Tha girls...summer '09 to Christmas Eve'ish. Enjoy!


First attempted, hand-crafted gingerbread houses.

At this point realizing the royal frosting "glue" wasn't functioning ... running to the kitchen to slap together some water and powdered sugar substitute which will cause all candies to droop and slide down the sides of the houses ... erg ...

Demolition started before the gnomes had a chance to move in. But then we're not Norwegian so maybe that's okay. Feeling sick now ... sugar coma ...

Dec 5
Ursula wants a good definition of the word "soon" and we've been failing her miserably. Because I told her Christmas is coming soon. But not until after Thanksgiving. So she woke up November 27 and asked if it was Christmas. When I said, "no, not for another month." She objected, "but you said soon." Well, isn't that soon? Another month? Then daddy had to go to the office. Ursula wanted to know when daddy would be home. When I told her "soon" she melted into tears. Back peddling, I said, "soon - like an hour and a half soon." "But I thought soon was 25 days!" And you know, saying that "soon is really relative to the situation" doesn't help matters. At. All. [s]

Ursula and school buddies Vivian & Lily practice their rabbit and alligator dance moves during intermission at The Velveteen Rabbit, performed by the ODC dance company. This was her first time in the audience of a live performance. aMAZing. Although later when Ursula figured out that we had skipped preschool to attend she was appalled. Jaw dropped. Tears fell. Accusations were made. General how-dare-you type of thing.

We have installed an alarm system to the advent calendar - a bell sewn to each day of the advent calendar.

Happy Holidays! This is not the photo we are using for our holiday card - but just barely. Tilda is affronted by having to sit still if a camera is aimed at her. And Ursula almost never looks AT the camera. At least here she is not a blur from dodging our of view. Big thanks to Noni for the patience of a saint and fabulous photographic services.

Grampa shows the girls how to use a REALLY BIG saw.

Tilda took a few licks of the whipped cream and was seemingly satisfied. Ursula took it much more seriously.

Ursula encourages Tilda to try out Pacman's bed (Pacman is Aunt Erin's french bulldog visiting from NYC) before Thanksgiving dinner..

Oct 30
We've been to the preschool party - awesome! And now have staked out a trick or treating 'hood for tomorrow known for "committed Halloween enthusiasts" that dance, costumed, in lit windows with music blasting, strobe lights, and plenty of jack 'o lanterns. Pretty close to us actually, but without all the locked up condo hallways.

There is quite of bit of back-and-forth costume negotiation with the 4-year-old ... would-be mariachi singer, would-be Super Cow, would-be robot-errr-tinman, would-be chair (!) ... We got her (forcibly) settled on Little Red Riding Hood for the party. The 2-year-old, on the other hand lurches into a high-pitched wail at the suggestion of a costume. Daddy brilliantly suggested we sew a wolf puppet onto Ursula's red coat - a real coat with buttons - meaning we could trap her in an appropriately warm costume. But pretty much as soon as we got to the party she stuffed an entire cupcake in her mouth and vomited all over the coat. [s]

> Ursula practices her evil laugh, [wav, 55kb]

Thanks to Ohdeedoh we started a new tradition here and it tastes reeeally good. Nom, nom...

Little Red Riding Hood, Gramma, the Wolf, and Littler Red Riding Hood, at the preschool party, right before Tilda vomited. Oh and Ursula later admitted she ate seven of the thickly frosted cupcakes set out on the knee-high table. She was running around feral while mom and dad were chasing, ahem, Stinky, and helping out at the craft tables.

Party body painting.

Rare moment when Tilda dons a costume of her own free will.

For a few seconds Ursula was adamant that she was going as gramma.

The Glam Rock costume?

We had to throw in a photo of the Halloween-conscientious-objector here to balance out the enthusiast. This is Tilda's I-love-you-so-much-I-have-to-grit-my-teeth look.

Ursula, Tilda, and Daddy work on a physics lesson ... friction, gravity, momentum.

Oct 10
The girls had a special treat this morning- sugar pumpkin whole wheat pancakes with spiced whipped cream! Someone called this "the breakfast that sticks to your thighs!?" Tilda and Ursula had their first flu shots yesterday...up the nose, nasal spray variety...and then back next month for part 2 and then part 1 of h1n1 and a month later for part 2- jeesh, you'd think the doctor would listen to us when we mentioned that Ursula just got over the flu- and most likely the h1n1 variety. [e]


Planning a pumpkin carving?


Here's the pumpkin carved from another drawing done right on the sphere




Recovering from the flu in her new pajamas and sleeping bag- thanks for the gift!!


Everyone gets to eat at Tilda's Diner (even T-rex is invited to the bean party)


Raspberry Devil's Food Chocolate Cake!


Burnt Sugar Vanilla Walnut Cake!

Happy Birthday Matilda! The big # 2 (with her Raggedy Tilda doll)


Happy Birthday Ursula! 4 and many more...(with Raggedy Ursula doll)


The girls taking the girls shopping


Ardenwood Historic Farm...turkey enjoying a free range


Trying out the engineer's chair on the train




She sees her sister drawing all day...both have filled sketchbook after sketchbook


This is right down the street...San Francisco hires these goats to eat the extra grass and foliage on hard to reach hills of the city..Tilda was very excited




As we've found too often, there is never enough tracks for the girls


With a little help from Daddy, Ursula had a masterful plan with the curve pieces


Planting almond trees.

