Our Day in Prison! VERY Picture-Heavy Post.

This past weekend saw us spending time with Robert's sister and her family. They were here as a part of their big holiday to Hawaii, SF and Vancouver! On Saturday we (finally) went to Alcatraz! Thankfully, Nicole (Robert's sister) had booked our tickets well in advance because there were a lot of people there and I doubt you can easily get tickets just by showing up. It was a cold day and we drove through a lot of fog on the way, which was interesting as we'd never driven through so much fog here before! Getting a good view wasn't boding well with the amount of fog there was! Despite the weather, though, it was lovely to see Mr 2 with his three older cousins who doted on him so much! It's meant so much to us that the people who matter the most to us have been to visit. 

We had to get a ferry across to the island, and as we did, I was relieved to see the fog starting to lift, but also to see that it was sitting on the city, itself. As we pulled away from the land, we left behind this cloud which made the city look rather ethereal sitting in a land of clouds. We came out into sun and a lovely clear day for a trip to an old prison! 

Alcatraz itself was, well... not as haunted as I was hoping for. LOL. Being an old GAOL, I was assuming it would be dark and there might have been some tales of ghosts or something, which may have given us some entertainment. But it really was nothing but an old prison. LOL. And I think the nicest thing about it was the view of SF from the island itself. Maybe it's just my over-imaginative mind, but I really thought it would be a spookier experience! 

I'm glad we went, though, as it must be one of the penultimate tourist-y things to do here. So I sort of felt like it was something we needed to do! But as usual with this blog, pictures speak 1000 words, especially when I'm half asleep! 

...there was a big of fog!

Fog over SF.

Getting closer to our destination...

...about as spooky as it got...

And if you had any doubt as to SF being a hilly city, here's some proof!

Rows and rows of prison cells.

In other news, I'm a week and a half into my studies, and I feel like it's going well. I'm still getting my head around being organised and making sure I get everything done around caring for a toddler, but it feels great to have a life and (hopefully) a future career to get into when Mr 2 begins school and gets more independent. I just submitted my first Photoshop assignment and I've had to do a few drawing exercises. It's a tough life. LOL. 

...but having said that, I will leave this post here as said toddler will likely wake from his nap soon. Thankyou, as usual, for reading and following. :-)

xoxo

Happy New Year! What a Year It's Been!

I've been meaning to update this blog for so long, now!!! But as the sun's setting on 2016, I thought that now would be a good time to FINALLY do so! (I also spilled ginger beer on my laptop a while ago, which made it difficult to type! But Robert got me a shiny new laptop for Christmas (one of the new MacBook Pros with the touch bar thingy!), so things are much easier!)

In the time that I haven't posted here, we've had our first Halloween, our first Thanksgiving, the election happened and Christmas has come and gone! What a year it's been. I said on Facebook earlier today that all in all, it's been a good year for our little family. Our move here has been a mostly positive experience. I start my graphic design studies in a few weeks, and the toddler is officially enrolled into pre-school that starts in August! Life just seems to be racing by!

My family was here for a week over Christmas. It certainly didn't last long; felt like I blinked and they were gone. :-( But it was so awesome having them here, and it was SO nice to have a WINTER Christmas! The only downside to that being that it didn't really feel like Christmas in the weeks leading up to it. Despite the Christmas trees, the carols playing in all the stores and the huge amount of decorations around the city, ironically for me, the Summer heat is what makes the Christmas season feel like Christmas. Despite that, both my Thanksgiving and Christmas turkeys were pretty good successes!

Looking back, the year really has gone in a flash, but I don't think we really have any regrets. Missing my family is really the only thing that has made things difficult.

The best things have been (in no particular order):

