I keep an old-school, paper day-planning calendar in my purse. I could probably learn to use my phone or some other electronic calendar system, which would save me from the hysterical moments when I can't find my little book, but I prefer filling in all of the daily boxes with our planned activities. And month after month, MOST of the days have something planned. It's no wonder we're already most of the way through November and we can't believe it's gone by this fast.
Last weekend we had the honor of joining family and friends for celebrations on both Saturday and Sunday:
Saturday morning we drove to Petaluma where lots of my in-laws were gathered to celebrate our little nephews first birthday. I've pretty much never understood the idea of having a first birthday until now. I always just imagined they were mostly a reason for friends with children to get together and have a party. But little one year old Miles definitely knew this party was for him! And the other children did too. Even the very little ones remembered when it had been their own birthday and they talked about it.
One year olds are smart. They are cute and fun and this is the first celebration of their lives that is all about them. While it's unlikely they'll remember this birthday forever, it teaches them that they have a special day and gives them something to be excited over. Though it seemed to me like they get excited over just about everything. *Excitement* OhhHHHhhh, balloons!! *Excitement*
Since it's not enough for us to ever have just one awesome day of the weekend, after a great Saturday spent catching up with lots of family, Sunday rolled around and we spent it celebrating the new citizenship status of one of our friends! (And some other stuff.)
Sunday afternoon we left our house headed to Sacramento. A little over an hour later we arrived at the Cal Expo center where the State Fair is held annually. The place is huge and we were attending two separate events here this day. 
Our first stop was the Crossroads of the West gun show. While I generally enjoy walking around and looking at all of the great items at these shows, we arrived later than we had intended and there was only an hour left for the vendors to have their goods displayed, so we decided to only purchase one $14 admission, and sent Casey in to look for what we needed. Unfortunately for him, most of the sellers were already packing up their stuff even though there was still a solid hour left. I understand wanting to get on the road after a tiring weekend at work, but it's unfair for the paying consumer that they're being cheated of that hour. Perhaps they should offer free admission at first sight of seller flight. Casey found one of the items he needed at an outrageous price that he finally talked the seller down from. He also looked at ammunition and the jaw-dropping price tags on this too. Last year was a different story and we found lots of good deals on items here. What happened?!
I walked around the gigantic parking lot (yes, for fun) until he called me and we headed to the second event, the Snowbomb Ski and Board Festival. The previous weekend it was held in San Francisco, next weekend it will be San Jose, and this weekend it was Sac-town. Free lift tickets for attendees brought a large crowd, but since it was later in the day we had no line getting in. We each snagged a couple free lift tickets and then browsed the winter gear on display. Casey needs new equipment but we didn't plan on buying anything this particular weekend. We did browse the clothing section and tried on some beanies, helmets, and goggles. Unfortunately, we were able to find every item we liked at a lower price online. What is the point of paying to come to a festival like this if you're not going to get a better deal than just buying the items on your own? We left empty-handed and let down by the greedy vendors.
I guess it's more accurate to say that Amy left empty-handed and Casey.... well.... as you can see.....
Since it'd be impossible to have this much fun without any food all day, I'm going to take a moment to share what happened next. Thanks to my handy food-finding app, we searched for "nachos", and were directed to Oscar's Very Mexican Food in West Sacramento.
Most people do not stop for food on their way to a BBQ dinner party. We are not most people. We stopped and ate the best nachos I've ever had. Real cheese baked onto light, crispy chips, spicy salsa on a nearby salsa bar with jalapeno slices, and beans, sour cream, and fresh guacamole. It was mouth heaven! And it was exactly what we needed to survive the hour drive to El Sobrante to see our friends for one last hoorah before we could go home and call it a weekend.
Most people don't spend a lot of time thinking about citizenship. Casey is a dual citizen of the United States and France. I am a US citizen. Our good friend Sy considered herself an American because she has been raised here, but she was born in Cambodia, in a small enough village that she didn't have a birth certificate to acknowledge her birth. On Independence Day 2013, she married our friend Corey, who is a US citizen and wounded veteran for this country. For the last several months she has worked hard to obtain her citizenship. Her mission was complicated by the missing birth certificate. But finally her day, her moment to truly be recognized as a legal citizen, had arrived! She renounced all princes, former government or loyalties to Cambodia, swore to take up arms if necessary to defend her country, and took an oath of loyalty to the United States. She was given a small flag when it was all over. Congratulations, Sy!
We celebrated this moment with her, her husband, and several friends over great food and good laughs. Lots of smiles and hugs, and before we knew it, another weekend had come and gone. And it was another good one.
