January Hiking

One thing that I love about living in California, particularly the area that we live in, is that we have gorgeous weather year-round. Summers are hot (a little too hot sometimes, but not as bad as Utah) and you can escape to the beach or somewhere else along the coast. Fall arrives with its beautiful changing leaves, though Joseph tells me it's nothing compared to fall in Pennsylvania, but I've never been there. Fall melds into "sprinter" a combination of winter and spring, where, technically it's winter, but the leaves have fallen off the trees and almost immediately started blossoming like it's spring. Then somewhere in there, spring begins and lasts us for a few months before it starts warming up for summer again.

This is only our third winter in the Bay area. Our first winter, it rained for about four months straight. It was really cool. Most of the locals weren't particularly keen on the rain, but for Joseph and me, it was awesome. It never rains like that in Utah, or in south Kihei.

Last winter, I'm told, was more typical. The temperatures drop to the mid to low 50s for highs and slightly below freezing during the night. It was nice to get a fire blazing in the hearth and snuggle under some blankets with the kids and sip hot cocoa while we watched tv or talked. It rained about half the time.

This winter has been kind of warm and has only rained maybe one or two weeks so far. The weather has been really nice and mild and beautiful and perfect. So, a couple weeks ago, we loaded up the kids and took them on a hike. Ok, it was more of a nature walk because I'm in no condition to all out hike. It was, however, the first time we've let Asher explore on his own, rather than loading him in a carrier. He did awesome.

I was playing with my manual settings in the car while we waited for Joseph to get snacks at the store. Moses wanted me to take his picture. I just like how this picture turned out. So handsome.

The beginning of the trail. Asher was such a trooper.

Akiko and Moses would race ahead of us...

... then race back down to us (and almost knock over Asher a couple times).

Asher started racing down to meet me, too, which is why this picture ended up blurring him, but I still think he looks super cute in it.

There was a gazebo part way up that the kids declared was a "magic place." I tried to get a picture of the kids together. Asher would have none of it, sitting on Akiko's lap, so Joseph suspended him upside-down, which also got him to smile.

Notice one of Moses' pant legs is tucked into his boot while the other is not. This is how it usually goes down when he puts his boots on.

Asher, explaining to me how much fun he's having.

Akiko really liked to stop and pose on rocks and logs. There are half a dozen pictures  like this.

We were down at this place in Campbell called Villa Montalvo, a school for artists that has a whole bunch of nature trails surrounding it that are open to the public. The trail we took led us to a place that overlooks the Santa Clara valley. It was gorgeous. But I didn't take a picture (d'oh!). It was so clear that day that we could see all the way to Oakland and San Francisco and see the Bay bridge stretched between them. That's a distance of more than 40 miles! Super rare, super clear day.

Growing up, one of the things we did as a family almost every Saturday during the summer was go hiking in the Wasatch mountains. I cherish those memories. I don't remember all the places we went or what may have been significant about each one. They've all kind of blended into each other as the years have gone by. But I had a lot of fun with my parents and siblings and that was the important part of the trips.

I want to share that experience with my kids. It's not always easy to do. Saturdays are pretty busy here. It's also kind of hard to do with newborns and babies. Sometimes we get sick (in fact, I was on this trip). But the kids love to explore. I hope we can get out and do a lot more exploring in the months and years to come. I love that we get all year for those opportunities in the Bay area.