Fabulous

We had a fabulous weekend! It started out with me heading to the city on Bart kid free to Rick's office. He had no idea I was heading there. I got there around 5ish. It seemed like a pretty sleepy office. There were only a few people around. I figured they must all be in a meeting or something. I headed to Rick's office and just sat down at his desk and waited for him. Luckily, it was just a few minutes before he came walking in and was surprised to see me. His first question was "Where are the kids?". A few minutes later we were off to start our date.

We walked over to the Wharf. I have been wanting to take him to Musee Mecanique for a long time now. This is the place that I bring "out of towners" and I thought Rick would enjoy it too. It is a museum filled with old video games and I mean old - even back to the 1800's. Each game is a quarter or two. We played some video games and got our fortunes told and our characters read by Lady Sal.




We then headed over to Ghirardeli Square were we caught the Trolley car. It was a beautiful night in the city, clear and not too cold. We rode the Trolly car across town to Union Square. We had dinner reservations at Farallon Restaurant, a delicious seafood restaurant. We had the following:

Appetizers:
Organic baby spinach with Balsamic grilled red onions, crisp gigande beans, and warm Crescenza fondue dressing.
Maine lobster bisque with cognac chantilly, chives, and extra virgin olive oil.

Main Course:
Pan seared Rhode Island black bass with green garlic puree, pea sprouts, crisp leeks, and pepper-saffron vinaigrette
Roasted Alaskan True Cod, with braised durock pork belly, crisp pancetta, roasted sunchoke, and cider reduction.

It was delicious. It was nice to sit down and enjoy a nice restaurant and delicious food without having to deal with wild kids. After dinner we took a little walk to our hotel. Rick had no idea we were staying the night. We stopped into the Clift Hotel so I could "use the bathroom". I told him it was a cool and funky looking hotel so we should take a look around - straight to our room. We liked the Clift. It was a great hotel. The crazy thing was, Rick had wanted to take me to that exact hotel when Athen was Crew's age. He had made arrangements with my mom to watch Athen and booked a room there but Athen and I both got sick and so he canceled. He had gone there for a business meeting and thought it was nice and wanted to take me there. Strange that of all the hotels in the city I picked the one hotel he wanted to take me to.

The next morning we headed out somewhat early. We had a delicious breakfast from a cafe on the way to Bart. We had a ham, cheese and egg croisant sandwich, an almond croissant and fresh squeezed orange juice. It hit the spot. We took Bart to the White Elephant Rumage Sale in Oakland. This is our favorite sale of the year. I get excited about the sale around Christmas time each year and patiently wait for its arrival. It was nice to enjoy the sale this year without a pregnant belly and a little toddler running around.

We didn't find any thing amazing like we usually do but we did get some good stuff. Of course we got lots of books for the kids. We got 54 books for $36. This year we bought books that were a little more expensive then in the past so we spent more money then we usually do on books. My favorite books are: Milton and Caps for Sale. We got a lot of old books with the best illustrations in them. We also looked for books that we grew up with in our childhood, like - Hucklebug, Scuffy the Tug Boat, and There's No Such Thing As A Dragon.




We also got Athen a pair of blue monster rain boots for $3. I think this might be my favorite purchase. He LOVES them. He put them on and wore them around. We took them off for nap time but when we went in there to get him up he had them back on. He had worn them while he was sleeping. That night after we changed him into his jammies he put his rain boots back on and wore them while papa read him bed time stories. We had to leave them out in the family room for bed time.




We found some cute European blue and red leather boots for little CrewB. They were only $2. He wore them to church today. We also got Athen a pair of skinny Levi's for $2 and a pair of blue and white striped train overalls. He looks pretty cute in them.




I bought some ice cream dishes of course. They are yellow. Although they look more brown in the picture. I also got a green glass bowl that I really like. Rick wishes I would stop buying colored glass things. We really don't have a place to put them but hopefully soon we will have a house and more space. They are going to look great when I have an outdoor dinner party in my backyard.



I also bought some orange napkins, a big black hat, a camera bag and a few little toys for the kids. By mid-day we were done with the shopping and called up Kimber (who volunteered to watch the boys overnight) to come and pick us up. The kids were doing good and happy as can be. It was like they didn't even realized that we had left them for a day. It was good to be back with the kids but a nice and needed escape.

After nap time we all headed to the park and walked around the lake and rode bikes. As we were riding bikes and playing at the park I was thinking to myself that life is good. I have a great little family and I LOVE spending time with them each weekend outdoors.
Life is Good!

This is the yellow glass pitcher that I got at the estate sale last weekend. The lighting in the picture makes it look more brown than yellow but it is yellow.