Happy Birthday, Joe!

We celebrated Joe's birthday in Bend with my family last weekend. We started off the day with a float trip down the river, which is one of Joe's favorite things to do. Clara and Hannah came with us for the first time, and they were completely entertained watching the cute dog that was floating nearby on his own raft! There were 9 of us floating on various rafts and tubes attached to each other.....we made quite the blockade on the river at times!

We had a barbeque that night at my sister's house, complete with homemade apple pie (a family favorite for birthdays!)

My grandpa turned 82 that same week and the neighbor boy had just turned 13, so Joe graciously shared his day (and his pie!) with the other two birthday boys:) I love how it looks like the two "older" men are giving advice to the "young one" in this picture!

Family Time

We spent four fun-filled days in Bend, OR, last weekend. The girls started out jumping at Bouncing Off the Walls for 2 full hours Friday morning with their cousins, Darien and Monica, and their Nonna!

Monica and her friend, Emma, stuck to the velcro wall
Nonna takes a turn down the slide!
Clara and her pink poodle, "Lovey", made many trips down the slides together.
Hannah learned to keep up with the big kids, climbing up the ladders and making her way through the obstacle courses by herself!

They swam in the pool every day. Clara tried out water wings for the first time, and spent over an hour floating and swimming "by herself" :)

Darien is an amazing cousin and caretaker of Hannah! I feel like I am truly "on vacation" when Darien is around to take care of Hannah, and Hannah adores her!

Crazy uncle Joe and Monica hanging out in the hot tub on the 85 degree day!

Sprinkler Park!

We had a fun morning with Cheryl and Eli at the new sprinkler park in Bellevue. The kids loved playing in the water! The water sprays on and off at random times, so Cheryl and I also had a chance to cool off while trying to take pictures and getting unexpectedly sprayed with water!

We had a picnic lunch in the shade, and then enjoyed playing at the dry park too!

Boy, are we enjoying this real summer weather and all the fun things to go do!

Happy 4th of July!

Aunt Julie and Teanne were in town for 4th of July, and we met up with Cheryl and Eli for the Kirkland Kids Parade.

Teanne wore a ballerina skirt for the parade, and got many smiles and waves from the crowd!
We stayed and ate shaved ice while watching the big parade. This duck, the many dogs that walked by, and the huge trucks were some of our favorites!

Clara got to experience her first fireworks late at night with Daddy. She talked about it all day long and took a long nap to get ready for the late night. Although she kept her ears covered for most of it, you can tell by her huge smile that she LOVED them!!!

She didn't go to sleep until 11:45 that night!

A day at the beach

For the past 3 summers, we have been able to enjoy a day at my good college friend, Tanya's, beach house. The first summer, Tanya and I each had one small baby, and could sit and talk for hours. This year, we both had two busy toddlers, but still found time to catch up! It is so fun to watch our girls change so much each year.

Hannah and Addison are less than 3 months apart, and they both were giving some great expressions for the camera!

The tide was out when we first arrived, and the girls loved squishing through the wet sand and having their feet sink down.
Hannah's feet would get stuck, and then she would fall forward into the wet pools of water. At least she doesn't mind getting wet and dirty!

Family of Five!

I figured it was about time that our littlest one got mentioned on the family blog! This pregnancy has been the roughest one so far, but we are starting the second trimester, so hopefully that should bring some renewed energy and the end of the nausea. We are expecting to meet this little one in early January, and will hopefully find out if it will be a sister or brother for the girls in mid-August!

Summer S'mores

The firepit made it's first appearance of the summer, and the girls got their first taste of smores. They loved them, of course! It was good practice for our camping trip at the end of July. Now if we can just get them to fall asleep in the tent, we should enjoy the weekend!