Cousin Travis' Wedding

The first weekend in October, we headed out to California for Cousin Travis' wedding to Dani. It was the girls' first trip to the west coast, and they were very excited to check out the beach.

The wedding was on the beach near Watsonville.  We were able to rent a place right on the beach not far away.

We flew into San Jose with Grandma, Grandpa, and Aunt Amy.  While Grandma and Grandpa went with Uncle Arch, Aunt Amy came with us to check out Henry Cowell Redwoods California State Park, which was awesome.  The redwoods really are amazing.  It was the first time any of us had seen them, and the girls had a blast walking the trail and checking out the trees.  While at the visitor's center, Kara learned about the animals that live there and about seed size of different California conifers.  Afterwards, we drove to our condo, unloaded, and met up with everyone for dinner at a nearby seafood restaurant.  There was a group of sea loins loittering around the fishing boats.  That would be our closest look at them this trip, so thanks for pointing them out Uncle Arch!

Sleeping has always been an issue on these trips, and we were pretty concerned since the girls were going to share a room at the condo.  The first night Emily popped out about 10 times to talk with Mom and Dad, but eventually calmed down and went to sleep (Kara was very quick to settle down), though the girls did wake Dad up at 5 am because, as they said, they just couldn't sleep any more!  The second night was better, and the third night was no problem at all.  Hopefully, sleeping on vacation will get progressively better...

On Sunday we drove to Monterrey for the morning.  We walked along the oceanfront and through downtown.  We didn't go inside the Aquarium, but we did check out the observation deck.  For lunch, we ate at a place that hung over the bay with great views.  A big sea otter was kind enough to entertain us too!  He was very close and fun to watch.  We also saw seals a bit further out.  Emily was pretty worn out after lunch, so we headed back to Watsonville.

That evening, there was a wedding rehearsal at the campsite followed by a cookout.  Travis and Arch grilled out and had a great spread.  The girls had a blast playing with Langdon, Dani's nephew.  They also had games set up, which were a hit.  The bonfire was also fascinating to the girls, along with being able to stay up a bit after the sun went down!

For Monday morning, we took it pretty easy and just headed down to the beach.  The water was quite cold, but that didn't stop the girls from running right in (though Dad wasn't too happy about hanging out in the water).  Kara spent most of the beach time just running around in the waves.  Emily ran in the waves but also played in the sand for awhile.  We were able to see a few dolphins in the distance from the condo too!

The wedding was beautiful.  The ceremony was on the beach with the reception up the hill at the campsite.  Travis had asked if the girls could be a part of the wedding.  The girls were supposed to walk down the aisle in front of the bride with a sign that said "Here Comes the Bride".  Emily was pretty excited about it up until the time it came to actually walk down the aisle with the sign.  She ended up just walking behind Kara while Kara held the sign.

The reception was awesome.  It was catered from a a food truck.  They had also set up games for the guests and had a S'mores cookout for dessert.  The girls had a good time playing with their new friend Landon.  And wouldn't you know it, Kara caught the bouquet.  Oh, boy!

Welcome to the family, Dani!

Link to pictures

September 2016

September was a pretty exciting month.  We got peaches on our peach tree (first time since 2012), so we spent all Labor Day weekend picking, peeling, and freezing peaches.  If you visit, I hope you enjoy peach desserts!

The girls quickly fell into a routine with school.  Emily was pretty gung-ho about preschool at first, but she started getting separation anxiety after the first couple of weeks.  She would be fine right up until the time that it was time for class to start.  Then she would grab onto Mom (and Dad the one time he dropped her off) and sob until we would peel her off and run off.  Fortunately, the teachers told us she'd be fine 30 seconds after we left, though she always seemed a little upset when we picked her up.  She seems to be getting better about it, though.

Kara, of course, is loving school.  She runs off to get in line everytime we get to school, never with a glance back.  She's also been enjoying playing soccer this season.  At this age, it's mostly just the girls running around in a big cluster after the ball, but Kara has fun.

Emily started a dance class (see the video below).  She's only gone a few sessions, but she seems to love it.  She likes to show off her dance moves whenever she gets a chance.  Emily is pretty into board games.  Her favorite these days is Chutes and Ladders, but she also enjoys Memory, Candyland, Hi Ho Cherry-O, and Chess (she's just learning how to set up the board and how the pieces move).

Emily quote:
"I'm just not thinking about it." Emily's response when someone asks her to do something she doesn't want to do, like clean up after herself, say good game when she loses, or get ready for school.

"I did a great job today, give me a high five!" - Emily to her dance teacher after class one day.



Link to picture

Back to school... for everyone

This was a month of first days of schools!  Kara had her first day of first grade on Thursday, August 18th.  Kara is really excited to start another year of school.  Emily had her first first day of school this year on August 31st.  She is starting preschool at the Rec Center, which meets for a few hours every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning.  That means...  Mom actually has time to herself on a regular basis!  So exciting!

