President's Day Weekend

Every President's Day weekend Calico Ghost Town does Civil War reenactments throughout the whole weekend. We found out about this about seven years ago when we went to visit some friends in St George, Utah. Calico was always something I had wanted to check out as a child. Every time we would drive the 15 to Utah when I was little, I would try to see if I could see the ghost town and I would wonder if there were any real ghosts there. So when we were planning our road trip seven years ago, I said we had to stop at Calico, it was a dream of mine. I have bigger dreams, but my small ones are just as big as my big ones. I don't put a lot of pressure on myself to have this crazy "Bucket List" that will bum me out if I don't do any of them. Anyway, we couldn't wait to share this town with our children and they loved it. Here are some pictures: 

Ryan at the Saloon with the locals.

Another thing on my list is taking Route 66 all the way to Chicago. I've seen the end in California and the end (kind-of) in Illinois but I want to see the rest of it. A few years ago, I saw a picture of these motels that looked like teepees and found out that there was one still in business in San Bernardino, CA. I put it on my Pinterest board and said I am going to stay there one day. Anyway, it worked out perfectly to stay there after Calico on our way to Hemet. We didn't tell the kids and surprised them when we got there, they were pretty stoked once they really woke up and figured it out.

The rest of the weekend we got to spend time with the Grandparents and some of the cousins. 

It turned out to be a fun trip. 

President's Day Weekend 2007

These are the lost photos from that trip to St. George that I wrote about in the above post. There is about a year of our life that is stuck on a hard drive because we went from film to digital and never printed anything off after that and I didn't start our blog until after Kate was born. These are some of the pictures that we took.

I was about six months pregnant with Kate and we didn't tell anyone that I rode a quad until after I had the baby because I knew if I delivered her and something was wrong, everyone would say it's because I rode that dang quad.

Our friends, Tazia and Adam. 

It's funny to see our interaction with other adults before children, on this trip, we road quads, hiked around, there was lots of rock throwing pictures of the boys and then this below. It's amazing the time we had to waste.

This building was vacant when we went the first time and now it is a doggie treat store with an ugly sign right above the word Calico. You couldn't even get a cool picture like this one now.

Me, chubby and pregnant.

Ryan meeting Abe Lincoln, one of my favorite pictures.

Man, how the times change, can't wait to go back in another seven years when Kate is a teenager. Crazy.

Valentine's Day

This Valentine's Day, we didn't have school, so it was a free day to eat candy and do a mini adventure. Now that we have kids, I like that our Anniversary and Valentine's Day fall close together because we do the couple thing before on our Anniversary and have Valentine's to celebrate with our little loves. 

Ryan got each of the kids a balloon and a Pez dispenser. The Pez candy was gone in about a minute and we lost one balloon to the ceiling in the morning, another one in the afternoon and the last one we lost to a popping incident. Oh well, they loved them while they lasted.

Millie's first Valentine's Day.

Later we picked up lunch at Subaway, (the way Kate says it) and ate it at this cool place/park called Heritage Hill. It has a few examples of homes/buildings from different eras of Orange County's past that you can walk around and check out.

Millie just relaxing and taking it all in.

Later that evening we went to Round Table Pizza for a heart shaped pizza. The place smelled like how I remember pizza places smelling like back when I was a kid, when it was the cool thing to have your birthday party at a pizza place. Er, maybe that was just Hemet and since my birthday was always in the summer, I always had outdoor parties, but I swear my sister had a few at Strawhat Pizza. Anyway...

Lastly, here is a side by side comparison of our little girl Valentines in the same outfit. Kinda bummed I didn't do one with Sam, but I remember thinking it was a little girly even though when Kate wore it someone commented that she was such a cute boy.

That was our Valentine's Day 2014.

10 Month Faves

She is cruisin' and crawling up a storm. My favorite is when Ryan comes home from work, Kate and Sam run up to him to give hugs and Millie is right behind, crawling towards him to greet him as well.

She really wants to do big kid stuff like her brother and sister.

One big kid thing she doesn't get, eating table food. She just giggles when I put something in her mouth and looks at me like I am being silly. She also doesn't put crackers in her mouth, she just holds them until her little sweaty palms dissolves them.

She is the proud owner of 4 teeth and she has a really cute laugh, which she was doing in this picture.

...And this girl can make faces. Her best one is the crinkle up her nose one and this first one is pretty classic...

This little girl has gotten right into our family and settled in. 

She rolls with it all and is her sister and brother's biggest fan.

My favorite thing to do is nibble on those cheeks.

She is pretty special.

12 Years

Back on Groundhog Day weekend, Ryan's parents offered to watch our sweet children for the night so we could take a little anniversary getaway. We decided Palm Springs would be perfect. Far but not too far. We stayed at this "boutique style" hotel, (I think that's what fancy people call it) called the Alcazar. It was small and perfect for us and they let you check out bikes to ride around town on for free. A huge selling feature for me, even though balancing on a bike is a little tricky, well, just bike riding in general is a little tricky. But I am always really excited to do it. We enjoyed being buddies and being able to finish our sentences without being cutoff by one of our sweet children. 

A blurry bike ride pic. What do you expect? I'm on a bike and clearly starting to veer off to the side. I've seen pictures like this done before, I don't know how they do it. I put the camera away for the rest of the ride.

It was nice to have time away with my buddy. When all the craziness is set a side for a minute and you can have time to just be together and hold hands as you walk down the street it really makes me remember why I chose this guy. Thanks for being my best friend and so much more. And thanks to the Stephens for watching the kids. We really appreciate it. 

That's all.