3/29 - Headless Yoshi is ready for a break

Spring Break, that is!  So am I.  (Both somewhat headless and ready for a break, that is.)  Look at my nice clean desk.  Now, let's get outta here before more work piles up on it!

 Lil' Guy got a new Pokemon friend.  Many thanks to ‏@MichaelJSealy for helping identify it as Axew.  #phew!

9/06 - Pink Yoshi loves a bake sale

I was starving this morning, and they were having a bake sale at work.  What a happy coincidence!

Did you see my rainbow and double rainbow pictures from yesterday?

Also, check out how they looked in San Francisco (from SFGate).

9/05 - Hold on, Pink Yoshi!

Doesn’t Pink Yoshi look sweet next to these little flowers?

Whoa!  Motorcycles don’t have seat belts, and this one is off like a rocket!  Hold on!!!!

After Pink Yoshi's hard day, she just wanted to putter around the house...  (help)

And then, on our way to derby practice, look what we saw!  A rainbow!

No, TWO rainbows!!  We are doubly lucky.

9/04 - Pink Yoshi finds a wonder window

Today, Pink Yoshi was seeking success.  This dragon had some ideas about how it’s done.  I did not know dragons were big on teamwork, but you learn something new every day.

This window was set in a very thick wall, and was very dramatic.  We liked it!

We also found a cute Dalmatian for Lil' Gal.

8/24 - Blue Yoshi is an honorary lady who lunches

At first, Blue Yoshi thought these footprints were from a giant that worked in the financial district, but I explained that they are BART’s attempt to keep us all in line.

We had a little reunion lunch with Katelyn and Jennifer, who escaped from I knew from my old job. It was so good to see them, but we missed Adelina and Linda (who is still at the old job).

8/23 - Pink Yoshi and the green steam machine

I have no idea what this kind of construction vehicle is, but it seems to have something to do with water pipes and the water tanks that have been sitting around this week.

Pink Yoshi found another pink dragon in the city.  Pink Yoshi said, “My, what a long tongue and sharp teeth you have!”  And then slurped her long Yoshi tongue at it.  Dragons are strange.

8/22 - Yellow Yoshi gets fruity

He wanted to know what was in these fruit boxes, but I told him we can’t open packages that don’t belong to us.

Yellow Yoshi saw the warning signs on this equipment and decided he would be very, very careful.  Good Yoshi.

6/21 - Yoshi learns a wheelie important lesson

This was written on somebody’s bike wheel (upside down!): “Each one teach one.” What will you teach me today?

Another one of those ice cream ads, this time with banana boats. (Lots of banana commentary today, for some reason.)

5/30 - Blue Yoshi meets lots of new friends

Unfortunately, my phone is still refusing to send or receive information today, so I’ll have to show you the pictures at home again.  Grrr.  Blue Yoshi met these new friends today:

Suzanne F and her two little doggies, Yogi and the other one whose name I can't remember.

My friend Meredith from college, who looks exactly the same as she did then.  (How does she do it?!)

Some kind of Curious George guy.

Meanwhile, at home, Lil' Gal lost tooth #6.  She is now ahead of Lil' Guy!  Woooo!

 Popsicle break!

5/18 - Yellow Yoshi sings happy birthday to Maranda

Yellow Yoshi saw these escalator stairs waiting for repairs and decided to climb up them.  It was good exercise.

Today was Maranda's birthday, so we took her to lunch.  We saw a cupcake truck on our way to the rooftop garden, and had to take a picture.

Then, on the rooftop garden, someone took a picture of us!

Tonight was the elementary school carnival.  We had so much fun and won all kinds of prizes.  The twins picked up mad hula hooping skillz, and I was pleased to discover I still had 'em.

 And now... on to the weekend!  What do you have planned?

4/16 - Yellow Yoshi frolics in the flowers (and our new "pet")

These pretty flowers are at our train station.  It's starting to feel like spring around here.

Yellow Yoshi couldn’t decide if he wanted to take the yellow trolley or the yellow taxi.  While he tried to make a decision, the light turned green and they both drove off. Poor Yellow Yoshi.

Here is a photo of our new "pet," King Emmett.  We found him while weeding this weekend.  He is a red pupa that will either hatch a fluffy moth or some kind of stinging wasp.  Let's all vote for the former, shall we?  This pupa is actually King Emmett II.  King Emmett the first was tragically squished with a Spanish-English dictionary.  Pobrecito.

3/22 - Yoshi did not know it was red sweater day

Looks like they’re cleaning or repairing the fountain in the lobby…  Yoshi thought maybe the silver balls had hatched, and was looking around for some friends.

Elizabeth and I have been color-coordinated all week.  Today, we wore our red sweaters.  Yoshi pointed to his red shell and wanted to be in the club, too.  We said OK!

2/17 - Yoshi meets a ferocious lion!

When the lion roared, Yoshi noticed he had a long tongue, just like Yoshi.  And then they were fur-Yoshi-ish buddies.  Justlikethat.

