Valentine Fun

I have been slacking on blogging lately, just like on everything else, but here are some pictures from our Valentine playgroup activity. We let the kids cut out sugar cookies and then helped them decorate. It was a lot of fun and not as messy as I had feared it would be. It made me want to try more creative things with Kaiya and not always be so worried about the mess.

Yoga

I recently started doing my prenatal yoga DVD again. I was doing it during Kaiya's naps a few months ago, but these days by naptime I am usually ready for a nap myself. I don't like having the TV on while Kaiya is awake, but I figured I needed the exercise and it's mostly just music and slow movement, so it's probably not that bad. Kaiya is really good while I'm doing it and mostly just plays with her toys all around me. But I guess she has been paying more attention than I thought, because the other day I caught her in a position like this: I asked her what she was doing. She looked up at me and simply stated, "yoga". Now she goes around doing her "yoga" (which is basically her in any position putting one leg up in the air and shaking it) all day. It's so cute and so funny!

Welcome Baby Clayton!

Congratulations Meghan and Jake!! Clayton Paul Rhodes was born February 6th at 3:45am. He was a whopping 8lbs 12oz! We went to see Meghan and the baby in the hospital yesterday evening. They are both doing well, and the baby is so cute! It was so fun to hold a newborn again. They are so light! Kaiya wasn't sure what to think of him, but overall, her impression seemed favorable. She kept trying to share her toys with him, and didn't seem jealous at all when Patrick or I held him. We are so happy to have a new nephew!

Amazingly Delicious

This might just be one of the greatest chocolate chip cookie recipes ever. We made this last night and I had to share it on the blog because it's so good! The cookies turn out big, thick, and soft, and they are delicious! We made ours a little smaller than the recipe calls for, and we also added a little cinnamon just for fun. Try it out and you won't be disappointed!

INGREDIENTS
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 egg
1 egg yolk
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

DIRECTIONS
1.) Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Grease cookie sheets or line with parchment paper.
2.)Sift together the flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.
3.)In a medium bowl, cream together the melted butter, brown sugar and white sugar until well blended. Beat in the vanilla, egg, and egg yolk until light and creamy. Mix in the sifted ingredients until just blended. Stir in the chocolate chips by hand using a wooden spoon. Drop cookie dough 1/4 cup at a time onto the prepared cookie sheets. Cookies should be about 3 inches apart.
4.)Bake for 15 to 17 minutes in the preheated oven, or until the edges are lightly toasted. Cool on baking sheets for a few minutes before transferring to wire racks to cool completely.

Our Texas Trip

Do you ever procrastinate blogging something just because you know it's going to take forever to blog it? We got back from our Texas trip about a week ago, and we had a ton of fun and took a LOT of pictures. So I've been putting off posting about it on the blog because I knew it was going to take a while to load all the pictures and write about it. And I was right.... We decided to go to Texas in December (around the same time all the snow started to fall... coincidence?) and were so excited when we heard the weather was supposed to be in the 70°s all week while we were there. We were not disappointed. It was warm most of the week and we were able to get out and do a lot of things. It was so fun to see my family, and Kaiya had a good time, except for the occasional squabbles, playing with her cousin Miles. Here's a bunch of pictures of what we did:

We went to the Texas State aquarium in Corpus Christi one of the days we were there. It was a lot of fun to watch Kaiya and Miles watching the fish. Unfortunately, my favorite part of the aquarium, the otters, were sleeping, so we didn't get to watch them play.

We also got to go to the beach one day. We went to the Padre Island National Seashore, and we got in for free since Patrick is a National Parks employee (sweet connections). It was a little windy, but we loved watching Kaiya explore the sand. She liked to run out to the water's edge and then run back before it touched her feet. Unfortunately, her coordination still needs some work and she fell in once. After that she was a bit more cautious, but it was so fun to see her explore and play in a new environment.

She loved to grab two handfuls of sand and then give them to me. I didn't have the heart to tell her that she wouldn't be able to collect it all.

We also went to the Corpus Christi museum. They had so many interesting exhibits, including the reproductions of the Columbus ships, but the kids mostly just liked playing in the kids area, which was also incredible. We didn't get to look around as much as we would have liked, but it was still a worthwhile trip.

Patrick and I in front of one of the Columbus reproductions. We dress like that sometimes to go out.

My dad loved reading to the kids every morning.

We took the kids to the park a couple of times. Kaiya was so excited to get outside again that she never wanted to leave.

At the lake near my parent's house.

The last day we were there we went to San Antonio with my parents and did a lot of fun stuff. This is us at the Alamo. There are way too many people there to get any good pictures.

We also we to the safari zoo, where this ostrich attacked our car. This place is so cool; you drive through at like 5 mph, and you have a bag of food and toss it out at the animals as you drive by. They get really close (sometimes too close, as in the case of this ostrich). Kaiya loved it.


We also went to the Riverwalk, and had dinner at the Rainforest Cafe. By the end of the day we were all tired, so the environment of this place was a bit much (thunderstorms every 30 minutes, animal sounds, a TON of people) but it was fun and we got this amazingly huge and delicious desert to celebrate my birthday.

We had so much fun in Texas and wish we could go there more often, especially in the winter!