Last Day

Our visit with the family ended on a perfect Santa Barbara day.  FINALLY, 70+ degrees, no wind and no sign of rain or fog.

Perfect day for the zoo.

Grandma and Poppy packed a nice picnic lunch for all of us.

Later that afternoon we played around in the yard.
 

Some volleyball...

Some dancing....

 Some tattooing...

And another stop, this time for dinner, at Los Gallos.

And then back home the grandparents went (always kiss the car to make sure you get home safely).

The rest of us (well the grown ups) were so tired but we had mentioned the bowling alley over the previous few days and the kids were not going to let us forget it.  In fact, when I asked Dylan what had been his favorite part of the trip so far, he said the bowling alley.  How sad is that?  We hadn't even been there!

 So, here we are at Zodo's Bowling and Beyond!

Calm down Michele, you only won tickets.  And those tickets only buy you an eraser for your #2 pencil.

They actually won pretty good crap, I mean stuff, for $20 AND we made Dylan a happy camper ;)

And that my friends, was the end of our Spring Break with the family!  Which means my kids are back to napping, sleeping in their own beds and are really, really sad that their cousins are gone :(

Dates with Mommy

On Mondays and Fridays I have both kids home with me all day.  I feel really lucky that I am able to have this time with them. I admit that some days we only make it to the gym or run errands, but other days like below, we go to the Natural History Museum or the Zoo.

The butterfly exhibit is back at the museum.

It was a cold morning out so most of the butterflies were hiding.  It was actually more fun this way because both kids were really excited when they found one.

It was also better because when Thatcher did find a butterfly, he would not follow the "no touching" rule.  So the less he saw, the better off for the butterflies....

These are the poses I get when I say, "1....2....3....CHEESE!" 

Thatcher definitely likes what he sees.

Kissing the caterpillar

Thatcher at 16 Months                     Samantha at 19 months

Samantha at 20 Months                  Samantha at 3 1/2

Princess Day at the Zoo

It was Princess Day at the Santa Barbara Zoo this weekend. 

Samantha got all FANCY in her princess dress and she got to wear a little makeup. Actually Mommy got carried away with the makeup....

and her hair....

So the princesses were not exactly the same as the ones at Disneyland.  The girl in the middle said to Samantha, "Do you know who I am?" and Samantha looked confused.  The girl said, "I am Belle."  I was afraid Sam was going to say, "No your not!" but instead she sort of went along with it.  "Belle" actually had braces which really was intriguing to Samantha.  You can imagine the amount of questions we got regarding what was on her teeth, why did she have those, do they hurt, do they come off????????

Thatcher was all over the place, walking right up to everyone, trying to leave with them. I am not even kidding.  As soon as we put him down on the ground he would take off for another family, or in this case, some princess. To heck with that Mama's Boy phase he used to be in!! :(

We did check out a few animals.  There is a new baby giraffe at the zoo, this isn't it, however we did get to see the baby from afar.  I couldn't get a good picture of it because it is separated from the rest of the giraffes on the other side of the exhibit.  I think he/she makes its debut next week.

After the zoo we had lunch at Brophys

And then home for nap time.