06.27.07
Vacationing from home
Jeff has finished up a big push through April and May and June that is finally over this week. We had hoped actually to go away for a few days of vacationing, but eventually decided that would be impractical given other constraints and obligations. So we decided that we would vacation from home, which gives us a lot of the pleasures of vacationing, but still our own beds and pillows and none of the hassles of a large vacation prep.
We decided that we would have an activity day followed by a rest-at-home day, with a lot of time spent together as a family even on the at-home days. On Monday we did our outing to the county fair which I’ve blogged here and here. Tuesday we took Cissa to the airport, caught up on a few chores around the house, and worked on getting the new bookshelfs braced (for earthquake safety). We got about two-thirds done and finished up today, Wednesday. First on Wednesday, though, we went to the Oakland Zoo and stayed about four hours, letting Jamie walk through a lot of it (although his favorite parts were the dirt and the pebbles and not any of the animals). I’ll post a few pictures of that once I get them off of my camera.
Katie would like to go on a nature hike; we will likely go to Garin Regional Park in Hayward, which has a creek, but I’ll research a bit to confirm a location with water as that’s important to her. (It could be a hunt; the bay area is very dry and we are seeing daily wildfires out our back windows turning many acres black.) Jeff would like to spend a day at the beach; we’ll need to decide which of the many great Pacific beaches to enjoy. I think I would like to do a bike ride. We’re also talking about seeing a baseball game.
Now that the bookshelves are braced I am going to set up our Library Thing account and we’ll start cataloguing the books and emptying boxes. That is going to be exciting; I got us some custom stamps to label the books once we’ve input them and the girls are looking forward to turning the process into a bit of a game.
It’s wonderful to have Jeff mostly off from work (he’s still participating in a few regular status calls and the like); he’s been working really hard! Still, it seems to be paying off with repeat clients; Genentech just contacted him today to negotiate for a new project.