Pictures...

Douglas and Helena had fun yesterday playing in the kiddie pool. Helena was wearing an extra suit of Douglas's plus his swim shirt.








He enjoyed splashing her (which she asked him to do)







And then she got him back!

School is going well...

Owen's teacher is quite good and the kids in the class seem like a good mix. They are wearing name tag stickers for the first few days and yesterday he and his friend Noah came out of class with their stickers switched to try to trick people. Did not seem to have worked.

It is really hot (100+) but is supposed to cool down tomorrow. I hope so.

There may be a state budget deal coming down, in which case Dan will have to work this weekend. No definitive news on that front yet though.

First day of school

Today is the first day of school for Owen. He is in a 3-4 combination class with a teacher with a very good reputation, plus several of his friends are in the class, along with the 2 kids he was in reading group with last year, so we are feeling optimistic that it will be a good year. Everyone seemed to be in good spirits this morning at dropoff.

Happy birthday Mom

a few days late! We went to Berkeley yesterday to wish her a happy birthday and have some of that delicious Virginia Bakery cake. It was lovely weather there, a little cooler than it is here.

Weird day

This morning during breakfast we had the back sliding door open and Violet came in with a bird in her mouth.

She dropped it on the floor and after begging her to take it back out again with no success, I went and got the broom and prepared to sweep it out the door. Whereupon it decided to fly all around the living room for ages. It kept perching on the curtain rod and on the chandelier. Dan and I were coming at it from opposite directions to no avail. Stupid thing. Finally he threw a towel over it and I scooped it up, carried it outdoors and it flew away.

Then Owen and I biked to the UCD craft center - he is taking a woodworking class this week, and told me about how they had him wearing a respirator, goggles and various other safety gear. When we came home and had lunch it was time to pick up Douglas and take the kids to the dentist. They had a checkup.

We went outside and the car wouldn't start. It turned out it had a dead battery. But we had to be at the dentist in 30 minutes so we hopped back on our bikes, picked up Douglas and biked over to the dentist (who luckily is only a couple miles away). The checkups went well, although the dentist reiterated his statement that Douglas has crowded teeth and will eventually need orthodontic work. Owen's look good.

Came home, called AAA, and the guy showed up in about 15 minutes and ran some tests and replaced the battery right there in the driveway. That was easy, at least.

Whew!

Seattle!

The kids and I went to Seattle from Wednesday until Saturday. We had a blast!

It was fun seeing all the old spots again. We planned to ride the ferry (at left) but didn't get around to it.



The first evening we were there, Alisa and I walked over to Kerry Park which has a fantastic view of the downtown skyline.








Alisa and me enjoying our walk.









The moon was rising, to the left of the Space Needle. On the right side Mount Rainier was visible. Most of the snow has melted by this point in the summer.






Alisa and Paul have a lovely house in Queen Anne, a nice Seattle neighborhood.







The next morning, Douglas and Liam were poking around in the yard. Liam planted some corn and he was enjoying watching new leaves grow.






Douglas on the way down to Pike Place Market.








Thursday morning we went to the Seattle Aquarium downtown.

Douglas and Duncan playing around at the Aquarium...






Duncan (who will be 8 next month) is very tall!








We had lunch at the Aquarium.








Downtown at Westlake Center they have a fountain where the water cascades in sheets and the kids ran between them and got quite wet. It was around 90 degrees so the water was a welcome relief.





Owen being goofy...








After the aquarium we rode the monorail.







The monorail ends at Seattle Center where there is an immense fountain. The kids (minus Douglas, who doesn't like getting wet) got still more soaked.







Duncan and Owen had lots of fun running in the water.








Liam also played in the fountain.








Owen is in the lower right hand corner of this picture, dripping wet.







Seattle Center is where the Space Needle is located.









Douglas was happy to have gotten a stuffed animal otter at the Aquarium.






A snuggly moment.








That night we went out to dinner with Beth, then stopped at a cupcake place and walked over to her house. Jay was out of town so we didn't get to see him.






Those were some good cupcakes!








The next morning the boys and I went to Gasworks Park while Alisa and her kids went to visit her mother, who had just had back surgery.





Gasworks Park has a lot of cool old machinery you are not supposed to climb on, but they did anyway.









There are some steep hills at the park which the kids ran up and down.




Gasworks is on Lake Union and there are lots of views of the water, downtown and boats.

That afternoon all four kids were thrilled because we took them to see Star Wars: the Clone Wars.






The next morning Douglas and Liam were having fun telling silly stories during breakfast.






Then we went to the beach at Golden Gardens in Ballard.

Liam had fun chasing a bird.







Alisa and three of the boys on the beach








Douglas liked digging in the sand.







Owen and Duncan built a cool sand castle. Duncan is great at building. Maybe he'll be an engineer some day.







We came back to their house and Alisa turned on the sprinkler. Liam had fun putting up his umbrella in the shower.






Finally it was time to come home. Here are the kids waiting in the Seattle airport for our plane.

We had lots of fun. Thanks Alisa and Paul for hosting us!

Meteor shower

Owen and I went out to Fairfield Elementary in West Davis where the Explorit Science Center was hosting an evening to watch the meteor shower. While we were there we were filmed by Sacramento News 10 and they posted a picture of us stargazing taken with their infrared camera.

Unfortunately we didn't see any meteors. Apparently the best meteor views are between midnight and 5 a.m. We did see Jupiter with its 3 moons and the moon through a couple of people's telescopes. They were very cool.

Your San Francisco Giants

We had fun seeing the Giants today. They beat the Dodgers in the bottom of the 9th, two outs! When they stepped up at the bottom of the 9th they were behind 4 to 3 but they ended up winning the game. It was exciting!





Owen and me in the stands.









We saw Manny Ramirez playing for the Dodgers. He got quite a booing from the crowd.





AT&T Park is a nice place to see a game.








Douglas got a little bored, though. But he managed to survive all nine innings. We were lucky it didn't go to ten.







The big baseball fan had fun.








Douglas at least had the chance to eat a big pretzel with plenty of salt.






Owen with the stands behind







Douglas and me en route to the ballpark







Entrance









Owen on the way as we were walking from the Ferry Building over to the ballpark. That's the Bay Bridge in the background.






Douglas hitched a ride for much of the way.

San Francisco

Before we went over to the Giants' stadium today we parked near the Ferry Terminal and had lunch there. The Ferry building is in the background in this picture (the tall clock tower). They have a cool fountain outside.






See, they have tall buildings in San Francisco.






The kids enjoyed the fountain.