Olive's 1st Birthday Cake Smash

So, Olive turned one! We didn't do anything crazy. We aren't big on outrageous birthday parties for the kids, but what we ARE big on is getting photos of them! One of the things I really wanted to do to commemorate Olive's first birthday was to get some smash cake photos taken.

Naturally, I ordered the world's most expensive (and beautiful) allergy-free cake from a local gluten free bakery. And then I stuck the birthday girl in front of it and watched as she very carefully (and not very messily) dismantled most of it. After a few minutes, I let Stella in on the action.... because I had promised her that I would.

Then, Nick and I spent the next few days eating the remainder of the most expensive cake we have ever bought. It was delicious!

Butterflies and ballet.

Stella has a new obsession: butterflies.

It turns out that the Pacific Science Center has a butterfly exhibit.

It's a room filled with thousands of butterflies. Some of them land on you as you walk by.

It's like a dream come true... for Stella.

Stella's second favorite thing (right behind butterflies) is ballet.

She had her first "performance" today.  It was at a retirement center. 

The people who live there and watched the performance loved it, and so
did the girls. I surprised Stella with pink daisies after the performance :) 

My Mom used to love watching Jess and I dance and I just knew she was proud of us. 

I hope Stella knows one day how proud I am of her. 

Yes, these are photos from LAST YEAR.

By Liv

I know you are thinking it. Don't lie. But who really cares if I post pictures that are two months old? I mean, the kids are STILL cute and STILL funny and we are STILL doing basically the same things, so no harm done, right? Right.

 First off, I'm Mom of the year for this little stunt: I booked an all-expenses-paid trip for our family to build Gingerbread houses through the local Children's Museum. It was super fun and we didn't have to clean up the mess!

 She was pretty excited to eat it. (I didn't want to burst her bubble, but we never did end up eating it!)

 Auntie Marcea stopped by to say, "hi" and Olive was overly thrilled.

 Our Christmas tree did not compare to Oma & Papa's.

 (And had much less gifts underneath it...)

 I met up with my friends in Hillsboro. I sure miss those girls!

 While at Oma & Papa's for the Holiday, we had a lot of dance parties.

 Papa & Olive. Strike a pose.

 On Christmas morning, Stella woke up to a TON of gifts from Santa. She was thrilled!

 Donning her mermaid costume on Christmas day. 

 The Hernandez-Tostenrudes.

 Stella's new best friend (compliments of Oma). We now need a bigger house...

 A few weeks after Christmas, we took a weekend trip to Sequim to see my Sister and her babies. They live on a farm with acreage, so we naturally needed to take the girls outside to...

 ...scream

 Olive Chapa and her blue blue eyes. Just like her Daddy.

 Olive spends the majority of her life wrapped to my back. It's the only way I can get anything done!

And she obviously don't mind one bit :) 

 I wish my Mom were here to see this! All of her Grandbabies in one tub. Heaven.

 Nick and Stella have a new hobby: putting together Lego sets. Stella loves it!

After 3 years, we finally re-visit Utah.

By Liv

It's been 3 years. A lot has changed since our last visit to Utah. We have lived in countless other states, cities, countries... We have lost family members and gained family members. One thing that remains the same: we absolutely ADORE Utah. Of course, Stella has absolutely no recollection of Utah and since we don't talk about our old home very often, she was quite confused when we drove her past our house in Salt Lake City (that is currently being rented) and told her the story about how that's the house she lived in when she was a baby. She was really only interested in seeing snow.

The main reason we wanted to revisit Utah was to catch up with some of our favorite people. Our good friends – The Helgesens – have just moved back to the USA after living in Africa since we all left Oxford over a year ago, and since Laura and Tenzing were the people we spent the majority of our Oxford-time with, Stella and I were very excited to reunite with them. Mostly, though, I was excited to see if Stella actually remembered Tenzing and if they still got along.

As it turns out, either Stella and Tenzing are very good at pretending that they remember each other, or they really DO remember each other. They picked right up where they left off a year ago and got back in to the swing of being best buds. Here are some photos of our weekend trip to beautiful Utah:

 The ever-beautiful Laura and her adorable son, Tenzing. My-oh-my how we have missed them!

 Daddy-daughter silliness.

  Best Dad ever.

 We took the kids inner-tubing in the snow. This was probably the highlight of the trip for everyone :) 

 I still can't believe Stella went down that hill. It wasn't steep, but the tubes went FAST!

 Sweet boy.

 Best friends.

 Do you see them up at the top? No? Oh, well I swear that's them. Just keep scrolling down...

 Nick, Xavier, Stella and Tenzing each had their own inner tube. The Dads held everyone's ropes tight so that they went down the slope together.

 Rounding them up...

 I'm sure Tenzing was saying, "Again!"

 Taking in a cartoon together.

 And a little pre-hot-tub dance party. (ps- Stella is potty trained but wanted to wear the "cool" swim diaper..."

 Silly dimply girl.

Oh yeah, Olive was there, too. She had fun chewing on her feet.