adventures!
Logan is TWO!
How is my baby boy turning 2 years old already? Even though he is far too big to be a “baby”, I still enjoy my sweet cuddly moments with him when he is drinking milk before bed.
Otherwise, he is incredibly busy! He has several 3 and 4 word sentences, most of which go something like … “I can do it”, “Loggie do it”, “I did it”, “I want it”, and “Where is Meenah?”. On occasion he will throw out a 6 word sentence, which always surprises us!
He can also carry on basic conversations. Today, as he returned to the house with Sandra, it went like this:
Mom: Hi Logan! How was your morning?
Logan: Good. Playground! Cold.
Mom: Did you have a nice time?
Logan: Yes, with trucks, vroom!
Mom: How nice. What are you doing now?
Logan: Nap. Milk. Monkey.
More than anything, I love the cute imperfect words:
Pee-pack for piggyback
Bluebies for blueberries
Structure for any type of construction site
Packpack for backpack
No-no for motorcycle (err, Mom might have had something to do with that one ;)
Hain for hand
You are very interested in how things work, especially things with wheels. You are always checking out the stroller wheels as well as shopping cart wheels. You also stop to check out every single bike locked on the sidewalk to see how the pedals turn … you go forwards and backwards, you are just mesmerized by it. You also have great ears! In our old 1927 home, you can hear the water in the pipes and you’ve started to pick up on this and ask “where the water” while you lift your little hands into the air and cock your head. We told you that it’s in the pipes in the walls, so whenever you hear the rushing water sound you look around, find a wall, put your ear up to it and say “pipes”!
I never imagined that you would be such a sweet and empathetic little boy. You care so much about the people around you; you’re always helping and giving in situations that I think would be too complex for you to understand. You just have such a big heart filled with so much love that you’re always putting your family and friends first … this usually involved a sweet treat or a coveted toy that you share instead of indulging on your own, even though you love it and want it for yourself.
Statistics:
3 feet tall!
30 pounds!
** At this exact age, Malina was 1 inch shorter and 2.5 pounds lighter.
Logan is happy and healthy … and we feel so fortunate to have him in our lives.
Malina, our baby girl, is FOUR years old
Yep, our baby girl turned four this month! We couldn’t be more proud of her! She is happy, outgoing, self confident, strong, and full of spirit!! At her 4 year checkup, they actually did more of a thorough checkup this time, which included an eye exam where you stand 20 feet back, as well as blood pressure. She continues to be on of the taller kids in her peer group, and friends always ask how tall she is, so now I know!
Height = 42 inches @ 92 % ile
Weight = 40 pounds @ 85 % ile
Pajaro Dunes Trip
We trekked down to Pajaro Dunes (between Santa Cruz and Monterey) with several families to spend time with old friends and celebrate Eliot’s 5th birthday! There was something along the lines of 17 adults, 7 toddlers and 2 infants … so it was crazy time all the time. With different bedtimes, naps times, and eating routines, we spent the majority of our time hanging out in the house and catching up. Our place was right on the beach, so we also enjoyed the sand and water :) Unfortunately, it was too cold for most of us to swim (well, except for Bill and Eric who dove in). One of the highlights was supposed to be a train ride on a real steam engine in Felton, CA … but t
here was a fire and the train was canceled. The kids were bummed but we replaced it with a trip to the famous Santa Cruz boardwalk, which was awesome for the kids! Malina has no fear, she rode every ride that her height would allow for, including the log ride and those chairs that swing around about 50 feet off the ground, as well as a real roller coaster. She couldn’t get enough!! Logan didn’t enjoy it quite as much though.
All in all, a crazy busy weekend chasing young ones around a 3 story house, but at the same time, wonderful to really catch up with great friends!
View photos of our trip to Pajaro Dunes!
Sleeping, bathing, playing, eating and birthday-partying!
The title pretty much sums up this post! We are in birthday party central over here … everyone we know seems to have an April, May or June birthday … which means lot of FUN! And with all our great Bay Area weather, the majority have been outside!
In addition, Logan has become very interested in going to preschool. He actually thinks he IS in preschool and part of Malina’s class. It is really cute, he even asks for his backpack most mornings. The hard part is tearing him out of the classroom as we say bye to Malina. Fortunately, the teachers and other kids love him, he’s almost like the class mascot, so they welcome him with open arms. Get ready for the fall little man, because it will be your turn!!
View photos of us having fun!
SF Half Marathon
We spent a few months training for the SF Half Marathon and when our alarm clock went off at 5am on April 7th, we decided that we were totally crazy to be doing this race as sleep deprived parents of young kids. But we dragged ourselves to the starting line, met up with friends and had a good race on a beautiful day. Chuck ran solo. Jessica ran with good friend and pacer/photo journalist Chris Jones. Once completed, it felt like a great accomplishment, but not something we plan to do again any time soon.
