Tanner Turns 8

The first of what will turn out to be several birthday parties was Tanner's "friend" party on November 16th. We took his three best buddies to Jump Time- an indoor trampoline place that has a dodge ball court, a basketball hoop, free jump area, and more. They bounced for two hours and then we headed to a local Italian restaurant for pizza, followed by frozen yogurt at U-Swirl (he didn't want a cake). Tanner claimed it was his best birthday ever. The boys all had fun. It was a long fiesta- the boys were dropped off at our house at 930AM and we brought them home around 2 that afternoon.

Next up was the "family birthday".  Since Tanner and Brian were leaving on his actual birthday we did the present opening on Wednesday evening. His favorite gift, by far, was the stuffed Bronco football thingy that Nana got for him. It is a zip up stuffed football that reveals the Bronco mascot if you unzip it. Whatever it is, it came along to CA with us and has been functioning as Tanner's pillow ever since. We got to sing Happy Birthday to him on Thursday morning before school, with a single candle in his birthday donut.

After he and Brian finished the Warriors portion of his 8th birthday (see next post) we spent a few days in Mountain View with Kim and Bill and Abby and Aidan. My dad came to visit for an afternoon and Kim and I tried our best to spoil him with good homemade food. Joe, Suzie, and Jasper came the next day and we all caught up on each others lives while the kids played outside and ran back and forth to the park.

Now we are in Oakland, preparing for several days in SF.  We are spending 3 nights at Sheila and Wayne's condo and pretending we are "city folk" instead of the country bumpkins we seem to have turned into since leaving the Bay Area 8 years ago. Did you know that the population of the Bay Area is over 6 times greater than the population of the ENTIRE state of Idaho???  Coming back here is culture shock in a lot of ways. I like to refer to this trip as "Diversity Training 101". I have been reminded in the last 24 hours that my children are so, so white. There is zero diversity in Boise so this is like a crash course in "people come in all colors,  religions, sizes, and states of sanity".  Tomorrow we are taking BART to Union Square so we can take a cable car down to the Fisherman's Wharf area. Wednesday we plan to take the ferry over to SF and maybe go to the new Exploratorium.

Thanksgiving Day will find us driving to Sacramento and celebrating Turkey Day amongst all of Brian's family- Grandma Mary, Auntie Sue, Lisa, Clark, and their five kids. Our kids can't wait to see the cousins and are all dying to use their swimming pool (what a treat to get to swim in November!!).