A close to Perfect Mother's Day

I only say that because a perfect mother's day would be if Wayne took the boys somewhere for the day and left me to watch girlie movies and read books! So this was a runner up perfect Mother's Day which consisted of some of my favorite people (Mother included) coming over for the day. My wonderful sister made all sorts of goodies, a beautiful tomato tart, a quiche and a delicious fruit salad. We had a special blend of Hawaiian coffee and fresh strawberry short cakes for dessert. A very special gift of Mochi from a good friend who knows me too well. A walk to the beach to watch Evan boogie board and ended the night with some take out from the Mexican taqueria, sitting around the table enjoying each others company. I'm just not one to go out on a holiday. It's too busy and all those poor moms that waitress. What a drag for them!

The picture below has a funny story: I told my dad we needed some pictures for the memorial. He just about fell off the cliff laughing. I do think it's a keeper.

Ride for Life 2010

I need to find out more about how this amazing event got started 9 years ago. I know it was started by some local acquaintances of ours, the Bruces', but I just don't know all the details. We have been invited each year but have always had something else going on. Last year it poured rain on them and go figure, when they got up there on the Wednesday before the weekend it was snowing! Susan Bruce said she was really glad they rented a trailer this year. Can you believe they were in a tent last year! Amazing people! The weather cleared by the time we got there at it was 80 degrees by Sunday. Everyone had a great time as I'm sure you can tell by how dirty the kids were! I'm already looking forward to next years Ride For Life.
Above picture; Ian, Wayne and Evan
Kids: These were just the ones in our group.

Next on the Agenda

Geesh, I feel like I have been going non-stop this whole month. An 8 day driving trip and family reunion, then came home to have my friend Mimi who stayed with me for 2 weeks, during which I had the middle school book fair and I had to fill in at work for my co-worker who was on vacation. And now I am shopping and packing the camper for a trip to the mountains this weekend. This trip is a fundraiser called "Ride for life" and it benefits the Ronald McDonald house in Palo Alto. Most of our friends have done this ride before, it's our first time. It should be fun, did I mention that this is Dirt bike ride? Yes, It should be fun! I'm sure I will have a story or two to tell when we return.

Half Moon Bay and Beyond

My Friend Mimi is visiting me for a couple of weeks and we have been all over. She lived here on the coast for 12 years before moving to her home town of Moscow, Idaho and now lives in Colorado for the past 10 years. Coming back to the coast is a real treat for her, living at 7000ft the air is dry and she just loves the damp beach air here. Like I said, we have been all over from Santa Cruz to Healdsburg, where the above picture was taken. Tomorrow we are heading to San Francisco for some Dim Sum and city culture. Not only do I love the company, I love having someone to drag around to places you only seem to get to when someone is visiting!

Spring Break Adventure

When I found out that my cousin was planning a "Yamane family" reunion in Los Angles for the the second weekend in April, I realized that it was at the end of our spring break and that it might be a perfect opportunity to take a road trip. I never considered a "road trip" with the boys for obvious reasons and crossed my fingers that they would not only enjoy, but appreciate the trip. I had BIG plans at first. Death Valley, Los Vegas, Hoover Dam and the Grand Canyon all before heading to LA where we would go to Universal Studios and Hollywood and finally the reunion weekend with our family. After some consideration I decided that The Grand Canyon was too grand an idea and cut it from the itinerary. We did add the Shelby Factory and The Los Vegas Speedway in Los Vegas and we also stopped at the Gamble House in Pasadena. The boys did great with the driving and we have some great memories from everywhere we went. But I think the best part of our trip was reconnecting with our relatives at the reunion. We had family come from as far as New York and Hawaii. We now have plans for another family reunion in 2012. This time on Kauai. And we have plans to bring my dad back down to LA so he can attend a gathering of his Kauai friends that have been getting together the last weekend in September for years.

Hello, My name is Jill and............

I am an addict. That's right, I'm addicted to a word game on my Iphone. It's called "Words with Friends" and It's, Well, It's addicting. The Ironery about this is that I am the absolute worst speller in the world and I usually hate word games like Scrabble, It's so humiliating to get beat by an 8 year old! But, I guess I can blame my new obsession over word games on my sister. She gave us a word game for Christmas called "Bananagrams". It's quite fun and I like "Bananagrams" because you work independently on your own crossword using the tiles provided. I've recently been playing this game on my Iphone as well and you can play "Live" games against other people out in cyber space (when you get creamed, no one has to know but you), Oh my! Then the other day my hairdresser told me about "Words with Friends" and how she and her husband are addicted to it. Well, I just had to try it out! So now, I'm addicted and I don't care. No 12 steps for me thank you. I'm becoming a better person ,I mean speller because of it! Join me if you want, My user name is Jane67.

In other news, we are going on a driving trip over spring break. Look out for news that could read something like this:
Mother jumps into the Hoover Dam after (stupidly) agreeing to a driving trip with her family.
Or I like this one:
Mother runs for her life out into the barren desert in Death Valley, It was her only hope for sanity after (stupidly) agreeing to a driving trip..........blah,blah,blah! Wish me luck!

Birthday Boys

Evan and his Uncle Mike have birthday's just days apart, so we usually end up with a "family" celebration, it's become a tradition. We haven't had Evan's party yet, he wants to invite a group of friends to his favorite trampoline place some time soon. But for now I have a couple of pictures to show off.
Below are from 2009.......Above are from 2010