The Year in Pictures: December 2007

December! While we didn't do anything out of the ordinary, it's always a memorable time of year with decorations, presents, and festivals. As the end-of-semester rush slowed down, we found time for day trips to Naples (again) and to Pasadena. The Naples trip was more of a night trip to see all the holiday lights, and for both better and worse, we inadvertently chose the night of the annual boat parade. It was crowded and festive, but it was also CROWDED. The trip to Pasadena was much mellower, with our first visit--and a fun one at that--to the Kidspace Children's Museum on the grounds of the Rose Bowl. (And as only Cal fans could say: "So, THAT's what the Rose Bowl looks like in person.")



The lights in Naples weren't the only ones we toured, and I got a few decent pictures on one of our evening walks around the neighborhood. On another night, I also managed to snap a quick shot of Santa, who was scouting the neighborhood via a City of Los Angeles Fire Truck.



The roster of December festivals also includes the Winter Spiral at the boys' school. This was Everett's first such live performance with lighted candle, and he did well--although he repeated his birthday performance of his endearing "wet" technique for blowing out the flame. Tony's class did its own spiral, and then entertained us with one of their great musical programs.



Of course, the real highlight of the Christmas season are the visits with family, many of whom don't see but maybe one other time each year. Thus, we had a wonderful Christmas Eve in Diamond Bar, and an equally enjoyable week to end the year up in San Jose. And, yes, there were presents.

The Year in Pictures: November 2007

Another month, another birthday. This time it was Everett showing off his candle-blowing prowess...twice. First came a modest true-birthday cake, then came a big weekend party, during which his candle-blowing technique became more, ummm, saliva-ey.



November also brought the culmination of the soccer season, and I finally got around to catching some photos of both boys in action.



And November, of course, concluded with Thanksgiving. It was a smaller-than-usual celebration for our family this year, but the SoCal branches of the extended Hoereth family did manage to get together for a good time, both in Diamond Bar and Long Beach.

The Year in Pictures: October 2007

October is the beginning of birthday season for us. Well, September is actually, if you include Audrey's, but somehow the boys' birthdays somehow warrant more attention than our own. Tony opted out of a conventional party this year in exchange for a family day trip to North County San Diego and Legoland. This proved to be a refreshing change of pace for all of us, and the fact that we could conclude the day with a dinner at Pizza Port Carlsbad certainly gets me on board with the idea. We did manage to also hold a small cupcake celebration at home on Tony's big day itself. Despite a momentary flare-up, he was able to extinguish all eight of his candles just fine.



October also brings what is fast becoming one our favorite weekend events of the year: a block party of sort at Burton Chace Park in Marina del Rey. Tony's cub scout pack passes out free hot dogs, which are always welcome, and there are fire trucks and other cool equipment on display, but the real highlight is the extensive collection of blow-up "bouncers". For the second year in a row, the boys' favorite was the giant red slide, and it proved to be a great spot for action shots.



The cub scouts also organized a return trip to Tanaka Farms in Irvine, this time for pumpkin picking (what else?). While most agreed that May's strawberry trip was better, the pumpkin patch did at least help get us in the Halloween spirit. And we managed to get in and out of Irvine just ahead of the horrific wildfires that engulfed much of interior highlands of Orange County and the rest of Southern California for the following weeks.

The Year in Pictures: September 2007

This is an easy month. It was back to school for all of us, which meant a busy but regular schedule following the free and easy days of summer. It was busier than usual, too, as now we had TWO boys going to Ocean Charter School and TWO boys playing soccer. This also meant I was coaching TWO soccer teams, including one that met TWO days a week with midweek practices joining Saturday games as part of our routine. Add in the fact that I was teaching a new class for the first time, and that I also began my TWO-year stint as co-chair of the Environmental Affairs Committee at the college, and the free time to brew beer and take photographs disappears. Indeed, we've only got a pair of photos from the month to share below, as I decided to go camera-free to the months two main events: a weekend trip for Audrey and me to San Jose for her 20th high-school reunion (fun time!), and a big party at my Mom's the weekend before to celebrate (belatedly) her 60th birthday and the completion of a big landscaping project she and Woody commissioned over the summer.

As for the photos, the first is of the two brothers on their way out the door for the first day of school. The second shows Everett (blue #10 on the right) in action during his first soccer game.

The Year in Pictures: August 2007

As the calendar turned to August, our summer camping trip continued northward along the Big Sur coast. We made an extended stop at Point Lobos, on the south side of the Monterey peninsula, to revisit an old girl-scout destination of Audrey's. The skies were characteristically gray--and the poison oak was literally everywhere you looked--but we still had a great time exploring the tidepools and hiking along the rocky coast. There wasn't a whole lot of marine life visible, but the seabirds and poppies were plentiful. Indeed, both boys insisted on a photograph with a particularly majestically perched gull (see blurry white blob in the background, as the poor light made me and my camera rather depth-of-field challenged).



Following a nice few days visiting Audrey's folks in San Jose--including a special family trip to watch The Simpsons Movie (Spider Pig!)--we turned the family truckster back south, passed through scenic Hollister (where we failed to see both Abercrobie AND Fitch), and stopped for a couple days at Pinnacles National Monument. As expected, the daytime temperatures were quite a bit warmer than along the coast, but not unbearably so. And the swimming pool at the campground provided a nice refresher after a long day of fantastic hiking up into the volcanic pinnacles themselves. Moreover, the campground was rather empty of people but teeming with wildlife, including deer, feral pigs (whose origins date back to either the Gold Rush or the Spanish, depending on whom you ask), and bobcat! We kept our distance from the latter--and she from us--but it was still a great encounter.



From Pinnacles we continued south, but also backtracked toward the coast. Following a very welcome pit stop in King City, and a memorable lunch of pizza and Firestone Walker Double Barrel Ale on draft, we made our way to Morro Bay and Montaña de Oro state park. The camping was better than Pinnacles, but the hiking--at least not the trail we chose--was worse, and we were all starting to long for our own beds back home. Nonetheless, we did spend some fun time wading in the water and climbing the rocks at Spooners Cove.