First Spring Beach Visit

What a perfect Friday we had! The morning started with a Grasshoppers birthday party playgroup. The Grasshoppers are Hana's playgroup and the hosting family lives up the street. After much rain and dreariness, we had sunshine and warmth and wanted to make the most of it! I was very excited when Kevin came in the door a few hours earlier than expected. We quickly packed up our things and headed down to the beach. Our swimsuits hadn't been worn in a while but luckily they still fit!
Although cleaning them up is not fun, I love letting the girls get as messy as they want in the sand.

We ventured toward water. Hana loves to frolick in the waves but Alaina doesn't yet! The day before, we witnessed a Coast Guard search at this same beach and it was an opportunity to teach Hana to respect the ocean and never go near the water without us.

As I sat on my chair in the sand, soaking up the sun and watching the waves....it almost felt like we were on a great vacation though we were only minutes from home.

Disney on Ice

The opening for night for Disney on Ice happened to fall on the day before Kevin left on a trip to San Antonio. Hana really misses her daddy a lot when he is away so I thought this would be perfect for a Daddy/Daughter date. I had never seen her so excited! Kevin even bought her a princess dress to wear. We keep Hana's piggy bank in our living room and she gets to put our spare change in it. When it gets full, we cash it in and let her spend the money on something fun. In the past, the money has been spent on the county fair, fireworks and the carnival. This time she used it to buy herself a snow cone and a Tinkerbell toy for Alaina.
I've never seen such a huge smile on this girl! She got to watching Lightning McQueen, the Little Mermaid, the Lion King and Tinkerbell.

Kevin even said he enjoyed the show as well. Kevin and I had our own date the night before and that morning, he had a breakfast date with Alaina. So nice that we all got some alone time with him before he left!

Talking

Alaina is 17 months and talking up a storm!

Mama/Mommy

Dada/Daddy

Uni (Korean for big sister)

Harmama (my mom)

PawPaw (my dad)

Jacket
Apple

Up

Baby

Teeth

Bye bye

Doggie

Yay

Belly

Shh

Bad

Shee shee (pee)

Uh oh!

I think that's all the words so far....

Gorgeous Saturday

Yesterday, I attended a baby shower for one of my friends. Her husband was having a guys poker day at the same time as the shower. I was looking forward to the baby shower and Kevin wanted to play poker too but didn't think it was appropriate to bring the girls to either event. I decided that I would leave the baby shower early to go be with the girls while Kevin then left to hang out with the guys. We each deserve some child-free time away with our own gender right?!! Lucky for Kevin, I left the house at the start of naptime and they woke up right after he left. I decided to take the girls for a walk at the beach for a 'photoshoot' since it was a stormy yet sunny day. We drove towards the beach but all the roads are blocked off with signs that say 'Flooded'. There was no flooding and I think this was in anticipation of the potential tsunami waves from the Chile earthquake. We parked farther than we normally do and ended up walking right towards the spot where the sand was way higher than usual. As I watched Hana gleefully run towards the sand pile, I knew that I was going to let them get dirty in the sand rather than go for a leisurely walk as planned. I started taking pictures and then realized my memory card was NOT in my camera. I was so upset!! Such a beautiful day and the girls were having so much fun - there would've been some great pictures!
As I watched them dive, crawl, jump in the sand & then run towards the ocean on such a beautiful day, I was a bit bummed that I couldn't capture their fun in pictures. However, I was so glad to be living in the moment and loved seeing them enjoy themselves. (Did not love teaching Alaina that eating sand & rocks is not okay!)

After stripping the girls of socks, shoes and pants, I plugged them into their carseats and we headed home. As I looked out of the door to our backyard and saw the orange in the sky, I still felt like I needed some pictures. The girls and I walked up our street and I was able to take these pictures. I am still learning how to use our camera and am always trying a bunch of different settings. Not sure quite what I am doing yet but I am happy to have gotten a few pictures to capture this beautiful day.

Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day was the end of a long week with all three of us girl being really sick. I started it off with a bad chest cold on Tuesday and by Thursday, H & A had caught my cold too. It didn't help that Kevin had to work past their bedtime on Friday and on Saturday morning too. Alaina was feverish but not miserable. As usually happens when Hana gets a cold, it quickly progressed into something much worse. When Kevin returned home from work on Saturday afternoon, she was completely miserable, pale, weak and her breathing was erratic. He took her to the doctor and she had a 103 degree fever, an ear infection and a respiratory virus. Poor girl! Kevin and I had were actually supposed to have a Date Night on the Thursday before V-day but it just didn't work out since we were all sick. This is a picture of my sickies. Even my tough little Alaina was feeling so weak. Valentine's Day was spent inside for the 6th day in a row but when we woke up that morning, we were so happy to have cards, balloons and flowers from Kevin waiting for us.
The girls' bouquet.

My lovely roses.

It is now 2 weeks after Valentine's Day and Kevin & I are finally getting another chance at our Date Night on Tuesday. Rather than go to some fancy restaurant, we've decided to go bowling and I am so excited. We used to go once a week before we got married and have rarely gone since!