Day: June 13, 2009

Photos by Sonja, comments by Andy.

May 30: Another weekend day down “south” (around San Jose) to enjoy the warm weather. I think we’d be reluctant to admit it, but it’s too cold in San Bruno for us. Even when the sun shines, the wind blows over the hills from the ocean and it is chilly most of the day. So we often find ourselves driving 20-30 miles south for the day, where it usually stays warm as long as the sun is up.

Rancho San Antonio park has a farm with some animals for the children to see, after a 1 mile walk, so it’s always a good destination. This time we discovered it also has a creek to play in:

The goats had 1-week old kids:

The way children interact is fun to watch. A lot of children end up around the animal pens. The first children Leilani saw, she ran up to them and said “Hi, my name is Leilani, do you want to play?” They completely ignored her, pretended she didn’t even exist. I told Leilani the children were busy with their own games and that she should try to be not so straightforward and more engaging.

The second time Leilani tried to make friends, she and another girl were stalking the farm cat. I thought this had a chance of succeeding, the two girl were showing a common interest. Then they got upset about who saw the cat first and how that might give some privilege. Then the girl picked up the cat as if it were hers and walked back to her family who were sitting in the shade. It was so surreal that I understand how Leilani didn’t really know how to react.

The third time was a charm, literally. Both were held up by their parents to see the goats, and started a conversation that first was all about counting the goats, and then Leilani started to clown around and they made each other laugh. Soon they were running around and Leilani wanted to race with him. Then they climbed on some stumps and jumped around, then they both wanted to see inside the barn:

They they found some real common ground, making faces:

It turns out that Seyon and his family are like us: we both moved to the Bay Area recently, and lived in Europe before that.

He had ridden his bike to the farm, but walked all the way back with Leilani, playing tag, scaring each other with monster noises, and dragging on the daddy:

Leilani showed him her two favorite trees. The hollow hobbit tree:

And the fairy house tree ring (of California bay trees that smell so good) where they played house and danced together:

BUBBLE BATH!

Look what I bought at the Asian Image…

Wow… that’s nice… do you think it’s good quality?

(it somehow reminded me of a tortoise)

Tiger gets a haircut (fortunately just a pretend one, and hopefully not a trend…)

Leilani wrote a letter to Santa Claus… well she dictated one: “Dear Santa Claus, please bring me a light-up Rudolph with brown dots and a little bit of red for the nose. Thanks You, Leilani” She drew a picture of it so Santa knows exactly how it should look. I really hope Santa does not forget, it’s a long time until Christmas…

Andy adds: …and a long time since last Christmas when she saw the light-up reindeer lawn decorations, I’m surprised she remembers.

Where have you seen this photo before?

Answer: At the top of the blog and with Stitch.

Photos published by Sonja, comments by Andy this time.

Finally, when everyone was feeling better and ready for a weekend hike, summer weather was over and the gray clouds stayed all weekend. But we still got in the car and drove over the Golden Gate Bridge to Mt. Tam (NOT visible in the distance):

It’s a curvy road, and I think I drove too fast and Leilani started getting sick. So we pulled over where there was a little stream. It turned out to be a pretty little area.

And Leilani found a redwood tree to hold up:

As we drove up, we reached the top of the clouds. At the parking lot near the peak, it was sunny and beautiful. We started by hiking a short half mile to the peak.

To the north it was all clear.

To the south, we could see nothing but clouds.

25 miles north of where we live, it is still spring and lots of flowers are blooming:

Even wild roses:

Since we didn’t want to go down into the clouds, we just hiked on the forest trails along the main ridge.

Sonja found the salamander, but we assume it’s not the one that lived at our house for a while:

When we stopped for a very late lunch, I showed Leilani how to smash acorns with a rock. After I told her that’s how the Indians made acorn flour to eat, she said she was an Indian and smashed a lot of acorns.

As you can see, lollipops are great motivators for Leilani on hikes.

In the end, it got cold in the late afternoon, Leilani got cranky and we walked back to the car.