Chattanooga

I've uploaded the pictures from only one camera so will just share about the first day of our trip for now. We arrived in Chattanooga around 3:30pm on Friday. The road trip there was great as Marco slept for about an hour and then just chatted away the rest of the trip. As soon as we arrived, we pulled right into the parking lot of the Children's Museum. We have been there before and it is awesome. Unfortunately, we didn't have a lot of time there before it closed, but we still had a blast. The kids LOVED it.
After the museum we headed straight to dinner at an amazing Italian restaurant. Ricardo and I each had some of the best pasta we've ever had. All three kids shared a pasta dish and really enjoyed it. Ricardo and I have always enjoyed eating out together and used to go on a lot more dates before Marco was born and even more before we had kids. Our dinner out on Friday felt like a special date night, but with three little ones in tow. We didn't get to enjoy deep conversation, but we did get to enjoy the wonderful blessing of sharing a family together.

At the children's museum, Ricardo took D & A to dig for dinosaur bones while I took Marco to the baby section. Here he is driving a hot rod!

They sat us at their huge communal table which was so cool!

The kids loved the dripping wax on the table behind Ricardo

Can't have a date night without an ice cream treat. Diego thought it was the coolest thing ever that we were having ice cream at 7:00pm, their normal bedtime!

Last weekend

We just returned from a fabulous weekend away in Chattanooga. We took off Friday at 1pm and returned this evening. We enjoyed a special family weekend and have some pictures to share...
Before I post about Chattanooga, I wanted to upload some pictures from last weekend:

Ricardo recently found out that with our Bank of America cards, we receive free admission to the High Museum the 1st Saturday of every month. Children under 4 are free so the 5 of us spent the afternoon at the museum for FREE! Can't beat that! We had a great time and the kids did really well keeping up with us while we enjoyed the different galleries. We made two stops in the children's area so they could play for a bit:




Marco loved playing with the blocks and especially loved playing with them whiling hanging like this!

Thought this was a cool family shot, in the elevator heading to the parking garage.

Last Sunday we went out to dinner to an old favorite of ours, Zyka. We had not been there for a really long time and we enjoyed a delicious Indian meal. The kids loved all the food, especially the spicy chicken.

Marco devoured his saffron rice!

So sorry these pictures are in a wacky order, but I think my mind is in a bit of a wacky order as well. Yesterday we were driving home and Diego kept saying, "biblioteca, mami, bibiloteca mami" (library mami, library mami). I wasn't registering what he was saying and pulled into the driveway before I realized we had to return our books at the library. Where did we end up? The parking lot of the dry cleaners! Yes, having 3 kids just might be making a bit foggy :)




It is very appropriate that he was wearing his spiderman shirt the day he learned to climb the door frames of the house. Elizabeth, I showed him the video of Alex doing this and he LOVES it. He loves to climb all the way to the top, tap his head then inch back down (or jump down if he is over carpet)


Happy boy with adorable chubs!


Last week we kept Hartley and Adeline for one night and then Gwen and Asher joined us for the 2nd night. We had a fun time with the girls and kept busy baking, reading, playing outside, coloring and giggling.

Best buds

As soon as they heard Marco wake up, Hartley and Alexia jumped into his crib. As you can tell, he thought it was great!

The cooking crew. We baked peanut butter cookies from scratch and brownies.

Delicate fingers opening the butter


They had a blast baking together and did great taking turns and working together.

Can you believe this lil' guy is big enough to play in the tupperware cupboard?! He loves it!

I love the joy that this photo captures.

Munchin' on some cantaloupe. He prefers to feed himself now and is eating a variety of foods. Tonight he devoured the vegetable and bean soup I made for dinner. He also loves cheese, chicken, all fruit, cheerios and all beans (pinto, kidney and black are his favorites).

We took care of Deven last weekend so his parents could so some house-hunting in our neighborhood (!) and the kids kept busy digging in the backyard. Yes, that is Alexia's gardening attire! It sure captures that girl.

Today was a busy day and tomorrow will be even busier. Diego starts soccer tomorrow so he is beyond excited!

We made a last minute decision to go out of town for the weekend so Ricardo is taking Friday off of work and we are going to drive to Chattanooga to have a family weekend away. I'll have lots of photos to share next week!

The Thursday that Tia Majo was here, Ricardo took the afternoon off of work. We took her to our favorite burger place and then spent the afternoon burning the calories from lunch. We went to the Old Roswell Mill and enjoyed a gorgeous walk:

Here is post 2 of 3 of our time with Tia Majo:


She brought a "pin the tail on the donkey" so we had fun doing that during our jammie day


The weather was gorgeous almost all week so we spent a lot of time outside:

Tia Majo's visit

Ricardo's sister, Maria Jose came for a week-long visit in February and we had an awesome week with her! The kids absolutely loved having her here and made sure to make the most of their time with her by asking to read books, paint, play soccer, swing on the swings, play doggy, etc. My pictures are all out of order, but wanted to get this posted before more time slips by so here they are!



On the Saturday that she arrived we took the family to the circus and it was such a blast! The kids remembered so much from last year and were really excited when we told them we were going again. I'm bummed I don't have more pictures, but the picture above captures the expression the kids had for over 2 hours!

Not quite sure what they are doing here, but this picture cracks me up

I took Maria Jose out for a girl's night out and we had so much fun. We started with a short stroll in the mall, a truffle at Godiva and then went to Cafe Intermezzo to enjoy delicious cakes, coffee and a really special time together.

Maria Jose wanted to treat the kids to something special so we went to Starbucks for rice crispie treat (for Diego) and a brownie (for Alexia). It was a gorgeous day so we sat outside and soaked in the sunshine.

The pictures below are from a day at the park with Tia Majo:

Playing doggy