October 31st, 2008: Halloween 2008

Happy Halloween from Wyoming!


Here are the boys in costume on the front porch.

Nolan was a sea otter, with kelp and even a clam to eat. Kelly created his costume starting out with a bear costume.

Barrett was his teddy bear, "Nac." Kelly also created this costume for Barrett.

Travis really liked his Tiger costume. This was a costume originally created were Barrett.


And finally, here is our jack-0-lantern as designed by Nolan.

October 24th, 2008: Scott and Kelly's 10th Anniversary Get-away

We recently headed off to Northern California for a 5 day visit and to see the Jimmy Buffett concert at the Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View.

This was Kelly's first time away from the boys for more than a night, and Nolan is almost 7 years old. So this was a great get-away and time to refresh a bit.

We had looked at going to the islands or to Vegas, and then decided on Northern California since Buffett would be there in concert. As it turned out, the weather was as nice as Jamaica with temps in the 80s all week and we don't think we ever even saw a cloud (except for a little smog here and there).

Kelly and the Sea Otters

Monterey Bay Aquarium

Moon Jellies and Us too!

An nice sunset with some well-cued Pelicans over our beloved Pacific Ocean.


The traveling 'circus' that is JB.

The one guy on stilts, and the guy driving are the two guys on stage and on stilts during "Hot, Hot, Hot!" just before the concert starts.

The aforementioned two guys on stilts. "Hot, Hot, Hot!"

We can't embed the youtube for JB's new lyrics for Fruitcakes Bay Area Style, but if you want to see some video from the concert, check out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huCRbc1BQaY

Scott, Kelly, and Kelly (from the other Kelly and Scott who flew in from Denver for the show!)

We headed back to the coast. Here we were at Half Moon Bay.


Kelly on the beach at Pacifica.

Dude, you can't walk to the Marshalls.


It really was in the 80s on the coast, and the water really was 55 degrees. Brrrr, even for Great Lakes standards.

Our first view of the Golden Gate Bridge from near the Presidio in San Francisco.

Kelly and a cargo ship on the bay after just coming through the Golden Gate. This is how our possessions traveled to and from the Marshall Islands.

During our day in the wine country, we toured the Robert Mondavi Winery north of Napa, then headed to St. Helena for lunch, then to Behringer for a few tastes, and then up and over to Healdsberg to sample some more wines in their town square.

On our last day we decided to take the tour at the Jelly Belly factory. A nice tour, and delicious!

We decided to pay the toll to cross the Golden Gate Bridge south-bound Friday just so we could see the coast again on our drive back to San Jose for our evening flight back to Denver. Here is Kelly at Seal Beach on the western edge of San Francisco.

Many thanks to Mom and Dad Findeisen for coming to Wyoming to watch all three boys. We really missed the boys, but it was great for them to get some time with just-grandparents and they had a great time too.