A great morning

This morning we told K that she is going to be a big sister next spring. She was and is giggly with excitement. She reminded us we are going to need lots of things for the baby, particularly a car seat with a handle to carry the baby. (I am sure she is excited about all the potential toys for her babies.) She also told us all the things she wants to do with the baby but mainly she wants to laugh with the baby. When we got to school she immediately told everyone so lots of warm wishes.... and as I left for work she told me to "have fun with the baby"

Now finally she understands why mommy spends any free time laying around sick. The other day when I came home from the East Coast and she found out I was still sick she told me "Mommy, I hope you feel better someday" I hope I do too. The last month has been horrible as I am so sick. I am looking forward to the first trimester ending.

Where's Mommy?

Apparently someone asked K where her Mommy was? K's response: She is NY. Follow on q: What is she doing there? K's response: Buying me presents!

Mommy who

Daddy and K have had a rocking weekend! They went to Eats my favorite breakfast place in the city yesterday and hit the zoo.. K's favorite part of the zoo were the kangaroos although she was bummed not to feed them. And as is fast becoming a tradtion that K loves more than us... a requisite stuffed animal. She got a little tiger (luckily she is not looking for his family, which is what she spent most of our trip to Bali last year with her zoo giraffe. I convinced her not to throw the giraffe in the ocean, that is where she thought his family was living and she was trying to organize a reunion. However we did end up buying two giraffes which she still plays with.) She has talked about the zoo every time we chat and so we will definitely have to return soon.

Today Daddy made them a nice early dinner and promised her a walk into town for an ice cream if she ate her dinner... Heaven. Especially since she got to go to the farmers market, hit the bookstore and play with Gma S this morning while Daddy was golfing.... Tomorrow I am coming home and am going to suprise her with Magnolia cupcakes.... Let's see how they do on the trip. Luckily I also scored the new Madeline book that just came out.... One of her favorite series.

My weekend in NYC was awesome.... Can never ever complain about NYC! The weather was incredible about 80 all weekend and the play, All My Sons was really good. Getting to see the play, Katie Holmes in the theatre and waiting for her afterwards was lots of fun. Suprisingly there were more folks waiting for her after the play than when we saw Julia Roberts on Broadway a couple years ago. K and I also went to the Met to see the recent remodel and the Turner exhibit and wandered the park and the Upper West and East side. I am hoping to see a bit of West Village and the Meatpacking district before heading home, but I am working tomorrow so not sure if I will get more than lunch in.

Stayed at the Hudson which is a beautiful hip hotel with great views from the Terrace and the restaraunt. Their bar is definitely one of the coolest bars I have ever been in with the most awesome drinks, which is how I initially discovered the hotel. Overall I would have to say the small room size make it not a really attractive hotel to return to. Thank goodness we didn't stay here when we came as a family last month.

DC

The work part of the trip has been fantastic.... Today I spent a few hours at some awesome museums.

I started at the Cocoran Gallery of Art which had a really neat exhibition on by Richard Avedon with all these really interesting portraits of folks... Very cool.

The best museum was my second even though it was rather intense... the Holocaust Museum. They did an incredible job displaying things, from peoples stories through a variety of mediums, a train car for visitors to walk through so you could see what the conditions were like of people being taken to the camps, pictures of lots of things better not to describe, a display of hundred of shoes taken from the Jews and given to Germans, a beautiful exhibit on Darfur to remind visitors of today's genocide. My favorite part was of the end... they had created a theatre made completely out of stones from Jerusalem with a tv interviewing survivors... There was a woman that described losing her friend the morning they found out they were liberated, she died en route to get them both water. On her way back she saw an American man who spoke to her in German, he also was a Jew but was there to liberate them and asked that she show him around. Both of them were in their early 20s and the story ended with them getting married and still being married today. It was a really moving museum!

The last museum I went to was the Phillips Collection, which had loads of beautiful Impressionist pieces and the perfect way to end the museum tour. Excited I saw three new museums.

Last night I got to run in Georgetown after my event which was beautiful. And tonight I am hoping for one more run.

I talked to K and Daddy this morning while they were out on their Starbucks adventure. K wanted to know if I had seen any horses and since I all had been doing was working since getting her I told her no horses, but I am going to NY tomorrow and will see loads there. Her response "New York again." Yes, going to NYC for a girly weekend to see Katie Holmes on Broadway with a CA girlfriend. Very excited about the girly weekend ahead.

Cavallo Point

I had a conference earlier this week at Cavallo Point at the Golden Gate. We had hoped to make a family get away out of it, but the work schedules didn't permit. I still had a really nice time as the views are stunning, the rooms are huge and the yoga class in the morning was awesome and a great way to start a day of work! However coming to get K and giving her the flashlight for bedtime that they gave us at check in and sharing an apple was just as fun.

