A fun week!

Mason's day, Monday, May 10, 2010

Mason was over on Monday and we had planned on a day at the Discovery Museum.  When we got there we discovered that it is closed on Monday!  Not a problem, Mason didn't know where we were going, so we headed home to the library.  He is playing with the Raven puppet, and just finished playing with one of the puzzles.
He loves playing with the wooden train set that Evan and Shannon had outgrown.  He tries so hard to put the tracks together.  He loves the blue bus and the wooden apple tree.
I am reading a silly book to him on the bottom of the page.  It is "Pirates Don't Change Diapers", written by Melinda Long and illustrated by one of our favorite illustrators, David Shannon.  Guess why!  Actually we like his art work.

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Mother's Day

We were invited to a Mother's Day brunch at the lovely new home of Ming and Suzanne. Such a wonderful floor plan and they are so settled having just moved it. Jayce and Cole are darling, and it was fun to see their dad, Ming's family and Kate, Matt and Mason. Thank you for the great eats!
We had Rick, Michele and Rio over for dinner with Matt, Kate and Mason. It was a lovely day. Loved the plants, gardening hat and resourceful watering device which uses used wine bottles and is cleverly called, "plant nanny".

Day Three, Hearst Castle

I started the day with a walk on the beach. Unbelievbably it was again sunny and clear. We took 2 tours at the castle; the Garden and Vista tour, and then one of the living spaces in the Casa Grande. The Hearst Castle is just north of Cambria in San Simeon, CA. and it is a 5 mile bus trip just to get up there. The statue is Three Graces; Aglaia, Euphrosyne, and Thalia, daughters of Zeus.
As some of the girls hadn't seen the Elephant seals, we took a little trip to the Elephant Seal Vista Point. This is the Piedras Blancas rookery and has grown from an original population of 19 to 15,000 animals. The seals spend 8 to 10 months a year in the open ocean, but they come here for birthing, breeding, molting and resting. They are huge!
Our dinner was a Robin's, a very cute little place.
After dinner we voted for next year, and we will be going to Portland, Oregon.
Tomorrow we will be lunching in the town of Paso Robles, a tasting at the olive oil store, and flying back to Kirkland.
A great time, well planned by Margurite and helped by Marlene. Loved it!

Day Two, Wine Tour

Another lovely day in Cambria. We boarded our wine tour bus at 10:00 AM, ready to sample the wine of Paso Robles, CA. We visited Summerwood, Castoro Cellars, Veris (formerly Jan Chris), Hunt and Four Vines. Ray was our driver and very well informed about the area and wineries. We were very impressed with the wine of Paso Robles. Sherry from Castoro instructed us on proper tasting techniques. We bought a lot of bottles of delicious wine.
Marlene's husband, Tim, has a small vineyard and he sent a few bottles for us to sample. Zinfandel, syrah, and a blend of zin and ? He is a great vintner and his wine could compete with any of the vineyards we visited.
Lunch was served in the garden at Castoro.
Mary Ann thought she was going to bed early, Shauna and Emily had other ideas!

Day One, Route 1, Nepenthe Restaurant, Fogcatcher Inn

Mary Ann and I took off from SeaTac early Monday morning, destination Cambria, California. Marlene picked us up at San Jose Airport and we headed South. We wound our way to Route 1 and the drive is simply amazing. The day was sunny and clear and we were having a great time. Lunch was at Nepenthe Restaurant in Big Sur. We stopped here and there at the vista points and just couldn't believe our eyes. We saw the Elephant Seals on the beach. There were thousands - the adult males are already gone, these guys are the babies and some moms. They grow to 2 1/2 tons!
On a lighter note, we had pizza at the Inn and everyone caught up. Great day.

Michele Birthday

We had Michele over for dinner for her birthday. Kate was not feeling well, and Rick was on the road, so it was Dick, Cathy, Mason Matt and the birthday girl. It was fun to have them over for dinner.

We had a simple dinner of chicken (barter, anyone) Hasslback potatoes, green beans and chocolate cupcakes with yummy butter frosting. Mason helped me make it and he was really surprised when the yellow frosting turned pink. He now really likes pink.