On Bears, Beans and Beers: Favorite Quips

Bean and I have been reading aloud a very good book together called "Maybe A Fox".

It's very well written, but a sad story with a bittersweet ending. Eddie read the book as well and warned me that it was sad.

I can easily get choked up over the slightest sad thing and as the story neared its conclusion last night, that was exactly what was happening. Bean got up and grabbed a box of tissues for me and placed them next to the nightstand for me. Then, when I'd get too choked up to read aloud, she'd start reading for me and I'd be the one to follow along.

At one point, I had to tell her I couldn't finish reading the last couple of pages out loud to her, I was just going to have the read the story to myself, quietly. I had forgotten that she had read the book herself before she asked for us to read it aloud before bed.

As I had tears streaming down my cheeks because of the ending, Bean surprised me with her words and actions and being so sweet and matter-of-fact about them:

Bean: "Momma, it's okay. It was her destiny [referring to a character in the story] just like it's your destiny to be crying right now like this. And it's my destiny to do this..."

She gently wiped the tears off my cheeks with her finger.

Bean: "It's the circle of life," she finished.

How did I end up with such a sweet, wise little girl like this? Oh that's right, I birthed Cupid, and Cupid is full of love!

Last weekend we took the girls out of school and headed to San Fran with my mom for the weekend. Grandma treated us all to an amazing mini-vacation, one that will be remembered, especially for the girls, in years to come!

To start, Grandma, in her retirement, will only travel business class or first class now when it comes to airplanes. Which means when you travel with Grandma, it's business class or first class for you, too! The girls each got to have their own seat next to a window. This was awesome because usually we have to negotiate detailed terms of who gets the window seat on each leg when traveling by plane. Bean reveled in how big the seats were in first class and the space around her. Comfy Horse seemed to enjoy his travel, too! I told Bean not to get to comfortable, though. First class travel is only with Grandma, so if we go somewhere as just a family of four, it's back of the plane for us. :)

But this smile says everything, doesn't it?

Once we got to our hotel, we left our stuff in Grandma's room (our adjoining room wasn't ready yet) and headed out to catch the trolley. The trolley was high on the girls list of "must do" things while in San Francisco. The conceierge told us the nearest stop was less than a block from the hotel. But we soon discovered it was trickier for a group of five of us to just hop all at the same time on a trolley that already had passengers. So, we headed down to where the trolley's turnaround and start their journey. While there was a long line and we had to wait for a little over an hour, it was cool to watch them turn the trolley's around, all done by manpower, to start their trips over again.

That wooden circle in the center of the picture below in the road is where the trolley is turned around by rotating that wooden circle!

Lulu stood for the trip on the trolley down to the waterfront.

A nice smile from Eddie for the camera!

Down on the waterfront by the piers, we started walking to where the dock was for ferry trips around the bay. My mom wanted to see about us jumping on a short cruise around the bay that would take us around Alcatraz. Walking to where the boats were, Lulu spotted this wooden bear outside a restaurant and wanted her picture taken. Bean of course, wanting to be like her sister, jumped in to be included. Lulu claimed her funny expression was because of the wind blowing in her face, but I think that's only partly true. (She's holding a pretzel in her hand from before we got on the trolley, earlier. No food or drink on the trolley! I kept it in my purse until we go off at our stop.)

Our gate for the one hour boat tour that went under Golden Gate Bridge and looped around Alcatraz. Boy, I've never seen so many Asian tourists actively wielding selfie sticks in my life than I did that afternoon on that boat tour!

Interestingly, Bean preferred to stay inside the boat during the tour and Lulu hung out on the top deck with Eddie.

Bean really wanted to see some sea lions so she, Eddie and I walked down to Pier 39 where there they were known to hang out and lounge about. Lulu didn't want to walk that far and neither did my mom, so they hung out together at a coffee shop while we ventured down a few piers. These guys were mostly sunning themselves but one or two were quite noisy and mouthy with each other. There was some ongoing squabbles between two in particular much to everyone's enjoyment. It smelled of bad sushi though from all that lazy blubber lying about!

For some reason, Eddie and I agreed, the majority of the sea lions were very social in that they wanted to hangout piled upon each other. There were plenty of open docks for space around them, but with the two squabblers, it seemed they were bickering over territory. We saw one sea lion with two sets of flippers from other napping sea lions in its face.

"Why don't they move to those other docks?" I asked Eddie at one point.

"I think they're very social animals, except for these two up front," he answered.

"Well, they may be social, but I also think they're just fat and lazy when it comes down to it..." I replied.

We were convinced the sea lion on the bottom left (below) was going to accidentally roll off the dock into the water if he wasn't careful! And the sea lion to the far right, though hard to see in my photograph (it was late afternoon sun directly at me) was a curious study of sociology. He was as far away from the others as he could be and so tightly closed up against himself. His lower flippers were tucked into him tighter than any of the others we could see, and you immediately knew he was antisocial, if that was possible.

