A Beautiful Day to be Outside

What a beautiful weekend! We are hoping for a lot more days like yesterday!

We spent Sunday afternoon in our backyard or Mattie and Bella's backyard as Gabrielle likes to call it. I don't know why she refers to it as Mattie and Bella's yard but she does. She also refers to the front yard as her backyard!

Samantha loved being outside playing. She just laughed and laughed on the swings. (Excuse the runny nose in the photo!)

Gabrielle has always been an outdoorsy kind of girl. This year I have noticed she is much braver and less cautious when it comes to climbing and going down slides. She also is a lot more creative with her play in general.

The two girls both just love swinging together. Gabrielle is going to have so much fun this summer with her little sister to play.

Samantha is going to skip the cautious stage I'm afraid. She already is jumping and bouncing all over the place. When I put her on the little slide she never hesitated skooting down it herself. I can remember with Gabrielle she was well over a year old and still was a little nervous about going down this itty bitty slide.

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

Maybe the favorite part for both girls was riding in the wagon. Samantha loves anything that involves moving but also loves anything she can do with her big sister. Gabrielle loved she actually now had someone to ride with her in her 2-seater wagon.

From My Little Sunbeams

The wagon is a lot heavier for me to pull around this year though!

From My Little Sunbeams

And the car is a lot heavier for Gabrielle to push around as well!

From My Little Sunbeams

I thought this was so sweet. After pushing her little sister for a bit, Gabrielle stopped to show Samantha how everything works. She turned the key for her, showed her how to beep the horn and turn the steering wheel.

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

And then of course checked "under the hood" to make sure all was working properly with the car. She had to clean out quite a few leaves and pine cones - things she herself had tucked away in there the last time we had the little car out.

From My Little Sunbeams

After playing in the sand, on the swing set, running around, throwing, kicking and chasing balls we all headed inside and amazingly each and every single one of us took a nap at the same time! Samantha was in her crib, I was in bed with Gabrielle and Ed was on the couch. What a perfect Sunday afternoon!

The next photo is of Gabrielle's creation at dinner last night - the remains of her tomato and the rest of her "salad" she didn't feel like eating with a ziti noodle placed on top. She called it a "cucumber pancake."

From My Little Sunbeams

And now for some extreme close-ups of messy faces!

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams