Halloween

Our pumpkins! Can you tell who did which?

Our awesome penguin costumes! Nothing beats a trip to Goodwill for making Halloween costumes.

Kung-fu penguin.

Kyle and Alexis visit Nor-Cal!

Brian's brother, Kyle, and his girlfriend, Alexis, came out to visit us last weekend. Thursday night we headed into San Fran for dinner (Ethiopian food...yum!) and Nightlife at California Academy of Sciences. They had a great rainforest and aquarium...and we thoroughly enjoyed being able to have some cocktails in the museum. Above you can note the evolution of man!

Friday night...back in San Fran for sushi boat. Sorry it wasn't a real boat ride! And luckily we steered clear of the jellyfish!

Ahoy Matey! Kyle and Alexis looking out over Carmel Beach...do you see what they see?

Great fun in Monterey...kayaking! We got very close to the sea lions, seals, and otters and saw some wicked jellyfish. And...we looked hot in our wetsuits!

The Custer men mugging in Santa Cruz. Finally, the sun was out! Still wouldn't call the beach hot, but at least it wasn't freezing.

We have been very grateful for our recent visitors and have had a great time! All are invited to Seattle too!

Melanie Visits Nor-Cal!

Sorry I have been a delinquent blogger! Time for big updates! My cousin, Melanie, came out to see us a few weeks ago and we had a blast...and kept her very busy. That Thursday night we went to AT&T Park to watch the Phillies play the Giants...sadly, the Phils lost and we froze our buns off. Who expects to need winter clothes at a baseball game in July?

One of our favorite activities since we've been here...biking across the Golden Gate Bridge into Sausalito, where we had lunch. Yes, it was foggy and cloudy of course, but bright, sunny, and gorgeous once we got into Sausalito. We then took the ferry back across and bay and headed to Ghirardelli for sundaes...a perfect treat after our 8mile bike ride!

Saturday we headed to Sonoma for some wine tasting. We got in about 6 vineyards and had a blast!

Picture of us in front of postcard row with the city skyline in the background. This is where the opening picnic scene for "Full House" was done.

And Monday while Brian worked, Mel and I had girls day at the beach in Santa Cruz...nice and relaxing!

Yosemite

We headed to Yosemite National Park on the 18th...it was a free National Park weekend, so why not take advantage?! Our first hike was to Lower Yosemite Falls (above). It was a short hike, but then we did a lost of pseudo-rockclimbing to get to the pool of the waterfall.

You can see Upper Yosemite Falls in the middle of the pic above. It is reportedly bigger in the spring and early summer and by the end of August will be dried up.

This is Vernal Falls, taken on our 2nd and more strenuous hike of the day. We went to the top...1.5 miles...the first half all uphill, the second half up many, many, many rock stairs. It was gorgeous though. Once at the top, we jumped in Emerald Pool in our clothes for a very refreshing swim. There was also a natural rock waterslide that of course we had to go down.

This is the view from Glacier Point. The large roundish rock in the upper left is Half Dome. Off to the right is Nevada Falls, which is just above Vernal Falls where we had hiked earlier.

Our final mini-hike of the day was through Mariposa Grove, one of the home of the Giant Sequoia trees. They really were massive and quite impressive. But it was also starting to get dark and Lori+hiking through the woods at night=Not so much fun, so it was time to head home!

Napa

We spent a lovely day in Napa last Friday. We took in 8 wineries and brought home 7 bottles of wine...not a bad day! Let's see if I can remember them all...we went to Sutter Home, V Sattui, Rutherford Hill, Beringer, Beaulieu, PlumpJack, Alpha Omega, and Peju. We also stopped at Robert Mondavi, but their tasting was too expensive, so we left. We had a picnic after our tour at Rutherford Hill overlooking some of wine country.

Sweet, sweet baby grapes!

I really just wanted to turn one of those over, dump in some grapes, and smash 'em up!

Brian hiding in the grape vines at PlumpJack.

Our last stop (can you tell?) at Peju. Mmm, Mmm Good!

