Why go down a hill when you have a dad to pull you around the yard?
On an unrelated note, I have been painting my bedroom and one day I was painting and Brian was supposed to be watching the kids. I came downstairs to see this:
Carly told me that daddy was "chit-chatting" to one of our neighbors outside and she and Jake were ready for lunch for so she decided to make it herself. 
Carly started gymnastics when she was 3 and absolutely loves it. She got her first gold medal last week. (No, she doesn't compete they just gave these out to everyone if they did the correct things.) She will be starting at a new gym in January which will (hopefully) be a better program and help her advance a little more. She is a great little gymnist and Brian and I love going and watching her. We fight over who gets to take her because we don't like to take Jake. He doesn't understand why he can't be in the class too! Great Job Carly!!
Luckily it was a nice day so we played outside.
Here are some pictures from Carly's birthday party. She invited seven best buddies. We played games, opened presents, decorated cupcakes, and acted silly!!! I think everyone had a fun time - especially our big birthday 5 year old!
carving pumpkins
painting pumpkins
decorating sugar cookies with Grandma Beatty
this is how Jake decided he needed to eat his cookie.
Cute little cowgirl and giraffe
the trick or treating party
yay presents!
Cute cousins!
Thanks Aunt Shelly for the #5 and #2 tee's.
ahh....this boy finally got a train!
Spider cake - since their party was so close to Halloween I decided why not!
Two candles on the front for Jake and five on the back for Carly.
We flew into John Wayne Airport in Orange County, California
Halloween Night at Legoland
We went to Legoland with my sister Shelly and her family. It was the first time I had met her baby Ellie and the first time she had met Jake. It was so nice to be able to spend some time with them. Carly and Tyler got along great.
Then we headed over to Carlsbad Beach to take some pictures. Shelly took some great pictures (I'll post those later). These are a few that I took. It was a chilly day and of course both kids fell in the water and were covered with sand. Luckily we had all of our luggage in the rental car so it was a quick fix. 
Trying to build a sand castle 
The moment right before she fell in:) 
We then said goodbye to Shelly and headed up to Santa Ana in Orange County where we would be flying out of the next day. We spent the afternoon playing at Newport Beach where, unfortunately, I left my camera in the car. It was warm and sunny and the kids had so much fun splashing in the waves. They LOVED going out and running back as the tide came in and out and we did it a million times at least. Carly collected a bunch of shells. Jake watched a boat come in. We all played in the sand and splashed around - it was really great. Then we went back to the hotel and got cleaned up. We decided to go to dinner at the Rainforest Cafe. We took them there since it was so close to their birthdays and that was where we took Carly for her first birthday in Vegas. Hopefully we can have many more birthday dinners at Rainforest Cafe - so fun!
The next morning we had to get up at 4:30am to catch the early flight out (gotta love flying stand-by). It was a great flight and we all came home and took a nice long nap! 
