Giving Tuesday field trip

Leo's school participated in a "Giving Tuesday" field trip.  The school collected gifs for the Family Giving tree organization.  The kids were able to pick gift tags with local kids' holiday wishes.  Leo picked a tag for a six year old named Christopher who wanted Star Wars action figures.  He was excited to used the "donate" part of his allowance to buy the gift for Christopher.  

After the kids had lunch at school, we loaded up and drove to an empty corporate building that is being used as a warehouse for the charity.  It was pretty bare in there. 

 There were big tables set up with wrapping paper, scissors and tape.  The kids got to work wrapping presents.  All the kindergarten through 8th grade students participated.

 Leo worked hard on wrapping presents.

 They did a lot of wrapping and got through the whole pile of gifts the organization had ready for us to wrap.

There were no functioning bathrooms in the building.  When we were done wrapping, they started working on cards but I needed to go to the bathroom.  The organizers told me I needed to drive five minutes down the road to Target or one of the restaurants.  Leo decided he needed to go, so I told the teacher and rounded up two more of his classmates; two kids I already know.  Other teachers must of caught wind of my bathroom journey because before I got out of the building, I had an 8th grader and a kindergartener added to my bathroom entourage.  So we drove to Target, used the bathroom and came back in time to finish off helping with the cards.  It was one of strangest field trip experiences I've ever had.

Celebrating the November birthdays

Tom isn't the only one with a November birthday in our friend group.  Ricky and Pete are both turning 44 this week.  Of course, Tom's birthday is a major milestone so we celebrated in a major way.  

We rented a limo and headed to San Francisco with three other couples.  

It was so fun to ride in style.  

We visited a cool bar before dinner and then headed to a Peruvian restaurant for a delicious meal.  After dinner we went to a cool bar, but our final stop was a more gritty, casual spot which is definitely our speed.

Here's Jeremy, Kristi, me and Tom.

The whole crew: Lizzy, Jeremy, Ricky, Kristi, me, Tom, Mary and Pete.

It was a super fun night and we didn't even lose anyone (though we came close at one point).

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving! It was just the five of us and a duck.  Just like last year.  Serafina helped me make a pie.  

She also helped set the table and created these fancy napkin situations. 

The bird. 

Tom's 50th: Final day in Santa Fe

Tuesday was check-out time from our spectacular house.  It served us so well with enough space for all 15 of us and a beautiful view.  Here's the house, called Sky Lodge. 

We had time before our flight so we headed into town for some shopping and exploring.

We didn't go inside the cathedral but we admired it from the outside.

Leo was disappointed that the Native American art museum was closed on Tuesdays, but we checked out the New Mexico Museum of Art instead.

Here's Tom checking out a Diego Rivera piece.

The kids love to draw in museums.

And check out interactive art displays.  They both used this old typewriter to add cards to the collection.

They also enjoyed creating their own scenes with puppets.

It was a cool museum in a very cool building.  After a yummy lunch, we headed to the airport and that was a wrap on our Santa Fe experience.  It was an incredibly way to ring in Tom's 50th year and we are so grateful to all the family that made the journey to celebrate with us.

Tom's 50th: Special Bday dinner for two

My mom was nice enough to watch the kids on Monday night so Tom and I could go out to dinner together.  We went to Café Pasqual's.  It was very small, very beautiful and very delicious.  

I'm so glad I got to spend some alone time with this amazing guy on his birthday.

Tom's 50th: Tent Rocks

Monday was Tom's actual birthday.  We woke up and had to bid farewell to the rest of our guests.  Once everyone had departed, Tom and the kids settled in to a couple games of birthday Boggle.  

We left Nana at the house to enjoy some quiet and we headed to Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument.  Before we started on our hike, we had a picnic lunch.

Then we headed down the trail.

Reading about the geology.

Family picture taken by a fellow hiker.

I know how much this guy loves to hike and be out in nature so I made sure to plan this outing on his actual birthday.

It was so stunning.

The kids had a blast making their way through the rock formations.

Tom always takes advantage of an opportunity to stretch his back.

The ranger told us to stay on the trail.  Tom did not stay on the trail at this point.  It was his birthday so what can you do.

A bit snowy as we got higher.

Cool hoodoos.

Made it to the top.

And then headed back down.

"Go stand by your dad so I can take a picture".  Well, they did.

It was a spectacular place to visit and we really enjoyed it.  Tent Rocks was definitely a highlight of the trip.