I took a red eye to DC last night... What a hard place to get to, you can be in Europe for the same amount of travel time. Luckily I recouped at Dean & Deluca with watermelon on their patio, reading the entire New York Times at Teaism with a yummy tofu salad and a bit of wandering around Georgetown. I brought all my running stuff so I am looking forward to running around my hotel as the area is really neat and great scenery to distract me... I am going to need it as I finished my day with dinner at the Four Seasons so outside of a bit of walking I don't think I got any real exercise in today. I did pick out the museums I want to visit so that is nice...

Daddy she isn't talking to you

We had an awesome family weekend with lots of lounging, but some really fun moments like checking out our friends B&A's beautiful new home that took years to build, but is stunning and getting to meet their third child who is even more beautiful!

However one of the highlights had to be a wedding we took K to on Saturday. The last few weddings we have attended have not included K as we have been in the wedding parties and thought she wouldn't enjoy being stuck with a nanny while we were off. So Saturday we took K to the first weddding she has been to since being a baby... and she loved it. The wedding was at the Stanford church so beautiful and of course great grounds for running... T was holding K as the priest asked the audience if we will support the couple etc. etc. K who was watching every detail turned to T when he said "we will" and told him in a firm voice. "Daddy, she is not talking to you, why are you talking" of course I was immediately in giggles. There was a 3 hour lag between the wedding and the reception followed by a 3 hour dinner which K handled in style impressing our table and everyone around her.... Mainly because she was very very motivated by the cake... When it came time for the toast K thought they were serving the cake and so she belted out at the top of her lungs from across the room "It is time for CAKE!" Needless to say lots of laughter. She found some other kids to play with and they rocked the dance floor... very sweet to watch them dancing and even allowed us to dance as everytime we tried to dance with K she walked away to hang with the kids. It was really nice and although kept her up way past bedtime a great family affair.

On Sun we met M&J as always a fun time. When I mentioned to K we would be meeting them... Instead of the standard why she asked if we were meeting them "because we haven't seen them in a while and we want to hear how they are." After a moment of silence I said umm exactly....

And finally one last awesome moment was her first extended playdate without us at one of her favorite people in the whole world, Mar, who goes to school with K. We are doing trades every couple weeks since the girls can't get enough of each other and we parents can get a few things done.... As soon as K woke from her nap, we heard her run down the hallway from her room, down the stairs to see if it was really time to go... The girls had way too much fun together.

New York

We were reading a story the other night and the little girl had three choices of places she could live.... When we asked K where she would live she immediately chose NYC. Hmm, wonder why, here are some pictures of K in NYC a couple weeks ago loving life!!! As we left Manhattan we asked her if she liked NYC. She said no, she didn't like NYC SHE LOVED IT!

K loves gymnastics

We finally signed K up for gymnastics. She has been going for a couple of weeks and she really loves it... Check out a couple pics of our super star!

Weekend fun...

On Friday Daddy had a bachelor party so me and K went out for ice cream after dinner and also finally bought a jogging stroller! The new stroller is awesome and was great on Saturday when we ran into town for a test run. We also ended up perusing the festival in town and going over to some of the kiddie rides, sharing a lemonade because it was so hot (consumed more calories than I burned with the lemonade alone). K is going to be a great trainer as the whole time we were running she was telling me to run faster! I have my own little coach! Now that the heat wave is over we are looking forward to lots of runs together.... We also went to our pool and went to a bbq with lots of kids on Saturday night so she had a fun family day.

Sunday T and I took Pmogi to Napa. We had planned to do the trip months ago when she first turned 21, but the weather yesterday made the wait well worth it... It was a tiny bit too hot, but we went to Auberge du Soliel for lunch, The Farm at the Carneros Inn and had awesome wines at Trefethen, Joseph Phelps and a few little wineries that just looked interesting. It was a really relaxing day and a nice way to help her celebrate being 21!

Our walk

K always spends as much time as possible dragging out bedtime with lots of chatter about the day.... Whenever she senses that you might be leaving she immediately asks so how was your day... anything to keep you in her room and her far from sleep.... Last night while we talked about our favorite parts of the day, K mentioned her favorite part of the day was the walk we did after dinner. And I had to post a few of her comments from the walk.

"Daddy, Thank you for making the lentil soup" Just as T goes to respond K continues with "I am so glad it is far away." So maybe she didn't like the homemade soup as much as she suggested especially since after we made her eat the requisite five bites she said she felt like she was going to throw up. Until of course she found out that being sick also meant missing out on a walk and just staying home. Not to worry... I loved the lentil soup, after all I was the one who requested it for dinner...

