Finding Balance in San Francisco

Nothin' like summertime in Tahoe

Just got back from a wonderful weekend up in Lake Tahoe. What a soul nurturing place Tahoe is.

Our friends Rebecca and Mike and their two darling children have been living up on the West Shore for the past couple years and we squeezed in a visit before they move to Switzerlandtomorrow. Hats off to Rebecca and Mike for having visitors the weekend before an international move!

We went rafting Saturday- the perfect blend of fun and relaxing.

Then this morning said 'ello to the neighborhood horse and logged some quality time on the beautiful beach down the street.

Rolled back into San Francisco to see that the sun is finally shining on our fair city. This has been the coldest winter in 40 years here (for crying out loud). Hope to see a little more sunshine this week.

Thanks again to Rebecca and Mike for a wonderful weekend, and good luck on a smooth move. Hope to see you guys in Switzerland next time

We love Camp Galileo!

We've been all about dressing up this week. The boys really enjoyed to Camp Galileo(incidentally, Quinn liked it even better than the other science camp he went to this summer,Camp Edmo) and they had lots of fun activities and costume days. First it was crazy hair day

Next they got their faces painted

and then Medieval day and "team color" day (neither of which I got pictures of) and finally Decades Day. The boys understand a lot of things you might think they wouldn't, but the concept of a decade and dressing up from another decade is not one of them. I kept trying to explain, but finally Jordan said, exasperated, "where is 'the 80s' and why can't I just dress up like Peter Pan?" So I let it go and the boys went as Peter Pan

some good video footage of a sword fight here:

Who is the real Peter Pan? from kathy hassanein on Vimeo.

we all got into the dress up action last night, too, for Torben's birthday "International Man of Mystery" party

Family vacation to Nueva Vallarta

Last week we had a family vacation to Mexico (Nueva Vallarta- just north of Puerta Vallarta), and I'm still feeling the positive effects of our sun-drenched vacation. The boys loved it, too.

We did a Dolphin Encounter through Vallarta Adventures that was fun

and stayed at Paradise Village, which was a good spot for kids and the resort even has live tigers on the property. The mama tiger, Daisy (in photo below), had just given birth to 2 darling baby girl cubs a few days before we arrived that the boys actually wound up getting to pet.

Paradise Village also had some great water slides that we logged a lot of time on

Quinn on the Alligator Slide in Puerta Vallarta from kathy hassanein on Vimeo.

and lots of activities at the main pool (didn't keep Jordan awake though!)

Jordan asleep at the pool party from kathy hassanein on Vimeo.

We rented a Jeep and popped up the coast one day, to San Francisco, Sayulita and Punta de Mita

Here's Quinn in front of the Four Seasons' Infinity pool at Punta de Mita

The Four Seasons was of course lovely, but I think Paradise Village is better for young kids. Always good when kids are allowed to be themselves, and at the Four Seasons I was afraid they were going to break something or annoy a patron. Not so at Paradise Village- it seems designed for kids- and adults, too! Great spa, and gotta love the Kids Club : )

Sh-sh-shark!!!

I just ran across this site  and saw this wild, supposedly non-Photoshopped photo:

  

A Very Strawberry Family Day

Earlier today we went to "A Very Strawberry Family Day" put on by the Marin Agricultural Land Trust (MALT) at Dolcini's Redhill Ranch, off Point Reyes-Petaluma Road.

We had fun hunting for strawberries

it was picturesque and a beautiful, sunny day

Speaking of beautiful, we went with the lovely miss Clara Puiggali (aka Quinn's future wife)

and her darling family

Got to check out some chickens, too- young ones, teenagers, hens laying on eggs and protective roosters strutting their stuff. Here's one of the hen houses:

I always think it's a good thing when the boys get to see first hand where their food comes from. It's kinda morbid to think that those harmless chickens cruising around are human food, but I'm trying to normalize the idea for the boys that indeed, some animals we use for food. Apparently, it's working. When one of the chickens came walking right by our picnic blanket, Jordan looked up at me and said "I think we should eat that one."

It's a nice spot. We had a lot of fun with this ladybug (right near Quinn's elbow):

I love the idea of a little old fashioned good fun, but we did miss most of the U.S./Ghana World Cup game because of it. Hubs Ryan was astonished that we went berry picking instead of hanging out with him to watch the game, but we'd reserved and purchased our spot about 3 weeks ago- so we went despite his eye rolling.

Don't expect to harvest a bunch of strawberries (e.g., this was our entire haul):

and be prepared for a little mud as well. All in all, a lovely and close little getaway.