Category Archives: trips

family, trips

Family Campout

Leave a comment

We just got back from Sarah’s family campout, and as usual, had an amazing time. Sarah’s been going since she was 4, this was my 5th, and Keana’s 3rd. I think Keana holds the camp record for average appearances; she’s batting a thousand so far. She’s really the only kid at the campout these days as most of our peers have opted out of the baby-making for the time being. This, of course, has its advantages and disadvantages. On the one hand, we have unlimited baby-sitters and Keana steals the show in the “under 18 category” every time. But on the other hand, we don’t have anyone else to hang out with that’s on parent duty. So while the moon rises and the drums rage on into the night and campers wander from circle to circle, fire to fire, we get out the tooth brushes, pack it in, and hunker down for an early, cold morning.

And yes, Keana woke early every morning, poked her tiny head out of the tent divider in our ginormous tent, and eagerly, excitedly squealed, “I’m awake! Let’s go out and play!” followed closely by, “Grandma’s awake. Can we go visit? You can come.” It was wonderful, heart-melting, and exhausting all at once. You know how it is when you’re camping and it’s so damn cold in the morning that you don’t even want to wake up to go out to pee? Well, imagine that with a two-year-old with endless energy and amazing puppy-dog blue eyes begging you to go play with her. Luckily Grandma and Grandpa were awake shortly after to entertain her while we cooked breakfast. Most of the mornings we would play in the meadow with bubbles and coloring books and stickers, eat second breakfasts, then go down for a nap around 11 or 12. Sarah and I would spend that nap time doing dishes from breakfast, getting things together for the afternoon trip to the river, and resting. Once Keana woke up, it was time to go-go-go again in a whirlwind of diaper change, outfit change, lunch eating, and hiking down to the river. Once we got to the river I would hold Keana and jump from rock-to-rock to get to the perfect spot where the water was deep, but calm. Most of the campers hung out at the river during the day, but by the time we got down there, everyone else was back up at their camps snacking and resting before dinner. So we enjoyed the mellow company that remained and spent the time splashing in the water and cringing and laughing at the crispness of the river.

Keana continued to amaze us with her knack for remembering names and faces. When we arrived on Tuesday (July 24, 2007), Sarah’s uncle Jim and Aunt Christina came to greet us as we set up camp. We joked about how we would definitely be the first ones up to wake the camp, and Jim said he’s up having coffee by 6:30 a.m. and invited us over. I told him not to joke because not only would we be up, but Keana would be talking up a non-stop storm. The next morning Keana woke up at 5:30 a.m. and once we got out of the tent she said, “Let’s go visit Jim.” Thinking it would be funny to take Jim up on his word, we walked over to his camp for a little coffee visit. In the end it didn’t quite work out because although Jim was up, let’s just say he wasn’t quite ready, so Keana and I turned right around back to our own camp. Keana didn’t quite understand and kept saying, “But I want to visit Jim!” Some fresh cherries quickly erased her mind of our previous task and she was on to new things instantly. It wasn’t long though before she was saying, “Let’s visit Christina!”—baby’s got a memory like a pachyderm.

The thing that’s really beautiful about the campout though is the community. Some people are related by blood, some by marriage, and the rest by friendship or acquaintance, but everyone is accepted and made to feel like blood. This community is fostered through a Friday night cocktail party that always has a theme- this year was Caribbean- and a Saturday night potluck where all those camping bring food to share in a big sit-down dinner in the meadow. On Friday evening Sarah and I were working on getting our food contribution to the cocktail party together and Keana was off having fun at Grandma’s camp. As I flipped the steak on the bbq I glanced across the meadow and saw Keana holding court with Sarah’s brother Michael, sister Rachel, and their camp-mates Alexis, her brother Neal, Eli, and Emily (and maybe more?). Emily’s mom, Lorraine, also spent quite a bit of time keeping Keana entertained too. It was so nice to be able to send Keana off across the meadow to an entire group of people that she not only loved but that we could trust. It was also cool to see so many youngsters between 18 and 21 show so much love for Keana.

