Birthday Celebration

Today was a laundry day, Miles worked on his website, Caroline did plaster of Paris on the deck, and I went out to do some shopping. It looks possible that my one day in Seattle between this and my France trip will be spent in the Passport office. So I went down to Vintage Oaks to do some shopping, and got Miles some pants, and some comfy walking shoes......When I got back we went down to Indian Valley and had a nice walk. The bay trees smell SO good, and we avoided all poison oak. Miles caught a lizard and it ran all over his shirt, and mom and I both did not have our cameras!! We came home and had a great dinner to celebrate Mom's birthday (tomorrow) and Caroline's birthday (the 18th). We had Champagne to start, which Miles and Caroline both declared disgusting, and then Dad grilled a steak, and opened a bottle of 1985 Diamond Creek Cab. Mmmmmmm, it was delicious. Caroline refused to try it, but Miles did, smelled it, swished it around his mouth and swallowed it. We all said, Well........ And he said "Now THAT I could get used to!" Mom and Caroline opened their gifts, we had dessert and it was time for bed!!

Here they are opening their gifts:
Here is the still life we did with the delicious wine. It was REALLY GOODThe daliahs are from Cathy and Paul's yard. Beautiful!

Rosetta Stone and Irony

I think that I got the worst grade of my life on a paper on the Rosetta Stone in the 9th grade, thank you Mr. Minick! Well, RS (the computer program) is now teaching me and my children some French! I really hope once we get there I will have the chance to discuss whether or not the horse is jumping or running, because I can talk about that a lot!

Le cheval saute!
Le cheval court!

I got some excellent French refrigerator magnets for my birthday...Maybe grandpa will tutor us. We leave for Novato on Saturday. These next 2 days are a whirlwind, of finishing laundry, packing, going to see Harry Potter (hooray! finally!) and then we leave on the 14th.