skiing with grandma and cousins. matt was ready! wore his helmet on the drive up the mountain. when we got there though a little unsure - he did do 4 or 5 runs before calling it quits - mostly skiing inside my skis though. kaitlyn doing great she liked dilly dally alley (renamed candy cane lane for the moment).
christmas eve at grandma's with the cousins. tony and i managed to overlap most of xmas eve and xmas there and the kids got a week with grandma.
well i admit, i am a cat person. hamish was a good dog, but i really haven't minded being dogless for the past two years. kaitlyn has wanted a dog though and recently tony chimed in that he might be interested. and i have told kaitlyn that if the right dog came along that needed to be rescued we would consider it. well meet sara a 3year old addisonian choc lab/pointer/something. her previous loving family opted to give her up due to the cost of care in her crisis and lifelong ongoing care for her addison's. and she is really super sweet and older and trained and good with cats and matt likes her and is not afraid of her. so we are no longer dogless. the cats are thrilled.
tony did the seattle half marathon on thanksgiving weekend. it was rainy but not too cold or windy. we stayed in a hotel with a pool and had old spaghetti factory for dinner - so the kids were thrilled! and had fun watching for daddy at the finish line. 
star wars this year. mom got the only decent pictures of the kids in costume and for some reason i can't turn them. princess leia and a clone trooper. grandma came to trick or treat with us and we actually had a dry not to cold night and the kids had lots of fun. 
bread and cocoa for breakfast again! then took tony to the bart station (he had an earlier plane home). then finally to chinatown (kaitlyn had been asking all week). the kids had fun and we ended up with a few more things for the plane home! then we were off to the bart ourselves and home. 
lots of bus time on monday - we had breakfast at bread and cocoa - yum! and then off to the golden gate park. the kids spent hours in the playground - then another bus to the cliff house for lunch - extra yum! then off to play at ocean beach, managed to make it back to the hotel to meet friends, go swimming and out to dinner.
kaitlyn and matt begged to go on the duck tours on sunday. it was actually quite fun and we had a good tour guide. when the ducks went in the water he let the kids take turns driving - and they really drove - i almost needed dramine! kaitlyn didn't want to drive but matt did! lunch at boudin bakery and then we played and watched sea lions on peir 39. took torlley back to the hotel to meet tony - grab some food quickly and head back down to the piers to take out night tour of alcatraz - highly recommended!
