thoughts from afar ...

This post is written from the faraway land of San Francisco.  (not San Fran or Frisco;  SF is the common abbreviation among locals!)  We're loving it out here!  And although we didn't take the photo above, we've been taking tons of photos of the local urban landscape. 

It's a lot like Vancouver in that the neighborhoods are so inviting, so comprehensive, and so unique.  Both Bren and I love the lifestyle afforded by these cities.  Where we live, its hard to envsion not owning a car, and the big box store is almost unavoidable, at least some of the time.  Particularly in our own neighborhood, there simply isn't anywhere to walk for groceries or fresh produce. 

To make the most of the nearby shops, we picked up fruit and veggies from one, cheese and bread from others, and are packing snacks to reduce the cost of eating out.  (one restaurant meal per day!)  But actually, its not as much about the budget as about being a great way to snack!  Yesterday, we ate our little picnic in the Panhandle near Haight and Ashbury.  It was quite lovely - we spent the entire day on foot.  It was great until the 30 minute trek home - one of our kids looked up the steep hill we had to climb and said 'can't we just take a bus the rest of the way?' .. but the homemade borscht and fresh bread that we knew were waiting kept us moving!  (Our hosts are AMAZING - we'll miss them when we check into a hotel in a couple of days!)

Here are a couple of early holiday shots - maybe some SF pics soon....

We travelled part of the way to Calgary (where we flew from) with my good friend pictured here.  She'd been in Manitoba racing in a Triathlon with another friend.  I am so proud of her and inspired!  It was great to visit -even if too brief!

When we arrived in Swift Current after the first leg of our journey, I was full of energy!  I invited the kids to explore, go for a walk, go for a swim, take in the sites...

they stayed in these positions and just grunted in my direction :)

But their dad was adventurous enough to go searching for a Shoppers Drug Mart, where we picked up yogurt and cereal for our supper (staying on the meal budget!) and a couple of forgotten travel items.   And later we did swim in the hotel pool! (Our super-secret mystery hotel booked on Travelocity was the ThriftLodge!)