View photos of our run
Zoom!
Mendocino Trip and Passover
Jessica’s parents and grandma flew in for the week of Malina’s spring break, which also included Easter and Passover! We both had to work but Sandra, GG, Ganda, PaPa and the kids spent the week having fun!! We spent a lot of time eating slow meals together, reading books, coloring, taking walks, going to the playground, swimming … and even checking about Malina’s 2 favorite museums in SF (BADM and CAoS).
We all drove up to Mendocino for the long weekend and stayed at a great house on the bluff overlooking the ocean, which was beautiful!! Soon after our arrival, we learned that Aunt Emily and her boyfriend Rob got engaged! Hooray! We are so happy for them! We had a few celebratory toasts on the deck for the addition to our family. While in Mendocino we took 2 beautiful hikes, checked out the downtown, saw really cool tide pools, and explored the area around our great big rental house! Jessica also learned that turkeys can fly!
It was a great visit!!
View photos of our family weekend in Mendocino
Mama’s night off & St. Patrick’s Day fun
Yep, you read that right folks! After almost 4 years of child rearing, Jessica took her first real night off! She went up to Yountville with a few girlfriends for a fun and relaxing 24 hours without kids!
Upon her return, we spent Sunday at a playground celebrating St. Patrick’s day with all things green!
View photos of our weekend fun
Lake Tahoe: Tahoma Weekend Video Montage
This pretty much sums up our awesome family weekend in Lake Tahoe!
Tahoma, Lake Tahoe: Snow, Skiing and Sledding!
While Chuck was between jobs we spent a long weekend up in Lake Tahoe. We stayed on the west shore in the cute waterfront town of Tahoma. We got very lucky and managed to pick a weekend that Tahoe received an additional 8 inches of powder. It made for slow driving conditions, but also a beautiful landscape, good skiing, great sledding, and lots of snowmen and snow angels :)
Malina got on skies for the first time at Granlibakken Ski Resort and did a great job!! She skied down the small hill 3 times by herself. Pretty awesome!! She and Logan both enjoyed the sledding as well. Otherwise, we enjoyed spending time in our cute little cabin and taking long walks in the snow.
View photos of our snowy weekend getaway in Lake Tahoe
Grandpa Chuck’s Visit
Grandpa Chuck came up to San Francisco to visit the family. We packed his 5 day visit full of play-dates, a parties, two music classes, a waterfront walk, a museum visit, a nice dinner out, playgrounds and a house hunting trip in Palo Alto. Whew!! We really lucked out with great weather while he was here, although not as warm as it is in his new home state, Arizona.
View photos of Grandpa Chuck’s visit to SF
Daddy has a new job!
Chuck recently turned in his letter of resignation at Credit Suisse and accepted an offer from LinkedIn!!! His new title is: Director, Corporate FP&A (Financial Planning and Analysis – for those who aren’t familiar with the acronym).
It is a great opportunity professionally as well as an opportunity to spend more time at home with his family!
We are so PROUD of you Daddy!!
Malina’s First “Lady-Date”
Yes folks, you heard it right… this was not a play-date, it was a lady-date! After several challenging weeks with Malina’s bedtime routine, we made a deal that if she could be smooth for 5 nights, Jessica would take her ice skating (she chose this activity) and she asked for hot chocolate as well… something she’s never had before. So she managed to be smooth for 5 out of the following 9 nights and we went! Who knew there was a full size ice skating rink in downtown San Francisco?!
Malina didn’t love ice-skating, but we did 2 entire laps holding hands. Then we had hot cocoa, which she didn’t like either. But they just opened a “City Target” in the same building, and that was a total hit!! She loved it! She commented that she’d never been in such a big store… our little urban girl.
View photos of us trying to ice-skate.
Mostly Tennessee Valley and a birthday at MyGym too
We spent a beautiful and sunny February morning north of the Golden Gate Bridge in Tennessee Valley. To our surprise the parking lot was already full at 9am and there were tons of families taking the mile trek down to the beach. The kids enjoyed the walk and all the “nature” we saw along the way. Once down near the water they played in a cold little stream with new found friends. The walk back was later than planned and several meltdowns ensued …
View photos of our hike to Tennessee Valley and a birthday party at MyGym
Random February Happenings
Despite being a short month, February was a busy month!
Below are all sorts of random photos taken at home, before swim lessons and at a Children s Creativity Museum.
View photos of us hanging out in February
Snowsuits and Tutus!
When it rains in San Francisco (a rare event) … we tend to get a little creative and a lot crazy at home! This past weekend was spent raiding the kiddo’s closets … which led to dress-up time and resulted in running around in snowsuits and tutus!
View photos of us being silly in our snow suits and tutus