Easter

If you know me, you know I tend to go a little camera crazy.

Especially during holidays.

So, get ready for a LOT of pictures!!!

We went down to Oceanside for Easter weekend (one of the perks of our move to Santa Maria!)

Rylee LOVES gum these days (she has just recently figured out how to chew and not swallow it) so she was extra excited about the gum that the Easter Bunny left in her basket. Cailyn didn't give a hoot about anything in a basket - she just went straight for the easily accessible candy on the tables and chairs. After she had eaten a good chunk of chocolate and jelly beans from the table, I was finally able to convince Cailyn that the basket was worth looking at, too!

She quickly went straight back to the table though - where she didn't have to mess with wrappers!

After the "hunt" (if you can call it that), it was time for the outdoor photo shoot. Grandma and Grandpa Mac's coral tree was in bloom and matched their dresses perfectly!

Shortly after we finished taking pictures, Rylee wet her pants. Fortunately, we had back-up dresses! (I pretty much always choose the girls' clothes, so when Quinn liked these cute dresses for Easter I let him have his way this year, even though I would have chosen the ones you are about to see. Luckily, Grandma Mac saw and loved these dresses, too, so she wound up getting one for each of her grandbabies! So I guess this was the year of two Easter dresses for my girls!)

These pics are at Grandpa Bob and Grandma Joanne's house during Easter dinner.

Rylee LOVED picking lemons straight from the tree!

These eggs were...CONFETTI EGGS!!!

And it wouldnt' be Easter without our traditional Bunny Cake, of course!

We got an egg coloring kit, but with all the hustle and bustle that weekend, we didn't get around to actually coloring eggs until Tuesday after we got home. It was a Tinkerbell kit, and Rylee insisted on dying every single egg green (since that's Tinkerbell's color.) I did, however, convince her to add other colors on top.

Next came the stickers...

...then the glitter (notice Rylee's other hand is up...she shook that arm at the same time as she shook the glitter out!)

A Toast to the Coast

First off, when I looked back at my previous post the day after I wrote it, I realized what a cheesy title I used...not sure if it's because I was so tired when I wrote it (which I was) or if it's just that I AM cheesy - which is also a real possibility (:

Anyway, this title was inspired by the sinfully delicious "Coast Toast" that we ate in La Jolla last Saturday morning (I was shocked to find that the recipe is not secret - you MUST try it! I bet it will be just as tasty, even without the sea breeze and amazing view!) That, along with everything wonderful that is the La Jolla coast, deserves a proper toast! I'll let mine be one of many pictures and few words (although, if a picture is worth a thousand words...)

The girls LOVED seeing all of the seals!

(Doesn't that look like the life? They sure looked like they love living there!)

Aside from the seals, Rylee's favorite discovery was this ladybug;

(I wish I had a better camera and could have focused on the ladybug in this picture...oh well, someday!)

Cailyn's was these flowers.

And here's a little video of Cailyn walking...pretty much as soon as we arrived in California, her preferred mode of transportation changed from crawling to walking.

Love can move mountains...then why not us?

I am SO grateful for all the help we received and love that was shown to our family during the moving process - without our wonderful family and friends, there is no way that I could have pulled it off!

My sister Emily very generously used her free flight (that she could have used to take a relaxing vacation) to come help me pack!

Many of our neighbors helped out by watching the kiddos and helping with the clean-up, my good friend Emilie came to pack several times (including a 24 hour all-nighter before and while the movers were there), and my cousin Megan let my girls stay the night while Emilie and I pulled the all nighter. Plus, Katie and Megan put together a wonderful farewell party for us where we got to visit with family and friends before we left.

I felt very loved (:

And when we finally got to California, we got this:

Daddy hugs and kisses are certainly worth moving for!


(Sunny beaches aren't bad reasons either!)

Clouds in the Skye

Rylee Skye spotted this jet cloud (is that what you call them?) while we were on a walk a few weeks ago.

She said "It a blue and white stripe in the sky like my shirt!"

California Girls

Hello, friends!

Two weeks ago in Utah, the movers loaded our stuff into a truck while it snowed.

Two days later, we were here

soaking up the sun, letting the sand run through our fingers and listening to waves roll in and out.

We miss our family, friends, and home in Utah. But we are happy to be near our California family, we will make new friends here, we are slowly settling in to our new home, and - most importantly - we have our Daddy back!!!

And I will take a sunny day at the beach over the snow any day.

I will be posting updates from the last few weeks at some point in the (hopefully not too distant) future.