Family Visit!

Within weeks of telling our family that we were moving to the Bay area, my brother Ken and his wife Diane decided to bid on (and, subsequently, 'won') a weekend trip to San Francisco at their church auction. They decided to stretch it into a longer vacation. And soon after, we convinced my Dad to join them. We've been looking forward to this since November!

Their trip has finally begun. Ken, Di and Dad arrived at SFO this afternoon for a 9-day visit. We're very excited to have them all here.

In accordance with Lange tradition, the visit officially started with Happy Hour. That was followed by a delicious chicken curry dinner that Karri prepared. So good.

Christening our new dinner table!

Ken and Diane have a great travel plan including Alcatraz, Sonoma, Yosemite, and a weekend downtown. Dad is content to relax at the house with the rest of us.

It's going to be fun. More updates soon!

San Francisco Here We... Are!

I said in my last post that a lot has changed. By far the biggest change is that we moved from Seattle to San Francisco last month!

Crossing the Golden Gate 

It's a long story. The short version is that my company was acquired by Intuit last October. As part of the deal, my co-founders and I agreed to relocate to the Bay Area, where Intuit is headquartered. Fortunately, they gave us 9 months to make the move so the kids could finish out the school year. We're committed to stay for 2 years. We'll see what happens after that, but are planning to move back to Seattle. Worst case, we'll have a great adventure in an amazing city!

We're renting a house in the city - in a great little neighborhood west of downtown. The neighborhood is Lakeside, but nobody here seems to know it by that name, so we just say 'West Portal' - which is a larger neighborhood just a couple blocks away. We're a 20-minute train ride to downtown (I work in the city), a 7-minute drive to the boys' school, and a 5-minute walk to Victoria's school. It's a great location and West Portal reminds us a lot of West Seattle.

Our new home

The kids are settling into new schools and making new friends. The boys (Thomas a junior, Matthew a freshman) are at St. Ignatius Prep.

1st day!

Victoria (7th grade) is at St. Stephens.

How about that uniform? Ahoy!

We're so proud of how they've handled the move. They were all supportive - despite their disappointment over leaving friends and familiar schools behind. They've definitely jumped in with both feet. Thomas got a part in the school play and is involved in the school's student produced TV station. Matthew is playing water polo. And Victoria is playing volleyball. I'll have lot's of fodder for future blog posts.

Karri has been the rock (and the project manager/task master/travel coordinator/cheerleader) who got us all through it... as always!

A fun walk on the beach!

Lot's more to come!