Birthday, ducks, and new bed!

That pretty much sums up our weekend. We celebrated with our buddy on Saturday as he turned the big 3! The girls had great fun in the jumper and with the cool balloon guy who could make mermaids and fairies!

On Sunday while Will was experiencing Tour of California and looking out for Lance and Aiana was enjoying blueberry pancakes at a slumber party, the girls and I went to feed the ducks at the lake with our friends.

We were very excited for dad to come home from the bike race so he could set up the new bunkbed. It will be a while until we move Anika into Caylin's room but I couldn't pass up this bed on Craigslist. Will and I stayed up unitl 11pm putting it together. All the girls were super excited to wake up and check out the new bed/house!

A family affair

Today my dad's side of my family gathered to remember my grandpa who passed away last month. It was a bitter sweet time. It's always hard to say goodbye, but nice to gather with family and share stories and laughs. I don't see this side of my family very often so it was very special to me to have everyone over and soak in the little time we had with eachother today. I didn't realize so many people were coming over or I would have taken Aiana out of school to be with us. The family picture was taken right after Dustin left and Anika went to bed, so I'm bummed we didn't get a photo with us all in it, but hopefully we'll all be getting together again!

My grandpa was a character, loved his family, and always had jokes. He was a diver in his younger years, and he served in WWII. This photo of my grandma and grandpa made me laugh because my grandma was always saying "I'm gonna brain ya!" or "I'll give you a knuckle sandwich!".

My cousin Joy and I with grandpa (who looks pretty wiped out!)

Joy and I with our youngest.

Fun in the backyard

One of the things I love about the rain is how green everything becomes. Especially our backyard, it turns from brown dirt to lush green. Wednesday was a nice clear day. I was so excited to get out and enjoy some sunshine! We went down for a walk by the bay to pass time before dance class. On our way back to the car we saw a furry caterpillar and stopped to check it out. We ended up observing this little guy for almost a half hour. It was great! For some odd reason, this caterpillar did not want to leave Caylin alone. Caylin thought it was great! We fed it some leaves and watched him munch, let him crawl over our shoes, and Anika squealed after being a little afraid at first. Caylin was sad when we couldn't bring it home. But what a fun half hour of our day, all because we decided to stop and check out a little caterpillar.

Later that day we went and walked through the tall grass in the backyard, got muddy, and picked a bouquet of leaves for daddy.

Our Valentines weekend

Will and I decided long ago that we were not going to have any expectations when it comes to Valentines Day. We both feel that there is far too much pressure and large expectations on that one day. Love should be shown throughout the year! However, my girls and I do love all the hearts and stuff. So I every year we have a family dinner with fun decorations. This year was pretty low key since Anika is still not feeling back to normal. We still had a wonderful evening. Mimi joined us for dinner and the girls got to open a huge package from Grandpa Dave and Gretchen. They had a blast with all their fun treats.

Earlier that day we took the girls to the zoo. Anika was cracking me up. Will was carrying her on his shoulders and she was gripping onto his ear to hold on. Are daddy's ears that big?...He was in pain...which was not so funny. But daddy was getting lots of Valentine love from Anika :)

Sunday afternoon we needed to get outside. We headed down to the canyon near our backyard. It started out a little rough when Will decided he WAS going to cross the creek (while holding Anika in the backpack and Caylin in his arms). I decided I did not want to get wet, it was freezing! I also did not want the girls to get wet, again, it was freezing and they were still not over their colds. I simply wanted to take a nice hike through the canyon. But it just wouldn't be like us Barley's to not throw in a little "adventure". Anyway, all was well, and we did end up just taking a nice stroll after all.

Caylin decided she was going to play in the mud. She dug up a mud pie and carried it around like it was her baby. She sang to it and rocked it. Anika just hung out in the backpack watched everything from there. Aiana decided she wanted to skip the canyon and ride bikes with her friends. :)

A miss and a not miss:

Every morning I get up with Anika at about 6:30am. We have a nice quiet intimate time before the rest of the household is awake. Soon after a puffy face, fuzzy headed little girl joins us. If she was sleeping upstairs, I see her big eyes peaking through the stairs. Later Aiana joins us. Anika gets very excited when Aiana wakes up. She squeals when she sees her (Aiana would not be very happy if I put her morning face photo up) :). I'm going to miss these intimate moments.

I will not miss getting up before the sun is up!

Happy Valentines Day!

My girlfriend came up with the super cute idea to take Valentine themed pictures. We spend a few days coming up with Valentine props, and of course she sewed a couple little outfits too. Then we finally met up to take the photos, and although I'd like to say our kids loved the idea and were just as excited as we were...I instead have to say, they were cranky, hungry, tired, and wanted nothing to do with hearts or the camera :). However, I was able to capture a few decent pictures to say Happy Valentines Day!