Sarah and I also got some down time too. While Keana slept in our tent-mansion nearby, we hung out around the campfire in the evenings with Iana, her boyfriend Ryan, Joscelyn and her boyfriend Jahee, our camp neighbor Sue and her boys Travis and Finn, cousin Nathan and his girl Jennie, Grandma Jennie and Grandpa John of course, Uncle Jim and Aunt Christina, and so many others. I’m trying to get as many names as I can in here so years from now it will spark our memory and we can tell Keana about her early family and friends at these crazy campouts. I know this isn’t everyone, and the list changes from year to year, but the bottom line is that there are many, many wonderful people that we share this camping experience with.

Packing up is tough, and leaving is even harder, but with help from the grandparents we got everything packed up and were on the road by 1 p.m. on Sunday (July 29). The trip to the campout was smooth, but the trip home was not. Keana was all tuckered out and so were we. She made it to Hwy 5 before we were forced to sing “the Tigger song” from Winnie the Pooh about 100 times to keep her pacified. And eventually she only wanted Sarah to sing it. That lasted until outside Livermore at which point Keana was angry. Actually, the word “angry” makes it sound slightly unpleasant. This was worse. She was outright pissed. She began crying and it quickly turned into screams of rage and frustration. We finally pulled off the highway into Livermore, just an hour from home, and had some burgers. She was easily pacified once she got out of the car but this girl has a temper. She’s all “cinnamon and spice” 99% of the time, but when it comes time to rage, she let’s_it_out. The trip to the campout took about 6 hours and the trip home took about 7.5.

Luckily that trip home didn’t taint Keana’s campout experience. The very next day she was already talking about going back to the campout and even today, while she washed her hands, talked about how they were “dirty from the campout”. So the campout is definitely on the list for next year, and we’ll be packing for four with an emphasis on the family in “family campout”.

development, trips

The girl can talk

Leave a comment

It is such a joy to hear Keana’s little voice! From the moment she opens her eyes in the morning to the moment she closes them to sleep, she is talkin’, askin’ questions, singin’, and makin’ noises. We absolutely love it. Sometimes we just lie awake in bed in the morning and listen to her talk and sing to her stuffed animals in her crib. The last couple of weeks she’s really been memorizing lyrics to her favorite songs. She’ll ask, “Mama sing it?” or “Papa sing it?” and smile and dance—but always listen—until she gets a piece of it then sings along. So far she’s learned part of the Sesame St. theme “Sunny Days” and the Dragon Tales theme, and she continues to get better on her “ABCs” and “These Boots Are Made For Walkin'”. Another popular phrase has been “Try it?” when we tell her something won’t work. It really makes me stop and realize how important it is for her to try just about everything on her own and reminds me of how much I liked to figure things out for myself, especially when adults told me how it would or wouldn’t work. I swear Keana teaches us just as much as we teach her.

Last Saturday we went to Pt. Reyes Station for biscuits and gravy at the Pine Cone Diner then headed out to the beach. Sarah and I really have Santa Cruz in the veins because we figured we’d just go over to HWY1 and pull over whenever we saw a good beach, like we used to do when we lived in Santa Cruz. Well, needless to say, up north on HWY1 is not like HWY1 near Santa Cruz. Eventually we found Bolinas (yeah, we’d never heard of it either). It’s kind of like a distilled version of Santa Cruz. Not a ton of tourists and crazies, and a lot of real northern CA beach bums and surfers. We had to run through the ocean near this retaining wall to reach a small patch of sand, so you could say easy beach access there was not. Keana had been talking about the ocean since we mentioned it Friday night saying “Ocean—get in there?”, so Sarah was determined to get our Girl to the beach. Keana loved just standing in the ocean waiting for each wave and didn’t flinch once. In fact, we had to yank her out on a couple surprise waves so she didn’t get totally soaked. She didn’t even mind the sand, though she still thought it was “messy”.

