Swimming

After our bike ride we took the girls swimming.

For the first time, we put Camille in a swimsuit and let her go swimming.

It proved...interesting.

 Unlike Claire who LOVED the water and splashed and laughed forever the first time we took her to the pool, Camille pretty much just had a look that said, "I don't know about this" the entire time.

 She got really cold and was shivering within just a few minutes, poor girl.

 Dad spent his time with Camille- see how thrilled she is?

Here is the major lesson we learned:

It is really hard to go swimming with three little girls! I had swimming down pat- it was a perfect science from the swim bag to the pool to the changing to the getting home all showered up. Now I will have to start from scratch to come up with a new game plan. Oh, well.

Bike Ride

Now that Audra can ride a bike, we decided to go for a family bike ride to a local park.

 Camille was all sorts of excited before we left

Audra's ready to go!

 Then we got to the park- the bike ride went well, Audra did great

 Camille figured out how to rock herself on this little toy and she thought it was just the best thing ever:

 Like most babies, the swing is a favorite

 Pretty much the entire time that Camille was in the stroller next to Claire she made the stink face.

I figured out that the Stink Face while in the stroller means one of three things:

1. She LOVES riding in the bike stroller
2. She HATES riding in the bike stroller
or
3. She really doesn't know what to think of the bike stroller

While at the park Audra figured out how to go across some really tricky monkey bars. She said, "Mom, I'm so proud of myself!" So of course I had to get some video:

Audra had a minor crash on the way home- her very first crash. She got over it pretty quick.

Overall, it was definitely a success!

Doodle Buddy

Audra drew a self-portrait:

Landsharks

Recently I signed Audra up for a running club called Landsharks. It's a pretty simple program- 6 practices, and 3 meets (Kristen, I think Alan should start something like this in OR- it's really cool!). Last week they had their first meet and Audra did great- she ran the 50 M and 200 M, and she had a lot of fun. And every time she ran past us she waved at us. It was really cute.

Today was the middle distance  meet. She ran the 400 M. She came in third place- smiling all the time! Because it is springtime in Colorado it was absolutely freezing.


Even though she was really nervous at first, this has been great for her. It's the first time she's won a ribbon (everybody wins a ribbon), and she's made friends with the older kids on the team.

Plus, she looks really cute while running.

 She was blowing us kisses right before the race. She LOVES blowing kisses. And raccoon kisses.

 Here's her other kindie teammates lining up. They are all freezing!

 And they are off! Audra is on the far left:

 Look at her smiling while she runs:

 That blur is her finishing. We are pretty sure she could have gone another 400 M- she is very good at setting a steady pace and she can pretty much run forever:

 Grandma will be mad I posted this picture, but it's so cute:

 This picture shows how cold it was- Claire was freezing the entire time:

 This is the whole team and Coach Paul on the right:

Go Landsharks!

First Hike Of the Season

Yesterday we realized we had nothing to do today- so we asked the girls what they wanted to do. Audra said, "Go on a hike and have a picnic!"

Even though it snowed on Wednesday, this IS Colorado, and the weather looked like it would be OK today- a high of 53, which can be quite warm with the sun shining.

Since we had nothing else to do, we headed up to the mountains.

 We forgot to bring the back pack carrier, but we did have the Baby Bjorn (thank goodness!). So, we tried putting it on backwards to see if it would work- to make it easier to carry her. It worked!

 Dang, he's hot!

 We let her down for a second. It did not go well as she decided to just eat rocks and sticks. I wish I could say it's the first time she's eaten rocks and sticks. Back to the carrier she went!

From our hike we could see Ben's work. Now tell me this: If you worked here, would you EVER leave your place of employment and get a job anywhere else? Yeah, Ben doesn't want to, either.

Here's a funny story of our trip:

While we were eating lunch, I said, "Come here Little Midget!" -meaning Camille. I have all kinds of names for her, and Little Midget is one of them. Audra said, "What's a midget?" I said it is a person who is really small, even though they should be bigger. Then, low and behold, a midget (dwarf) came walking down the hill! What a crazy coincidence! (and lest you think I am a horrible person, we did explain to her that the proper term is "Little Person" and that they are just like the rest of us- just shorter).

Overall, I realized two great things today:

1. Audra has great ideas about what we should do on do nothing days.

2. I LOVE days that we have nothing planned! I will gladly take more of these days!

Happy May Day!

Strong Arms

I mentioned before that Claire is awesome at the monkey bars. Here's the proof:

And Audra also has some amazingly strong arms:

It really is impressive how strong these girls are. All Audra wants to do is play on the monkey bars- she gets really upset if it's too cold to play on them or if the park we are at doesn't have them. It's really cute, and Claire is definitely following in her footsteps.

Camille just stands/walks around looking really cute. Because, well, she is just plain cute:

 Trying to get a picture of the three of them proved nigh impossible:

 Claire insisted that I get a picture of her climbing across the chains- it's fun when she gets so proud of herself: