Black Friday Sunset

Last night I rode my new bike to upper Rockridge and caught a pretty spectacular sunset. It felt so peaceful and serene. The weather in Northern California has been perfect the last few days. Jeffery and I spent most of today walking and biking around the area running errands and then catching up on housework. For dinner we ate the rest of the Thanksgiving leftovers. Even though we cooked two turkeys to ensure there would be plenty to take home, it never lasts long enough. And neither does time off. I spent the majority of the past couple days procrastinating writing the rest of our wedding thank you notes. But I am running out of time. Our anniversary is right around the corner. How did that happen?

Photos from our trip to Sonoma coming soon.

Temescal Alley

Jeffery got his hair cut at the Temescal Alley Barber, and while he was waiting I explored the area. I was pretty surprised to find chickens. It felt like I was in Spain or the South of France. No, just Oakland.

Scavenger Hunt

I'm really excited to be back in school taking a photography class at City College of San Francisco. Our first assignment was a scavenger hunt. We were given a list of 45 things to capture that included concrete subjects, such as something in our neighborhood, as well as abstractions, such as "our greatest fear." It was an exercise for us to practice using our DSLR cameras in manual mode, which [confession] I have never done before. Now that the training wheels are off, I feel completely liberated. These are some of my favorites. 1, 2, 3, 4: Castro, San Francisco; 5, 6, 7, 8, 9: Tilden Park Botanical Gardens, Berkeley; 10, 11, 12, 13: my neighborhood, Oakland.

Oakland Athletics

We watched the Rays beat the A's last week. Despite the loss, it was a hot and beautiful day in Oakland. We bought $14 value tickets, which included $6 worth of food concessions. Jeff had a chili dog, I had nachos. We were behind top plate all the way at the top, and when the hundreds of girl scouts surrounding us left in the 7th inning, we had the top deck to ourselves. So it was nice and quiet and we found some shade and you just can't beat that view.

The Golden Hour

It's been nearly a month since we left San Francisco and moved into our new apartment in Oakland. We love it. Kitty loves it too. There is so much room. And so much light. When the sun sets behind the neighboring houses, the telephone wires and the trees outside light up, and before it gets dark, everything is golden. I feel really lucky. I keep thinking it's too good to be true. But then I am reminded that we endured two years living in downtown San Francisco, walking past crackheads and their filth every day, and hearing sirens blaring all night. Our apartment was so small that there wasn't enough room for bedroom furniture or golf clubs or a second bike, and so we slept on a mattress on the floor, and Jeff couldn't go golfing and we couldn't go on bike rides together. And now we can. And it's laughable to think anyone would pay so much to live there, especially when what we have now is a 20 minute BART ride away. But we did. We wanted to live in the City. And now we know better.

I've started running in the mornings. Most of the houses in our neighborhood have flowers or vegetable gardens in their front yards. Right now the morning glories and thunbergia and passion vines are exploding, and I had no idea that bougainvillea came in so many different shades of red and fuchsia and purple. Artichokes are flowering, and their thistles are florescent periwinkle. There is a park close by, Dover Park, and the entire perimeter of the park is planted with vegetables. It is so beautiful. It does really make me want a yard of our own, and that's the next step. But it is so nice to be in a place where we can live comfortably for a few years and be able to save for our dream home. I feel like Jeffery and I have entered a new stage in our lives and it's only getting better.

Biking in Oakland

The other day I borrowed Jeff's bike to run errands, and now I can't wait to get a bike of my own. We live in Temescal, which is close to Rockridge. North Oakland so quickly turns into Berkeley, and it's flat and the streets are wide and shady, perfect for biking. We've been grocery shopping at Berkeley Bowl, and it has revolutionized our lives. The produce department is enormous. There are so many options, and there's a clearance bin where you can get an entire bag of tomatos or avocados or eggplant for 99 cents! The other day we made a large bowl of guacamole, and even though the avocados were mushy on the outside, they were perfect on the inside. We've also been making our own pizza and pasta sauces. I can't say it enough, I really love living in Oakland.