Family

On Thursday afternoon, Bruce and I had this NSFW text exchange.

I was just about to go pick up the boys at school, but luckily my friend Tiffany was with me and she said she’d tell them I’d be a little late if I wanted to pop over to Google. So I rode over there (across the street) and saw outside the visitor’s entrance a black suburban, presumably waiting for Bono’s return. So I plopped down on a bench and asked Bruce to come out and join me for a casual visit.

Pretty soon Bono emerged from the building with his host, Sergey Brin.

There was no press, no onlookers other than me and one other man who’d been sitting outside and called Bono over to chat, and only a couple of other people who seemed to be Bono’s mini entourage. He walked over to the car and chatted with Sergey a bit more about the driverless cars in the parking lot.

And then he was off. Seeing Bono so close to home and hearing his iconic voice made my day! Heck, it made my year!

As an added note, I’ve searched for news and/or pictures of this visit on the interwebs over the last couple of days and I can’t find anything. Apparently, even visits to Google[x] are super secret … or perhaps this was only a big deal to me.

(More pictures here.)

I cleaned out our desk area yesterday and came across this year’s horrific school pictures, which I had buried under a stack of paper. We have a history of bad school pictures, but these may take the cake.

The group shots are more acceptable.

The Sunday that was Mother’s Day was a lovely but low-key affair. Bruce made me breakfast and then the four of us went to San Francisco to see the Kronos Quartet play a family matinee gig. We had lunch in the City and then hit an open house in Redwood City on the way home. (The scariest house ever, by the way, for which someone will probably pay 30% over asking.)

Anyway, I was kind of surprised by the boys’ lack of involvement in the day. They didn’t have crafts from school, which they’d always had in years past and I love receiving. Moreover, they just seemed to not really realize what day it was. Granted, we Moisions are generally low-key about these Hallmark holidays, but still it seemed odd.

Well, in true Moision fashion, a couple of days later they sprung into action with a “surprise” breakfast. I put that in quotes because they’d asked me to get bacon, eggs, hash browns and bread at the store for a big weekend breakfast, and then prepared it all while I was out on my walk yesterday (Wednesday). They also made a card which I was to read aloud and then at the appropriate moment they would put the plate in front of me.

Ezra also made me a monster frame which you can see in the photo. It’s nice to be appreciated and loved, no matter what day it is.

It’s time for another random photo posting. Here are some shots that don’t fit in anywhere else.

And here’s all of us at the Giants game.

A couple of days ago I noticed there were new signs on the boys’ bedroom door. I think they are so indicative of their personalities that I had to post them. Here’s Ezra’s.

And Finn’s.

The first week of April (and spring break) brought us a three-day visit from Bob, Vanessa and Thomas, as well as a Saturday with the Detterich clan. We had a great time with everyone! The boys couldn’t wait to see their cousin and hijinks ensued quickly. Upon their arrival, there was an immediate nerf gun war that lasted a couple of hours. After a break for dinner, we walked to Rick’s for ice cream where we tried to get a picture of the three boys. They weren’t particularly cooperative.

On Saturday we met the Detterichs at the kite flying area of Shoreline park. It was a perfect day.

After kite flying, we went over to Google where the kids tried not to fall into the water …

… played video games …

… tried out some Google snacks …

… and explored all of the crazy Google stuff.

The adults played around a little, too.

Later, the kids bonded over computer games.

And then we had dinner at the local ramen place before the Detterichs left.

The next day was Easter, so we had an Easter egg hunt in the back yard.

After an enormous amount of sugar was consumed, we decided to try the Canada Road bike ride again. We were a little worried they might not close the road on Easter Sunday, and the weather was threatening rain, but we set out anyway. What could go wrong?

Things looked good at first as the signs said the road was closed, and the weather app said it wouldn’t rain. Alas, just as we reached the beginning of the closure the rangers were out opening the road up again. We don’t know why they opened it early but it was a bummer to have the cars whizzing by. And then, just to make sure there was icing on top, just before we got to the furthest point along the route, almost ready to turn around and head back, the skies opened up and it poured. It rained so hard it was actually comical. We were all soaked by the time we got back to the cars, but some time in the warm cars and snacks solved all the kids’ woes.

The next day we Wunderlich County Park for a hike.

A fellow hiker took a group shot for us.

I have lots of pictures from the day (here), mostly thanks to Finn who commandeered my camera.

A few weeks ago we caused the boys a bit of trauma by contemplating putting in an offer on a house in Redwood City and then deciding against it. The house was a kid’s dream (or at least our kids’ dream) with a half-acre lot and a stream running through the property. Alas, it was on a very busy street and we just couldn’t get past the noise so we nixed the idea. Ezra, in particular, was devastated so in an attempt to cheer him up, Bruce invited the boys to come play video games at Google. And cheer him up it did. Here are some pictures from our mini-arcade adventure.

I liked this sign left on a broken Lord of the Rings game.

We had wanted to celebrate Pi Day by having Bruce’s work group over, but a few key members were going to be out of town so we postponed it. Last weekend it happened — a pie potluck and a cornhole tournament. I didn’t take many pictures but we had a nice group of people with a variety of pies: shepherd’s pie, pizza pie, pumpkin pie, berry pie, chocolate pie, and some Russian “pies” (Bruce disputed that these were actually pies, but really only to give Baris a hard time).

I reprised the deep dish apple pie from Pi Day.

And I made a chicken pot pie.

The cornhole tournament was super fun, with Bruce’s colleague, Devin, and I going head to head for the championship. He won.

Here he is celebrating with his two year old, Kingston.

I’m glad Bruce works with such a nice group of people.

March 14, 2015 was Pi Day of the Century (3.1415 …) and we had to celebrate properly. We’d seen a recipe for Deep Dish Apple Pie on America’s Test Kitchen and it was too good to pass up. It was a family affair — Ezra helped me with the filling and Bruce and Finn rolled out the dough.

It’s a fairly fussy recipe, but worth the work. It was beautiful.

And got thumbs up all around.