I remember when I was growing up I talked all the time, and now as an adult Sarah would definitely say that my verbosity has remained strong, especially late at night or when she’s trying to sleep. I remember too how adults responded to me when I talked and how that made me feel, and I want to always be sure Keana feels that she’s being heard, that what she says is respected, and to try and have patience with her as she expresses her thoughts out loud. I think if we encourage her voice through listening, she’ll learn to verbalize her thoughts better and even become a better listener in the process.

family, holidays, trips

Home for the holidays

Leave a comment

This year, “Home for the holidays” really took on its true meaning for us. I mean, we had three Christmas celebrations with three different portions of family in three different locations, but we spent Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and New Year’s at home, in OUR house, just the three of us. Was it a little selfish? Maybe. Was it fun, amazing, and wonderful? Yes.

I took two weeks off work which was just barely enough. We celebrated Christmas with my Mom’s family on 12/22 and had the usual great time with the Petersons at Keana’s great grandparent’s house in Los Altos. She adores her second cousins (which are closer to her age than mine). They’re still years ahead of her, but lots of fun. And now that Keana is walking, running, and talking, she’s just a like a “real person” to them now, which means running all over the house, passing out gifts together, and sharing gifts- at least for a moment or two. At dinner she sat on Great Grandpa’s end of the table and even got him to play a little game of “I’ll throw my toy on the floor and you pick it up for me” which lasted longer than I thought it would. It’s good to see I’m not the only softy for those baby-blues. Keana also enjoyed a nice dance session with Great Grandma Jacquie after dinner. Great Grandma kept an excellent beat and Keana obliged with some nice shakin’ of the tail feathers. Keana was having such a blast that night that we couldn’t get her to go to bed and she stayed up till almost midnight.

The next day we spent time with my immediate family for a mellower Christmas celebration. Keana had a great day walking around in Grandma’s shoes and playing on the floor of the kitchen while dinner was being prepared. She loves to say, “Boots are walkin'” which often spawns round after round of the song, “Those Boots Are Made for Walkin'” to which she dances and calls out for more verses at the end of each previous verse. She never gets tired of dancing to that song. That night while opening gifts we had a great time with tons of laughs. Pretty much any time we get Uncle Peter in the mix, laughter is never far behind, and we all feed off of eachother’s stories and laughter until the night is late. Christmas Eve morning we packed up our loot and headed back to the east bay.

On Christmas Eve I bbq’d some New York steaks to get our stomachs prepped for the amazing rib roast that Sarah fixed on Christmas. Sarah and I also made biscuits and gravy for a special Christmas breakfast. And because it was just the three of us, we moved at our own pace, opening gifts all day long and Keana got a chance to enjoy each gift as she opened it, before moving on to the next. I also felt that we really had time to enjoy eachother and especially Keana which was something new for a big holiday event such as Christmas. Eventually the last gift was opened, only bones were left on the table after dinner, and it was time for Ms. Keana to don her PJs and sleep out of her second Christmas and on towards the new year.

The next day we packed up our gifts and our cooler and headed to Great Grandma Bev’s house—which overlooks Millerton Lake outside of Fresno—to celebrate Christmas once again, this time with Sarah’s immediate family. We spent a couple days up there and had lots of fun, including a great dance party with Keana leading the way, paying tribute to the recently deceased Godfather of Soul, James Brown. We also had a chance to make a visit to the snow up by Shaver Lake and it was gorgeous—bright and sunny and clean with fresh snow. Keana’s very first encounter with snow was tentative. She did walk a little on it, with the help of Tia Iana and Rachael, and Sarah was able to feed her a little bit to try it out on the tastebuds. So it was a fun, new experience and I’m sure she’ll dig the snow to a much higher degree when she’s older.

On 12/29, once again, we packed up our loot, said our goodbyes, and hit the road back to the east bay. Keana’s break-down, complete with tears and screams of “I hold your hand!”, an hour from home was a clear signal that she was ready for a break from our holiday tour schedule.

In the following days the new year approached and started without much event. It was amazing to think back on 2006 and remember the major life events that took place. Here’s just a few:

  • Keana’s first steps (and subsequently running, jumping, and more dancing)
  • Keana’s first birthday
  • The beginning of sentences
  • Keana’s first plane ride and trip to Hawaii
  • Our second wedding anniversary
  • Grandma Linda turned 50
  • Great Grandma Ellie passed away

365 days is a long stretch. And given the fact that most major events in life, good and bad, happen in split seconds, a year is bound to be packed full of both. Day six of 2007 is coming to a close and we can only look forward, ready to laugh, cry, walk, crawl, and dance through the other 358.

