taking time to smell the flowers

i love his flower smelling pose!

she would stop and bend over and smell anything she could get to, and then say "mmm".

for the flowers higher up, mommy would help get her nose up there. there is something so angelic about this shot:)

then we also got to see a few innings of a baseball game. ryder climbed right up and watched it with pure amazement!

we spent the day in golden gate park yesterday. it was so nice and sunny! our favorite place to chill and explore is the botanical gardens. we always seem to find something new to check out. yesterday we saw, ducks, geese, fish, and turtles in the pond, then walked into the gardens and stopped to smell every single flower we could find. it was really nice to just stop for a moment and take the time to smell the flowers, even if it was every single one. 

fun at the table

aunt tessa is a favorite at the sf mangos. ryder absolutely adores her (he calls her his best friend), quinn is just amazed by her (it's like she can't keep her eyes off of her, but if tessa comes in and holds her right away, quinn will get all shy...it's so funny). lately when she comes over the kids seems to be so excited, it's hard to control them, so having dinner is always a little crazy! 

blue 32...hut hut

ryder has quite the arm! a little dangerous, maybe. lots of fun, definitely! that's how we role:)

quinn also likes to throw the ball around (well, she likes to do anything ryder does). she is also becoming very attached to pieces of clothing, like this swimsuit! she insisted on putting it over her clothes, yes, she wore this all day. 

just groovin

so this was taken in the morning on our way out to school. what a sense of rhythm (which comes from me, of coarse!). we dance all the time here, it's a great way to express ones self! ryder has evolved quite a bit with his dance style, not sure what to call it yet, but i'm feelin it!

bubbles

the easter bunny brought the kids some bubbles amongst other favorites. no backyard, so we compromise...doing it city style! yep, out the window.

easter

we had to quickly color our eggs on saturday before the easter bunny came. we only make the 3 primary colors and create off of that....it's so fun. ryder's favorite color to make is teal.

this is what happens when mommy is doing to many things at once and wasn't at the table for 5 seconds. 

quinn's version of how to eat a hard boiled egg.

what a fun mess.

ride ryder ride

this was such an amazing moment for all of us, and to have it on video....priceless! 

russian river photos

quinn trying out the bike. she has to do everything that ryder does, of coarse!

ryder took this photo of quinn at the beach. 

ryder found this bike in the basement. we dusted off the cob webs, put some air in the tires (although the back one was totally flat), gave ryder a little push and off he went. it was so cool to see. he was just so proud, and so were we!

jesse teaching ryder how to skip rocks.

ryder was the king of go-fish! he won every time, even when naked and wearing a patch!

that is just too cute.

russian river

we spent a few days up north on russian river, one of our favorite places to go to escape the city life. it's just so peaceful and relaxing, and we all have so much fun! the house we stayed in was gorgeous, surrounded by huge redwoods, and had all the luxuries the sf mangos needed. our days consisted of waking up every morning in our huge king size bed, watching the weather channel (that is ryder's new concern), then heading outside for a morning soak in the hot tub. then we pretty much played go fish, ate yummy food, played outside, hiked around, went to the beach, played more go-fish, learned how to ride a bike (yes, ryder totally rode a bike! it just blew my mind. it was so amazing!), played hide and seek, giggled a ton, and most importantly (and this is my favorite rule for our family) we just simply loved each other! ah, vacation:) 

dandelion

ryder was blowing dandelions today, so quinn had to try it too! it was so funny for ryder and i to watch her experience the dandelion. but what struck me, was the fact that she really didn't care about what occured with that flower, she was more concerned about ryder touching her bag of marbles! i mean lets keep things in perspective here:)

is there something on my face

having a smoothie with breakfast is a 'norm' at our house. both kids love this delicious breakfast cocktail:)