Trip to the Snow

Last weekend (President's Day weekend) we took a spur of the moment trip to the snow. Ciara had the week off from school, and all the kids were asking about going to the snow. Luckily we managed to get a rental and get everyone geared up in time to go. We set off on Sat and managed to avoid the holiday traffic, still ran into some as we got closer to the mountains, mostly big rigs being turned around. It started to snow as soon as we got there and I do not think it stopped the whole time we were there, the snow ploughs were constatntly going. We stayed in Soda Springs right across from a ski resort, we checked that out on Sun and they had a special play area for kids under 8, that worked out perfect for us, they were able to try tubing and sking. Ciara had one bad wipe out that set her back for a while but she got going again. The next day we just played in the snow around where we were staying, Ron managed to make a sledding hill from the piles of snow around the deck and they had a great time going up and down there. Next day was time to head home again, in order to get home we first had to dig the truck out of the snow, chains were required on the way home and driving on the white, snowed out freeway with no other cars around us made it feel like a real adventure.

Tara's Birthday

Tara just turnrd 2 the end of January and sure is turning into a little girl. She is really starting to talk a lot, has become quite defiant and insists on being included in everything her sisters are doing.
We just had a little family party for her, it was my regular day off so I picked Ciara up after school and we got some balloons and made her cake, Ciara did most of the decorating. Tara understood exactly what presents were and it was even better that they were all for her.

Christmas holidays

Thanksgiving in Arizona

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Halloween

Fall

Fall weather is here, there is a chill in the air and the leaves are falling off the trees. Life is moving along at the usual pace around here.
Ciara started Kindergarten in September and is settling in to her new lifestyle very well. There are remodeeling the school so they are in a temporary location now, which is closer for us. Ron walks her to school everyday for an 8.30 start. There are 3 Kindergarten classes altogether, she is in Mr. Coleman's class, we do not here much about what happens in the classroom but more about her bathroom breaks, eating in the school cafeteria and recess. She is enjoying a new sense of independence, especially that there is no "mommy" to say no to cookies and chocolate milk for lunch at the cafeteria. We are trying to restrict too much cafeteria food, hopefully the novelty will wear off soon. School gets out at 1.30, she goes to the after school care program run by the city. they pick her up, they go swimming 3 days a week and do all sorts of activities including getting some homework done, it is great.
My mom "Grandma Joan" and sister "Auntie Aileen" were also here for a week in Sept. We had a really nice week with them, we went bowling for the first time with the girls, Fiona was funny, she could barely lift the bowling bowl and it took about 5 mins to make it down the alley, by time it got there it had no momentum to knock a bowl over. Fiona and Ciara also had a trip out for lunch and a movie and Ciara got to go get her nails done with Auntie Aileen. One of the days Aileen and I ran/walked from Fishermans wharf in SF to Sausilto, it is 8 miles, our route took is along the water to the Golden Gate Bridge over the bridge and down to Sausilto. We were very proud of ourselves as we did it faster than we expected (1 hr 40 mins). We met my Mom in Sausilto had lunch and took the ferry back. We are going to try amd make that an annual thing and and beat our time, but my brother kindly reminded us that might be hard to do as we are getting older.
The kids are starting to get excited about Halloween but their Daddy is even more excited and has started to get his props ready for Halloween. That is about it for what has been going on around here..

End of Summer

I cannot believe the whole summer has gone by and we have not managed to post once, so I will just give a brief summary of some of the things we did ( some I cannot remember).
The end of July we took a camping trip to the Calveras Big Tree State Park with 3 other families all of whom have girls around Ciara's age. It was our first camping trip with all 3 girls, but they all did great and showed they were capable of roughing it for a few days. We spent one day swimming in a lake close to the campsite and another day swimming in the river and just hanging out and relaxing in general. The kids all got on great together and we hardly saw them the whole time, with the exception of Tara, she was too little to run with the gang.
Early August brought Grandma Trish and Grandpa Ron to visit, we had a really nice visit them, we almost gave Grandpa Ron a heart attack when we forced him to drive through downtown San Francisco on our way to the Bay Area Discovery Museum over in the Marin headlands but it gave him some stories to tell about this visit.
On August 15 Fiona celebrated her 3rd birthday and thinks she has officially joined the "big girls club". I took the day off and she got to hang out with just me, she graciously allowed Ciara to join us to go see Kung Fu Panda, it was her first trip to a movie theater and she was more interested in the bag of popcorn ( which took her the whole movie to eat) than the actually movie.
We just spent this past week renting a cabin at Sorensens resort in Hope Valley, approx half hour south of Lake Tahoe. The scenary around us was beautiful and made for a very relaxing time. We went swimming in a natural hot springs pool, spent time just playing by the river close to the cabins and we spent one day at the beach by Lake Tahoe. We also brought the kids for a little horse ride which was fun. We went on little mini hikes and played games and everyone was well worn out by night time, we actually got to sleep in some mornings ( that was a highlight for me). It was a really nice trip and we are hoping to go back in the winter time to play in the snow.
I am going to post some random pictures from the summer, most are from the Sorensons trip as that was really the only time we took the camera out.