coen gets his wings

as sad as we all were to leave the city, we were very excited to go to portland to see auntie shanny and uncle mike. of course our future pilot was most excited that he got to fly on a plane again. the flight attendants fell in love with coen and his joy of flying. within minutes of being up in the air they were letting him call and talk to the pilots. he was in heaven. they pinned him with real wings, and as soon as the plane landed they took him up to meet the pilots. best. day. ever. 

finn leaves his heart in san francisco

our sweet little finn was quite sad to leave the city. 

i feel you finn. 

tear. 

cruising the bay

on our last day in san fran coen and i took an hour cruise of the bay. about 10 minutes in i remembered that i get sea sick. i actually did okay while on the boat, but here we are 2 days later and i still feel like i am floating. 

coen did pretty good on the boat, and loved seeing the golden gate bridge. 

of course he was ridiculous and cute and everyone loved him. of course. 

finn takes the train

san francisco zoo

yesterday coen and i headed out for a day at the zoo. this week has been SO beautiful. blue sky, not a cloud to be seen and pretty much NO fog. i think we have had more sun this week than hilo has seen in awhile, it's just a little chiller. about 20 degrees chillier. i am loving it! 

we had to take the muni train out to the zoo, and the whole experience was pretty smooth. it is always stressful to jump on a train and not be 100% sure what to do next. but we did it, and i feel victorious about it. 

this is a beautiful zoo. very spread out and park like. we could have stayed for 4 more hours, but nap time was calling and my feet hurt. the reindeer where visiting, getting all fattened up to pull the jolly man's sleigh. coen was mostly excited to play on all the bronze statues of animals, and of course the steam train ride was his most favorite part. just in case you care, i was all about the giraffes. the giraffe exhibit is top notch. 

i love having a kid to justify all these fun outings. total perk to being a parent, you get to be a kid again. 

jolly old saint nick

what is better than a picture with santa? a FREE picture with santa. we happened upon a very high tech santa at the mall in downtown san fran. microsoft is sponsoring these free pictures in cities all over the country, so check to see if there is one in your area. they take a few pictures, then send you to a fancy computer station where a friendly microsoft elf helps you email the pictures to yourself and prints out one free picture. 

annnnd our santa was SO super nice and jolly and coen loved him. LOVED him. 

oh, and he gave out full size candy canes. 

and, i got one too. 

there was a small misunderstanding. coen really in his heart thought that santa would give him what he asked for right then and there. i didn't realize this till we were walking away and coen was yelling to santa, "where is my new really big airplane?!" 

he was crushed all night. poor guy. 

anyway, the older i get the more strange it seems to visit santa at the mall. but you know, to coen it is perfectly normal and he really really loved it. so, there you go. 

oh, and santa please bring that really big airplane. but you can go ahead and pass on the weed-eater he keeps asking for.

i love this face!

i am so lucky to get to spend my days with this sweet face. we headed out to the children's creativity museum, to um get creative! for some reason coen was in rare form and honestly was a train wreck. 

nothing a little ride on the carousel can't fix. 

this is the result of me trying to get a picture of the horse he was riding. i am not allowed to let go of him for even a second. 

making me sand pancakes on the playground. he is quite the chef. 

and the best part of our day, lunch with daddy!  

these are the lame shots i got at the creativity museum. it really was a very cool place, coen was just not feeling the large crowd. i am admitting that this outing was a total disaster. you know what? it happens and i started to let it ruin my day, but decided to shake it off. 

and that is actually really hard for me to do. 

we all know there are gonna be days like this.