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papa_mike

Spring Break 2017 – A Return to NYC!

by Papa K on April 16, 2017

(Dad note: I guess it’s safe to say I am officially out of the habit of posting on the blog 🙁 I will work to see if we can get it back in the mix!)

The girls had their spring break this past week and we headed to New York City for some fun in the big city! It wasn’t the girls’ first trip – they each had been before – but it was our first as a full family. Overall, the girls were a great age to run around the city – and we definitely took advantage of that. (Truth be told, I wore Lauren on my shoulders a fair amount – so maybe another 6 months for her would have been perfect – but we really covered a lot of ground.)

Grandma and Papa Boston joined us for the first few days and we had a blast exploring and eating with them. As you’ll see below Grandma took the girls to the American Girl Store and that was indeed the highlight of their trip – they are still talking about it. It blew their little minds. (To be clear, we also went to the top of the Freedom Tower, visited the Statue of Liberty, went to the Met and Whitney museums, saw Blue Man Group and The Lion King … but yes, the American Girl Store was the “blew their minds” event 🙂

Here are some pictures of our adventures…

Christine found a list of a bunch of cool graffiti down in the Lower East Side so we wandered around and found a bunch of them...

Grandma Jill with the girls at the American Girl Store

I mean look at those smiles - they are in heaven!

Lauren and Mei Mei ready to eat

One last pose at the American Girl Store cafe

Goofing around at one of our many eating stops with Grandma and Papa

We spent a morning up in Central Park and started it off with a horse carriage ride - don't worry, we didn't let Maile and Lauren drive 🙂

We're walking through Central Park and all of a sudden Maile yells - It's Balto! - she remembered this sled dog from one of her books at school.

We checked out the new Museum of Mathematics - it was a fun couple hours, but not amazing - has some potential though

Family shot on Liberty Island

Maile Girl ready to get her art on at the Met

One. Big. Dinosaur.

Maile and Lauren taking in some more grafitti

Watch out - 4 tyranosaurs!

Hitting up Gray's Papaya for some hot dogs and papaya drink!

Papa and his girls

We had a blast at Blue Man Group - the girls loved it!

We did a lot of street walking - hardly took any cabs - mostly subway and walking - got our steps!

High jumping on the high line!

We met up with one of Maile's classmates, David, to check out the Freedom Tour and Statue of Liberty

Lauren is so over the Freedom Tower

Maile Girl and I high, high above NYC

Maile and Lauren meet the Fearless Girl down near Wall Street

Before we headed out to the Statue of Liberty, Christine took the girls on the Sea Glass carousel

4 lovely ladies...

Lauren enjoying some seriously good ramen at Ivan Ramen

Striking some poses at the Met

We hit up Koreatown for some seriously good Korean BBQ cooked right at the table

We ate and wore a lot of ice cream!

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Mid-Winter Break with Grandma & Papa Boston

by Papa K on March 9, 2017

Okay, so it was a couple weeks ago already – but A LOT has happened since then 🙂 This year for mid-winter break, Grandma and Papa Boston came out to San Francisco to spend the week with the girls. The girls had a blast running all over the city and keeping Grandma and Papa on their toes…

When they weren't running, they were cuddling and reading...

Checking out the scene down at Pier 39

Say cheese!

Showing Papa our furniture climbing skills...

One of the many good eats

Maile and Lauren getting their dentist training in with the play doh set...

Grandma and Papa always take the girls on adventures exploring the city...

Papa steps out from behind the camera with his girls!

And yes, the girls showed Grandma and Papa every corner of the playground...

A special treat getting a pedicure with Grandma

It was cold, but that didn't slow them down...

And, of course, a trip wouldn't be complete without some baking 🙂

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Thanksgiving Fun 2016

by Papa K on November 29, 2016

For only the second time in my life, I didn’t head to Boston for Thanksgiving. After our big trip to Minneapolis a few weeks ago, we decided to stay local and Grandma and Papa Boston along with Auntie Elyssa and Uncle Stephen came to us. We rented a house up in Healdsburg and had a California-style Thanksgiving.

Grandma and Papa with Maile and Lauren on the deck outside our rental house

Mommy had the great idea to kick things off with a full family turkey trot. 1.5 miles and the girls did awesome. Christine and Maile ran ahead. Lauren and I followed behind – and Lauren ran the whole way – didn’t stop once! I was very proud of her.

We're bundled up and ready to trot!

The whole family got involved in the trotting!

Maile Girl at the finish line

Maile came back and ran the last yards with Lauren

Very proud of my little runner!

After that we cooked up a storm at the house – it had a huge kitchen that was perfect! The girls loved having so many people to play with, read books, play games and goof around with.

Cooking with Grandma

All in all, it was a fantastic extended weekend and a nice start to the holiday season. We hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving as well!

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Maile & Grandma Jill’s Dinner Party

by Papa K on August 10, 2016

(Dad note: Apologies for the long delay on posts! Maile and I traveled back to Boston last Wednesday and over the weekend I was riding in the PMC. Between the ride, work and lots of travel, I’ve been behind on my posts – sorry!)

Maile is spending a couple weeks in Boston staying with Grandma and Papa. Its quite an adventure for Maile Girl and so far she is doing great and having a blast. When Grandma heard that Maile went to cooking camp earlier this summer she had the great idea to have Maile throw a dinner party when she came to town.

