Monica's house is being tented this weekend (it isn't even a striped tent, she complains, just a dull gray one) so they needed to leave town and decided to come to Sacramento. She talked Roni and family into joining them at the Railroad Museum, and of course we wanted to come too.

She didn't call last night because they had a FIVE-hour trip getting here, Friday traffic on a three-day weekend. So I left a message on the cellphone that we'd be there a little after 11, since we had an errand to run first. I wanted to take these cookbooks and another bag o' books to the library booksale sorting. We loaded the car and headed off, only to discover the poolhouse tightly closed. Is it because of the three-day weekend, or have they moved to a different place? Whatever, this means I'll have to try again next week after I make a phone call.

OK, first try is for the real Belle Cooledge cache. You will recall we thought we'd found this but had actually found the Sesame Street cache. The actual cache is up in the tree. Someone else couldn't find it. We saw these people tonight at the party and told them to remember their first e-mail conversation with us. That was about our "Going to the Tent" cache, and involved looking UP. (They found Belle Cooledge the next day.) As we left, some other cachers drove up. This led to the wonder of how to count "wild" geocachers when I've seen them again.

Back to the poolhouse, just in case, no luck. Then we headed south to the Freeport Sports complex where there's another cache, and also a really neat artwork of rocks painted like different kinds of slightly-squished balls.

We came up I-5 and got off on Sutterville on the short side (50 feet and the River) and found a cache there, then back to Land Park near Fairytale Town for the real Sesame Street cache. This time I had something appropriate for it, a Grover colorform. Some little girls were looking for some sort of treasure, apparently for a party game.

Then it was time to head to Old Sacramento. As we pulled into the parking garage we spied Roni and family. We joined them in front of the RR museum, where they were calling Monica to come fetch. As members they can get guests in. They thought only two, but it turns out we got in free as well.

I asked if Alex had gotten her Valentine and apparently she danced through the living room singing "I just got a letter" from Blue's Clues. We gave Genevieve and Charlotte theirs. G. was being a little shy, as was Alex. Must have taken --- oh, two minutes -- for them to warm up to us. Charlotte was all smiles. With 6 adults and three children, especially one trapped in a stroller, we pretty well had the situation covered and the menfolk could actually take a look at some of the trains as the toddlers went zooming through the exhibits. Once we got upstairs to the toy trains, things were better for them. But let's face it, you don't actually get to enjoy museums when you go with children.

Genevieve was getting whiny because she was hungry so we went out looking for food. The restaurants all had empty tables but 30 minute waits, the Carl's, Jr. is gone, so we finally went to Subway. Then we walked along the River back toward the History museum. I figured there were a few things the children would like in there. Meanwhile, Genevieve developed a yen for ice cream, so they split off while Alex climbed up and down on trains. Eventually I caught up with M&M and told them to meet us in the museum. They have a pass, and we were able to sweet-talk the people into letting Roni and RJ in. They waved M&M through as well. It helps to volunteer occasionally!

Well. This turns out to have LOTS for small children. They spent a lot of time in the log cabin. Genevieve took a pot and a wooden spoon and painted the logs. They played checkers. We zoomed past the dollhouse to the dining room so they could look out of the window at the bridge swing open. Then, downstairs, there are veggies to weigh and tractors to push, and a lot of fun to be had. We spent longer here than anyone expected.

"This goes here!"

We said goodbye outside, so M&M could go back to their hotel, R&RJ could go home, and we could pick up a couple of caches. #800 was on the Tower Bridge. Then we went to the Downtown Plaza. It had finally dawned on me where this cache was, on the elevator. Sure enough, and we were able to retrieve it slyly, though it was a little harder to put it back. Then we hunted, one more time, for the first part.

We ransomed our car (Roni will have to report there, it took our firstborn) and came home to get ready for the geocaching party. This was in a church social hall in Roseville. There were about 70-80 people there, and it was a lot of fun as usual. I managed NOT to get barbeque sauce all over my white clothing.

We'd talked with Roni about maybe joining them in Monterey so we could babysit Alex while they were kayaking. The timing is a little tight due to my tenuous Grand Canyon plans. Then it turns out Rich really wants to do the Reno bowling again, so suddenly it dawns on me that one sightseeing trip in April-May AND another family trip (hi, Bernadette!) in June or July would work out a lot better than trying to combine the two. You see, we end up in the corner of Colorado it seems like we should see B., but it then explodes into Wyoming and just gets really unwieldy.

In the morning, Rich gave me a heart-shaped cache (that happened to have some candy in it.) Be my Valentine! What a great day!