We showed our wedding dance to the kids last Saturday, our anniversary, and it was so sweet! Hudson turned around and gave me the biggest smile about half-way through. I’d love to share some more favorite photos from the weekend, below.

Our house has been in chaos. It’s all good stuff, but we’re working on the front yard and the bathroom simultaneously. Brilliant or big mistake—the jury is still out; but it’s going to be done soon!

At least this weekend we’re all getting to escape the dust and spend some time in San Francisco. The American Urological Association is having its annual meeting there, so Aron and I will go out early and then the kids will join us for one night in the city. We can’t stay for too long, however—there’s a Frozen-themed birthday party and Skyler has literally been counting down the days. Hudson will have his first violin recital that afternoon!

Here’s hoping everyone has a good one!

Some links of note…

First, did you leave a comment on Tuesday’s post? Just let me know what you’d pick from Arhaus and you’ll be entered to win a $500 store credit!

This beautiful home tour has California written all over it!

How to delete something from your Netflix history. Hooray—so my kids can stop being reminded they once got to watch tk.

Related: Something I’d very much like to watch on Netflix. When I’m not hungry.

I’m usually not a proponent of single-purpose kitchen items, but I got a berry bowl and haven’t looked back. This one is pretty!

Some ideas if your landlord won’t let you paint your kitchen cabinets.

Anyone still watching Grey’s Anatomy catch that episode with Scott Speedman (aka Ben)? I hope he comes back! Shonda is clearly a Felicity fan.

Aron and I have been laughing at this Ubarre video. But now I kinda want one.

Another reason to visit Los Angeles. (P.S. All the L.A. Travelogues)

I will make this one day this summer.

These are great travel tips!

Fun fact: Bob Ross made all of his painting shows for free! After he spent years “being mean” in the military. Who knew? (Buzz Feed did, of course.)

“It is a role of choices, a cascade of choices, huge and petty, one after the other, neverending.” Such a great essay on choosing motherhood.

My friend has been screenshotting this book with lots of fist bumps, “yasss,” and crying emojis. Looking forward to reading the whole thing!

And some highlights from the weekend…

We celebrated Mother’s Day early with both of our moms and then met the babysitter on Saturday afternoon. She was kind enough to offer to take some family photos…

Oh, man. Skyler got upset and stomped on Hudson’s foot…

So this was the best we could do. She also took some photos of just the kids after we were gone, however, and they’re so wonderful! (And now the bad ones just make me laugh.)

We stopped first at the Cornerstone Sonoma—home to Sunset Magazine’s gardens and half a dozen shops and tasting rooms. It’s a beautiful place to walk around and get inspired. There was a cocktail garden entirely devoted to growing ingredients for cocktails! My favorite shop was called Nomad Chic—the owner says she also has a place in Todos Santos.

Afterward, we continued on to Healdsburg, where Aron had made reservations for a tasting at Banshee. The wine was delicious and the tasting room felt intimate and cool. Definitely a place I’d recommend.

He’d made us dinner reservations elsewhere, but we switched to Shed at the last minute. I just love how beautiful and delicious everything is, despite being a more casual setting. And the menus are always so in keeping with the season. We shared avocado soup with asparagus, a Strawberrry and Agretti salad (my favorite) with pepper and sheep’s milk cheese; a celery root carpaccio with smoked trout, salmon roe, and pickled rhubarb; local Salmon sashimi with cured egg yolk and green garlic; and a roasted spring onion dish that had sausage, hazlenuts, and laychee. Our dessert was a cheesecake custard with kumquats. We joked that all we were missing was something featuring ramps and fiddlehead ferns.

If you’ve never been, I wrote more about it here—bonus, you get to see newborn Skyler! They have a lovely online shop, too.

The next day was Mother’s Day. The kids had some awesome cards and homemade presents for me; I got to sleep in; and we tried again for family photos.

Success! My favorite is actually the unposed one in the middle.

This year, after breakfast, we drove out to Capay Valley for the annual Mother’s Day garden tour. It seemed like a good year to glean some tips…

Highlights were visits to Chamisa Ridge Nursery, Full Belly Farm, Good Hummus, and Capay Oaks.

Séka Hills Olive Mill was giving free wine tastings to moms (and complimentary chocolate covered strawberries), so of course we also stopped there. I’m pretty sure that this serene shot of me was taken just as Skyler was about to hit her brother.

But somehow they worked it out moments later and we carried on with what amounted to a beautiful day!

 

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