Mara's Visit

We have had a very busy month of July!  It all started with Mara coming to visit us from Maine.  We had such a great time hosting Mara on her first big trip to Cali by herself.  We did so many fun things together and Tory and I loved turning it into a "staycation" for ourselves.  One highlight was our fun 4th of July.  We took Mara to an A's game (note: we wanted to go to a Giants game, but they weren't in town.  We said, "I guess we can go to an A's game, but only if they're playing the Red Sox." And they were!)  We took the BART and ate lunch inside the stadium at a restaurant with floor-to-ceiling windows so we could watch the game as we ate.  We stayed there and out of the sun for the first 4 innings so we had a great view, but when we got to our seats, we were sitting as high up as possible!

That night we had an awesome BBQ in our backyard.  Mara had already helped us back there quite a bit, so it was time to enjoy some of our hard work!  We had a great meal (complete with watermelon that we cut in my mom's style) and finished it off with a super special cake that Mara and I made and decorated together.  They went over to the Herricks to watch the fireworks, and I watched at home. Tory made a totally ghetto firepit in the morning so we could make S'MORES late at night.  So after the fireworks, they came back with Chris and we had lots of fun in the back lighting some tiny firecrackers.  Unfortunately, Tory bought UNSWEETENED chocolate for the SMORE'S, thinking that because it was Ghirardelli it would be great, but forgetting to check the type of chocolate.  He made a bet with Chris that he could eat a whole bar in two minutes, and we thought he could do it easily because he's done the Saltine challenge easily before.  He barely got through half of it!  Mara and I improvised by spreading peanut butter on the graham crackers and sticking chocolate chips to them :)

Another fun outing was when my parents came up for the day.  They took me to a TaskRabbit user testing job, then we all went out for lunch in the Marina. We went to a modern Italian place with amazing food and awesome service.  I was so pleased that I went home and wrote my first Yelp review!

No trip to SF would be complete without walking across the Golden Gate Bridge!  This was our first time doing it (we tried once but had no idea it would take so long and only got halfway across).  It was ridiculously crowded and super windy but we still had fun.  We made it across to the other side, took a few pics, and headed right on back.

One of our most adventurous days started off very ho-hum: yard work!  We made Mara earn her keep with some good old fashioned manure maneuvering.  (The results of that hard work will come in a later post).  After that morning working hard we drove all the way down to Capitola for some fun in the sun.  On the way we got out to watch a bunch of people kitesurfing -- so cool!  We got an amazing picnic lunch at Gayle's then caught some rays.  Tory wanted to rest after all the yardwork but as usual Skyla had other ideas.  Mara and I had fun watching the lifeguard camp that they had; there was a super cool surfer dude type (just like Crush from "Finding Nemo") and he kept doing these drills where he would call something out and all the kids would run and jump in the sand.  

Mara and I had lots of fun together when Tory was at work.  We did a super girly day that included high tea at Lovejoy's Tea Room.  I had run by it a bunch of times but this was my first time going in.  It was so fun!  They brought us tea along with tea sandwiches and fruit.  They even brought Skyla her own little plastic tea set. It was so fun!

One of our more adventurous days was when we went to Great America.   We got there nice and early to avoid the lines and went straight to Flight Deck (formerly known as Top Gun).  There were lots of changes but for the most part it was exactly the same as when I used to go there with Casey and Fiona in my middle school days.  One of the best changes is the water park they've added -- we can't wait to take Skyla there some day!

The remaining days included lots of great food and fun with family and friends.  We went out for my mom's birthday at a cute Italian place in San Jose, we went to Boudin for some good old fashioned sourdough bread, we went to North Beach for dinner with Molly (and gelato at a place right next to Mara's pastries!), and we had the Bargas family over for a cookout and S'mores.  Too much fun!

We were very happy to host our beautiful, sweetie pie niece and sad to see her leave.