~BALLET is still the no.1 for me. Aside from injuring my foot a couple of times, it's just been a dream come true. I've been doing pointe for almost six months, now (I think?), and I just feel so grateful for the whole opportunity every time I go to a class! I've also become Kathy's graphic designer. LOL. I make online flyers for her, which in turn, is giving me some great design practise (you know what they say: 10000+ hours of something makes you a master in it!).
~The 2 year old boss and I have also made some really lovely friends, which I'm just so happy for. We don't know whether we'll have anymore children, so it's really important to me for the little guy to have friends early on. I'm also incredibly anti-social and was always a really awkward, shy kid, so I just do what I can to encourage the little dude to not be like me! So far, he's much more easygoing than I was as a child, and I'm very glad for that! Haha! Having good friends that we see regularly has also taught him so much! His language skills have improved so much, and he's learned to share!
~AMAZON. LOL!!! Amazon makes life even more convenient. I'm mentioning Amazon here because as of yesterday, I'm so thankful for it! The toddler and I bought Robert a pair of Coach gloves for Christmas (toddler even picked them, himself). But they were the wrong size. We went back to the store yesterday, only to be told that not only did they have none left in stock, but they weren't able to order more as they've stopped making them! We wandered around the city in the hopes of finding another pair from a different store, but I didn't like our chances as they'd gone on sale, so they'd pretty much sold out everywhere! I was so gutted (probably even moreso than Robert!). But we had a chance look on Amazon and found they had ONE pair left! So I was very happy and am now more appreciative than ever of Amazon. LOL!!!
~All the kids' facilities and activities available here. The Bay Area has (so far) been an awesome place in which to raise a family!
~The adventure of it all. From just being in a brand new place to learning to drive on the opposite side of the road to exploring, it's really been a fantastic experience for someone as unadventurous as I am!
~People are generally quite friendly. Unless you're on the road in which people simply become impatient douchebags.
~The appreciation for the arts. Enough said.
~The opportunities available to Robert and his career. Also enough said.
~The city's multiculturalism. Also something that's very important to me.
~The convenience of everything. Whether you're wanting ice cream delivered in the next couple of hours or you're looking to study, it seems that everything's available here. Of course, the flipside of that being that it really makes you feel spoilt. I feel like a spoilt brat of the world, especially compared to what so many others are going through these days. I'm not an overly religious person, but I find myself saying little prayers to myself (or God or whoever's up there) everyday for the fortunate life we lead. It's scary to see how easily it can all be taken away, so I'm grateful everyday for the blessings I've got.
~Living in a country where everything seems relevant. Whether it's a TV show you're watching or politics, I feel like we live in a place where I'm immersed in what we see on TV, online, or wherever else. Maybe that's thanks to the media, but it's sort of exciting to see things and think 'yeah, I get that now', or even 'crap, how's that going to affect us now?' (in RE: to the recent election). I've found myself caring a lot more about world happenings since I feel like they're a little more relevant to our lives now.
~Feeling like an anonymous nobody. This sounds a bit strange, but I like cities. And I like feeling like I don't know anyone or that there's a big chance of me running into people I know. I like anonymity, and that was something I looked forward to in having a new start. For some reason, anxiety really kicks in living in a small town or the country, especially if it means I constantly have to see people that I need to make small talk with. Yes, I'm anti-social, yes, socialising makes me incredibly anxious if it's random, but hey, that's just the way I am. Sigh...

And I'm sure there's more. However, I've had my annual new year's drink and I'm already feeling the effects. I have no idea how I've managed to type this much!

So in saying that, I wish anyone reading this a very HAPPY NEW YEAR! I really hope that 2017 is fantastic for you. Thank you so much for reading/following this blog. Hopefully I'll make more regular posts in the new year!

xoxo

Future Plans and Emma Prusch Park

I've been asked quite a bit recently what our future plans are and whether we intend to move back to Australia or not. I'm sure people ask this out of politeness than genuine interest, but for anyone who may be reading this, the answer is that we're not sure. We're playing everyday by ear at the moment and just seeing where this adventure takes us. Careers aside, I feel like it's been good for us so far; for us as a little family unit and for us individually (despite the fact that Robert works 24/7 and really didn't get a break when he took a week of leave a few weeks ago. But that's a different story.). For me, I really genuinely wanted a new start and to move somewhere we literally didn't know a single soul. And yes, I wanted a bit of an adventure. I'm not an overly adventurous type (I'm definitely not someone who feels like they need to see the whole world before they die), and being quite introverted, I tend to stick to my comfort zones. But I feel like making a new start freed me from some personal and emotional baggage; a new start has felt really good. There were also people that I wasn't sorry to have left behind (don't worry, if you're reading this, chances are none of them were you! LOL). And I'm not going to lie: I kind of enjoy being one of the people who have a foreign accent! Haha! A lot of the time I get asked if I'm British. Australian is usually people's second guess. Anyway, I hope this answers the question of whether we'll move back or not! There are things we like and dislike here, but I think you'd find that anywhere. 

