Bommer Canyon Hike

Saturday we decided to do a little exploring and go on a short hike at Bommer Canyon, about 2 miles away from our house.  We planned on going about an hour, but a restricted access area was open so we decided to go a little longer to check it out.  Bridgette was a trooper and walked the entire 3 mile loop by herself, including climbing up some pretty intense hills.  This is at the top of a series of hills.

 View of Irvine behind (blocked by Penny in the backpack, haha!)

 Taking a break, eating snacks and enjoying the pretty wildflowers.

We saw all sorts of wildflowers, bobcat tracks, big birds and Bridgette found a ladybug she held.  It was a great day, despite the whining from Penny the last half- hour and Bridgette getting tired the last half mile and asking to go home.

Valentines Day

We had a wonderful Valentine's Day this year!  We started out on Friday with a "Valentine's Party" with some of Bridgette's little friends.  We watched six kids so they parents could go out to dinner alone, and I could earn some babysitting exchange bucks.  It was a little crazy, but the kids were great and had lots of fun.  We tried to decorate cookies, which was a bit of a disaster since they all started eating cookies and candy as fast as they could!

 We watched the Valentines Day "Daniel the Tiger" which all the kids loved and watched really close to the TV, haha!

 Saturday, we got ready for our family fancy dinner.  I decided to make a yummy, fancy dinner here so we could all enjoy Valentines Day.  On the menu we had: Maple- glazed salmon, with roasted asparagus, arborio rice pilaf, homemade potato rolls and chocolate chip cheesecake for dessert.  We had so much fun, it's definitely going to be a new family tradition!

 Bridgette spent two hours in the morning making heart decorations which we hung from the ceiling.  She glued on heart confetti to the big hearts.  She was so serious about it and so proud!  It looked darling!

 I plated up everyone's food, channeling my inner chef and brought it over restaurant style.  Bridgette was so into it, and kept saying, "This is my first fancy dinner!"

I love all my sweet Valentines!

Lazy Days

Tyler is on the world's easiest rotation, so we've all been enjoying the extra time together.  We have spent time at the park, enjoying the tire swing.

Lots of Disneyland afternoon trips.  I've always wondered who these Dads are that are at Disneyland on a Wednesday afternoon.  Now I know...

 Since Tyler was with us, we could ride some new "big girl" rides.  Bridgette thought it was a blast.

 Penny made this "oooh" face the entire time on the carousel and cried when we took her off.

 So we went on it again!

 

We've also gone to the beach.  Little miss tried climbing up into the chair all by herself.  She's so much more adventurous than Bridgette was!

Hooray for this awesome rotation that lasts all the way through March!

1 Year Pictures

My neighbor took some cute pictures of Penelope in her birthday outfit.  For some reason, she was a stone face, even with Bridgette and I dancing and singing with tambourines!  We still got some cute Penny smirks though.

I love this one!

 Standing all by herself.

Finally a few smiles!

 

 Crawling as fast as she can to me.

 I love these sweet chubby cheeks!

At her 12 month checkup, Penny was 28.5 inches- 25%ile and 18#- 15%ile.  She is definitely slimming down with all this crawling around.  She is very close to walking and takes 3-4 steps before she falls.  She is very good at telling you what she wants, especially with the start of her chubby finger-
pointing.  She loves to eat, take baths and swing.  She laughs when she burps and blows raspberries at you (all day long!).  She's a crappy sleeper and I'm beginning to think she always will be.  She snuggles anything remotely soft and loves her blankets, stuffed animals and baby touch and feel books (snuggles dog fur...)

It's fun to see how different Penelope and Bridgette are even though they look almost exactly alike.  Here's the proof:

Bridgette at 1 year