san fran: adventure playground and lindsay wildlife

Our last full day in San Francisco!

We made it to the adventure playground in Oakland. Such an amazing concept! They need more playgrounds like these. Basically, there is wood, nails, paint, and tools and the kids can build anything they want to or add on to an existing structure. And they can play all over.

Out of my kids, Kyler and Perry spent the most time working hard on their structures. 

Perry was pretty proud of his fort when he was finished. 

Layla and Kacin's attention span for building wasn't quite as long, but they definitely enjoyed the zip line.

Kacin was a good big brother to stay by Layla's side when she was nervous to go on the zip line for the first time.

We had lunch back at the house and then played some more games together. Our last adventure in San Francisco was a visit to the Lindsay Wildlife center. It wasn't very big so my expectations were pretty low, but we ended up spending a lot of time there and really enjoyed all of it. We learned about so many different animals they have rescued and got to watch "behind the scenes" as a vet took care of a newly brought in animal. 

It was our last night in that 100 year old, but worth a million dollars home. The home definitely had a lot of character, some weird smells, and some amazing views. We love airbnb for vacations. 

san fran: china town and lombard street

It wasn't on our to-do list to drive the crooked street, but when we realized on our way to another destination that we were just a few blocks away anyways, we joined the parade of cars driving down Lombard street.

We also accidentally drove by the painted ladies at one point.

But my main purpose today is posting about china town. We decided to park at Jenny's house and then take public transportation to China Town.




We strolled the streets of china town and let the kids pick something small out to purchase.

We also found the fortune cookie factory. We got our free sample and then we made our own fortune cookies. Each of the kids wrote down a fortune. My personal favorite was what Perry told me to write, "Mommy Happy."

When we got back from our trip, we gave those special fortune cookies to grammie and papa. 

After our adventure in China town, we got Chinese food for dinner and ate it back at Jenny's house.

This day we went to China town was actually the 4th of July. Since we didn't do our normal 4th of July traditions it didn't really feel like a holiday. It was still a great day, just fun in a different way. We were planning on going to see a fireworks display, but everyone was so worn out we decided just to head back to our rental house and play games. We said goodbye to Jenny and on our drive home across the bridge we saw firework after firework shooting into the air in all different directions. We turned on patriotic music and I felt like our   Independence Day celebration was somewhat redeemed.

san fran: the golden gate bridge

It was windy and chilly when we walked the Golden Gate Bridge. 

I just need to say again, thank goodness for that stroller. It allowed us to do so much more as a family than we otherwise would've been able to.






Perry decided to get out and join in on the jumping. 











We were hoping to walk the whole bridge, but we only made it halfway. It is so beautiful along there, but it's pretty noisy and we were all still a little worn out from our previous day of biking.

I feel like Layla looks so grown up in this picture.

san fran: Golden Gate Park

I think a huge highlight of our trip was the day that we rented bikes and explored Golden Gate Park.

We stopped at the rose garden. And at other pretty places.

We saw the bison.

The windmill was a lovely little place.

On the windmill, there were these circles perfect for climbing into (with a little bit of effort on the high ones) if you ignored how dirty they were. Perry was pretty amazed at how high Kacin was.

We ate lunch at a sandwich shop near the coast. Then kept on biking to see more.

We stopped to see the horses (our kids are still obsessed with the show Heartland so they get excited to see horses).

We stepped off of our bikes for a little while so we could get out on the lake. We rented a pedal boat.

We stopped at a children's park to try out a cardboard slide (Jenny says they have these all over the city).

We had a quick bike by the conservatory of flowers. You may notice I have like four layers on. It was a cold day. But it feel nice to add layers on in San Francisco rather than not have any more layers to take off in Arizona.

Five hours on a bike plus one hour on a pedal boat! We were a little worn out but in a very good way. Golden gate park was absolutely beautiful and enjoyable and such a great place to explore on bikes.