Mike's party at the Beach!

On Saturday after the Kentucky Derby party we headed over to the beach for Chris' friend Mike's birthday bash. We were excited to see our friends! Leanh got to see Caroline again and is excited to have a baby of her own in a few months!

Its so funny to me to see all these guys without children just loving on the baby. Charlotte was so excited her "Best friends Jonas and Christina" were there. Watch out Christina, I think Charlotte has a bit of a crush on "Jonas, Jonas"as she says.

Case in point as to why we are moving far away from San Diego... baby in one arm, check out Matt's shirt...

 

 Charlotte found the water spicket and had a blast getting water to wash her feet off with. It was a never ending process! We didn't break it to her though, we just let her continue to wash off the sand...

She even mustered up the courage to give Jerry a hug. For a long long time she would say "I don't like that guy, he scare me". I think after their trip to the zoo her feelings changed, although in her defense, he does like to scare her!

Caroline enjoyed her first trip to the beach!

Jackie was nice enough to take a family picture of us!

Charlotte was the only kid there (besides Caroline) and she loved getting all the adults to play with her!

She loved Jackie's dog, or horse rather! She was very tempted to ride him!

I think she had the best time playing with Cass (Mike's fiance). She is wonderful with kids and Charlotte just loved her. We love her too... she entertained Charlotte for quite a long time!

She took her down to see the water, which of course scared Charlotte!

Then she brought her up to have a turn at the Piniata. Charlotte was quite disappointed when shooters (mini bottles of alcohol, Grammy) came out instead of candy.

Then Cass gave Charlotte a huge piece of cake. Then Charlotte got crazy.

She of course wanted me to take pictures of her back instead of actually smiling for me.

She eventually found Chris and snuggled and goofed off with him.

There were quite a few airplanes that flew over us and boy were they loud!

Finally, to end the night, Charlotte joined in on a game of beach volleyball. It was quite amusing!

What a fun evening!

Kentucky Derby

Yesterday we were invited over to Charlotte's friend Josie's house for a Kentucky Derby party.
This of course meant that we had to wear big gaudy hats. Chris thought it would be fun to put
flowers in our hats. So he did.

Charlotte loved hers!

It's the longest she has kept a hat on in a long time!

She kept going over to the door to check herself out in the reflection!

She thought it was so funny!

 We watched and waited while Chris finished his hat!

 I didn't realize that this was the only picture I got of his hat. I didn't get one of Caroline's either. Oops.

Charlotte got on her party dress and we got ready to go!

Once we got there we watched the horses run, which Charlotte loved. We didn't have any winning tickets though! Charlotte enjoyed playing with her friends from school and carrying around the Padres Gnome she found in the garden. She was certain it was Santa Clause and would not put it down.

 No, that is not mac and cheese Chris spilled on Caroline... It is what you think it is. Poop. Poor Caroline needed her outfit changed and really could have used to be hosed down, but we settled on a baby wipe bath. Luckily Chris was holding her, not me!

We had a great time hanging out with our friends!

The past week...

Wednesday we had a tie-dye party that Charlotte has been begging for. I found spray tie-dye stuff that you just put in the dryer to set it and figured it would be much easier with little kids. There were positives and negatives about it, but the kids had a blast. It was so nice to get together with Abby and Lisa at the same time! 

 We did our normal errands on Thursday while Charlotte was at school, but we finished a little early so Caroline and I came home and hung out. She is such a sweet baby.

 Chris has to work late on Thursday night and the girls went to be so easily for me. Only once they were asleep they kept waking up within an hour of each other. Charlotte wet the bed not once but twice. It is rare that she wets the bed to begin with let alone two times in the same night. Caroline was up to eat more than usual and when she didn't want to eat she was sniffling and kept me up. In between that, Chris came home and woke us up too. It was a long night of only a couple hours of sleep. So Friday morning I slept for an extra hour and Charlotte was so great and gave Caroline a bottle. (Daddy was home, I didn't just let them fend for themselves!)

Charlotte was very excited that today is Baylie's birthday. She is 11 years old. We got her a cookie and some doggie ice cream from the pet shop yesterday and Charlotte insisted on singing Happy Birthday to her. Baylie loved it!

 Chris thought it would be funny to put the party hat on Caroline too. Poor baby.

 We have been very busy, and continue to be this weekend. Hopefully lots more pictures to follow...

Strawberry Jam!

Saturday afternoon we made some jam out of our strawberries! Charlotte was very excited since we were all out of "Dede's Jam"  (Grandma). She was eager to help. She mashed the strawberries, stirred the sugar in (her favorite part) and scooped it into the bowls. Chris left with Caroline in the Ergo to go for a walk and Charlotte convinced me to let her lick the spoon. I think the final straw was drawn when she asked for some jam in a cup. There are some battles not worth fighting. So jam in a cup was had. She loved every minute of it. We made labels for the jam and have been enjoying it since!