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Happy New Year! How was your holiday break? Hope you had a good one. We headed to Palm Springs and San Francisco this year to visit family and eat our weight in tacos. Here are a few photos, if you’d like to see…
First up, we went to Palm Springs for four nights. We always meet Alex’s family here for the holidays and rent a couple houses with pools. (The city has so many rad midcentury places, which are more affordable than many hotels.) This year, we stayed at the beautiful Sycamore House; and our relatives stayed at this colorful spot with a killer view.
Christmas morning was a happy chaos of breakfast tacos, swimming and presents. Toby’s favorites were these (real!) guest checks, so he could pretend to be a waiter, and of course a car magazine.
Alex tried on these hilarious tattoo sleeves. (Between you and me, I secretly found them so attractive, haha. Who knew?!)
And he gave me this nickname necklace, which says “Bunny” (him) on one side, and “Fox” (me) on the other side. It made me so teary, and I still haven’t taken it off.
And, finally, Anton’s most beloved gift was a package of break-open geodes. Our rental house didn’t have a hammer, so he just hurled them against other rocks until they cracked open; and they were beautiful and sparkly inside.
But the biggest highlight of the trip was that the boys got to stay up for Christmas dinner. Usually they head to bed, and we have an adults dinner around 8 p.m., but this year we ate at 6 p.m. and it was wonderful to have them there. Toby dressed up, and Alex served him a martini glass with water.
After Palm Springs, we flew up to San Francisco to see my dad, sister and niece and in-laws. My friend Birgit was out of town, so she let us crash at her beautiful place. How amazing is the garden? Her artist friend had come to visit years ago and built the wooden walkways as a host gift. Note to self: Improve my host gifts. (See her full house tour here, if you’d like.)
San Francisco was so much fun to explore, as always. (Thank you again for the advice!) We saw alligators at the Academy of Sciences, braved the slides at Dolores Park, watched mice battle soldiers at The Nutcracker, wolfed pizza at Pizzeria Delfina, and of course ate many more tacos.
The final weekend, we went with a big group of relatives to the Pelican Inn at Muir Beach, which really captures the feel of an English pub. They serve classics like fish and chips, shepherd’s pie, and bangers and mash — plus pints of lager and cider.
Here are some photos Anton took, which actually capture the vibe really well!
After lunch, we walked over to the beach for some fresh ocean air.
Above is a classic portrait of a Goddard-Williams vacation, in which one child is happy and wants to stay yet the other child is annoyed and wants to leave. EVERY TIME, GUYS, EVERY FREAKING TIME.
Finally, our last night, on New Year’s Eve, we visited my brother-in-law Paul’s grave. My sister poured out a glass of his favorite whiskey, and we drank some ourselves while the kids ran around and the sun dipped behind the mountains. On the back of his tombstone is a beautiful excerpt from a John Bunyan poem: “Then Fancies fly away, He’ll fear not what men say, He’ll labour Night and Day, To be a Pilgrim.” Be still my heart.
Now we are home sweet home, back in Brooklyn. Hope you had a good holiday and are looking forward to the new year. Lots of love to you. And now: 2018, let’s do this. xoxo
P.S. Eight California trips, since Toby was teeny tiny!
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