Easter egg goodies for all!

 Claire is practicing her rock climbing, but since there are no rocks around... she climbed on my desk where we were making Easter baskets for our neighbors. She started her Easter a little bit early. I am going to have to get really creative at hiding birthday presents considering she is only 1 and she can already find most things!

 We took pictures before going to church in our pretty outfits!

 Although they aren't quite smiling in our family picture, at least we got one where they weren't trying to get away or they weren't crying!

 Marie loves her dress! She was saying, "I'm a princess!" I don't know where she got the princess thing from... we never call her a princess, but she just picked it up from somewhere! I have to admit she does look like a princess in her dress.

 These girls did great at finding their Easter eggs. In their Easter eggs, they got some Butterfinger chocolate eggs, Hershey's chocolate squares, and mini candy bars. Claire loved the Butterfinger chocolate eggs... She would try to eat them wrapper and all. She would get angry when you tried to take them away to help her open them up because she thought wasn't going to get the chocolate back!

 Marie's favorite was the Hershey's chocolate squares because they were the easiest to open up. She loved all the candy though and has been asking for candy for breakfast!

Pa found some Starburst jellybeans in his Easter egg!

Look what Ma found in her Easter egg! She was completely surprised.

Spoon Feeder

 Claire has learned how to use a spoon! We just decided to give her a spoon one day and she actually knew how to use it!

 Claire does great, as long as you help her get started by holding the spoon correctly. Otherwise she will try to use the wrong end of the spoon sometimes.

 She doesn't always get 100% of her food to her mouth, but she does pretty well.

 Our girls love to make forts. Their hair was standing straight up and Marie looked over at Claire. She started laughing and pointing at Claire's hair. I told her that hers was doing the same thing, but she didn't believe me.

Claire likes to drink the water in the tub, but when we put bubbles in the tub she tries to drink those instead and gets a great beard!

Another Death Valley Trip!

The last time that we went to Death Valley we didn't end up camping overnight, so we thought that we would try again!

 It was incredibly windy, but it was still a gorgeous place. There were several spots that we didn't get to see last time, so it was good that we went again.

 Teddy's parents met us there was well. We also went with the Turner family! It was a party!

 We got our campground set up, but remember how I said it was incredibly windy?

 The Turner's tent didn't quite make it through... so they slept in their spacious van. It was probably better in there anyways! It was windy ALL night! I don't think anyone got that great of sleep, but it was still a great time anyways. Who doesn't have fun when there are tinfoil dinners and smores?

 The two Marie's had a fun time as well. They would trade chairs and run around chasing each other.

 Teddy's parents got some good Grandma and Grandpa time with the girls. Everyone had fun!

 We also got to see these really neat fish! Who would have thought that fish could live in Death Valley? These fish have morphed over the years to be able to withstand the high temperatures.

 The Marie's had a fun time running on the wooden trail and it was a great length of a hike. It was only around .75 mile to the fish and back.

 Next we were on to the sand dunes again. We saw these last time we were here too, but they were so much fun we had to make another stop. The girls are also bigger now and can enjoy them even more! We took a little hike out to the further sand dunes and it was really neat! It was hard to tell how far away things actually were with that much sand everywhere.

 Look at this good lookin' bunch!

Marie loved planting Claire, and Claire loved it as well!

Another successful trip to Death Valley! Thank you Turners for inviting us!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

 The girls have been taking advantage of the warm weather that we have been having. They play outside almost all day, every day! I make them come inside to get Otter Pops to cool down, but then they just want to go right back outside again.

 They sure do have fun together!

 The checkout lady at the grocery store on base gave us these tattoo/sticker things for the girls. They were so entertained! Claire was confused on why she couldn't just pick it off.

Marie was decked out in as much green as we could find. Claire had a green shirt with a green hair clip, but she spilled food all over her shirt... thankfully we had another shirt that had a little bit of green on it!

More of LA

 We had some more time left while we were waiting for Tyler, so we did a quick trip by the Queen Mary. The girls had passed out in the car so we didn't go in and get any of the tours, but it was still neat to see.

 Tyler had let us know that he was on his way back from his race so we went to pick him up at the pier. There was a park there that the girls just loved. It was great for them to run around since they had been in the car for a lot of the day.

 They loved chasing the pigeons!

 The girls did not want to sit still for a little group photo, so this is the best we got.

 There was a lighthouse that was also fun to see! There must have been a prom going on because there were several couples there taking pictures with fancy dresses on. Marie would point at them and say, "Princess!" I think she made their day.

 Tyler arrived on his ship and we brought him home to recover.

Marie thoroughly enjoyed having a sleeping buddy.

Trip to LA

 Tyler came out for a quick visit and so we made a trip down to LA. We took the girls to the beach a couple days after the Japan tsunami and there were TONS of surfers taking advantage of the larger waves coming in. We had a great time watching the girls, but we didn't dare put more than our feet into the icy cold water.

 Claire would chase the water in and out and occasionally she wouldn't run fast enough. The water got her feet wet and she hated it because it was so freezing! So she stayed back and decided to dig in people's footsteps left in the sand.

 Marie is a pro by now with the water. I think she was surprised at how cold it was, but she loves the ocean. She had a great time chasing the birds and digging in the sand.

 Claire had a hard time walking on the sand, but it was even worse in the tracks that were left by jeeps. She couldn't get over the ridges so she would crawl over them!

 We were waiting for Tyler to get done running his marathon, so we went for a walk after the beach. We came across this little grassy area a couple blocks from the beach with a ridiculous amount of squirrels. There were probably 100 squirrels in a two block park. We have squirrels at our house, but these were different.

 Beside being fearless of humans, they will actually come up on your stuff looking for food. They must have smelled all the gold fish crackers that Claire had dropped in the stroller. We fed these guys a couple more crackers, just to encourage their crazy behavior.

The only way you could get them to leave you alone was to chase them or stomp really loud right next to them. After they tried to bite Teddy's foot, we decided it was time to leave that park. We had a great time though!

Puzzles and hair!

 Claire is getting big too fast! She loves doing puzzles now. You have to help her quite a bit by pointing to where they go and spinning them around for her, but she loves them!

 She also loves to drag them all over the house and hide pieces.

 Marie is also getting big too fast. We finally caved in for her first haircut! These pictures are about a month old... but she is even cuter now! I couldn't stand the mulletish hairstyle she had going on.

 She actually stood fairly still for a 2 year old. Good job Marie!

 I think her hair looks a lot fuller now. It also makes her look so much older!