For me, 2008 has definitely started off with a bang. Just take a look at how my last week has gone: Monday: We all go to the mall to buy Peter new jeans. We return with a couture top and a new car for me. World fails to take notice. Tuesday: It’s 2008! Our family…
Category: Out & About
Craftapalooza and Christmas Week Craziness
Every year, I vow to do less at Christmas, and every year it still ends up hectic. Because of an early Thanksgiving, most Christmas duties seemed to be done, but now it’s the week before Christmas, and everything’s going on. On Tuesday, the homeschoolers organized a craft day. Kelly loves making crafts, so I couldn’t…
Christmas in the Park
One of our most delightful Christmas traditions is San Jose’s Christmas in the Park downtown. It’s location, Plaza de Cesar Chavez, always has something going on, whether it’s a Vietnamese lantern festival or a free performance by the San Francisco Symphony. But Christmas in the Park is a real community extravaganza that kicks off with…
Al Gore Moves Into Legos
Last Saturday, Neil’s robotics team had its annual competition at nearby Gunderson High School. The theme for this year’s challenge was based on alternative energy: with their Lego robots, each team had to complete various tasks, including getting “uranium rods” back to home base, installing a solar panel on a house, and “harvesting” (ethanol-creating) corn….
The German Christmas Guy
As marvelous as living in California is, the one thing that blows here is Christmastime. While other people enjoy frosty walks among snowy trees, merry carolers, and festive shop windows, Christmas in California is depressingly yellow. Sure, the community does the best it can to capture the Christmas spirit. San Jose’s Christmas in the Park…
Appreciating My Own Backyard
I’m very excited about my upcoming trip to Germany in February. I thought about where I wanted to go while I was there, and thanks to businesses like Ryanair, there were a variety of fantastic possibilities. From Frankfurt-Hahn airport, I could fly roundtrip to Barcelona or Katowice (Silesian Poland) for free; to Rome for 10…
OMSI
The major reason we drove over 500 miles north on our impromptu vacation was OMSI. We first discovered this fabulous science museum on our first visit to Portland, 7 years ago, when the then-2-year-old Neil was intrigued by its exhibits for hours. Things haven’t changed, and we even enjoyed having an OMSI Traveller membership last…
Ferndale
Between the Humboldt Redwoods and Portland, we drove over to Ferndale. We saw it on our family vacation last year, when I added it to our must-see list, solely on the fact that it’s reproduced both in Disneyland’s California Adventure and Legoland California. According to the parks, Ferndale is famed for its well-preserved Victorian buildings….
The Snoopy Museum
We started our northwestern adventure with a visit to the Charles Schulz Museum. It’s a small museum in Santa Rosa dedicated to Charles Schulz and his creations, namely the Peanuts characters. Kelly, in particular, loves Snoopy and carries a Snoopy blanket around with her, so there’s an added element of charm in it for us…
Philip Glass and Leonard Cohen at Stanford
On Monday, Peter, Neil and I went to see a “conversation with Philip Glass and Leonard Cohen” at Stanford. The next night, a performance of selections from Cohen’s poetry The Book of Longing set to Philip Glass’ composition was scheduled to be performed in the same theatre. Amazing, the tickets to the talk were free….