Happy Birthday, Gil...

For Gil's birthday I surprised him with a weekend camping trip with some friends at the local national park.  Turned out to be the worst weekend to camp.  He had just come out of the field (having spend a nice out in the cold rain) and then we had a severe weather warning the weekend of our camping trip.  We decided to brave it anyways.  We ended up not getting any snow just a few sprinkles late at night.  It was definitely the coldest weekend we have had all winter.  We survived with lots of hot chocolate and a lot of hanging around the camp fire.  Our first and only full day turned out to be pretty nice.  Nice enough for the guys to do some rock climbing.  Most of the weekend, Gil just kept telling me 'Wait till your next birthday!'  Even though it was cold, we all had a great time.  

O' Christmas tree, O' Christmas tree!

December has been jam packed with activities thanks to our advent calendar.  So to recap some of our activities I have decided to do so through photos.   

Aubrie was very helpful this year with picking out and decorating our tree.  

Some of our other activities included; chocolate croissants for breakfast, picnic dinner by the tree, making paper snowflakes, and going on a Christmas hike (which Aubrie fell asleep during.)

 I hope you all had an enjoyable December and there will be more post to come about our visit from Uncle Anthony and Christmas Day.

Gobble Gobble

Just in the time before November is over, here is a little bit about our Thanksgiving in Big Bear.  

Some friends of ours invited us to Big Bear along with their family.  They rented a nice open cabin just down the street from the ski slopes (which surprisingly had one slope open.)  Luckily our dogs get along so we were able to bring Kai along for the trip, which was nice.  

I was really excited when we arrived to find out they are holiday puzzlers as well.  We normally just do a Christmas one so I was excited to do one before December came.  We collaborated on the meal and personally I think it turned out really well.  Aubrie made some new friends while we were there and quickly went around hugging everyone and the dogs.  

We only spent one night but the day we were set to leave we took a quick trip to the local zoo.  We were pleasantly surprised.  We thought there were only 10 exhibits but it was packed full of animals (wolves, bears, tons of birds, pigs & deer.)  Aubrie really enjoyed the zoo; made me think it was time to take her back to the San Diego Zoo now that she shows a little more interest.  All in all I am really glad we joined them for Thanksgiving and we had a really great trip with the whole family. 

New Addition

We found out in late September that we are expecting baby #2.  We are all very excited and can't wait to find out if Aubrie will have a baby brother or sister.  My gut is leaning towards boy but I have also had several dreams that it is twins which we know it isn't...so who knows how much truth there is to my gut instinct.  Our little bundle will be arriving in May 2012 and we are excited for the next few months to prepare Aubrie to be a big sister and to see how great she will be with her little sibling come May.  This time around Gil is home for the pregnancy as well as the first 7 months so it will be different and very exciting for all of us to experience all of this together as a family in the same country, state, house!

2 Year Snapshots

I finally got around to taking Aubrie's 2 year photos; 2 months late but now is better than never.  I created a chalkboard with some facts about her for her birthday; I haven't erased it yet because I wanted to get pictures of her with it.  Today I finally decided we were going to get this done since I have another idea for the chalkboard.  I dressed her up in the same dress from her party and we went outside in the sunshine for a few photos.  She isn't really into photos right now so I didn't get many but here are a few of my favorites.  

We celebrated her birthday with just the family on her actual birthday.  We had a yummy breakfast, skyped with grandparents while she opened presents and just had a relaxing day together as a family.  The next day we celebrated with friends.  One of her friends came over and a few of Mommy and Daddy's and we had a nice time eating and opening all her fun presents.  We had a good time and I think it was a great 2nd birthday for her.  Thank you to all who came and helped us celebrate.

I have a few more posts in mind and hope I will get to them soon.  Stay tuned.

August & one big photo dump

Just as I catch up on posts for July, now August is gone.  So I have decided to do a photo dump for the whole month of August.

Augusts big events were a day trip to San Diego for a breweries anniversary celebration and a night in Vegas to see Celine Dion and both of these events fell on the same weekend.  Other than our one very busy weekend we did some shopping for new shoes, several trips to the pool, and I got the guts to body wave/perm my hair.  

Our trip to San Diego was a blast.  We had a babysitter for the day and met with some friends for beer tasting and some delicious food.  Luckily, the brewery wanted people to be responsible and have a DD (which was me of course) and had some amazing food and home brewed sodas for us responsible ones.

Our trip to Vegas was an anniversary gift to me from Gil.  A good friend watch B for us while we went out to dinner and saw Celine Dion's show.  It was a really good show.  She has one of the most powerful and pure voices.  Even for those who aren't big fans (Gil) the show was still entertaining.  

That about sums up this past month.  Next month, little B turns TWO!  She is definitely entering toddler-hood!  Naps seem to be disappearing from her day and defiance is her new thing.  

That's all for now, enjoy our photo dump from this weekend (and all others in August.)