inked

Last week we had a company picnic at the Santa Cruz boardwalk - I love a work day spent in the sun. I ate hot dogs, played air hockey, rode on roller coasters, and got some airbrushed ink (my arm is on the right). Later that day when I was walking around Palo Alto, I wondered if it looked real enough for people to think it was an actual tattoo. I think the blue was too blue...

like a fish

Yesterday I went swimming at a community pool in Menlo Park. It was my first swim of summer, and just what I needed on a hot day.

p.s. this was just one of their two pools - one for family swim, one for lane swimming

the Sunday paper

Interesting article on data centers...

and

should we take our honeymoon in Southern France? This sounds pretty awesome...

I love lazy Sundays.

photo: taken yesterday in the Marin Headlands, right before sunset

mj

There are two Michael Jackson songs that I love - that I could listen to everyday - that have changed my life. The first is Billie Jean. In college it was the song I blasted while I was getting ready to go out. My roommates always started by making fun of me, but in the end we were all leaping around to Billie Jean with a drink in one hand and our make up in the other.

The second song is called "Ben" and I have put a link to it below. My best guy friend from college is named Ben and I used to sing this song to him. I believe the song was for a 1970s movie called Ben about a guy who befriends a rat (remade in the last ten years). It is a sweet song about friendship and it still makes me smile.

friday

On Friday's I like to post fun photos. Here is a friend with one of his chickens - Ashlay. Looking forward to the opportunity to try fresh eggs in a few weeks. :)

Have a great weekend!

home improvement

A few months ago we got some design advice on what to do with our living room. Knowing that I loved the blog thisyounghouse.com, my fiance had bought me their design service for a Christmas present. They suggested that we recover our piano bench. Many months later, I just got around to recovering our piano bench last night.

I had bought two yards of the recommended patterned fabric in February from fabric.com - some to cover the bench, and some to make pillows (eventually).

I didn't actually know how to recover a bench, but luckily John and Sherry at thisyounghouse.com had written about it a few month ago. I bought a staple gun at target last weekend so I was all ready to go.

I think that the finished product came out pretty well!

Pretty awesome change I think.

strange flowers

On Friday, we were walking in the Sunset to meet Alison and Eli for dinner when I stopped to take photos of these strange flowers that caught my eye. They were growing in a flower box in front of someones driveway. I had never seen anything like them before - what crazy blue fringe, what an unusual spectrum of colors, what an interesting raised center!

Does anyone know what they are?

UPDATE: http://www.passionflower.org/

"We had these all over Mississippi. The maypops taste like slimy guava. The flowers refer to the passion of Christ. Read more above! I love you! Mom"

perspective

I wish to be misunderstood,

that is,

to be understood from your perspective.

- Bill Knott "wrong"

The summer before I met my fiance, I bought a book of poetry and read them before bed. I had just read this poem a few days before my first date with my now fiance and for some reason it has always stuck - a poem that I memorized by accident. There is something sly and subversive about this poem and I like it.

spring cleaning

I just realized that if you subscribe via reader to my blog, that you will need to change the subscription settings from "seablueseegreen.blogspot.com" to "www.seablueseegreen.com" to continue to see the feed. Sorry for the inconvenience!

Have a good week and let me know if you have any problems.

Happy Father's Day!

Happy father's day dad! I went through my photos from the past few years and pulled up some good ones to celebrate the day. My dad is one of the most generous people I know. He is always there to help others and is a constantly inspiring me to be more generous with my time and energy. He has always been there to set a good example for the six of us and we appreciate it all the time, but especially on father's day.

Here is a good photo - this is how much banana pudding we were able to convince my dad to try at New Year's. Notice that it consists of 1 nilla wafer and a little whipped cream. My dad doesn't eat fruit (bananas included). I think that is pretty funny.

My grandmother memaw lived with us for many years before she passed away. Here is my dad in 1981 with my mom's mom (we called her memaw). Notice the characteristic white linen suit.


Here is a cute father daughter pic taken at the wedding of a good friend (Tracy). He drove all the way out to the very furthest suburbs of New Orleans to pick me up so I wouldn't have to drive. All through high school Tracy and I had joint birthday parties, so my dad came in to say congrats.

Here is my dad with two of his brothers - John on the left and Jim on the right. His brother Joe passed away a few years ago. This photo was taken after a post-Christmas trip to Galatoire's a few years ago.