They sent to work soon after we arrived, picking out recipes, making centerpieces and placemats, and then, of course, all the prep and cooking. They spent two afternoons in the kitchen getting everything ready – including vegetable crudite appetizers with an herb dip, sloppy joes and a crumble for dessert. Grandma even showed her how to make radish flowers!

Prep, prep, prep!

Showing off her radish flower!

Sloppy Joe, Slop, Sloppy Joe...

The chef with her guests, Nancy and Andrew

At the dinner table, ready to dig in!

The funny thing about this chef is while she loves cooking, she still sometimes is picky when eating 🙂

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Fun at the new SF MOMA with Grandma & Papa

by Papa K on June 1, 2016

Grandma and Papa Boston have always loved taking the girls to museums. In fact, here’s Maile on her first trip to the MOMA with Grandma Jill and Papa Mike.

The new MOMA just re-opened a few weeks ago – so was a perfect chance to check out the new digs. Its a pretty amazing museum – one of the nicest art museums I think I’ve been to. Excited to have it here in SF and I’m sure we’ll be back again.

Here are some shots of the girls and the rest of us exploring…

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A Quick, Fun Visit from Grandma & Papa Boston

by Papa K on May 31, 2016

Grandma and Papa Boston flew in to town for the long weekend and we packed in lots of fun while they were here. They arrived Saturday afternoon and left Tuesday AM, but along the way we went to a BBQ, played some bocce with our old neighbors, ate some delicious meals, went to the new SF MOMA (more on that trip later), went to the park with some old friends, went bike riding, walked all over, read, introduced Grandma to Totoro and just had a blast. Whew, I’m tired just thinking about it. And that doesn’t even count Grandma and Papa’s visit to Lauren’s classroom on Tuesday morning, which by all accounts, was pretty epic!

Grandma and Papa Boston with Maile (almost 7) and Lauren (3.5)

It was definitely enough to tied us over until later in the summer when we all get together again!

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This is your kids. This is your kids on Grandparents.

by Papa K on February 15, 2016

Maile and Lauren are two very lucky girls. Last week, while we were traveling, Grandma Gail and Papa Cal took good care of them and kept them busy with all sorts of projects and activities. This week, during school vacation week, its Grandma Jill and Papa Mike’s turn and they are kicking things off with all sorts of fun adventures.

And all along the way they send us photos so we can eavesdrop on all their fun 🙂

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Thanksgiving 2015: So what else did we do?

by Papa K on December 2, 2015

We’re back in San Francisco now, working off some jetlag (4:30 AM wake ups for both girls this morning – ugh!) and thinking back on a great week in Boston. This year was special for Thanksgiving since a lot of Grandma Jill’s family came in to celebrate with us. Of course, we did a horrible job taking pictures with any one – but that’s because we were having too much fun!

We did take a few pictures as we went about our week though and we had a ton of fun going all over the place…

First stop, getting our teeth all cleaned - and more cavities filled for Maile Girl 🙁

Lauren is the coolest dental patient around!

Then we headed into Boston to see Daddy's high school play at Fenway Park!

My first football game at Fenway Park! Do they always play here?

Lauren accompanied Daddy for his annual tackle football game with his childhood friends...

And we saw some Good Dudes in Boston on Sunday...

Getting in the spirit of the season...

Oh yeah, and Maile lost tooth #2 (with an assist from Papa Mike)!

And she got a little sick one day too 🙁

Lauren found a big giraffe made of Legos...

... and an even bigger Christmas Tree!

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Cape Cod Vacation, Part 1: Beach Time!

by Papa K on August 9, 2015

Last week after the PMC, we headed to Cape Cod (Chatham specifically) for a week of fun with Grandma, Papa, Auntie Elyssa and some other friends. We rented a great house for the week and spent a lot of time on the beach. We’re not normally a big “spend every day at the beach” family – but we went for it this time and had a blast.

The beach we spent our time at was called Ridgevale Beach. It was an awesome beach for families – one of the best I’ve been to (outside of Hawaii, of course ;). On one side there were tide pools that the kids absolutely loved running through and searching for crabs. On the other side was a solid beach and a sand bar that was fun to swim out to. Water was warm and calm and we let the girls run wild – and they loved it.

Watch out beach, here comes trouble...

... and she brought her friends Maile and Papa Mike too!

Papa Mike assisting with some serious hermit crab mining...

The tide pools were perfect for Lauren to run and swim around in...

The only way we could keep them still...

A great beach is even better with great friends like Jordy!

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PMC 2015 – A Great Welcome At the Finish Line!

by Papa K on August 5, 2015

(Apologies for the lack of posting this past week – we’ve been on the east coast for the PMC – see below – and vacationing on Cape Cod. Been spending good time away from the computer, but that has messed up my posting schedule!)

This past weekend I rode in my 5th Pan Mass Challenge. Last year, Maile joined me in Boston for the PMC while Mommy and Lauren stayed home. Maile, Grandma and Papa Boston met me in Boston after I took the Ferry home from where the ride finishes in Provincetown. That was pretty awesome.

This year was even better! Christine and both girls, along with Grandma and Papa Boston AND Auntie Elyssa all came down the Cape and were actually there at the finish line when I completed the 192 mile ride. I had never had anyone waiting for me at the finish and it was everything I hoped it could be. I’m truly thankful that everyone trekked all the way out to the very tip of the Cape.

We had a great ride and it was an awesome weekend once again – and even better, this year, we rented a house out in Chatham and have been enjoying some vacation time this week (more on that to follow)…