And when we returned from our walk.... K said "I am not going to put my shoes in the closet, I want to wear these next year." Needless to say the shoes are still sitting near the front door.

Our grandma's are the best!

We have the two best Gmas in the world!!!

Yesterday night Gma C's package arrived with a cute little cow for K to use for her morning milk as she likes to prep her breakfast herself. Heaven. K was thrilled this morning when she was able to use the cow pourer for her milk and watched me clean it very carefully as it is super fragile. So much for the plastic winnie the pooh cup we were using. Gma C makes everything better. K was even more thrilled when it came last night with tons of big bubble wrap for popping.

Gma S has been saving the day around here while T and I have taken turns traveling and been covering K and making dinner for us. Additionally she found these magnetic marbles for K that K is in love with.... When she came over to watch Obama last week during the DNC I think we all spent more time organizing marbles rather than watching, but we are very lucky to have such awesome Gmas.

Pmogi also covered for me while I had my nightly summer school class and T was in Europe and Gma S was away.... Which reminds me... it is official I PASSED CALC! That is right my fantastic tutor has been relieved from his job as calc tutor. You can't even imagine how awesome the last few nights with no math at the end of each night have been, we have actually been able to talk and not about math!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And needless to say we talk about Aunt S, Aunt J and Cat. all the time as we miss them soooo much! The girlie visit earlier in the summer as K in love with all of her family and asking daily when everyone is coming to visit again.

So all in all we are very lucky, we have awesome Gmas, Aunties, Cousins and I have the best husband in the world, who has tutored math to his wife for pretty much our whole marriage. Unfortunately we still have statistics, but I am definitely not taking that this quarter.

The Human Race

I went down to LA this weekend to run in the Human Race. It was really fun. They had 15,000 runners participating and as a result tons of energy. The run part was good and of course could have been better, but I haven't been working out much in the last few weeks due to work and travel.

Just going to pick up the race packets on Rodeo was fun as there were tons of people out, never can complain about walking down Rodeo and they had a great dj there. The run was held on Sunday and started at 8:31pm in downtown LA right near USC. On the night of the run they started out with the list of celebs also running in our location, clips from around the world of other runners who also ran earlier in the day as the run was held all over the world and continued on with a bunch of Olympians who came out with their medals and warm wishes. The opening ended with a celebrity trainer getting everyone stretched out and we were off. The energy rocked!! There were people watching on the streets, kids who wanted our glow sticks and what was even neater music representation from other places that were also hosting the race. So as we ran along we ran into Brazilian, Chinese, South American music being played by various bands. It was really cool... The run ended with yummy little treats from Starbucks and Bear Naked granola. Also as part of the run Kanye West performed (he had also performed in Australia for the human race... thank goodness for time differences and flew back to LA to close out the race here)... Of course great music. The night ended with an incredible firework display (awesome for me as I haven't seen fireworks since before K was born as they are always way past bedtime.)

Not sure how another 10k can compare to such an awesome production. It was great and a great check in for the half marathon also sponsored by Nike in mid October. Better keep running.

The rest of the weekend with A was really nice as we got to see Sex in the City followed by awesome food in old town Pasedena, wandered on Melrose, went to Manhattan Beach, hit Pinkberry and Little Tokyo for sushi and most importantly found our shorts for the run in October! In high school I am sure we never thought we would spend three hours searching for running shorts.

Home

How could I forget our awesome comfy bed..

I am so lucky to have such an awesome family... Meeting K and Daddy at the airport and getting a very warm welcome from MoCa made me feel like one very special mommy last night... even with a 16 hour travel day.... We went to sushi on the way home (bummed to have missed Gma S's meal she cooked for our return) and I immediately felt like a mommy again... trying to convince K to eat, ask for her to keep the door closed as we went to the restroom even though she was done and listening to the daily avoidance of bed. It is nice to be home!

Our last day in Paris was warmer which was great. We went to the Luxemburg Gardens, visited a museum in the gardens and had cafe cremes at one of our favorite cafes which is in the garden, had crepes at St Sulpice and went to our favorite shops... And of course packed... always the least pleasant part of a mogi adventure.... luckily most things made it and K loves loves her presents. She is even wearing her very cute poncho that I thought I was going to have to pay her to wear to school today... Looking super beautiful as always!

Loire Valley

The Loire Valley is really pretty... We have been wine tasting, jam tasting and chocolate tasting. All lovely!!! We have stumbled on fields of sunflowers, seen loads of field mice and even a fox on the way back from dinner one night.