Mimi came out to visit us for a couple of weeks this month.  We got to hit all kinds of sites around the city.  We hit the Celestial Seasonings factory, Denver Museum, which was awesome as always, the Hammond Candy factory, the Denver Aquarium, and afternoon tea at the Huckleberry.  It was quite the whirlwind visit!

Kara started playing soccer with some of her friends from teeball.  So far she's having fun, but it's mostly just a bunch of the girls running around after the ball.  But she's having a blast!  Kara also lost her 3rd tooth.  We think she looks pretty cool with the gap in her smile.  :-)

Link to pictures

July 2016

The summer is just flying by.  It seems like every weekend is jammed packed with activities, and we still aren't getting everything done that we want to.

The first weekend of July, we headed down to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science to check it out.  While we were there, we got an annual membership to the museum. If anyone wants to meet up there, let us know!  Both girls had fun, though Emily was ready to go back home well before Kara had seen everything she wanted to see.

Kara stayed up for the first time this year to see the fireworks on the 4th (they start around 9 pm).  Emily went down at her usual bedtime (and thankfully stayed asleep through the fireworks), but Kara stayed up and watched Zootopia with Mom and Dad.  There's a local fireworks show that we can see from our backyard.  After the movie, we got ourselves set up in the backyard and enjoyed the fireworks show.  We eventually got Kara down to sleep around 9:30.  We paid for it the next day, though, as Kara was quite grumpy and moody since she didn't get enough sleep.  Maybe someday we'll be able to do exciting things with the kids without worrying too much about sleep.

We went up to Breckenridge for several days later in the month (separate blog post to follow soon).  We attempted to do our annual backyard camp-out the weekend after we got back, even getting as far as getting the tent set up, but Kara had a bit of a melt-down as were getting everything ready.  It was probably too much excitement.  We'll try again in August.

Kid quotes:

- After dinner one night, Emily chose jelly beans as her dessert (the girls get a small dessert if they eat all their dinner). Mom said Emily could have 3 jelly beans since she's 3 years old.  Emily grabbed 4 jelly beans, and Dad pointed out that Emily was only supposed to get 3.  Looking very innocent, she quickly popped one into her mouth and showed dad the 3 left saying, "look there are 3."

- After our 4th of July grill out, Mom said, "Wow, I am stuffed!"  Emily promptly replied, "We don't having stuffing, we have bones inside!"

- We've been having some minor issues with rabbits eating things in our garden.  Emily noted, "Something's eating our plants like bunnies... or sharks..."

Link to pictures

Breckenridge 2016

Breckenridge was a bit of a blur this year.  We went up the first part of the week this year, instead of the last half of the week like we usually do.  Our plan was to head up Sunday after Emily's nap.  Unfortunately, Emily decided that she wasn't going to take a nap, so at 3, we just packed everyone in the car and headed up.  We hoped that maybe she would sleep in the car (she didn't) or at least that she'd be tired and sleep when we got there (that didn't happen either).  After we got there and got unpacked, we grabbed dinner at the hotel restaurant and then tried to get the girls to wind down for bed.  After a quick bath, we tried to put the girls down together in the same room (gotta give it a try).  Kara was actually pretty good and tried to go to sleep.  Emily, however, kept popping out of bed to check on Kara and everyone else in the other room.  Around 9, we gave up on the experiment and moved Emily to the other room.  Emily just didn't sleep well at all that night, tossing and turning, and waking up hysterical in the middle of the night.  So, our trip didn't get off to the best start...

Sleeping, in general, was a bit of a struggle the whole time we were up there.  Mom swears that the people in the unit above us were doing construction with power tools and work boots every night until 11 pm.  Luckily, Kara and Emily generally slept pretty well after the first night.  Mom and Dad, however, had trouble sleeping every night.

We didn't get a lot of hiking in this year.  We went on a short hike near the lodge the first morning, but that was about it.  Kara was really enthusiastic about hiking, and Emily was a trooper.  We hiked until Emily said she wanted us to carry her, and then we just headed back.  We did get a lot of pool time in.  We went just about every morning.  Kara had a great time practicing her swimming skills.  Emily mostly enjoyed just being in the water and occasionally jumping in to Dad.

We also made our annual trip up to the top of Peak 8 to check out the Breckenridge Summer Fun Park, which was a bit of a bust.  We bought the pass for Kara this year, so she could do just about anything.  She did the bungee bounce and the alpine slide (with Dad).  We also bought a limited pass for Emily.  She got up on the trampoline for the bungee bounce, but decided she just wasn't into it and backed out once they tried to put on the harness.  Unfortunately, the roller coaster they have up there and the zipline were both down, so all the kids funneled into the kids ropes course.  After waiting in line for over an hour, Kara got to go down the kids zipline (which was about a 15 second ride).  By that time, it was almost noon, and Emily was done.  We just headed back to the hotel and took it easy for the afternoon.

We ended up cutting the trip a little short.  We had planned on staying Wednesday night and heading back Thursday morning, but since Mom and Dad were sleeping so poorly, we just headed back home Wednesday afternoon.  The drive back was uneventful.

Link to pictures