Fun with Dad

Yeah for Saturday! We love it when Daddy doesn't have to work! During our vacation Ken and I would wake up early in the morning and walk on the trail around the Bay. It was so nice to spend that quiet time together. Our first stop on our walk this morning was for me to show Ken where Rose's fishing pole went over their pier the afternoon before. The tide was extremely low and the water was so calm and fairly clear. We were actually able to see her fishing pole laying on the bottom of the ocean floor covered with about 3 feet of water. Ken (being the awesome fisherman that he is:-) ended up going back to the hotel and got Darin's fishing pole and was able to fish out Rose's pole! Oh my goodness that little girl was so happy when she opened her sleepy eyes and saw her fishing pole! It helped that Daddy kept telling her that she was the only one who caught something because there was a muscle stuck around her line. I wish I had taken a picture of them together, instead I just have Ken right after he fished it out of the Bay.

The plan for our fun day was to ride BART into the city and go to Alcatraz. That evening Ken and I had a SURPRISE planned for the kids.
Rose was Daddy's little travel buddy. They were inseparable. Rose really took it upon herself to make sure Daddy didn't get lost in the city. Seriously, so cute!
Nathan and Ginger are so cute together!
All week I had been teasing Ken about bringing his Leatherman with him on his work trip and wearing it all day. A leatherman isn't exactly Bay Area Metrosexual:-) But I had to eat my words on that one since it came in quite handy for fishing and for fixing my purse zipper.
Darin and Me.
This is Coit Tower. Darin took a bunch of pictures of historical sights for his school project.
Me and my Nathan on the Ferry ride.
The Golden Gate Bridge
Darin was able to get a picture of Ken and me with Alcatraz in the background.
The Rock
Rose and Ginger were such good sports all day long.
Well, except for when they had to hike up the equivalent of 13 stories. I believe that is what the guide told us. We took a guided tour of the Fort, then did the usual Audio Tour.
This is the shower room. The boys were disgusted that the prisoners took a shower out in the open with 40 of their closest friends. That's the way I put it to them:-) Rose and Ginger thought that was AWESOME to be able to shower with all your friends.
On the audio tour...



The girls kept their earphones on for about 1/3 of the tour.

The tour was great! After it was over the girls were so ready to be off the island. This picture may look like she was hiking the hill but she was actually walking down it backwards. Silly Girl!
Rose hitched a ride on Ken's shoulders.
Back on the boat the girls were back to being extremely cute and lovey.
What's up with strangers taking pictures of our kids??? It happened alot on our vacation.

After Alcatraz we all needed to rest our feet and get something in our bellies. We stopped at Hard Rock Cafe at Pier 39. My number one travel tip is to pack a deck of cards. Oh my goodness did they save us a number of times. Plus, it's just fun.
Darin especially liked the music. Of course he does like Rock music bordering on almost Heavy Metal.

Two seconds into our bus ride to the Bart Station Ginger fell asleep. Rose fell asleep like 2 minutes later. It was craziness. Thankfully Ken is strong enough to haul around 95 lbs of girls. I practically had a heart attack when he had to walk down two flights of stairs while holding both of them.
Those two girls slept through everything. They were squeezed and juggled all around as we navigated the crowds.
We had to get off at a transfer station to hitch a ride onto the train we really needed and they still slept through that. They slept for over an hour. Ken likes to re-tell this story to the boys about the different stages in a man's life. Right now he is in his 30's which is clearly the Pack Mule stage of man's life.
Nathan is so handsome!
So, all day long we teased the kids with hints about our surprise. Well, actually we didn't give them any hints, they just kept trying to guess what their surprise was. Ken and I totally threw them every which way so they had no idea what we were going to do. It was AWESOME!

So we packed them up in the car to drive to our surprise and guess what all of our children did...
Nice huh! It actually turned out for the best because their surprise was to see a double-feature at the Drive In Movies in San Jose! And we were running a little late to catch the first show, so we actually had time to pick up our usual Kentucky Fried Chicken and set up our car with all of blankets and pillows. We were still able to see two shows it just meant us staying up until 3 am. Those naps came in handy for our kiddos. We couldn't give up on our plan after we built up our surprise all day long. So we pushed ahead! We saw Yogi Bear and Rango. Well, Darin, Nathan, Rose, and Ken saw those two movies. I cuddled with Ginger for a little bit and we both fell asleep for most of the movies. What can I say, it was a super long day:-) And lucky us lost an hour the next morning because of Daylight Savings. We could possibly be the craziest parents, but it was so much fun!