When we left the sea lions we walked back through Pier 39 which is a bunch of outdoor shops and attractions. There was an utterly gorgeous merry-go-round in the center and Bean just had to go for a spin. There are a bunch of photos of this beauty because its just that: stunning!!! It was made in Italy and yep, it shows. I can't recall ever seeing a more beautiful carousel from the animals to the paintings that adorned it. Check out this rabbit below, or maybe it's a hare rabbit?

Bean chose this beautiful sea horse to ride...

A kitty cat with a fish in its mouth!

There was an upper level to the carousel one could ride on, too.

Meanwhile, I marveled at the beautiful paintings of SF attractions painted around the top and the underside of the carousel itself...

The three of us made our way back to Grandma and Lulu and went inside the Italian seafood restaurant at the site of where our boat tour set off and returned. Eddie had done some quick Google reviews of restaurants and the Franciscan Crab Restaurant got high marks. It was around 4:30 pm when we arrived so there were not a lot of people inside, yet. We got a nice booth seat that had a beautiful view of the bay. Each table and booth in the restaurant came with its own pair of binoculars! Of course, that meant instant fighting over who got to use the binoculars. Good grief! EVERYTHING is a bloody competition!!! I have to say though, the wait staff was very attentive and friendly and the food was delicious. Plus, the views are spectacular. I unfortunately got the short end of the stick and had to sit with my back to the view. Boo! I do have to recommend the prix fixe dinner option. A very good value! My mom and I each ordered that and chose to have the clam chowder starter and the crab Alfredo pasta for our entree. Each prix fixe dinner comes with vanilla kustard for dessert (rich ice cream) and all five of us easily shared two kustard desserts, it was the perfect amount!

Done with dinner, we walked back up to where we had gotten off the trolley, earlier. Little did we know that it would be nearly a two hour wait for us to get a trolley back to Union Square! (Our hotel was directly on the trolley line and across from Union Square & Macy's.) Poor Eddie was starting to wish he'd brought a coat with him! The temperature kept dropping during our slow shuffle around to board a trolley and we began to watch the fog roll in. What we couldn't figure out was why they would bring empty trolley's down, turn them around, and then either let them sit for ages, or send them on without anyone able to get aboard. After the latter happened, they turned a trolley around and as they moved it towards where passengers would get on board, Bean, who was watching behind the fence in line called out, "Don't forget the passengers!" to chuckles and laughs from the rest of us all wondering the same thing.

This gentlemen was playing and serenading us with easy going hits from the 60's & 70's. He had a lovely calm and smooth voice, which was appreciated by those of us wondering if we were ever going to get back to where we needed to. He did pretty good in the tips department as the evening wore on, too.

Here is a close up of the system that rotates the trolley around to go back the way it came from...Once we got on our trolley home, Lulu made a point to sit about three people away from us on the side seating. The return trip as well, felt more like a crazy roller coaster ride than the ride to the waterfront earlier in the day. Lulu, in classic fashion, began organizing the passengers around her to throw their hands up in the air along with her when the trolley started going downhill and picked up speed. That's our "Tour Guide, Lulu" as we call her!

Saturday Morning

Saturday morning after a nice breakfast buffet in the hotel, we boarded our hop on hop off tour bus for a tour of San Francisco! The girls were very excited to be traveling on a double decker bus and secured their seats right at the very top front of the bus.

I think this is a terribly cute picture of the girls! It will probably end up on our holiday card this year.

And a nice snap of Eddie, too! (Everyone wised up and brought and wore their lightweight but insulating jackets this time around.)

Our destination, courtesy of our hop on' hop off tour bus, was the California Academy in Golden Gate Park. This amazing science museum and aquarium wowed my mom and I when we visited San Francisco together three years ago. The girls (and Eddie) enjoyed the museum so much. Below, we made sure not to miss the penguin feeding in the African exhibit. Bean is crazy about penguins. They had an in depth penguin study lesson when she was in first grade last year.

Bean was very excited to point this out to me:

A tiger in the tree and a tiger under the tree! Not sure what's scarier, though, Bean's glowing eyes are pretty freaky!

After our museum adventures my mom wanted to get a picture of the girls on the bridge at the Japanese Garden. When I was in about the fourth grade, I'd gone to SF with my parents before Christmas to see the Nutcracker ballet. One of the places we visited was the Japanese Garden and this was snapped of me, there:

My mom wanted to get a picture of the girls atop the same bridge, too. So, we walked across the park, paid admission and the girls scrambled up the sides for their photo op:

Here, Eddie was snapping pictures of Lulu from a different vantage point.

A cute picture of Bean under this pagoda...

Then I asked for her "kitty" face and got this!

That Saturday night we all meet up with my Aunt Debbie and Uncle Charles for dinner at the Cheesecake Factory, on top of Macy's across from our hotel. Debbie and Charles had been in SF for the weekend, too, as Charles was attending a medical conference. I had to snap this next picture because it was the funniest thing to see and also a great picture to capture the times we now live in. While we had been seated at our table around 7 pm, we noticed throughout our dinner that the lights in the restaurant periodically went dimmer and dimmer around us. By the time the 3 people at this particular table had left and this larger group had showed up, it was getting remarkable hard to see anything let alone a menu with smaller print. But when everyone is equipped with a smart phone these days, a flashlight app is always available when you need it!