Somehow my parents have managed to stay sane after raising SIX kids. This photo was taken about 2 years ago. The biggest difference is now Patrick is literally a foot taller - and is now the tallest one in the family.

No father's day post would be complete without mentioning my brother and his sweet baby girl - now two years old.

Happy father's day to all dads and dads-to-be!

crabs

Last night we went out to dinner in SF with Alison and Eli at a restaurant in the sunset called Thanh Long. They are known for their roasted dungeness crab (see above). Between the four of us we ordered 3 and dug in - bibs and all. It was a great time! Alison - have a safe trip back to Shanghai!

friendly friday

Last night I had the good fortune of seeing my former roomies Julie and Julia. We got dinner at Plutos and then ice cream at a new place in Palo Alto where you pay by weight (thus the big cups above). Tonight I will see Eli and Alison (who is in from Shanghai for the weekend), and I am so excited. Have a great weekend!

Joe T. Wilson Ball

This is a photo of Joe T. Wilson Ball - my maternal great grandmother (my mother's mother's mother). I thought it was an interesting photo, I particularly love how Joe T. is framed by the tree and its shadow.

update from my mom: "I love this picture, too, it's very atmospheric. It was taken in Kansas right after she married my grandfather. I think she was lonely there and she didn't like how flat Kansas was and how the wind blew all the time and blew dust into every crack and cranny in her house. She's standing behind the wall because she is pregnant and in the 20's one didn't advertise when they were "in the family way". Mom"

Ryan and Red McClure

My cousin Marie Louise lives near Aspen, CO. Usually I only get to see her at Christmas, so imagine my delight when my mom passed on this article from my aunt Beth. Marie Louise is featured in the Aspen Daily News for her work bringing the red McClure potato back from the brink of extinction.

*photo from the Aspen Daily News

Way to go cuz! Keep up the good work! I would ask you to send me one to taste, but that wouldn't fit well with the local, slow food movement's goals I suppose... :)

through the hoods

I read a lot of design blogs, and this poster was featured the other day. While it isn't really something that I could imagine putting up in our home, but I still love it. If I lived in Minneapolis/St. Paul I would be very tempted!

Tommy time

This past weekend my little bro came to visit me in SF. We had a great time!

When driving to the airport, I asked tommy about his favorite moments. So here they are (in no order):

• eating sandwiches in Crissy Field (see picture below)
  
• dinner at the Cuban restaurant on California Ave in Palo Alto
• dinner with my fiance's family on his dad's birthday
• dinner with my fiance's brother and sister and law
  
• walking across the Golden Gate Bridge (see picture above)
• coming to visit me at work
  

Thanks for coming to visit! Hopefully next time you come, you will bring your fiance and lovely daughter!

Friday

I'm excited for the weekend because Tommy is in town! Among other things we are going to check out the Golden Gate Bridge. I hope it isn't foggy...

service

This week at work everyone was encouraged to take some time and volunteer in the bay area. Along with most of my team, we decided to volunteer on Tuesday at the Youth Science Institute at Sanborn Skyline County Park in Saratoga. There were about 30 or so volunteers in total and together we worked on repairing an Ohlone hut, repairing a fence, and sanding and staining 13 picnic tables. It was really nice to spend time outside doing a little manual labor.

.

Here is a close up of the woven reeds that make up the Ohlone hut.

The non-weathered wood in this photo is what we replaced over the course of the afternoon.

The Youth Science Institute (YSI) has a number of insects, and the volunteer guide showed us one of their biggest residents - the tarantula spider. While they are poisonous, this spider is used to people handling it and usually won't bite unless very aggitated. The YSI would be a great place to bring kids - and the park surrounding is beautiful.

*All photos from Jun Gong

today

Thinking of you! Good luck today!

blueberries and oatmeal

Thursday when I got home from work, I sat down and flipped through my new issue of Bon Appetit. They have a column called "Cooking Life" where writer Molly Wizenberg describes a delicious meal. This month's column was written about Blueberry Oat Scones from the Standard Baking Company in Maine. Given that Dave and I had a clamshell full of sweet blueberries in the fridge (from our CSA bag), I decided on a whim to bake scones instead of figure out what to eat for dinner.
Here they are just before they go into the oven.

And then just after. As a treat to myself, I bought this double devon cream half off at the grocery store. A warm scone with the wonderful cream was AMAZING. These are probably some of the best scones I have ever had - I really liked the flaky oatmeal in the batter. Is it wrong to think that blueberries are better this way?