Happy belated Easter everyone!! We had a wonderful weekend up in the mountains at our family cabin and absolutely loved the downtime.

Stopped to take a quick photo in Murphys

On Saturday, we wandered around downtown Murphys (one of our favorite towns) and visited the local shops on the main street. We had to stop ourselves from buying a ton of cute items. I’m very intrigued by adult coloring books and almostttt bought one several times. We also saw a cute book to document Claire’s school years which had spots to write in her teachers, friends, favorite classes, and pouches to put in artwork, report cards, etc. We have a few more years before Claire starts school so there’s no rush in getting that now but I’m definitely going to keep it on my radar! In the last store, she found a cute kids owl backpack and proceeded to grab it and try to fill it with coloring supplies. It was SO adorable!! My heart couldn’t handle seeing her try on that backpack. I’m thinking she might need one to tote around her toys.

Walking back to the cabin from the park

Claire absolutely loves the swings and she thought it was hilarious that I was jumping under her to take this photo. Definitely a risk that paid off!

After that, CJ dropped Claire and I off at the swings by our cabin while he grabbed a few things at the grocery store. Claire and I walked back to the cabin together after playing on the swings for a while. I had one of those moments when walking back, where I thought to myself, I hope I never ever forget this. It breaks my heart that I can’t remember every moment with her but especially ones like these. The weather was beautiful, Claire was holding my hand and pointing out things she saw and just chit chatted with me. I thought, how did I get so lucky? I do miss the squishy-ness of baby Claire but MAN do I love this age right now. I love that when we’re heading somewhere, she say things like “Daddy, I’m comingggg!” and “Papa, where areeeee youuuu?”, I love that she asked me where Daddy was, that she noticed the huge trees and was in awe of them, that she still loves to hold my hand, that she heard Zoe barking from far away and pointed it out, and is always delighted at the smallest things. She makes me appreciate the small things and, for that, I’m so grateful.

That night, we dyed Easter eggs with my mom – it was Claire’s first time! She absolutely loved coloring on them with crayons beforehand and dipping them in the cups. She got more and more bold and by the end was plopping the eggs in the cup without using the little metal hook. We had to remind her to be more gentle with the eggs. 🙂

Pure joy on Easter morning. She was SO excited to see what the Easter bunny brought her.

Lately, CJ and I have been finding ourselves glancing at each other with the biggest smiles on our faces at how adorable our little girl is. A few moments that made us do that:

• Lately, she’ll ask us a question, we’ll answer and she’ll respond with a matter-of-fact “Oh.”
• Or, last night, we were putting her to bed and she kept trying to open her bedroom door, would say “Be back,” and then would leave to grab something.
• We’re really talented at making ourselves more sleepy than Claire during her bedtime routine and you’ll hear Claire say, quite often, “Daddy, wake up!” because she can tell we’re losing him.
• For the longest time, we’d ask her a question and, if she wanted to answer yes, she’d say “Mmm Hmmm”. But, now, she will say with an enthusiastic tone “Yeahhhhh” or “Yep”. Writing this down doesn’t truly emphasize how cute it sounds but you have to take my word for it. Her little voice is to die for.

Group photo before heading over to brunch at Ironstone Vineyards

She was soo happy to be with the bunny

Okay, I digress, back to Easter weekend. On Easter Sunday, we had brunch at Ironstone with my parents. Claire was too excited for the Easter egg hunt and for the Easter bunny to be interested in eating. She is soooo in love with the Easter bunny. The hunt was starting a couple minutes after we got down to the field so we told her she had to wait to see the bunny but that didn’t work out so well. When they announced that the Easter egg hunt could start, Claire had a meltdown and stood in one place crying the whole time. We helped grab a few eggs for her and headed over to the Easter bunny which cheered her up. Easter Sunday was a lesson in, no matter how much you plan for a perfect day, life happens. Toddlers happen. And that’s OK. The day was perfect because we were all together (but we did miss CJ’s mom and sister! We love you!) and that’s all you really need.