Jack London State Park, Glen Ellen

After our morning adventures (part one of this post), we headed north about 15 minutes to the small town of Glen Ellen. Our first stop was Jack London Village, where we enjoyed a chocolate tasting at Wine Country Chocolates. This elicited a happy dance from our 3 year old, who has developed quite an appreciation for chocolate!

Sonoma. On a budget. With kids. IT CAN BE DONE!!

Oh wine country...that beautiful place you go to relax with a glass of wine, while basking in the California sun. Sounds amazing right? But what do you do if that day now includes young children?! Simply put...the wine regions of California are too beautiful to cross off your list just because you have your kids in tow. This weekend we took advantage of the unseasonably warm weather (70 degrees in January!) and headed to Sonoma for what turned out to be a wonderful day with the kids.

Discover and Go!

I was SO excited when my little sister told me about Discover & Go. It is a program offered by most Bay Area libraries, which allows library cardholders access to free or discounted passes at a number of Bay Area museums and venues.

The Japanese Tea Gardens, Golden Gate Park

To cap off our long holiday weekend, we headed over to San Francisco for a morning in Golden Gate Park. With over 1,000 acres to explore it's hard to know where to begin! Our first stop was the Japanese Tea Garden. The Garden was first created back in 1894 for the World's Fair, and is now the oldest public Japanese garden in the United States. The paths meander through the 5 acres of beautifully maintained gardens which feature traditional elements such as the arched drum bridge, stepping stone paths, pagodas, stone lanterns and several koi ponds.

An amazing afternoon at the Point Bonita Lighthouse

For whatever reason the Marin Headlands were not high on my list of places to visit; however, at the urging of my sister, I decided to do a little research into one of her favorite spots, the Point Bonita Lighthouse.  I found that you had to walk through a tunnel to get to Point Bonita and that pretty much sealed the deal. My kids love tunnels! This was a fact I was not aware of until our recent visit to the Sutro Baths, but that was enough for me to pack the kids up and head out on our adventure.

Family Fun in Tilden Park

Tilden Park is one of my favorite places to take the kids in Berkeley and a hidden gem when it comes to free family fun (Note: some of the attractions have a low admission fee). The drive up to the park rewards you with some amazing views of the San Francisco Bay. I always have to remind myself to stop looking at the view and pay attention to the road! Below are my five favorite stops in Tilden.

Sutro Baths and Lands End

By about noon on New Years Day, our house looked like a tornado had hit it, the kids were getting stir crazy and I was waiting for my coffee to kick in (the downside to actually making it up until midnight is that kids still wake up around 6:30!). So we had to get out of the house...and it had to be soon! Parks are a great option on holidays, and we had never been out to the Sutro Baths or the Coastal hiking trail. So off we went!