the zoo and a choo choo

sunday we met up at the zoo with the godbold/ricci gang. highlights of the day for the kids were for sure the giraffes and the train (and i hate to say it but the cheese nachos for mom...my guilty pleasure in life). at times it was hard to herd everyone together because dottie, wyatt, and malcolm ran around here and there checking everything out. it was for sure hard to get a good picture of everyone together...

bicycle built for 3

for a long time now, i have wanted to check out these (kind of dorky) multiple person bikes at golden gate park. the weather was gorgeous this weekend so i decided that this was the weekend! dottie loved the helmet and as you can see in the picture of chuck with her in the grass, she would not take it off even when not riding on the bike. afterwards we checked out the paddle boats on stow lake and saw about 15 turtles hanging out on a log (major highlight of the day!).

Dottie spills the beans...

baby ashwin

hooray! we finally got to meet mindy and gautam's new baby, ashwin, today. it took a bit of coaxing to get dottie to pose with him (perhaps chocolate mini eggs were put in the mix as a treat if she looked at the camera and smiled) but we got a good one. he is so adorable and just as sweet as can be! we just can't wait to see him again!

lobster rolls!

this past sunday we were inspired (by B) to go down to half moon bay for lobster rolls at sam's chowder house it was well worth the drive!! chuck went surfing with ian and b beforehand and dottie and i met them down there. nothing beats chunks lobster with butter drizzled over it on a fresh roll! dottie did not want to partake in the lobster but had a nice serving of their homemade mac and cheese that she was quite happy with. with our bellies full, we went for a post lunch walk on the beach. dottie was so happy to be on the beach running around that she cried when we left.

the little farm

this past friday, dottie and i drove over to tilden park to meet our friends marie and siena at the little farm for a picnic. for not having seen each other very recently, they actually warmed up to each pretty fast and had a really fun time running around together. marie and siena brought some celery to feed the animals and the girls were a touch timid to actually feed them so we did it. they enjoyed bossing us around about which animals to feed! after the farm we had a lovely picnic lunch that marie had prepared. a lovely way to spend a friday morning!

(the adorable dress on dottie was made by our friend hannah as a gift for dottie's 2nd birthday! we are very lucky to have such talented friends who are so sweet to dottie...)

the dentist

dottie visited the dentist for the first time today! i was a tad nervous going into it because you never know how a toddler is going to react to something like the dentist. it definitely could have been teary but it ended up going great! 3 reasons for this: she was able to watch dora the explorer on one of 2 screens (on the wall and the ceiling), and she got to choose a toy from the toy drawer at the end of the appt (she chose a plastic pink watch), and she got a dora sticker. it's the little things in life! at my friend kim's suggestion, i also told dottie that the dentist would be tickling her teeth during the appointment and it was a perfect suggestion. at times, dottie even laughed during the cleaning. 6 months til the next visit...

tahoe with grandpa bill

chuck's dad has done such a fabulous job of making sure we get together yearly to go skiing/snowboarding at a ski resort. this year chuck, dottie, and i drove up to meet him in tahoe for the weekend. what was supposed to be an easy 3-4 hour drive on friday ended up being a 7 hour drive because of an unexpected snowstorm that made for a late arrival but excellent snow for the weekend. dottie had a super fun time (inside and outside) on her new sled and even got to go tubing on sunday. she had so much fun playing with grandpa bill this weekend that on the way home yesterday, she must have mentioned him at least 10 times.

to see more pictures of our weekend, click HERE

jump up, jump up, and get down

we have been big slackers lately with the blog so these pictures are from a rainy day a few weeks ago. if you haven't been to PUMP IT UP before, i highly recommend it! it's a warehouse filled with jumpy castles. we met our friends kim, frannie, & jane, and umi, lucy, & elliot for a pre-nap jumping extravaganza. smiles from ear to ear and only a few head bumps. note to self, it's really crazy to go down the slides with the kids and in the future, i might not attempt it again. i almost took out my own daughter in attempting to help her. the slides seriously seemed like they had been oiled. (the last picture of kim with dottie and frannie isn't in focus but it gives you an idea of what the place looks like)

cousins!!

this past weekend, chuck's cousin becka came for a visit from vancouver with her friend andrew. chuck tried to meet up with her for a little snowboarding in tahoe but unfortunately, there was so much snow that the road was closed that chuck had to take to get to heavenly where becka was. lucky for us, becka and andrew drove through san francisco on the way back home and we got to spend some time with them. we had a great dinner together and a nice walk home with dottie happily holding becka's hand almost the whole way home. she was a big fan of her cousin!

bye bye mullet, hello bob!

her 3rd haircut has been a long time coming!

her bangs still aren't growing at all but the back sure needed a trim. the picture was taken right after the cut on my phone so it's a little hard to see. we think she looks pretty darn cute in her new do!

this girl loves her accessories...

and so does her mama????

oh boy does our girl love dressing up! a good portion of her time during the day is spent in some kind of dress up hat, beads, cowboy boots, pirate gear. tonight she was wearing my rain boots around (with much difficulty) looking like she was ready to go fly fishing. i am think the need for a trunk full of dress up clothes is just around the corner...

wyatt turns 4!

another fabulous birthday party for one of dottie's favorite older and wiser friends, wyatt... the jumpy castle was a huge hit but unfortunately got a little soggy in the rain so the kids had to head inside for a boatload of fun activities!