Reed's Birthday Week

We started the week off with Sunday dinner at Heather's house, in honor of Reed's birthday. We always love visiting her in Palo Alto. Look who was hoping for a piece of London broil:

Reed and I have been trying to go on walks in the evenings.  He has even been waking up and going into work earlier so that he can be home for dinner at a good hour, with plenty of time for a family walk afterwards. I really appreciate how seriously he takes his role as a husband and father. He is always willing to do whatever it takes to be there for all three of us, and it makes a huge difference to our family.

On this particular night, we wore the boys completely out!

Tuesday, I took the kids to our weekly park day. I send an email out weekly to all the young moms in our congregation, and we meet up and let the kids play while we talk with other adults. Cal has been practicing his pedal bike, and is getting really confident. The one thing he has yet to master is starting on his own; I ended up chasing him all over the park so I could launch him on his way every time he stopped. His friend E.J. (3-years-old) was really excited that Cal had a Lightning McQueen bike, and in his excitement, kept accidentally riding straight into Cal's trajectory. He'd yell, "Lightning McQueeeeeeeeen" and zoom right into Cal, who was, by then, also screaming. Nonstop comedy.

Even with the dive bombs, Cal was very good to his little friend, who followed him around the entire morning on his own red bike.

Tuesday night, Reed and I continued our semiannual "fancy feast" tradition at the Plumed Horse. We'd been once before, a few years ago, on Valentine's Day, and didn't have the best experience. We decided to give it another try, and we're so glad we did. This time, the food (and our experience) was fantastic. I tried abalone and antelope, and we both enjoyed copious offerings of amuse bouche from the chef (he was apparently in a very good mood that night). They even brought Reed his own supernova dessert with a candle for his birthday.

It was a great evening. I'm so glad this wonderful man was born.

We continue to enjoy our stay-at-home summer. Wednesday, we had an ice-cream social at our friend's house in the afternoon. The look on Cal's face can probably tell you how he felt about it:

Cal and his buddies enjoying their ice cream:

Cal picked out Reed's birthday present this year, and when it arrived, he begged to play it all day. Reed, good dad that he is, got Robot Rally all set up, and played through it with Cal.

Friday was miniature golfing with friends. This little golf course has been very good to us this year!

We partied nonstop this weekend. It was the first time we've left Elliot with a babysitter, and it went really well. We went out on a date (to see Guardians of the Galaxy--loved it!) Friday night, and then went to a Clue-themed housewarming party on Saturday night. I went as the maid, and Reed was Mr. Green. It was a hoot and a half. We laughed ourselves silly!

The baby did great with sitters both nights. Looks like a lot of date nights are in our near future!

Summer of Love: Food Trucks

Reed and I have been wanting to try out the food trucks for a while now, and we decided that getting a group together for dinner would make for a perfect summer's evening. We certainly weren't disappointed.

 About halfway through the evening, the street musicians made an announcement and had the crowd serenade Cal for his birthday. Here he is waving to everyone as the accordion hummed out "Happy Birthday."

We drove home under a starry sky, bellies full of street tacos and frozen custard, ears ringing with accordion music, kids asleep in their carseats. :)

Valentine's Day

We have a brand new baby in the house, so a grand night out was not part of the Valentine's Day plan this year. Reed more than made up for it when he brought home our favorite -- Hamachi shots from Alexander's Steakhouse. My mouth is watering just remembering this.

We didn't do half bad with our at-home Valentine's Day. Definitely more than enough love to go around. :)

He's Home!

It is so wonderful to have Reed home! To celebrate (and to try to keep Reed awake), we went out to dinner the evening he arrived home. Cal snuggled his Dad all throughout dinner. Look how happy he is to have him back:

Reed brought us several special items from the Christmas markets in Berlin, including this pyramid, which Cal was fascinated with. It'll be so fun to take it out each year at Christmas and remember the night we got our Daddy back.