We visited beautiful chateaus at Cheverny, Chambord, Ambrose and Chenonceau. Chenonceau also had wonderful gardens. Lots and lots of hot abd cold pink as K would say. Cold pink is light pink. We spent a considerable amount of time in Bloise, which is a really small town with lots of staircases and little alleys. Although I think Ambrose was our favorite as the food was really good and the town had a very quaint feel to it.

We are heading back for one more blast of Paris before returning home to what we hope is warmer weather. We keep running into cold and rain.

Jean Luc

Thanks to a wonderful man at the Hilton near our flat we have a wonderful week planned. We are leaving for chateaus and wine tasting in the Loire Valley this morning. It is my first time driving in France but what a wonderful road trip ahead.

We learned about some outlets outside of Paris. Needless to stay incredible as we hit our favorite French brands. Agnis B, Chantal Thomass, Compton de Cotoniers.

We also went to Opera Garnier one of the most beautiful buildings in Paris.

We fell in love with Poilane and decided to bring home some of their jams and pastries. Always trying to take on challenging return trips with luggage.

And one of the best things a warm night eating at a brasserie and watching the people go by.

Champagne

Today we went to Reims in the Champagne region... And it was awesome. We caught the morning service at the cathderal which was stunning and had the best pastries and breakfast in all of France. And the best part of the day... A tour of champagne caves at Pommery. Freezing, but very cool... Down 30 meters and surrounded by champagne, very unique contemporary art and did I mention cold cold air. We learned about the champagne making process, very cool. The tour ended with some vintage champagne and two very happu mogis.

paris

Ok, so I have lost count of cafe cremes... All yummy! We have done some amazing things in addition to hitting up some of our favorites such as the creperie in St Sulpice, falafels in the Marais, pastries at Laduree and Berthillon ice cream. The grapes are incredible and so sweet, if only I could get them through customs.

But a few of my favorite moments:

Seeing a beautiful Vivaldi concert in St Chapelle which has stunning stained glass windows. Incredible!

Going to La O'rangie a small Impressionist Museum in the Tuilleries and indadvertently saving the best for last... Two circular rooms with every wall in the room covered by 20+ panels of Monet's Water Lilies... Being able to sit in the middle of the room and feel like you are in the middle of a pond of color.

Shopping... More shopping and of course more shopping.

An outstanding cafe in the Tulleries watching the people go by. The only cafe creme so far that served the requisite chocolate pieces making it the perfect drink.

A picnic on the Seine of cheese from Heidard (which I found in Singapore and loved) and eating stolen bread from our lunch table as every boulangerie closes for the August 15th national holiday and believe me we searched. Apparently they bring in palm trees and a bit of sand for a beach in the middle of Paris so there we sat staring at beautiful palms and the Seine. Interesting.

first cafe creme of 08

After 20 hours in Boston complete with lunch in the North End a few shops on Newburry, loads of meetings and a quick seven hour flight to Paris.... the mogis are here and ready for Paris!!! Just had our first cafe cremes and gearing up for a day of walking, museums and exploration. No shopping due to a national holiday. Not to worry we can power through all our museums in one day leaving endless hours for shopping!!

Not one time but five times

We asked K if she liked or loved NYC. She said she loved NYC and wanted to come back at least five times. We spent the last day or so downtown wandering SoHo, West Village and the Meatpacking. I saw the most beautiful kids clothes at the park in West Village, Wow there are some beautifully dressed kids for the park. K tried her first Magnolia cupcake and T and I had a wonderful anniversary celebration with K in the meatpacking. We picniced in the park, wandered and did loads and loads of walking. It was great. Even our babysitter worked out while we were at the bell ceremony went fantastic. We were scared to death as we had tried it once before a couple years ago and it was horrible. I think a return trip is in order.

not the good bye we hoped for

With meetings running late and a lack of available cabs we had a sprint to our hotel and a crazy ride back to the airport with limited cash resources for the tip and very limited time. Luckily I was able to promise large tips and many rides next month when I am back in New York. battling rush hour was jerky and we all ended up rather sick so there we were K and Mommy cuddling in the backseat laying down while K tells Mommy... It's ok, I will cuddle with you, don't be sad. I know the van is too big, it's not a Lexus. You will be fine, don't worry.

The funniest part of this the comforting is taking place after the pee in the cake takeout box. We bought some great looking cake, which we never ate, so out the cake went so that the container could double as a potty. Of course not an exact science and poor Tom took off his shirt to clean the cab floor. The cabbie said nothing did a million illegal maneuvers and I got to my flight which I was late for with 40 minutes to spare. So the goodbye now that I am in Boston and T and K are on a flight home was a quick kiss and a wave as I flew out the door. I am going to miss my travel buddies!!!