Weekend hiking

We went hiking twice this holiday weekend and both were super fun. Saturday we headed out to Rattlesnake Ledge and played at the lake for awhile and then hiked partway up the trail. The kids spent the whole time climbing the huge boulders and naming them. We had a couple friends along and it was lovely.

The kids go past one of our local parks every day on teh bus and they've been dying to check it out for months. We finally got out to it after church on Sunday and it turned out to be a really fun park for all of them.

Chloe decided Sunday was the day she needed to have her hair done for the first time. Someday I imagine her hair will start growing for real, but at this point it's still all wispy. But it's finally got some length in the back and so she got a twinner set of pigtails to Genevieve and it was the cutest thing.

Yesterday for Memorial Day we had a jam packed day. We started out the day with a church pancake breakfast at a local park. Then we headed out to Twin Falls, which is a 2.5-mile hike that the kids completely rocked. We pulled out all our hiking poles and they loved having their own. We finished the day off with dinner at our cousin's house. It's been a long time coming that we could spend an entire day out and come home with happy kids. We don't have any diapers to deal with or naps and this newest family life phase is turning out to be really delightful. There's a million more places we can check out around here, so our weekends are looking good for the forseeable future.

Botanical Garden

We finally got to the Bellevue Botanical Garden this weekend. I took the four kids and we had a grand ole time. Genevieve thought it was funny to look crusty for all the pictures, but never fear, she loved it too. We loved the botanical garden in Clemson and the one here did not disappoint. We'll be back. 

 Chloe has started saying cheese and grinning huge when it's picture time. Took long enough! I think we might get an all smiling family picture finally for the first time ever now.

Biking, camping, and selfies

We took advantage of bike to school day this week, borrowed my SIL's bike trailer, and had a grand ole' time biking to school on the Cross Kirkland Corridor trail. It was just hard enough for my kids that they were infinitely proud of themselves for doing it. It turned out I loved it too. There's a huge hill between our house and the start of the trail otherwise I might think about doing it more. Maybe when we've convinced Aaron that he can indeed learn to ride his bike two-wheeled and he can ride himself, so I won't need a bike trailer, then we'll do it more.

 Aaron has taken to the selfie game as well as portraits of Chloe. I have a jillion of them on my phone already.

 We spent this last Friday/Saturday camping at Ensign Ranch. It was delightful. I went there all growing up every other year for family reunions and it was a lovely tour down memory lane going back. We camped and helped clean up the place a bit, which was the reason we went for a service project, and waded in the river and generally had a fabulous time.

 Sunday we did our very own piano recital. Everyone played a number, even Aaron and Chloe, who aren't actually doing piano lessons yet. But I'm teaching the older two and it's been fun so far.

Exploring

Genevieve decided a couple weeks ago she wanted to chop her hair off again. I made her wait a week or so to see if she really stil wanted to do it, and she did, so we went for it. It's so cute. I love her short hair. She does lose most of her curls for now when it is short because they start around her jawline for now, but I'm pretty certain that will change the older she gets. Her hair has thickened up a lot in the last year or two and I just love it.

 We're trying to get out on Saturdays doing things now that we're settled in and the weather is getting nice. This weekend we tried out Saltwater State Park.  It's a very rocky beach south of Seattle with lots of rocks, lots of seaweed, lots of shells, a fun playground, and my kids loved it. We spent several hours there and they had a grand time. The weather is getting truly lovely and I love living here more and more all the time.