*****

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago(? I'm losing track of time!), we took Mr Toddler to Emma Prusch Farm Park. It was sort of a continuation of checking out these awesome parks in SF and surrounding areas. It was about an hour's drive away from SF, and for anyone who knows Sydney, it was a bit like driving from the CBD to Penrith. The weather difference was similar as well: we left a cool, temperate SF and ended up in a very hot San Jose. Which sucked because I hate hot weather, and we probably would have hung around a bit longer if it hadn't been so hot. But the park itself is pretty cool, and I couldn't think of anything similar in Sydney. Aside from an awesome playground, it's basically a playground crossed with a little farm. I think its intention is to show kids what country life is like a bit. There are multiple picnic areas, an animal area that's home to some goats, chickens etc., a farm house, a barn and some gardens. There are also chickens just wandering around the place of their own freewill (clearly the owners have a lot of trust in people!). 

In his typical fashion, Mr Toddler went straight for some old tractors once he'd had lunch. He wanted to sit up on them and play with the steering wheel, but unfortunately the heat had made the metal too hot, so he couldn't really play on it. But I thought it was good for him to see some animals again and to be in a big, open space. City living definitely has many perks, but the one thing it doesn't have is a lot of green, open space. 

San Jose itself was interesting. And I'm starting to get more accustomed to the Bay Area being home to many small cities, unlike Sydney which is a big city with lots of big suburbs. If I were to liken The Bay Area to Sydney, Sydney CBD would be its own city, Parramatta would be its own city, Penrith would be its own, etc., etc. San Jose was also like walking into Mexico town. Everything was in Mexican(???)... Portuguese(???)... Spanish(???)... (what language do they speak in Mexico? LOL!), and I felt like every business was a taco place. LOL. (I guess we know where to go if we want many, many tacos!) I've found it interesting to see the influence of a country we really don't have a lot of exposure to in Australia. I'm glad we got a car. We didn't have to, but I think it was worth it, if only just because it's given us the chance to explore so much more than we otherwise would have. 

Anyway, enough of my rambling. Here are a few pics from the park. If Mr Toddler ever decides that animals are his "thing", it would be a great place to host a birthday party at!

xoxo

Muir Woods

I do apologise: the updating of this blog is somewhat sporadic these days! I was trying to give weekly updates, but that hasn't been happening as I've run out of time or, well... that's about it: I've run out of time! Or we just haven't done anything interesting.

But this past weekend was Father's Day here. Robert wanted to go to Muir Woods which is our closest forest of redwood trees (it's about a 60-90 minute drive one way, depending on traffic). These forests are some of the oldest in the world, and some of the trees here are around 1000 years old! The place was really beautiful, and for me, it was nice to wander around in nature without having to be too afraid of spiders! Haha. The drive was a little scary: the road we took was very windy and some parts were on the edge of cliffs. I was often yelling out to Robert to drive slower or to move further into the road in fear of driving off the edge! Ha...

After wandering around the forest for a couple of hours, we headed to Stinton Beach for lunch. I'd been looking forward to finding a beach as it's now Summer here, and it would be nice to take the toddler swimming. And coming from Australia, I had expectations of spending much of Summer at a beach. But I don't think that will be quite so. Stinton Beach, at least, was a big surf. Which is fine. It's just not as child-friendly as perhaps a Sydney beach is. It was also very open and big. Like everything here, it was bigger than beaches tend to be in Sydney. And according to someone Robert spoke to, people tend not to go swimming as much as the water's so cold. And I'm not going to lie: it just wasn't as picturesque and as beautiful as Sydney beaches are. The sand's a bit grey and the water doesn't seem to have that sparkle that I'm used to. It's also quite a drive, where I'm used to living about 15 minutes away from Balmoral. Oh well...

That said, it was a lovely day. Here are some pictures:

Following on from that, on Sunday we went to Lands End, but I haven't finished going through the photos of that little trip, so I'll save that for another post.

In other news, our stuff finally arrived!!! It only took four months! Haha. Although our lounge has been lost. As far as we know, it could still be on the boat. But it's good to have all of our stuff and our apartment is starting to look more like us now. It's been very exciting for the toddler: as far as he's aware, we've suddenly been gifted with all these new things! 

Anyway, I will updated again soon with some photos from Lands End and another beach. 

xoxo