weekend with grammy

my mom watches aleah every wednesday. they spend time together on a very regular basis, but we rarely have time together as a family and even more rare is the time we've spent away at grammy's house. so we planned a weekend. we arrived late friday evening...went for a walk, played with some toys from grammy's toy box, and slept in grammy's crib. daddy woke early in the morning to get in a round of golf.

when daddy left, the little one wanted to share the bed with me.

to add to the fun, sara came with atticus and nova. wake up little nova, time to play.

she is so adorable with the most expressive big eyes.

just learning to sit on her own!

atticus decided to draw a picture of aleah. he is so concentrated, i love the tongue!

aleah wearing her "baby" (suit). if she sees it, she wants it on. if it can't go on, she loves to hold it. she has never had a favorite blankie, but this is coming close. and no, the suit isn't supposed to be off-the-shoulder. it is just a tad big :)

who's coming up the stairs? could it be daddy?

alright, i'm out of here. time for some serious fun now!

meanwhile, nova found a little doll and was so cute for the camera:

we headed outside with a few toys, the bubble gun, and the camera:

atticus getting ready for blastoff!

i loved these adorable cousins together:

grammy!

grammy with the girls:

and with all the grandchildren:

later in the day, after baby had a nice nap, we had a carousel ride at the mall...well, i guess it was two rides :)

...and a casual dinner in old town pasadena

daddy showing daughter the finer points of the iphone. she's already surprisingly good at working it :)

what a good time we had! aleah realized that grammy's drawers might possibly contain toys and surprises that she can play with. we came away with a new stuffed piggy and lots of smiles. see you soon grammy! XOXO

summertime fun

i am out of sequence here as it has been about a month since we spent this fun day walking around beautiful san juan capistrano. i am all about capturing the moments, some which we might remember and others we most certainly would forget without the images to remind us. it was a beautiful, sunny, warm summer day. we had no plans laid out but found the little petting zoo just south of the railroad tracks. there are bunnies, guinea pigs, llamas, cows, sheep, goats, and...best of all...ponies!

oh how fun it was for us to watch little aleah with no fear or hesitation as we stepped back and watched her be led about. she was completely at ease, smiling and patting her pony, shadow. she even got to trot a bit! (i did some drastic editing on some of these photos because of the bright daylight overhead, minimal color and deep shadows.)

there was plenty of time to get close and personal with the farm animals.

while daddy was looking at something else, aleah was checking out the gift shop.

she talked us into bringing home her own pony just like shadow! we were able to get away without the hat this time :)

to my sweet daughter...memories of happy trails ever after...

our next stop was to ruby's for a little lunch. there are some pretty red benches in the courtyard.

we saw some cute stores, i loved this rocking horse.

i love this man!

he is so patient with me and my camera.

what a smile! this one warms my heart every day.

this was such a pretty red train, i couldn't resist asking him for one more...or two.

after this, it was time to head home for a nap. may you all have happy dreams!