As a Christmas present, Santa brought us tickets to the Egyptian exhibit at the de Young Museum in San Francisco. We finally used them in March. Steve loved it, Lisa tolerated it and the kids ran through it as fast as they could.

Since we were in the city, we spent some time at the Exploratorium which got Patrick all pumped up. As a pseudo-scientist, it was his first visit to “the museum of science, art and human perception. His favorite part? “Just about everything since we walked in through the door,” said Patrick.

Emily chimed in, “I loved the sound booth where we listened to the story and we had to supply all the sound effects for it.” She made us all try it one by one.

On the way home we also visited long-time friend Paula “Wags–O–Matic” Shaw–whom we hadn’t seen in perhaps 10 years–in Walnut Creek and met her two children for the first time.