Our "Wicked" Weekend in San Francisco!

Here we go! We're "Off to see the Wizard", and have "One fine day, in the Emerald City..."

Couldn't leave home without the Nintendo DS players

Golden Gate Park!

Walking out on the Golden Gate Bridge. A little windy, and the fog would come and go, but it really was a nice day for walking out there. The girls really thought it was cool that you could walk on it!

The girls...

and Daddy with his girls

a cool shot I got

a freight liner going under the bridge

checked in to the Good Hotel, remodeled from recycled products, small but very clean, and very San Fran and "green". Only around the corner and a block down from the theater (Market and 7th Sts.). Except for a little confusion over the billing, it was a wonderful place to stay. We would totally go back!

Our farm girl and our witch are ready to go!

YES!!! Mommy is excited too!!! Here we are, at the Orpheum!

sillies...

Inside they tell you you can't take pictures, but I really wish I could have at least taken a few of the inside of the theater. It is beautiful. Anyway, the show was so incredible, and our seats were third row, so we really did feel like they were performing just for us. The costumes, sets, orchestra, vocals, EVERYTHING was amazing. Made me miss doing operas a little, but it was sooo fun to sit back and enjoy all the talent!!! The girls were totally mesmerized. It was great to see them experience it!

So throughout the whole thing, we were getting compliments on how great the girls looked in their costumes (a couple other kids were dressed up too, they said, but we never saw them). Because of this, one of the ushers said that we needed to go outside and wait by the stage door for the actors to come out, as they would get a kick out of seeing the girls. Sooo, we waited just a little bit and got to meet them, take pictures and get a few autographs. The first one is Glinda (Kendra Kassebaum), although Kris moved as he was taking ker picture and got a blur of her. Her resume is totally impressive, and she has played this role on Broadway and in the touring group, she also just finished a film with Lisa Kudrow and Natalie Portman. So cool! At least the rest of the pics are better...

Here they are with Boq- who later becomes the Tin Man (Eddy Rioseco). Awesome!Fiyero- later becomes the Scarecrow (Nicholas Dromard). Awesome acting and voice

And as Madame Morrible, the one and only Patty Duke!!! She was tiny and spunky, and soo sweet. She talked to the girls and gave them autographs, talked to everyone, and then got in a SUV with her husband and left. Soo cool to meet her. And despite being so nice to everyone that night and playing such sweet roles when she was younger, she did awesome job being the villain!!! (but then again, what do you expect from the person that gave us such an awesome childhood performance as Helen Keller in The Miricle Worker?).

waiting by the stage door!

Finally, we got to meet our other witch. She took a little while to get all that green MAC Makeup off of her! She was incredible and oh so nice. Such talent!!! Thank you Vicki Noon, and even though we love Idina Menzel, you are now "OUR" Elphaba forevah!!! posing with Dorothy and mini-Ephie- played by Becca :)

and our very own Dorothy, Mallory!

We were all tired and happy after the show, and it didn't take long for us all to fall asleep once we got back to the hotel. Besides, we had to rest up for Day two!

On day two, we woke up got ready and ate. Then we went down to the shopping plaza on 5th and Market, and bought our Cable Car passes. We enjoyed talking to people in line and watching them turn the cars around to go back down the route. Oh, this might be a good place to add a comment about the little pink purse that Becca had strapped to her on the rest of these pictures. On our way to the theater the night before, a man had walked by and complimented her on her costume and gave her a brand new purse for free. I told him he didn't have to, and he insisted. He was kinda one of those shall we say "earthy" city types. Later we speculated on how he had gotten this new purse with tags on it. Hmmm...Becca likes the purse though. Mallory, who had been a couple steps ahead with Kris wondered how she had missed out. So we may have to get her a purse next time we go shopping. Okay, back to day 2...

I had a little scavenger hunt mapped out for us in Chinatown, so we got off there first. We didn't find everything on the list, but we found quite a bit. Here are a few...

this is the The Fortune Cookie Factory. It is down an alleyway and somewhat hidden, but so fun to see how they are made. They start out flat and hot off the press, then they put the fortune in and fold it quickly before it cools. They were nice and let us take pictures, and gave out samples. YUM!

This next one is of an herbalist shop. Some of them do not like pictures being taken inside their shops, and this one had a sign on the window that said so. We took this picture so the jars with interesting-looking contents could be seen in the background. So cool to think they have used these remedies forever, and all of these things remind me of a children's book called The Last Dragon, which is about a boy staying with family in Chinatown. There was a street where each building was painted in different random colors and red lanterns out. Cool, although I didn't get a picture of it...The girls like the kite shop a lot!

One of the stops was the first Eastern Bakery in San Francisco. I wanted to try something Chinese, and the girls wanted to eat chocolate chip cookies. I made them get chocolate covered fortune cookie and share a chinese pancake with me. We didn't like the pancake much, it had some sticky, rice custardy thing in the middle. We did like the chocolate covered fortune cookie though...

Back on the trolley...

Being the thrill-seekers that we are, the girls and I were excited to stand and hang on to the outside railings. The next stop was Fisherman's Wharf, so this was our view as we went down the hill and towards the Wharf. We saw Alcatraz island out there perfectly...

Right before we got on the trolley, we took a picture of St. Mary's Cathedral. I love the different archetechtral styles you find in SF. Also, I wanted to get a dragon lamppost picture before we left Chinatown.

okay, back to the Cable Car ride...

Mandatory "we were there" photo...

another one, with Alioto's and the boats behind them

Awww, a cute shot of my babies!

Between Piers 41 and 39, where we chased seagulls and watched street performers. There were several "robots" there, a huge, "moon guy", and of course the bush guy, that didn't scare the girls. They saw him scare someone else ahead of us while we were walking and laughed pretty hard about that :)

Watching them make the sourdough bread at Boudin's Bakery and Cafe. We had seen this a couple time before at Disneyland, so it was cool for them to see the real place.

Back at Market and 5th, watching them turn the cars around again!

It was pretty crowded but we had a great time in the big city! The girls totally enjoyed it and said that their favorite parts were walking on the Golden Gate bridge, the cable cars, and getting to see Wicked, among other things. I am glad we could make some memories as a family. It was also nice to get out of the summer heat and have a change of pace. But at the end of the journey, as Dorothy would say "there's no place like home!"