Christmas 2010

A group of friends came over for Christmas dinner. It was a nice way to break in the house for our first Christmas in El Cerrito.

After dinner snuggle.



Have a great New Year's!

Sunset Views of San Francisco

First Winter Tahoe Trip

Tahoe has been hit by some big early storms the past view weeks. Good snow and blue skies made for a great couple days at Heavenly. Too bad we didn't have as good of luck on the blackjack table.

Early Christmas in Gualala

Kevin, Yari and I spent the weekend before Christmas with my parents in Gualala. It rained most of the weekend but the condo we rented was pretty cozy and had a view of the ocean. Definitely looking forward to visiting Gualala when the weather is better. Also I need to get another bag of coffee from Cafe Lala.



We headed up the coast to the Point Arena lighthouse. We decided to take the tour to top.

Point Arena is the closest point on the West coast to Hawaii. The lighthouse is also the tallest lighthouse you can visit in California.

Andrea and Sean's Wedding

A whirlwind weekend of celebration for Andrea and Sean's wedding. Lisa P. and Mandy flew in Thursday night and we crashed at Andrea's along with Darcy, Jackie and Britta. The next day Erik and Dan married Andrea and Sean at City Hall. A cable car took us back to their house for champagne toasts and Johnny shots. A too-much-fun trolley ride ended my night pretty early at Mercedes where the reception was held.

The festivities continued at Andrea and Sean's the next day.

Tahoe for Bendy!

We spent a weekend in Zephyr Cover at an awesome cabin overlooking Lake Tahoe.

Shasta & McCloud Falls

Kevin and I met up with Kim & Brian at McCloud Falls. They attempted to summit Mt. Shasta but turned around a couple thousand feet short of the top.
While they were up on the mountain we did a great hike at Castle Crags and another hike along McCloud River.

Night-time View

Lisa & Jocelyn in the house!

I had an awesome birthday with Lisa and Jocelyn visiting on separate trips. Lisa came first and we hit the most awesome El Cerrito garage sales. She helped us with fixing up the backyard.

Jocelyn came and the two were able to overlap with a dinner at KR's amazing place overlooking Mt. Tam.

Jocelyn, Andrea and I watched the opening to Eclipse followed by an lunch at Luna Park, then Dolores and finally Zeitgeist. Joc and I continued the birthday festivities by watching Eclipse, again, with Kevin at the El Cerrito speakeasy.


Definitely a great birthday celebration!

Moving Day!

Thanks to Erik, Ari, Jiri and Sherri for helping us move down the three flights of stairs of our old apartment and into our new house! That damn, comfy but unwieldy couch gave us trouble again. It took us awhile to move out but fortunately we were able to unload pretty easily so it left more time to grill.

We returned to the old apartment where 2 hours of cleaning turned into 5. :(

Painting, painting and more painting

99th Bay to Breakers

Sticking to the Beer Pong/Flip Cup theme, we descended upon Golden Gate Park for Bay to Breakers 2010. Ari had the best costume, making the most of her Dirty White Elephant present. It was probably the last year for the ping-pong table theme. Rumors of an alcohol-free Bay to Breakers are swirling around for next year. We'll see what happens.

Hopefully our new house!

Just had the property inspection yesterday and things are looking good. Hopefully the rest of the process goes well and we'll be moved in by Memorial weekend! It's in El Cerrito, just north of Berkeley, and less than a half hour BART ride from San Francisco. More pictures...

Mandy's last days in California, sniff sniff

Mandy organized a farewell meetup at Becketts in Berkeley.

Passing around the green hat for everyone to wear.

Final sunset from Mandy and Cameron's apartment.

Tears!!!

Tahoe

Ta-HOE! While I didn't go as much as I wanted to, I had some really great days snowboarding at Heavenly with blue skies and good snow. It an unbelievable feeling going down the trails with views of Lake Tahoe in front of you.

Kidnapping Andrea and Ferg

"We're just trying to avoid Bridge traffic," we told Andrea & Sean. They were starting to get a little anxious when we kept heading way south.

Meanwhile Mandy went all out decorating a hotel room with Cameron, Erik & Ari in Santa Cruz.

As part of their surprise we took them to the Mystery Spot. The general consensus... nausea.

Playing pin the engagement earring on Andrea.


And cake!

It was a very random night involving the Santa Cruz boardwalk and arcade plus a bowling alley/karaoke dinner.

Palm Spring Getaway

Charity, Bechtel and a few of their friends rented a house in Palm Springs over President's weekend. A 50's tiki theme dominated the house.

We pretty much just lounged around the pool and enjoyed the sun, warm weather and Mai Tais. We also hit a casino or two during the weekend.



Half the group went to Joshua Tree for the day.

Weekend in San Diego

Dana was attending a conference in San Diego so I flew down for the weekend.

Renee took me to a fun bar in her neighborhood and we met up with Dana in the gaslamp district.

Dana felt the call of the mechanical bull.

I spent the afternoon at the San Diego Zoo before heading back to San Francisco. Koala bears!!!

Bear Valley

I joined Kim, Brian and Sucio at Bear Valley to celebrate Kim's birthday. The weather wasn't ski friendly so we went snowshoeing and built a fun sled run instead.