Kwanakis 2007!!!!!!!!!!!

Perhaps one of the best pics I've ever taken, above is Lucy trying to eat a sammich and laugh at the same time. This was only one of the many delightful moments at this years annual Kwanakis Celebration. This years theme was a sort of karaoke entertainment night where everyone was welcome to sing, play music, or perform in any way they wanted. Below are just a few of the wonderful acts and some great pics.

Can you guess? Yup, umbrella...

Ain't no fun

SF Preggy Lilli

Xmas

Mom and Paige

While my mom was here from Nov 29th until Dec 6th we did a lot of fun things, but also met our cousin Paige from Australia. Her grandfather is Jeff who is my grandpa Ernies' brother. It was great getting to know her. While mom was here, we went to some awesome restaurants- Tavern on the Green, Spice Market, Mesa Grill, and Cafe des Artiste. We also went to some Chelsea galleries- aaah, the sequined and spiny red white and blue patriotic saddle! The Neue Gallery had a fabulous exhibit on Gustav Klimt. There was also napping and a lot of walking around. We had a drink at the Cafe Pierre at the Hotel Pierre and saw the tree at Rockefeller Center. It was so much fun! Come back mom!

Behind the red curtain at this fancy hotel is a burger joint

Kate, Paige and I in Washington Square Park

All of us after having dinner at Sticky Rice

By the way, this is my street :)

At Rockefeller Center

Bronx Gridlock Takes it ALLLLL!!!!!!

The roller derby is the awesomest thing ever!!!! I can't wait for it to start again. My first game happened to be the championship and although my favorite players- Cheapskate and Suzy Hotrod were on Queens of Pain- the Bronx Gridlock ended up winning...

Bean Town, Day 2

We had to finish the Freedom Trail, so we walked up to Bunker Hill and then the billion steps up the monument to the top- it was a great view of the city. Next we headed over the the park along the Charles River and watched all the boats- mostly sailboats. From there we thought we could see the Harvard campus- ooh! We walked along the river for a while, then headed to Newbury Street where there was a lot of shopping and restaurants and got some sushi. We were pretty tired, so we decided to head back to NYC. Since it was Labor Day, the trip back took a few extra hours. It was sad because we could see the skyline and we were so close but it took like 2 more hours at that point. All in all a great introduction to Boston- I think we did a lot in the time we were there. Hopefully we'll be back soon.

Pahk the cah in havahd yahd

We went to Boston for about 30 hours. We just made the 9 am Chinatown bus, and after 4 hours of driving through beautiful New England, we arrived at the Boston Bus Terminal. We headed out on foot and spent the next, oh probably 7 hours walking around Beantown.
We headed up to the Boston Commons and wandered through the lovely park, and then started on the Freedom Trail- a painted red line that takes you by a lot of downtown Boston... its pretty cool because it takes you past a lot sights- the gold dome of the Boston State House, a graveyard where Sam Adams and some other patriots are buried, and the Quincy Markets- where we got a bowl of clam chowdah. We wandered to the Aquarium and looked out over the water then headed back to that red line. We saw some churches and old meeting houses and Paul Revere's House. It was a nice day, a great walk, and all the leaves were beautiful- just starting to turn yellow. We go a piece of Boston Cream Pie- from a pretty famous bakery (there was a huge line) called Mike's. We still hadn't figured out where to stay, and we could see the Marriot across the river, so we headed over and ended up getting an amazing apartment type room (with a living room and kitchen) on the 8th floor corner overlooking downtown Boston and the Charles River. After a bit of a rest, we went to see the USS Constitution, still following the Freedom Trail. Next we had to get some good seafood, so we went to the Barking Crab, which was a fun sort of tent like place on the water. The food was great and as we were eating a fireworks show started going on.

Boston State House

Fountain in Boston Commons

Sam Adams Grave

Old-looking important building

the hahbah

clam chowdah in Faneuil Market

Paul Revere's House!

The beautiful view of the Charles River from our apartment-like hotel room

Chris and boat

USS Constitution

The Barking Crab!! We sat along the river and a huge fireworks show went off while we were there...

Shakespeare in the Park

Chris and I naively walked over to the ticket office on Lafayette 20 minutes before they started giving out the FREE tickets to that nights performance of Romeo and Juliet. We were like, yah, we'll just grab some tickets... when we got there the line went so far down the block you couldn't even see the end. We trekked to the end of the line where they told us that the people had told them that tickets would run out 10 people in front of us, but we waited anyways. When we finally got to the front, they were giving out single tickets not together so we grabbed 3 (one for Chris Burns) and headed to the park.
We met Chris at the entrance to the Central Park Zoo and went in and saw lotsa birds, red pandas, penguins, monkeys, seals, and giant polar bears. It was great.

Marmoset

Red Panda and Sea Lion Head

Birdies

When we left the zoo it was 5:00 pm and the Shakespeare didnt start until 8:00 so we decided to walk around, and then it started raining. This would have been fine if we had remembered our umbrella, but Chris and I are still used to California weather where you can pretty much look outside and tell what temp it is and if its sunny or rainy.

We wandered around came across another free thing in the park, this time a concert and a band that I actually like was playing, Apples in Stereo, so we listened to a few of there songs in the rain. After this we wandered over to the Delacorte Theater near Belvedere Castle.
The theater was really cool, its outside and Elizabethan style, which I guess just means that it comes out into the audience. It was a full circle that could rotate and it had this opening that had probably and a couple inches of water, so they were often walking in water. Its hard to explain, but it was really cool. Juliet was played by Lauren Ambrose (Claire from Six Feet Under) and I thought she was good. My favorite were Mercution and the maid, who was the comic relief and played by Camryn Manheim. Romeo was a bit overdramatic for me. All in all, it was a really great production and it was free!