Putting Abel to work!

I've been pulling Abel around on his tricycle for a few weeks now and I've finally realize I might as well us the tricycle as a cart too! Abel loves it.

Oh how I love sunny weekends

The Rae Clan headed out to Guemes Island for a much needed mini vacation and we had a great time. I had a small amount of "garden guilt" as we loaded onto the ferry, the weather was amazing! How was I leaving the garden in it's messy, needy spring state for three days?

I pretty quickly got over it. We stayed at the Guemes Island Resort, which is on the beach, and spent the weekend playing on the beach, taking mini hikes, harvesting and eating copious amounts of wild nettles, throwing sticks for Maddie, reading, napping, and eating. It was great.

We stopped in Edison on the way home for snacks (okay, we stopped in Edison on the way to and from Guemes Island). We couldn't pass up Bread Farm and Farm to Market Bakery. No, not even once. How is it possible that such a small town has two of the best bakeries I have ever been too? And they have Slough Foods? I really love Edison.

So, we took our bounty (Allium bread, fresh local Chevre, and a pear danish) and headed to Maria and Dennis's new farm in Alger. We met the new chicks (all 35 of them), Ian helped Maria fire up the tractor for the first time and we wandered around the property talking about what critters would live where, someday.

It was a great, relaxing weekend. Pretty much exactly what we needed.

Christmas

Christmas was everything I'd hoped it would be this year. Fun, delicious, sincere, handmade and filled with joy and laughter!

The days leading up to Christmas were full. I've never made so many gifts or done so much planning! I actually made a calendar for the days leading to Christmas so that I would be finished making Christmas gifts and stocking stuffers by the big day! And, I am happy to report I loved the process. Planning the gifts, the meals, decorating the house, wrapping the presents! The hardest part was waiting to give Abel his gifts!

That said, Abel cleaned house this Christmas. Ian and I made homemade puppets, a handful of stuffed critters (wolverine, mountain goat, lynx, and dinosaurs!), and a shop/kitchen. Yes, a shop/kitchen. He is crazy about it. The inspiration for the kitchen came from a blog I saw months ago, but the more I thought about the kitchen the more I thought, Abel would love a shop. I knew our house was too small for both a shop and kitchen, unless we combined them. Ian put it together and its perfect. Add to the shop side a set of "tools" and some super cool nails; add to the kitchen side a cute little tea pot and wood spoons and the kid is set! Abel of course got a mountain of other gifts that he also loves, but there are too many to list!

A newish tradition to Rae Christmas has been the addition of "games". We started the tradition a few years ago and this year we upped the ante. Ian and I created a scavenger hunt, the prizes were a can of sardines and a gift certificate to wash dinner dishes! Okay, we made the scavenger hunt on Christmas day and didn't plan for the prizes, we'll do better next year! And yes, there will be another one next year! The scavenger hunt was so much fun. I haven't laughed so hard for ages. It is truly my favorite new Christmas tradition.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, full of family, love and laughter; and wishing everyone a joyous new year!

Planes, trains, pigs ears, and cousins!

That's right, Abel took his first plane ride, ate pigs ears and hung out with cousins. Oh California, there is no place quite like you!

The Rae clan needed a vacation and when the Kenney's welcomed Baby Langdon to the family early this month we knew we had the perfect excuse for a trip. Our visit included five days in San Francisco, Thanksgiving with Jodi's family and a few days of hanging out with Jodi's family in the beautiful Carmel Valley (where Jodi and her family live).



As Ian would say, we ate our way through San Francisco. We didn't eat a bad meal and let me tell you, we ate a few strange ones! We ate delicious chinese food (to include pigs ears, a savory custard with clams, apples and herbs and delicious eel fried rice) at Mission Chinese, breakfast every day at the Farm Table (yes, every day!), sushi (Abel loved it), Indian food (he didn't love it) and Burmese food at Burma Superstar (the tea leaf salad was amazing!). We also got to visit Ian's cousins in Alameda, hang out with friends in town, walk to the top of Tank Hill (we are Raes! We had to find the highest point around), walk along the beach, check out Golden Gate park, play at the Exploratorium, walk across the Golden Gate Bridge, eat sugary pastries in Chinatown and browse books at City Lights Books.

Perhaps the most challenging and fun part of our visit to San Francisco was figuring out transportation. We opted to not take a carseat, committing ourselves to only using public transportation. Trains, subway, foot, bus, plane and ferry. No, we didn't take the cable car. They were ridiculously more expensive than the alternatives and slow. I do have to admit that they look pretty cool coming down the street.

From San Francisco we took the Cal-train south to visit Jodi and her family in Carmel Valley. We got there in time for Thanksgiving and it was good! Jodi made a super tasty pumpkin cheese cake, Dave smoked a turkey and the side dishes topped it all off. Dinner was good!

It was fun to see all of the cousins hanging out and "playing". I say "playing" because there were four kids under the age of four. It was a little crazy. Carson and Abel are learning the art of sharing, Peighton is willing to share but would like to be asked first (or so it seems to me) and little Langdon is only 3 weeks old so he's not playing yet. Everyone came out unscathed, only one dish was broken and frankly both of those feel something like small miracles!

That said it was wonderful to spend time in Carmel Valley. It is so beautiful and warm there!

And now we're home. And how I love this place. Walking off of the plane last night in the pouring rain I was reminded of how much I love this place. Of how much this place has come to be my home, my place. Sometimes we have to leave to remember. And now I remember. This place, this life, is so right for me. I'm grateful to have visited family and friends in California, to have seen the sites and eaten tasty food and now I'm grateful to be home. Home with Ian, at 2912 Cottonwood Avenue, with our critters out back, the winter rain pouring down, playing with Abel and laughing at Maddie, while sitting in front of the wood stove.