Happy New Year and good night.

family, holidays, trips

Babies don’t care about holidays

Leave a comment

Keana does not care about the holidays…yet. Some people out there may be getting a little worked up over that statement, so let me explain. Holidays are really for us adults and older kids. It’s for those who realize how important getting family together is, even if for just one day. But it’s also a time for us to express and recreate all the traditions and expectations that surround the holidays—for better or worse—that we’ve learned and assimilated for ourselves through our lives. I think Keana sees things differently. I think Keana is excited to see our extended family any time and there just happens to be some random pumpkin on the porch—which, by the way, someone totally messed up by cutting holes in it—or everyone makes a big deal about eating turkey instead of the chicken and rice she requested. But as a whole, I think she just takes everything and everyone in stride, at the moment, and enjoys (or doesn’t enjoy) things as they happen. There’s no expectations or sense of tradition and I think that’s pretty cool. It’s so fun to see Keana still really new to this world taking one day at a time, and hopefully she’ll grow to love and understand the traditions we create together. Or, I guess it’s always possible she’ll grow up hating our family traditions and once she turns 13, when November/December rolls around, she’ll dress in all black, swear she’ll disown us when she turns 18, and refuse to get in the car to go to so-and-so’s house for “one more stupid, pointless holiday celebration”. I truly hope it’s the former and not the the latter. Anyways…

Unfortunately we just couldn’t see all the family this Thanksgiving. This year we drove to Fresno with Sarah’s sister Iana (Tia) to be with Sarah’s family. Thanksgiving day we saw Grandma Jennie, Grandpa John (our hosts), Tia, Great Uncle Jim and Great Aunt Christina, second cousin Shawn, Great Aunt Blanche, second cousin Shanti and his girlfriend Alysa…and I think that’s pretty much it. Uncle Michael got stuck in Olympia where he’s attending college because plane ticket prices sky-rocketed. It sounded like he was going to have a typical college tofu-no-stuffing-kegger-video game-potluck Thanksgiving—which I’m sure was fun—but we did miss him. My family (Grandma Linda, Grandpa Sam and Uncle Peter) went over to our friend Rhonda and Baptiste’s house for Thanksgiving in San Jose, so we had to settle for the holiday phone call instead of actually seeing them. I’m not sure what Great Grandma Jacquie and Great Grandpa Vic did (or the rest of the Petersons), but hopefully we’ll get to spend Thanksgiving with them next year.

Speaking of great grandparents, Sarah’s Grandma Ellie passed away very early Thanksgiving morning. It wasn’t entirely unexpected and we just imagine her somewhere wonderful and peaceful with the love of her life Charles and all the other family and friends that have gone before her.

The day following Thanksgiving we had a great visit with Sarah’s Dad Robert and his wife Cindy. They are always great hosts and Keana had a blast playing in the backyard and with all the little treasures that Grandpa found for her. Eventually she got so sleepy that she drifted off to Nap Land and had a nice two-hour nap which gave the rest of us a chance to catch up on the last year. Once again we were reminded of how fast time seems to be flying by.

Saturday we packed up and headed back to the bay. It was great to see everyone but we we were very thankful to be home. Then, tonight, Grandpa Jon flew in from Denver for business and took the three of us out to dinner in celebration of my upcoming birthday. It was fun getting caught up and we are thankful that he’s out here so often on business.

It’s been a week filled with family events, a little road trip, and great food. I think it’s safe to say Keana’s second round of holidays are shaping up nicely, even if she doesn’t know she’s supposed to care about them yet.

(look for November pictures in the upcoming weeks)

development, family, holidays, trips

1500 mph and Accelerating

2 Comments

A friend of mine once said it’s amazing how fast time and money disappear once you have a baby. Sarah and I have found both to be true. But what better investment for time and money than the one they call Keana?

