weekend with the grandparents

On Sunday, we went up to Napa to check out a few wineries with N's parents. Many along the Silverado Trail were closed for Easter Sunday, but we had a nice time tasting at Baldacci and Hagafen (for Passover).

On the way home, everything was going smoothly until all of a sudden the car lost power. Right across from the WalMart in American Canyon (we actually cruised to a stop in the AC city hall).
AAA came and towed it to our garage in SF, with N and his dad. Alec, G. and I hung around while the other grandparents came to pick us up. Not how anyone expected to spend the late afternoon, but it all things considered, it went smoothly.

maybe we should have taken the tractor instead...

Obelix at the beach

N's parents arrived for a visit last Friday, and we had a great weekend exploring the coast to the north and south of SF. On Saturday, we went for a hike in the Tennessee Valley, ending up at the wonderful little beach just north of the Golden Gate bridge. The day was warm, the walking was flat, and the wildflowers were out, making it a beautiful day. A. slept most of the walk in, but we woke him up to play on the beach.

Slowly waking up in Grandpapa's arms.

A. was especially fascinated by some heavy rocks that someone left as a mini Stonehenge, and were rearranged by N., with help from A., to make a person.

with his menhir

Sunday the plan was to head south on route 1. We had a fun time playing in the sand and with the kite in Miramar, and then headed down for lunch at Duarte's in Pescadero for some cioppino, oysters, and pie.

sunscreen is necessary!

70s kid...

My mom has been finding bags of toddler clothes that my siblings and cousin wore in the 70s. A. sported a rad navy corduroy zip-up jumpsuit on Sunday to watch the explosion (of course he ran off down the street, with me at his heels, about 30 seconds before it went off, so after an hour of waiting at the top of the Hill, we missed it), and while I was gone last week, N. dressed him in these great "tough guy" overalls to check out my past and future wheels. Circa 1972, I think.

A few weeks ago I needed to keep A. occupied, as he was more interested in non-toys than toys. The result was a non-toy toy, a kitchen that I put together in about 5 minutes. It resides in our kitchen, and has a sink, stove, and oven filled with more supplies. Food mainly consists of old corks, which A. loves to push through the holes where the "controls" are.

I guess that I should teach him to stay out of the oven!

Evel Alec!

Alec had a blast riding my old big wheel on Friday. Not content with just riding it, but doing wheelies and other tricks.

Kids - don't try this at home...

Alceste

I started learning French in fifth grade with the Madame Miller and her high-heeled sneakers. Our main text book was "Petit Nicolas" - a little blue cloth-bound book containing the adventures of le petit Nicolas and his friends written by Goscinny and illustrated by Sempe. The series started in March 1959, so this month marks its 50th anniversary, which is being feted in France.

Nicolas' best friend was Alceste, whose main passtime was eating. In the English translation, republished beginning in 2005 by Phaedon Press, Alceste has morphed into Alec.

Like Alceste, our Alec likes croissants, but he seems to like his papa (le grand Nicolas') ollalieberry pie even better. Here he is digging in on Pie Day '09.


Unlike Alceste, Alec's main passtime isn't eating, in fact, he is pretty skinny. Perhaps because he eats his bananas with a fork...


This weekend we also had a surprise visit from Uncle Dan - who got all of Alec's attention. Here Alec showed him that his lego pyramid was like the pyramid in his book.


Last week, he did a similar stunt with the tiger on Auntie Rai's tshirt and the tigrrrr in one of his favorite books.

Playing indoors, and outdoors

The winter weather is challenging for our California boy, especially since he has been fighting a cold and serial ear infections for the past few weeks. To cheer him up, N. got him some Duplo blocks (extra large Legos). A big hit, but he's still getting the hang of them. However, after trying the Duplos, the larger Megablocks are a cinch.


In addition to blocks, Alec loves reading. Here he is getting a bedtime story read by one of my librarian friends. She read him Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel and, below, The Very Lonely Firefly. Not her usual reading material.


Finally we've been able to play outside, since the rain finally is giving us a break. On Saturday, we went to Crissy Field with Auntie Rai for a walk.

Lots of exploration, including a close observation of this great blue heron.

Our little birdwatcher

Very big fish story

On Saturday we decided to go to Golden Gate Park to see the exhibits at the De Young Museum, and perhaps check out the California Academy of Sciences finally. We zipped through the YSL and Warhol exhibits at the museum, since Alec wasn't very interested, and was just waking up. I had already seen the Yves Saint Laurent show in Montreal in August at the Musee des Beaux Arts, and actually liked the flow of their exhibit better.

Since the lines didn't seem too long at the Academy, we made our maiden voyage there. N had bought a membership before it opened, but we had kept putting of our visit until the crowds thinned out. Since that seems like it won't happen anytime soon, we felt like we were postponing for nothing.

It is very cool - brought back memories of my childhood visits. They even have the old seahorse fence around the alligator swamp, although the Benny Bufano seal sculptures that used to be in the entryway are no longer there, and the guard didn't know that they were in the side garden with the Maya Lin sculpture. So photos of Alec riding a seal will be for a future date.

Alec loved the aquarium - we saw the alligator, turtles, gars, and some very cool sea dragons. Much better than the Monterey Aquarium, I thought.

We took the photo above next to one of the tanks of fish from the tropics, everything was moving too much for the iPhone, so it is sort of atmospheric.

After the trip, a very happy and very tired little one.