At the beginning of August, we went to Steamboat Springs with the Nicoll family. It has been an annual family trip ever since Chris and I were married there in 2006.
Since our wedding was held at the Botanic Park, it is one of the places we always have to re-visit. This year, we got to visit this magical place with our baby girls!
The Butterfly Garden
There was a bumble bee on a flower and Addison just kept staring and staring
Playing in the Pond
Dad and His Girls
Chris loves this sculpture, it reminds him of DNA
Our favorite rock garden
We'll be back again next year, and Emily and Addison will be able to walk around on their own and explore the gardens in the park.
On Thursday night, the girls officially graduated from the baby tub. For the last month or so, we have taken some baths with them in the big tub (one at a time), but if they were on their own, they were still in the little green baby tub. But after a summer full of swimming and getting comfortable in the water, these girls were ready to be on their own in the big tub!
Cousin Callie has a very special chair. This chair has her name on it, so it indisputably belongs to her, and if you are very special, she will let you sit in her chair. Earlier this month, on a special Tuesday family dinner night, she shared her chair with her cousins and her grandpa.
While we were in Michigan, Emily and Addison met their cousins, Johnny and Heidi. Well, really, they're second cousins since Liz is Chris's cousin. I found out when I Googled it and found this link. Here we are hanging out with the Jackson Family:
Heidi is such a big girl, she even got to hold the babies! Here she is with Addison:
The girls experienced their first camping trip this summer. We went up to Guanella Pass and found a great spot in an open valley with no other campers around. Doug and Kirstin came along, and lent us and the babies their wonderful helping hands.
While Emily is still comfortable in her car seat and will take naps on long car rides, Addison is such a mover when she's awake, and such an adamant stomach sleeper when she's asleep, that sleeping in the car isn't something she does very often. Emily had a nice nap on the way up to the camp site, but after a little playing, Addison needed a nap.
Dad set up the tent while Addison napped, Emily hung out in her Bumbo, and Doug and Kirstin worked on dinner.
As the sun went down, it started getting a little chilly, so we put hats on the girls. This woke Addison up, which she wasn't too thrilled with at first (although Emily thought it was quite funny).
But after realizing where she was and what was going on, she began to warm back up.
That's right, folks, we are officially camping girls!
Of course, no camping experience is complete without a camp fire. This was the first time Emily and Addison had ever seen a fire, and boy was it amazing!
After the girls went to sleep in their pack n play that Dad set up in the tent, we enjoyed s'mores and a Kirstin concert under the stars. Emily and Addison slept great and didn't keep Mom and Dad up at all.
They woke up at their usual morning time (5am) to eat, and then fell back asleep until Mom and Dad woke them up at 8. Dad had been awake for awhile, and needed to get out of that hot tent!
We enjoyed a breakfast of instant oatmeal (fruit n cream of course), packed up the car, and headed back home where we enjoyed an afternoon dip at the pool.
We had such a great time, and will look forward to more camping next summer!