The "goop" at preschool eventually soaked out of the sweater. Five hours and a toothbrush work miracles.

flavor: salted caramel...edit- this was balsamic strawberry...daddy had the caramel

Daddy's gone for a week installing a show in Maine. Perhaps he flew on one of these airplanes. Wait - is that a mermaid up there!? Perhaps Ursula thinks daddy flew to Maine to get some Starbucks coffee. When he talks to Tilda on the phone she cries and points at the door ("where daddy? daddy come home!").

Day 5 at preschool Ursula gets stuck on "the dome."

Ursula salutes you (or the cell phone) on her first day of preschool.

Was very, very worried about the bento snack passing muster at the new school. So far Ursula has been loudly critical of the hummous she got on day 3 even though the pine nuts were carefully picked out. I'm starting to wonder if that box is BPA free, I mean it was just so nice and cheap ... There is no way I can keep everything labelled (the Sharpie marks keep coming off the plastic). Ursula is intensely proud she has her own lunch bag and bento just like in My Neighbor Totoro. And Tilda is determined to investigate and upend everything in that bag right before leaving in the morning, even though she gets her own bento (there are two up there).

Usually she naps with Baby Ruby, Baby Greta, or Baby Agatha. But today it was the microphone. Here she is singing into it.

Trusting daddy gives a chocolate-cupcake-equipped Tilda a ride.

Taking advantage of the melon-end of the season.

Tilda tries to snuggle a babysitter during a photo-op.

Daddy gets convinces some slave labor to "harvest his farm" in the social networking game "Farm Town."

Tilda explores the grounds of the Inn at Occidental.

Plant identification with grampa.

July 8th

Summer fun! Ursula and Tilda just had a great visit with Gramma Kay! She took the girls to the Academy of Sciences, Mammal Rescue Center and we took Gramma on a cold windy hike, sorry ;)

Today we went for a birthday trip to pick your own fruit in Brentwood...we're a few days late for the good fruit, but did have some apricot and peach scraps. Next year we'll get those cherries on memorial day.


Tilda getting a chance to pick the higher peaches on the tree. Ursula kept getting the lil' ones lower down.


Hike near Devil's Slide...you can see the tunnel construction on the mountain in front of us...


At the Marine Mammal Center...all those seal pups were rescued and hopefully will return to the ocean after some bandaids etc.


Dr. Wolsborn and apprentice help rescue a seal pup with a milk pump.


Climbing the lifesize elephant seal sculpture...


Aunt Nancy supervising the best pre-desert ritual in the world.


Uncle Bob always calms down the kids during a vist...(kidding of course)


Blackberry hunter on Independence Day.


Someone ate all the berries...before we could bring them home.


Our new family plot at the USF community garden...Ursula gets ready for planting.


Temperatures don't do this photo justice...we needed to stretch legs...it was windy and about 44 degrees in the fog...

Someone enjoying a well deserved post-hike juice box


Looking down from the Coastal Trail near Muir Beach


Fighting politely over who gets to blow the seeds of the dandelion...


Thrilled to rub on the molasses and salt glaze...(handmade sourdough pumpernickel)


Someone just loves to read read read...we had to get her a special light so she could go to sleep on her own. On the first night we found her asleep with a book across her chest, nightlight still going, right next to her head...tough fight. Since then, she places the book to the side of her bed and can even turn off the light before zonking. (Next week is the tough one...Tilda will be joining her big sister in the same room...crossing fingers)


Finally! She doesn't try to run straight into the pond. Oh Tilda, please grow up, but not too fast.


Painting buddies


"I'm very happy to have you on the trail"


"Yay! I'm out of the backpack carrier and free to run" (Please don't run into the poison oak)


Summer fun!


Pizza!


This is the nicest way Momma could think of to encourage some roughage in Tilda's diet. It took almost an hour to gut that many sugar peas (Tilda won't yet eat the pods) and pit that many cherries.

Tilda (a.k.a. "godzilla") is now able to restrain herself from knocking over Ursula's cities, buildings, swimming pools, and other constructions. But it's not easy for her. Notice the twist, the bitten lip, ...

Gramma Kay made this for Uncle John in 1970...Ursula loves him...yes, Raggedy Andy...who is now a lady.


Summer came early on sunday..90 degrees and then the next day was 52...oh San Fran.


From a nice cutting paper lesson to a Tinkerbell inspired bang trimming. She even went to get a ziplock to repeat her first haircut. Argh..


redruM pasta time

April 30 Whatever flu...every sneeze at the supermarket causes everyone to look around. This is going to get scary really quick. My bet is that they cancel graduation...sad.


Tilda gets initiated at USF as a model for the Painting 1 course. She lasted 1.25 hours (with the help of a DVD...)


Foxtail barley..


Andrew Wyeth eat your heart out.



Getting some meat on our little meateater...

Did you miss the last couple weeks of pictures?