Labor Day weekend

Last weekend, Chris had a much needed 4 day weekend over Labor Day. We had a fun packed weekend! On Friday, I took Claire to the Monterey county fair. She especially loved all of the animals. On the ride home, we would recall all of the different animals we saw - cows, sheep, goats, horses, chickens, roosters, ducks, rabbits, etc. We had a great time. That night, Chris and I went out on a date to the fair while my neighbor watched Claire. We had a great time! We met up with some friends, had some yummy food, rode a bunch rides (the kind that wouldn't make Chris sick), and had a great time. We even got to ride the Zipper! This was my all time favorite ride at the Orleans County fair growing up. My friend Sarah and I would ride it and try to flip our individual cart as much as possible. I had planned on riding it solo since it would make Chris sick, but when I went to get on, they said I couldn't get on unless someone was with me. What!?! So, Chris, how sweet he is and how he loves me, got on with me. He knew I really wanted to ride it for old time's sake. He actually liked it at first as it is exhihilerating and a ton of fun. Then he started to not feel so great. I think he liked hearing my excited squeals though. Thankfully for him, the ride was short enough (unlike our 3 hour whale watch) that the sick feeling didn't last long. In fact, soon after that ride we split a raspberry and whipped cream topped funnel cake. Mmm.

On Monday, we went camping at Manresa State Beach about 40 minutes north of us. We only wanted to go one night this time as a trial run with Claire and because Chris had lots of homework over the weekend. We got a 10'x16' tent that is 6' tall in the middle for only $60. Woo hoo! We had a nice camp site, and because many people probably had to work on Tuesday, it was pretty quiet there. We were about a 5 minute walk to the beach. The most difficult part was the 10 flights of stairs to get down to the beach. Well, the hard part was really going back up. It was beautiful there.

On the path to the beach.

The view of the beach before we headed down the 10 flights of stairs.

It was actually warm and so beautiful with the sun shining on the water.

Claire just LOVES her daddy time.

This lasted just long enough for me to get this picture. Then a bigger wave came and washed it away. Good thing we'll last longer than that!:)

On the beach with my little cutie! (She had no interest in getting down to touch the sand or water.)

Again, the food was the star - tin foil dinners, hot dogs (Claire ate 2!), s'mores, toads in a hole (egg cooked in bread) and bacon for breakfast all with a yummy campfire smoke flavor...oh the yumminess. It was really relaxing sitting by the campfire with Chris after Claire went to bed. The sleep was, well, terrible. Claire woke up about an hour after we went to bed, and since she cried for a while, I was afraid she was too cold, so she joined us. She wiggled around, fell off the air mattress once, woke up in the middle of the night and decided to talk for a while, etc. I don't know how anyone co-sleeps. Ugh! But since the rest of the camping trip was so much fun, it wasn't too hard to overlook the terrible sleep. It was a lot of work for me - preparing the food and camping equipment and cleaning up and unpacking it all when we got home. It was really too much work for just one night, but worth it for our trial run. Next time we'll go for at least two nights. We had a great time!

Claire dressed in her double layer pajamas on our air mattress. Our tent had plenty of room for our queen air mattress, a rug/ sitting area in the middle, her pack and play on the other side, and lots of room for our stuff.

On the way home from our camping trip, we stopped at an awesome and huge fruit stand. We got tons of yummy fruit and veggies for cheap - 7 avocados for $1, 7 artichokes for $1, etc. In this picture Claire is holding a hugest grapefruit I've ever seen! They were only 3/$1 and quite yummy!



Last weekend we went to a really huge and fun playground in Monterey near the Fisherman's wharf. It had more types of slides than I'd ever seen. Claire loved it except when we got to sandy parts, she wanted us to carry her. I don't if it's because it makes her feel dirty (she HATES any hint of being dirty) or if it hurts when it gets in her sandals, but she does NOT like sand. This is a picture going down a cool slide that was made up of horizontal rollers. When you got to the end, it felt like it spit you out! She went down facing front with me, but got a little clingy with Chris.

Claire is gaining more independence by dressing herself lately. Well, I still help her, but she can mostly do it herself. This morning while I was getting the laundry ready, she snuck off with some of her clothes. I found her like this. Notice that both legs are in one leg hole. Hee hee.

Claire loves to steal my oven mitts and run around with them on her hands. :)

Claire is such a little girl. She loves to dress up. These are the sort of "accessories" she pulls out of her toy box - a hat, glove, "bracelet", and "necklace". She is so stylish.

Claire loves to sit on my lap while I play and we sing during family home evening. Here she was taking a turn on daddy's lap while I got the dessert ready. It's not FHE without dessert!

Claire's hair is finally long enough to put up! I have tried clips before, but she pulls them out soon after. On Sunday I attempted pig tails. I was surprised she left them in for the half an hour before church. When I got her out of her car seat once we arrived at church, she had pulled them out and was chewing on one of the flower bands. I put them back in a couple of times during the meeting, but gave up by the end. She looked so cute though!

Claire was apparently bored during breakfast that morning. She rests her head quite frequently during breakfast lately. Too funny.

Claire has really started enjoying singing children's songs and dancing to children's music. One morning, we happened to be watching Regis and Kelly. (We hardly ever have the tv on, so we were lucky.) Yo Gabba Gabba happened to be the guest singer. Claire loved it! She jumped around like a crazy baby! I ended up recording it and rewinding it over and over again. She learned some of the words to the songs. I got some great video of her dancing. I just love watching her excitement.

We almost daily sing songs like "The Wheels on the Bus", "The Itsy-Bitsy Spider", "Head Shoulders, Knees, and Toes", etc. I love when she does all the motions! She also LOVES to read lots of stories.

I'm also so excited to see Claire's nurturing personality coming out. Her teachers in nursery notice it too. She loves to take care of her babies and all of her stuffed animals. She changes their diapers, puts them nigh-night, covers them with a blanket, hugs them when they're "sad", feeds them, etc. Even when she sees or hears children at the playground cry, she says, "saaad" followed by, "hung" (hug). Or if someone coughs, she asks, "k,k?" (ok?) "rink?" (drink.) She likes to make sure we're ok and wants to make sure we have a drink if we need it. Too cute. I love how sympathetic she is towards others.