Giants

Go Giants! Xavier had been waiting for this moment all day yesterday. I think he sang Take Me Out to the Ball Game about a hundred times. Last night was LDS family night at the ball park. Someone organized last night as a night for lds families to go to the baseball game, so we definitely joined in on the fun. We had great seats and got discounted tickets.



Instead of driving to the game we took the CalTrain. It was so much nicer than the BART and it was a double decker train that went about twice as fast as a normal train. I think Xavier had more fun on the ride there than at the game. His nose was pretty much stuck to the window the entire time. We went through plenty of tunnels and every time we did he would say, "I see a dragon blowing fire out of his mouth." Good thing the dragons didn't blow the fire on our train.



Here we are in front of the ballpark standing in front of the statue of Willie Mays Jr.



This ball park was so nice! The Oakland A's stadium, let's just say looked like the ugly step sister compared to this one. Poor Oakland. They had an entire section for kids. The Coke bottle has 4 slides kids can go down.



Xavier even got to practice his batting skills. After he hit the ball, instead of running the bases he went chasing after his ball.



I can just see him 5 or 6 years from now in the outfield chasing after baseballs with as much energy and spirit.



Coming off the slide.



By about the fourth inning Xavier was getting quite restless. He pretty much didn't sit in his chair the entire time, but he started asking to go home. So I pulled out the old tickle monster trick to keep him entertained. As we were playing Xavier said "I'm a superhero!" I said "Really? What powers do you have?" He instantly replied "I have HORSEPOWER!" and shot his hands into the air as if he were getting ready to fly. It was the most hilarious thing he's ever said. He never ceases to surprise me with his BIG imagination.



Tim got this shot of the stadium and the bridge in the background. Pretty cool to see the water right by the park.



What's a baseball game without a hot dog. If you look close you'll see a mustard mustache on Xavier's mouth. I think he ate most of the hot dog and enough peanuts for the next year.

Xavier has quickly become a fan of the SF Giants.

La Bamba

Xavier has always loved the drums and guitar and since we've been in California his favorite thing to do is bang on a bowl. He usually comes up to me and says, "Mama I want to tweedle beetle battle a bowl." At first I wasn't sure what he meant. I originally thought he was saying he wanted to battle a bull and after asking lots of questions I finally understood he wanted to bang on a bowl like drums. I got this clip when he wasn't watching. It seems that when he bangs on the bowl "La Bamba" is always the song that follows.

Need a laugh?

I'm sure you've all had those days where you just need a good laugh. Well Tim has introduced me to a couple websites that are completely for that purpose. If you know Tim he's got quite the sense of humor and these websites are right up his ally. I have to admit they are quite hilarious. If you haven't heard of these before take a peek.

www.failblog.org
www.awkwardfamilyphotos.com

Uncle Joe Visits

The world traveling brother came to visit us in sunny California. Joe has managed to visit James in Australia and us in California this year thanks to his great job. There are definitely perks to Joe having a job where he travels a lot. He is able to mix some pleasure with business. Joe came into town on Friday and has to leave us tomorrow. :( We are definitely going to miss him. He probably won't miss having to sleep on an air mattress that loses so much air by the time he wakes up he's basically sleeping on the floor. Thanks for suffering for the sake of spending time with us, Joe.

We managed to fit in a visit to Half Moon Bay, Santa Cruz, and some sight seeing in San Francisco. Xavier was so excited to see his uncle. He was a little sad when he found out Gabe, Grace, and Lilly weren't coming too. But he sure loved having uncle Joe around to treat him to ice cream, play with him, and read books to him. The boys had a blast being boys and I enjoyed sitting back and watching all the grins and giggles.



Alcatraz in the background



Boudin Bakery and Restaurant. Yummy sourdough.



Famous cable cars

We are definitely going to miss Joe. Thanks for coming to visit!

Golden Gate Park

This past weekend was my sister's birthday. She wanted to be outside as much as possible on her birthday so we decided to visit San Francisco again. We spent the day in Golden Gate Park. This is no ordinary park, this park is gigantic. I think it's over 1,000 acres so as you can imagine we only discovered a little corner of it. The corner we visited was absolutely beautiful. We went to the Japanese Tea Gardens which were amazing!


Here is one of the many gorgeous views inside the gardens.



Family photo in front of a pagoda.



Xavier and Naysa both got to ride on the oldest or one of the oldest carousels in the world. And they got to run around at this children's park that was very fun. Tim and X are at the top of this cement slide. All they are sitting on is a thin piece of cardboard. Tim managed to wear a small hole in his new jeans. He just smiled and said "Man people pay a lot of money to et holes in their jeans. All I had to do was ride down a cement slide." Go figure.



Spinning bucket seats- another favorite. I spun Xavier so much there was a moment when we thought he'd puke. Whoops. I got a little carried away.



We also visited the Conservatory of flowers. This place had flowers and plants from all over the world. It was breathtaking and reminded me how amazing this world truly is. How can you not believe in a God after seeing things like this?





Xavier, Naysa, and Leland were drawn to the water and the fish. Why am I not surprised?

