Family Ties

YAY!! I had a great weekend! My mom and little bro Marcus came up from SoCal to visit Derek and I. It had been 4 months since I had seen my mom and 7 months since I had seen my brother. Although, we keep in contact through phone calls and text messaging often, it's still way too long to go with out the physical interaction, ya know. So Thursday night I picked them up from SJC and we came back to our place and laid low for the rest of the night. I slaved over the cutting board and put together a great big 'ol salad for dinner, (hahaha)which we all thoroughly enjoyed, along with catching up conversations and a couple of glasses of wine! (a n/a sparkler for my 12 year old brother)
The next day, Friday morning, after my jog at the neighborhood HS track, I came home and picked up them up and we headed out for the day. We went and had coffee and shopped around on good 'ol Lincoln Ave. They hadn't been in awhile so it was like old times:) At around noon, we realized that the Farmer's Market was going on in downtown San Jose. It was actually the first time any of us had been, believe it or not, and we really enjoyed it! There's a little bit of everything there, in just the span of a block and a half, maybe two. Short and sweet:) If you are there and get a chance, I really recommend stopping by the Crepe table. We shared their Chicken and Mushroom crepe....chicken, mushrooms, spinach, feta cheese, bell peppers=YUM!
After our fill of the Market, we headed over to the Almaden Valley Nursery to find some plants to re-pot for the front of my door at home. I had been waiting for the right time to get out there and bring new life to the entrance of my place again. It has been a couple of years since the last time I had planted anything and that means it was way too long. I thought it would be something that the three of us could enjoy together. A way for us to spend quality time together and make something pretty at the same time!
With sooo many choices and help from the "plant guy"Dave at the nursery, we came home with 5 beautiful flowering plants and 1 beautiful flowering small tree! That evening my mom and I dug our hands in the dirt, (btw, we both agree that we LOVE the smell of fresh soil) and re-potted all 6 plants and arranged them on my porch. I absolutely love them and we both really enjoyed ourselves.

Meanwhile, our boys (Derek and Marcus) went to grab take-out for all of us and we all had a nice dinner! Along with more conversation, laughs, and reminiscing moments:) Nothing like a little moment with mother nature to work up an good appetite for all of the above!!
Saturday morning came early once again from the late night before, but wanting to stay true to form, I awoke nice and early-er to get a workout in before we started our long day. We had a Trunk Show to attend to in Los Gatos as well as a family reunion in Gilroy. The Trunk Show was a feature and sale of the arts and crafts of the Etsy/Sf group. One of my dearest friends Miranda is apart of this creative clan and she was there to sell her beautiful Hair Petals and delectable cupcakes (MiraCakes)as well as feature her mother's classically chic handmade stationary. We were all glad we were able to attend on our way out, and we're glad to have met some new creative ladies who inspired me to channel my own creative lady;)
Then it was off to Gilroy him, nor did I ever really meet anyone on that side of the family. My immediate family come from Southern California, but all of my mom's family (including her)were born and raised right here in San Jose... and there is a grip of them! Not everyone was able to make it that day but I was told that something like 400 some people were invited....WOW! I'd say though that about to meet everyone at our family reunion. After fighting traffic, making a few pit stops, and finally finding the park location, we arrived. We were first greeted by my Uncle Albert who is my mom's oldest brother and organizer of this get together. Mind you this was a union of the Robles family, which is my grandfather side, and of whom I never even really knew. He passed away when I was in the 1st grade so I never had any kind of relationship with half of that were there over the course of the day. My group were probably some of the last to show up (if not the last) but we were able to still enjoy food, meet lots of new faces and catching up with old ones...well you know what I mean, right? ;) The only bummer about there being such a big group was that it seemed that people were a little overwhelmed. So there wasn't a whole lot of intermingling with the ones that didn't know each other. Most people stuck next to their own immediate families and/or the ones that they knew best. I guess I kinda did too...Oh well!~
The day ended back at home with left over BBQ for dinner and lots of cold stuff to drink. It sure was a hot one:)
The next morning we got up early once again to tackle yet another long hot day in Gilroy. This time though we were headed to the Gilroy Garlic Festival. It was the first visit for the three of us, Derek, myself and my family, but we were meeting up with some alumni's there. Derek's two sister's and their family go every year. So we get to Gilroy and almost at the very front of the freeway exit you are being directed to drive in a single file line to the parking area. Once you park, you get out of your car and get into another line to get on a shuttle bus to the park itself. The busses were nice though, air conditioned and TV monitors getting you informed as to the festival criteria, where to go, food to expect, etc. Once in the park, it's a free for all.
We ultimately had a good time, however, for any first timers next year...I would suggest to prepare yourselves for lots of sun, long lines and lots of fried food. The garlic artichoke hearts, garlicy calamari, garlic fries all YUMMY! We spent alot of time in the wine tent, where you can do tastings from 8-10 local wineries. The cherry on the sundae there was that the tent was filled with water misters, thank god:)

The weekend came and went so fast, unfortunately, and we had to drop my mom and brother off at the airport for their return home:( But I couldn't have asked for a better visit....I'm already planning for the next one:)