Radiolab and Mahler

Recently, Reed's been listening to the Radiolab podcasts. He has slowly introduced me to the show, and we both love it.  Reed found out that they were coming to do a live show at our local college, and at the last minute, we finally bit the bullet and bought tickets.

I had my doubts about how a radio show would translate into a satisfying visual experience, but they pulled it off! The first half was about a new theory of dinosaur extinction, and the visual elements did not disappoint. Several huge puppets made their way onto the stage…

...and the set was equipped with huge screens that projected demonstrations of small-scale physics experiments, all of which illustrated the plausibility of the new extinction theory. It was completely fascinating!

It was refreshing to attend a show where the presenters assumed we knew what they were talking about.  The audience was really responsive, and I had this moment where I just sighed contentedly and thought, "These are our people!"

And lest you think, "But what about the right side of the brain?", check out what was waiting for us only two nights later: The Stanford University student symphony, playing Mahler's 2nd.

This was my first concert in the brand new Bing concert hall at Stanford, at it was not a disappointment.  The space was beautifully designed, with perfect acoustics.  We will be making it a goal to return to concerts there as often as we can. We even got to enjoy a cup of cayenne cocoa with our friends afterward at a Venezuelan coffee shop downtown. And again, there was that feeling: "These are our people." 

With everything it has to offer, Silicon Valley is turning out to be a fantastic place for us.

Paramore Concert

For my birthday, Reed surprised me with tickets to the Paramore concert at the Warfield in San Francisco! We had an awesome time. I even chalked my hair blue for the occasion, but it all rubbed out before the night was over. 

The Warfield is an amazing, historic theatre that is unfortunately located smack dab in the middle of the tenderloin, which is filled with homeless people, drugs and trash. It was a disturbing experience waiting in line outside, but once we were in, the concert was a total blast. 

Days of Love

Holidays are really starting to be very fun for me and Cal. He is becoming more aware of the passage of time, and always asks me things like, "What's next?" and "What we do today?"  Lucky for us, the spring months are adequately sprinkled with little holidays that get us through the weeks with joy.  He loved Valentine's Day this year, and it's always so easy to come up with themed activities. One of our friends had us over to play and decorate cookies on afternoon. Just look at that focus!

Reed took me out to a Los Gatos restaurant for our biannual "fancy feast", and on Valentine's Night, we had a special dinner at home with Cal, complete with presents. Here is Cal opening his new apron:

My little boy loves to cook and bake with me, so he knew exactly what it was when he opened the package. Look how excited he is! We now hang it on a hook about 3 feet off the ground, and whenever we start dinner, he runs and puts in on himself. Same thing goes for hanging it up after we're done!

Reed's present was something to hang in his cubicle at work, which he was thrilled about.

We finished the night with Grandma Linebarger's chocolate lava cakes, cooked in heart-shaped ramekins.

We are very blessed to have so much love in our little family, and in our lives.

Date Night: Pinball Museum

One of the cool things about living near San Francisco is that there are infinite things to explore. You could probably live here your entire life and still not have seen everything there is to see. I was reminded of this when our friends asked us to accompany them to the pinball museum in Alameda. My response: "There's a pinball museum? Like, on this planet?" Who would've thought!

It actually had some pretty amazing historical pieces. There were several rooms, and the machines were organized by decade, starting with some of the old wooden penny machines from the 30s and 40s. Very cool! All the machines were lined up side by side, making for a bright and noisy display.

 We played tournaments on several machines, where we'd play our turn and then rotate to the next machine, like a crazy relay race.

 See that high score? It's mine. No big deal. I won most of the tournaments. Hate to brag! :)

 We spent most of our time with the machines from the 80s and 90s. I was excited to see "The Black Knight", which I spent many childhood hours playing at a friend's house, but unfortunately, it was out of order for the night.

Another fun date night! Visiting such a fun little nook of the city made me want to be more proactive about exploring the cool things at our fingertips. I see many eclectic date nights in our future.