Brian's Birthday Pics

Super Secret Brownie Birthday Surprise...with peanut butter M&M's!

Gifts from my Mom and Dick.

Gifts from Brian's Mom and Dad.

Skydiving!

Brian got very surprised this year by a skydiving adventure for his Happy Birthday. He had no clue until we arrived at the airport. At first he thought he was going to be flying a plane and then he looked at me and said, "Or...are we going to be jumping out of planes?" SURPRISE! Here he is with his instructor, Laura, getting suited up.Those 2 little blips are us! Brian jumped first, so his chute is the one on the bottom. It was really crazy getting to watch him jump! He went from sitting right next to me to being about the size of a dot.

Here's Brian coming in for his landing...which he took a little hard on his bottom. His instructor misjudged the landing just a tad, which resulted in a 10ft skid in the sand, thus also a nice crotch full of sand! But at least it was soft sand on the beach!

And here I come with my instructor, Garth. We landed on on feet.

We survived! And it was so incredibly awesome...unlike anything that you expect, since we never really felt like we were falling. We got to do flips out of the plane, had about 60sec of freefall, then 8-9min of hangtime. We highly recommend it!

Alcatraz Island

Here is Alcatraz from our ferry boat ride over to the Island. We did a guided tour of the island with stories of all the escape attempts made when the island was in operation as a federal prison. We then did the audio tour through the prison. What I found most interesting was that the officers and their families lived on the island and the kids would take a boat to school everyday in San Fran. They described the island as a "nice place to grow up." I don't know about you, but I'm not sure I would want to raise a family next door to the prison where the countries worst criminals were sent...but at least you know where the "bad guys" are.

Me on D Block in isolation.

Brian "taking a break" in his cell.

After going to jail, we went out for some real San Fran seafood...my first dungeness crab and certainly not my last! It really seems like there are a lot of pics on here of me eating...hmmm. Anywho...it was damn good and I will be having more before we leave here!

Fisherman's Wharf

On our first weekend in town, we figured we should start our sightseeing in San Francisco but as where else...Fisherman's Wharf. We basically just spent the afternoon walking around Pier 39.

Sourdough bread bowl with clam chowder...isn't this a great pic?

Forrest Gump outside his restaurant.

Overlooking San Fran Bay.

And of course, the seals! They were very loud and we found it amusing how they would go in the water then come back up and just climb over each other.

Finally...an O's game!

On our first Saturday in town, the Orioles also happened to be in town playing the Athletics. So we headed into Oakland for the game. Above, batting practice.

Adam Jones signing autographs.

Woo-hoo, so excited for the game. That excitement didn't last long. The O's played horribly...so horribly that we were actually embarrassed. Actually, I can't say our fielding was all the bad, but as usual our pitching stunk up the place.

Brian also supporting the O's just as I support his Phils.

And lucky us! We were at a game that included a free Jordin Sparks concert after the game. Naturally we stayed to watch.

Ireland 13

Back in Dublin for our last night...so sad:( We spent the evening the Temple Bar area and had a fantastic last night.

After having an appetizer beverage at The Long Hall pub, we were beyond excited to come across the Gallagher Boxty House! We had wanted boxty during our entire trip, but couldn't find it being served anywhere. The receptionist girl in Killarney had actually told us she had never heard of boxty...we were starting to this it was an "Irish" dish made up by American's until we found this. Had we found the Boxty House our first time around in Dublin, we would've come back. The food was completely scrumptous and if you are ever in Dublin THIS is the place we would recommend you eat. They had over 10 boxty dishes to choose from and we couldn't tried them all!

View of Temple Bar...pub, after pub, after pub. We went to a few and also stopped for some gelato and people watching, which included a man dressed as a cartoon leprachaun with many people paying to have their pic taken with him.

Our last stop of the night, "The" Temple Bar. It was crazy crowded and we had to fight our way through, but worth the stop.

Our last picture in Ireland. All we can say is thank you to Ireland (and to Globus) for an unforgettable trip. We had the time of our lives and would love to return someday. We hope we have inspired everyone to take a trip there! This concludes our Irish Adventure.