Halloween: There’s nothing scary about a baby. Wait, maybe I mean there’s nothing scarier than a baby? This baby crawling around our living room relies on us for everything. That’s scary. Just about everything she’s learning right now comes from us. That’s scary. When she pulls herself up on the furniture, then balances with one hand while reaching for something completely out of her reach all the while tottering on legs tingling with new muscle sensations. That’s scary. The fact that Keana will some day want to go to some Halloween party- instead of hanging out with us- with teenage boys that are surely stupider and more dangerous than I was when I was their age…that’s scary as hell! But on the surface…no…there’s nothing scary about a baby.

This year Keana was a little Giants player dressed up in her Giants outfit that Kacie gave her. Halloween night we carved pumpkins, made a music video to Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”, and passed out candy. Not much else you can do on Halloween with a baby that’s not very scary.

Visits: While Papa’s been visiting PA for work, Mama and Baby have had visitors and have been visiting on their own. In November Grandma Jennie came out for a couple days and Sarah and Keana went back to Fresno to visit Sarah’s high school friends Katrina, Mary, and Gina. They also visited with Grandpa Robert and Nana Cin and had blast with all parties in attendance, everywhere. Keana also had her first trip to the bar when we went down to Pescadero and visited with Auntie Sara, Sam, Jack, Sandy, Byron, Mollie, Leiban, and the whole Duarte’s gang. Grandma Linda was also up last week visiting and hopes to make it a semi-regular thing since she’s so close.

Thanksgiving: The real question this year is what DON’T we have to be thankful for? We shared Thanksgiving with family friends at Rhonda and Baptiste’s house in San Jose. Everyone who came to dinner had a customized crown to wear (which was required to eat), so beat that!

Eating: Keana has recently begun sampling the wondrous array of food items on this planet called “vegetables”. So far she’s tried sweet potato, squash, and avocado. She was skeptical at first, and even a little concerned, but has started to enjoy it. Her two front, bottom teeth are coming in nicely and they’re almost halfway up. She teethes pretty intensely at times, grimacing and munching down on many objects with fierce little baby force.

Sleeping: Keana is a great sleeper. She usually takes a couple naps a day and mostly sleeps through the night, waking occasionally to fill her tiny stomach. She has a few rough nights on and off which keep poor Mama- and sometimes Papa- from actually recovering from the busy days, but as a whole, she is a great little sleeper.

Mobility: Keana is now crawling at astonishing speeds. When motivated- for instance in pursuit of the cat- she can really make her way across the room quite quickly. She has also started pulling herself up on furniture and legs, and takes decent steps to advance her position. Keana’s also taking a liking to pointing at objects and where she wants to go. She’s been able to sign for milk and clap for a while, but now she also waves goodbye (and hello!). It’s really enough to make your heart melt; imagine little Keana, standing in her crib, waving goodbye as you’re heading out the door for work!

Christmas: It’s just around the corner and we’ve been busy making Keana’s first Christmas a great one. Last Saturday we went down the street and got a great tree and decorated it Monday night with Tia Iana. Uncle Peter called from Thailand, so in a way, he was there too. She loves playing with the tree and especially loves to point at and touch all the different ornaments. This weekend we’re going to Fresno for a Solstice Party at Nino and Mia’s and having early Christmas with Grandpa Robert and Nana Cin (and hopefully Great Grandma Bev too!). Then on the 20th is the Peterson family Christmas and we’re very excited about seeing Great Uncle Vic, Great Aunt Kristie, and second cousins McKenna, Cassidy, and Riley for the first time. THEN, on the 21st, is Great Grandma and Grandpa Peterson’s 50th wedding anniversary, so we’ll be in Los Altos for that. I think we’ll have our own 4th Annual Christmas Party on the 23rd, Christmas Eve mellow-styles on the 24th, and on the 25th, Grandma Jennie, Grandpa John, Grandma Linda, Grandpa Sam, Uncle Michael, and Tia Iana will be coming over to our house for Christmas Clamb Bake 2005. Soooo… if you want to spend time with us and you’re not on the list, sorry. Please call back soon for 2006 reservations.