West coast cuties

We just got back from our trip out to California. We had a great time and I have a lot to write about but that will have to wait a little bit since we have a lot of unpacking to do. So, these pictures will have to hold you over until I have a little bit more time to sit down and write about everything.

The girls in La Jolla.

At the zoo.

Ella's favorite thing in the world to do is go to a slide park - that is Ella's word for playground. We went to three in San Diego. I think her face in this picture really captures how much fun she has playing at the playground.

And look what our little Maddie Bear learned to do on our trip!

Everyday moments

I think that I often get so caught up in planning what the next move is going to be in the day, that I don't take a minute to enjoy the moment that I'm currently in. Being a mom, means that you always have to be "on" and thinking one step ahead. I am sure that many of you moms know exactly what I am talking about. I admit, I can be a bit neurotic when it comes to planning and this often results in total chaos in the household. It's during these moments, I am very grateful for my wonderful husband who makes me step back, catch my breath, and makes me refocus. Chris has been home with us for the past two weeks and let me say that it has been great! I think we are all getting so use to having him around that it is going to be a huge shock to us all when he does have to start traveling again for work. But in the meantime, we enjoy the time that we have now and cherish the everyday moments we have with the girls.

I love these pictures of Chris making dinner and Maddie hanging out in the kitchen. This is us pretty much every night.

BFF

I think these pictures say it all!

Daddy...lunch time

I hear Ella say this phrase all the time now. She has really gotten into serving us lunch lately. So much so that I think we eat lunch about 8 times a day now. Actually, Daddy has been eating a lot more lunches than Mommy. It's pretty cute because she will set up a little picnic or as she calls it a "picmic" for us. She will get a blanket and spread it out on the carpet and set up all of her food. This can take awhile because Maddie likes to crash the picnic by taking a couple of the condiments, usually the mustard. When it's finally ready to go, Ella will call us over for some fine dining. We usually eat the same things at Cafe Ella....corney shark, moussaka duck, garlic sea turtle and sometimes there is a special of lemon pepper duck. I know, I am sure your mouth is beginning to water. We wash it all down with some lemonade. We also have an oven/microwave (the coffee table) which Daddy provide the sound effects for.

I need to get a picture of our picnics but for now, here's one of the girls from today. We moved our picnic location to our new kitchen table.

So, if you are ever wondering what we are doing during the day...chances are that we're having lunch....again!

Pizza man

As many of you may or may not know, Chris worked at Pizza Hut one summer while he was in college. Looking back, I'm sure he would tell you that job launched into the career that he has now. We've all had those kind of jobs - gotta start somewhere. Anyway, back to the pizza. So, Chris hated working there and prides himself on the fact that he hasn't had pizza from Pizza Hut since he quit that job. However, he has never lost the valuable pizza making skills that he learned that one summer. He is now passing on his knowledge to his daughters.

Our morning routine

Two of my favorite times of the day are when Maddie is taking her morning nap and when Ella is taking her afternoon nap. Why? Well, in the morning I get to spend time with just Ella for an hour or so and in the afternoon Ella usually sleeps a little bit longer than Maddie so then I get some alone time with just her. I think it's good that they get some one-on-one time, especially since Ella is going through this I need some attention phase right now.

Since Chris has been working at home the past couple of months, as soon as Maddie goes down for her nap, Ella and I go outside and take Cooper for a walk. Shortly after we put Maddie in her crib, Ella chimes in with, "I want to go walking now." Her favorite things to do on our walk is pick flowers and her new favorite is to collect sticks. You would think that we are gathering wood to start a small fire based on the amount of sticks sitting by our front door at the moment. The other challenge we face in the stick collecting, is that Cooper loves a good stick. Therefore, Cooper is constantly trying to pry the sticks out of Ella's hand. Ella finds this rather amusing most of the time. So, their battle for who is going to carry the stick around the neighborhood usually goes on for the entire time of our walk.

I think the best part about our morning walks are when Ella picks out what she is going to wear. Below are two fine examples;

Project Runway season 23 watch out - I think we have a future stylist in the making!

Festival food

I think the girls have picked up their dad's liking of food that can only be found at a festival. We have been to two outdoor festivals the past two weeks and Ella has already sampled kettle corn, a pork sandwich, lemonade, fresh cut potato chips, and a hot dog. Her favorite by far is the lemonade. But she hasn't tried a funnel cake or a corn dog yet so that could change. We do have one more festival that we are going to go to at the end of the month so we have to save something for that outing. I don't know, the way she guzzles down that lemonade, I really don't think anything is going to top that for awhile.

Here are a couple of pictures for the Inman Park Festival that we went to on Sunday. The girls were so good which kind of surprised us since we were there for three and a half hours. As soon as we got them in their car seats to come home, they crashed.