Celebrate!

This past weekend, Riley had 2 friends who celebrated birthdays so she had the opportunity to spend the weekend partying and having birthday cake 2 days in row. It really doesn't get much better than that! Saturday was our friend Taylor's Tiki themed birthday party, which meant that Roo got to wear her hula girl grass skirt and seashell top that her Grandma and Grandpa brought her from Hawaii.

After the party, Tim and Katy invited us and our friends Erin and Alec back to their house for dinner.  So it was just Riley and the boys for some playtime.

Taylor's birthday gift from Riley had an art theme and I had made a little apron for her to wear while she's creating.  Since we also had 3 other little artists in our midst we thought a great craft for the afternoon would be making our tots aprons too.  They even got to put them on and break them in with some painting. 

Their friend Audrina got one for her birthday too, so get ready for plenty of adorable matching apron pics anytime this little group is being crafty! 

A little dinner with her buddies, they all ate delicious grilled cheese!

On Sunday, we celebrated our friend Audrina's 2nd birthday and Riley of course had a great time playing with Alec and James again as well as getting to hang with the birthday girl.

Eating cupcakes...Riley's was green and the best part as far as she was concerned was the very cool Elmo ring that was on top!

Riley's ABC's

Little Mail Carrier

One of Riley's favorite things to do is to walk to our mailbox and she especially loves when she can ride her bike there.  Today was really cold and very gray, but we decided get out for a walk anyway and while she loves new bike from Santa, she opted for her old bike that has a basket on the front that she can use to carry the mail back home. 

Little Cowgirl!

This past week we took Riley to the Stock Show.  It was her 2nd year to participate in a tradition that my Mom started when Ryan and I were little.  Each year, the Stock Show comes to town in January and each year my Mom would take us and usually a few friends to get up close and personal with livestock and explore great western stuff found only at the Stock Show.  It was an outing that created lots of great memories for me as a kid and I hope that it's something that Miss Riley enjoys just as much.

This year was made even more special because Kris and Popdaddy both took the afternoon off work to join Riley, Gigi and I at the show.  Riley loves animals and she is now at what seems to be the perfect age to enjoy checking out all of the animals big and small.  Gigi even bought her an adorable pony dress and matching tights for the occasion. The only thing she wasn't about to do was get up and ride on anything, no ponnies, longhorns or Belgian horses for this cowgirl.  Maybe next year.

 Checking out the bunnies with Daddy.  It won't be long before she'll be begging to take one home with us.

Petting a goat named Nebraska with Gigi.  She thought is was pretty funny that this goat eats animal crackers, but she left the feeding up to Gigi.

Riley and Popdaddy looking at the huge Beligian horses.

Probably the biggest his with Roo was the petting zoo.  There were baby goats, pigs, sheep and even a llama that she could pet.  She loved how the little goats would run up and give her "kisses" on her hands. 

While we probably could have spent the entire day in the petting zoo alone, we had to move along to see some other stuff too. We got to walk through the area where all of the cows are kept and groomed. She enjoyed getting to see them but didn't really want to close. She particularly liked to watch the cows that were taking a bath. We had such a great day and Riley could not stop talking about all of the animals we saw and how much fun she had.  We can't wait to go back next year!

Happy New Year!

We welcomed in 2010 up in Silverthorn with our great friends the Nichols and their friends the Anne, Sean and George O'Reilly.  Tim, Katy and James invited us up to stay at their cabin for the holiday weekend and we got to spend 3 great days in the mountains with our friends.   We played games, ate good food, and watched our little ones play, it was the perfect to spend the holiday.

We suited the kids up on New Years Day for some fun in the snow.

 Unfortunately, the sleding was less of hit than we hoped it would be, but the good news was that James has a pretty cool pair of little bity skis that all of the toddlers got to try out.

We also got to go ice skating at Keystone.  Kris and I had a great time and Riley loved about the first 15 minutes and then needed to take a break from all of the fun to have some hot chocolate and potato chips.  It possible that if we could have gotten her to wear her gloves she might have enjoyed this winter activity a little bit more.  Oh well.

We hope for a very happy and proserpous New Year for all!