Did you know that, in the city, there are elevators under the sidewalk?  It’s true. They’re open a lot in the mornings so people can deliver supplies to the buildings downtown, but this one was open for our lunchtime walk.

Yoshi liked the pretty lights on my work building.  (Me too.)  Yoshi sang a little song: "You light up my life."  (You do.)

2/15 - In which Yoshi and Yellow Crayon become fashion accessories

Dinesh brought Jeanine a fancy dress back from India, and she thought Yoshi would make a nice hairpiece. He kept falling off, but a binder clip finally did the trick!  (Yellow Crayon and I thought they were both silly.)

We went to Walgreen’s in search of discounted Valentine’s chocolates, but there was nothing left!  Yoshi felt empty inside.

When I saw Yellow Yoshi, Yellow Crayon, and Yellow Cab together, I started humming a little Cold Play tune…

YELLOW

Look at the stars
Look how they shine for you
And everything you do
Yeah they were all yellow

I came along
I wrote a song for you
And all the things you do
And it was called yellow

So then I took my turn
Oh what a thing to have done
And it was all yellow

Your skin
Oh yeah your skin and bones
Turn into something beautiful
You know you know I love you so
You know I love you so

I swam across
I jumped across for you
Oh what a thing to do

Cause you were all yellow
I drew a line
I drew a line for you
Oh what a thing to do
And it was all yellow

Your skin
Oh yeah your skin and bones
Turn into something beautiful
And you know
For you I'd bleed myself dry
For you I'd bleed myself dry

It's true
Look how they shine for you
Look how they shine for you
Look how they shine for
Look how they shine for you
Look how they shine for you
Look how they shine

Look at the stars
Look how they shine for you
And all the things that you do

1/21 - Super 6th Mario Birthday Party

First of all, let me say that I cannot believe my teeny little twins are now six (6) years old.  I remember getting a bag of hand-me-down clothes and looking at the size 6 pants and thinking, "They will never be big enough to wear these." And now that time has come.  (sniff!)

OK, moving right along...  Lil' Guy is very into everything Mario Brothers.  A little bit on the Wii, but mostly loves playing with Mario action figures, pretending he's Mario, etc.  Lil' Gal plays along.  It's easier that way.  So, when I asked them what theme we should have for their birthday party, it was merely a courtesy.  I knew how it was going to go.

Thanks to many great ideas from the internet, here's what I did....

Cupcakes for school:

Decorations:

• Mario table topper, borrowed from a neighbor (thank you!)
• Balloons and streamers in red, green, yellow and blue
• Plates and napkins in red, green, yellow and blue
• Pin the Mustache on Mario poster (see Games below)

Food:

• Broken Glass Jello, in Mario colors

• Goomba Meatballs (sadly, I ran out of time to add the faces)
• Spinach Dip with Moo Moo Meadows veggies
• Star Power Cookies

• Toad on a Stick (inspired by these)

• Mario and Luigi (red and green) juice boxes 
• Mario cake and vanilla ice cream (not bad for my first attempt at fondant, no?)

Games:

• Race to collect gold the most coins
  Bag of 400 coins found at Party City.  I gave each kid a paper lunch bag with his/her name on it, and opened the doors to the twins' rooms where the coins were hidden.  The kid with the most coins won a prize.  Everyone got to keep the coins they found.

• Yoshi Egg Race
  I used some Easter eggs on a stick that I found at Michael's, and painted spots on them with green nail polish. The kids lined up in two teams.  Each kid had to run to the end of the room and back and then hand off the egg and spoon to the next kid in line.  The winning team got prizes.

• Pin the Mustache on Mario
  I had this poster printed at 18 x 24" at my local Copymat.  We used black construction paper to cut out mustaches and used blue painter's tape on the back to make them stick.

• Pass the Bob-omb
  I found a styrofoam ball at Michael's and painted him to look like Bob-omb.  The kids sat in a circle and played Hot Potato, passing Bob-omb until the music (Herb Alpert worked nicely) stopped.  Whoever was left holding Bob-omb was out.  The last kid sitting got a prize.  This was the most fun game we played.  The kids pointed and laughed hysterically whenever someone got out.  It was so cute, I almost had them play a second round!

Prizes

• Gold coins
• Mario Kart erasers
• Small gold plastic trophies

Goodie Bags/Favors

• Mario/Luigi posterboard hats

• Mario Kart pens
• Mario Kart stickers
• small notebooks in red, green, yellow, blue
• chocolate gold coins

We had a total of 10 kids, and they had a great time.  It was a delight to host them -- they were polite and literally begging me for more and more games!

Here are the twins, still wearing their hats days later -- now with the addition of mustaches!
(They are still wearing the hats, now two weeks later!)

A super shout-out to my wonderful friends, who came early and hung streamers and a million balloons, made the poster board visors, assembled goodie bags and hid cold coins, and did anything and everything else I asked of them.  Thank you so much for your help and for listening to my story over and over again of how the power went out at 2am while I was up to my ears in fondant and none of the batteries in the flashlights worked.  David, Joanne, and Linda, you guys ROCK.