Bike Davis...and other fun

We planned a small family vacation with Grant's family in Monterey, so we decided that we would take a few more days off and visit my parents in Davis first. Grant hadn't been to their house since we moved back, there was a Volvo show that Grant wanted to go to, and I wanted to teach Rowan to ride a bike! We left Friday after work and got to their house a little after midnight. The drive was actually better than I anticipated given that we left around rush hour on a Friday. The kids fell asleep for the last 4 hours of the drive which was obviously ideal :)

Saturday was started out with some bike riding! Rowan had been nervous for a week or 2 anticipating riding a 2 wheel bike, but we assured him that we would help him and it was going to be fun. He hopped on, Grant ran next to him and held onto the bike for maybe 3 minutes, then he let go and Rowan rode as we just ran next to him for about 5 minutes, and then he told us we could just stand and watch him, he could do it by himself ;)  I was so proud of his accomplishment! He was so happy and excited. Our neighbor saw him learning and she runs a bike program and brought out a button for bike month, a bell and a light for his bike. It was the perfect introduction to bike riding!

We have more videos than pictures, but he was so much fun to watch. He's still working on braking...I think it scares him more than he's not capable, but the bike is a tiny bit big so it's hard for him to put his feet down easily. It'll come with time. He rode up and down our street countless times and then we rode to the park and he did about 4 miles worth of loops around the park. The next day we rode to a gymnastics gym to play around at, and then later in the week went on a bike ride all together. It was perfect. Davis really is the perfect biking town! I am sad that we live in such a hilly area because it's going to be hard for him to get lots of practice.

Boden didn't want to miss out on the fun (or Grant!)

We played around the house a lot, which was the perfect. The boys both LOVE Mimi and Papa's toys (they couldn't wait to get them out of the attic the second we got to the house, and Rowan said that we should start keeping our toys in the attic ;) 

Rowan got to try out crayons on the hot plate, one of my favorite activities growing up. Such a fun art project!

Another childhood favorite of mine

Rowan's other favorite thing to do at their house is pick stuff in the garden. Unfortunately most of it isn't ready, but he was still really excited to get this armful of chard ;) We made a smoothie with it.

And Boden helped Papa make cinnamon rolls for Sunday morning breakfast.

Scott, Trisha, Maddox and Camdyn stayed with us on Saturday night on their way to San Francisco for a few days before Monterey, so it was fun for us to chat and the cousins to play. We had dinner together at Plutos on Saturday night and then they came to church with us before heading out on Sunday.

Monday was Grant and my 13 year anniversary! So my parents watched the kids and we headed out to dinner in Sacramento. We ate at Cafeteria 15L and then walked around the Capitol gardens for awhile afterwards. Unfortunately I wasn't feeling great by the end of the evening so we headed home.

I ended up with something worse than just pregnancy sickness (I think)...

The next day we decided to head to Old Town and do a train ride! We got super lucky, as there were only train rides on random Tuesdays, and this one was the last one for several months. It was about a 40 minute ride along the river, which was scenic and fun.

We then checked out an old candy store and each kid got to pick out 5 pieces of candy (I know, that's kind of cruel in a store this huge), but it was still a fun treat for them.

I was out for the count the rest of the day with terrible stomach pains, just overall feeling crappy and throwing up after I tried to eat some toast that night. Luckily it didn't last too long so we went on with our fun. It was so nice to be home to have Grant and my parents to pretty much take care of the kids so I could just sleep it off.

We tried to call get caught up on sleep while we were there ;) We had so much fun and relaxation with my parents, it was the perfect beginning to our vacation.

We stayed until Thursday morning, at which point my mom flew out to Utah to wedding dress shop with Holly, and we drove over to Monterey (with a pit stop in the bay area to check out the wheels that Grant wants to buy for the Volvo).