August 28, 2010

Duck Ponds, Bike Rides and Pie

With Lillian feeling better after being sick last week we were all ready to dive right into our regular activities this week. On Friday, before heading to our usual Friday lunch play-date, we stopped by the duck pond in Central Park in nearby Santa Clara. The park is very close to where we lived when we first moved out to California and we used to frequent the pond regularly, but haven't been back since we moved to Mountain View several years ago. Lillian's love of ducks is well known so it was the perfect place to kill some time watching the friendly ducks do their ducky thing.

Today, we planned a very special outing. Lillian is getting to be a very proficient biker so today she and her daddy both mounted their bikes and set out on a ride on the nearby Stevens Creek trail. They rode on their bikes out to a spot about two miles out from our house that has loads of blackberry bushes and picked enough berries to bring home and make a super-yummy, rustic berry tart (the crust recipe can be found here but the filling was just the blackberries with a little sugar and corn starch).


Lillian and the ducks.



The Duck Pond.

Yummy wild berry tart!

August 21, 2010

Boating on the Lake

After returning from our fun and exciting vacation, Lillian fell sick with Strep throat and spent most of the week laying on the couch watching TV. By Saturday the antibiotics were doing their trick and we were all tired of hanging out at home so we headed out for a fun outing that would entertain Lillian yet not require too much effort on all of our parts. We went out to Shoreline Lake in Mountain View and rented a paddle boat to cruise around the lake. Despite a strong headwind, cramped seats, and a not-so-helpful little girl who wanted to steer the boat all by herself (we paddled around in circles several times), we still managed to make it all the way across the lake and back. We also miraculously remembered to bring the camera along so we actually have pictures of this outing.



The family making slow progress across the lake.



The view from the middle of Shoreline Lake.



This has nothing to do with our outing today but I found this weeks old video on the camera when I downloaded our pictures for the day. Lillian showing off her moves to a bad synthesized version of the Bananarama song "Venus".

August 16, 2010

Summer Vacation

This past weekend we packed up the car for a road trip. With grandparents in tow headed up to Mt Shasta in the far reaches of northern California (aka The state of Jefferson). Mt Shasta is conveniently located about halfway between Portland and San Francisco making it an ideal spot to meet up with Uncle Joe and cousins Lucas and Raquel. We rented a cabin for the weekend in Dunsmuir that was able to comfortably house the eight of us for a nice gathering of most of the Husky clan.

Mt. Shasta is a beautiful area filled with huge snow caped mountains, alpine lakes and roaring rivers. Besides the requisite shooting the breeze with the other grown ups while the kids entertain each other, we also drove up to the ski bowl on Mt Shasta, hiked from Castle Lake to Heart Lake (well everyone except Grandma Betty and Lillian), and cooled off in Lake Siskiyou.

If you are interested in seeing more pictures check out the web album from the trip. Special thanks to Grandma Betty for actually remembering to bring a camera on the trip.


Lillian, Lucas and Raquel climbing the slopes of Mt Shasta, needless to say these three didn't make it any where near the 14,000 foot summit.

Joe, Eric, Kristen, Terry Lucas and Raquel, at Heart Lake, if you look really hard you can see some snow in the background.

Lillian and her cousins take a dip in Castle lake after the hike to Heart lake which is located about 2/3 of the way up the ridge behind Castle lake.

Lillian, Raquel and Lucas at McCloud falls.

Eric, Lillian and Raquel in Lake Siskiyou with Mt Shasta in the background.

August 11, 2010

Los Gatos

Lillian's Grandpa Terry and Grandma Betty have been visiting for a couple of weeks. This past weekend we took a trip to the nearby village of Los Gatos, which has lots to keep everybody happy. There is a bike trial that leads to a park with a minature railroad and carousel,and there is also a great brew pub in town. Lillian rode her scoot bike on the trail while the rest of us walked the trail for about 3 miles round trip. After all that walking we were all ready for some nice cold beer at the Los Gatos Brewing Company.








August 3, 2010

Beach Boardwalk

This past weekend we went to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk for Eric's company's summer picnic. After visiting Happy Hollow earlier this summer Lillian has developed a bit of a taste for amusement park rides. Although many of the rides were only for big kids, there were several kiddie rides that were just the right size for her. The carousel was so much fun that we rode it twice. But the big Ferris wheel she asked to get off of about 20 seconds after it started. Her favorite part of that ride was when it was finally our turn to get off.