Xavier's Messy Art Class

Over the last 4 weeks Xavier has been taking a messy art class. His teacher's name was Miss Janet and let me tell you she was wonderful! This class was strictly process art rather than project art based, which I love because children at this age are still learning about glueing, cutting, painting, etc. Each week there were 5 different projects the kids would make. Xavier had a blast learning new skills and making new friends. Xavier doesn't like to get his hand dirty or messy, so some of the projects were challenging because he'd want to stop as soon as he got paint or glue on his hands, but I tried to encourage him as much as possible. Oh and the best part for me is that Xavier could make as big of a mess as he wanted and I didn't have to worry about cleaning it up or that it would stain the carpet or his clothes. Double bonus!



Xavier is making a bird feeder. We used apple butter and spread it around a small paper cup. We punched a couple holes in the top and threaded a pipe cleaner so we could hang it outside. Xavier enjoyed playing in the bird seeds more than putting them on top of the apple butter. Now it's hanging on our porch and Xavier asks if he can eat it sometimes. I have to remind him it's only for the birds.



Xavier is painting with cars. All you have to do for this activity is get some tempera paint or whatever you have at home and gather some small toy cars. Let your child "drive" the car in the paint and then on a sheet of paper. Xavier loved this project.



Play clay was the most popular. He loved making "noodles" with a garlic press. He also enjoyed "cutting" with a plastic pizza slicer.

At the end of every class Miss Janet had about 5 minutes of singing time. We learned a new train song that Xavier loves. It goes like this "Choo choo the fast train is going down the tracks! Choo Choo the fast train is going down the tracks! Stop look and listen! Stop look and listen." Then we'd repeat this with bumpy train and slow train.

We are sad this class is over, but he just started a sports class and a playskool class that I hope will be as much fun as this one.

Our 4th of July celebration was a trip to Half Moon Bay. It was pretty cloudy and the water was super cold, but we still gave it a go. When we got to the beach Tim noticed some dolphins swimming in the water. It was so neat to see real dolphins so close to shore. (I've heard that if dolphins are swimming close to shore that means sharks are close by too; not sure if that's true, but thankfully we didn't see any sharks)



Xavier loves being buried in the sand and letting his "wormies" his toes pop back out of the sand. He also loves digging gigantic holes, mainly so he can slide down the side of it and fall into the pit. After a while Tim wasn't able to dig the sand out fast enough before he'd slide into the pit and along with him fill the hole with sand again.



Here is Xavier behind his mound of sand.

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I didn't get any pictures of the firework show. We visited a neighboring city, Santa Clara, for their fireworks display. Xavier loved being able to sip on a "slurfee" (slurpee) before the show started. As the fireworks started to go off Xavier was not a big fan. He kept saying "It's like Mulan. It's like the bad guy." If you've ever seen the movie Mulan you'll know what I'm talking about. At the end of the movie there is a scene with fireworks and the bad guy is trying to kidnap the emperor. I had no idea he would make this connection and therefore seem terrified of the fireworks. We had to reassure him that the fireworks were nice fireworks. He still insisted we go home. As we started walking toward the car he shouted "Stop! I want to watch the fireworks!" Oh how quickly toddlers change there mind. So we stayed for the rest of the show. It was an awesome show too. One of the best I've seen in years. Needless to say he still hasn't stopped talking about the fireworks and it's been over a week.

Fourth of July Weekend

We decided to go to the San Francisco Zoo. It's no San Diego Zoo, but it was definitely worth the trip. There is a children's section that was fabulous. Xavier got to get up close and personal with several smaller animals- he got to pet a rabbit and a turtle. We did not get to see any gorillas (which was total bummer because one of the gorillas had just had a baby.) The giraffe exhibit was awesome because they were only a couple feet away from us. Our favorite was the grizzly bear exhibit.


There was a huge reinforced wall between us and the grizzly bears, but they would come right up to the window. It was neat to see them so close and wonderful that we were protected by the wall. :)




Xavier loved the animal farm. He looks like a little farm boy. I think Xavier liked this one as much as Grandpa Richardson's giant lawnmower.



Maybe we could go into the farming business.



He even got to brush the goats hair. I think he tried to make sure he brushed every goats fur at least once.



After being at the zoo for about 6 hours we called it a day. We did so much walking our feet were throbbing by the end. And as you can see the bambinos were all tuckered out. I love it when they're sleeping. They look like such angels.

Oakland A's vs. Detroit Tigers

Last Tuesday was probably Xavier and Tim's favorite outing so far. We went to an Oakland A's game. Who do you think they were playing? Our very own Detroit Tigers. Our seats were awesome. They were right behind home plate in the middle deck. We got to the stadium early so Tim and X could watch the Tiger's batting practice. Let's just say both of my boys were grinning from ear to ear.
As we were waiting for the game to start we decided to get Xavier a hot dog. What's a baseball game without hot dogs? He's had hot dogs many times before, but this time it was a little scary. Somehow he swallowed an entire bite and started to choke on it. I panicked and Tim rushed over to Xavier. Then luckily he coughed it right up. It went flying a couple feet. I was so relieved!! Boy did I realize I need to brush up on my Heimlich Maneuver. Other than that, the night was an enjoyable night out at the ball game.
Xavier knows Take Me Out to the Ball Game by heart and he loved being able to sing it with the entire crowd.
When I asked him what his favorite part of the night was he said "cotton candy and peanuts." Well, I guess those two things complete the ball game experience.





I was thrilled to have captured this smile. I'm sure many of you who have a toddler know how difficult it is to capture a picture with them smiling and looking at the camera.



It's also rare that all 3 of us are in a picture together. My wonderful husband who makes friends anywhere he goes managed to get along with the guy next to us and his family. They were nice enough to take this shot for us.