Happy Mother's Day!

Yesterday we returned home from our special Mother's Day trip to Monterey. It was a nice trip and we had excellent weather.

We left on Wednesday and headed to Franco's parents' house for lunch. Sophia appreciated the opportunity to run around. From there we drove straight to Monterey (about 2 hours) and Sophia slept most of the way. A very relaxing drive! After checking in at the hotel, we took a walk down around the wharf and ended up at San Carlos Park.


Sophia ran around, chased birds, and then fell and scraped her knees right as we were leaving. She was very sad every time she looked down at her knees and saw them bleeding. She held her sore knees the entire time she rode back to the hotel (in the stroller).

That night Sophia slept terribly. She woke up in the middle of the night and didn't go back to sleep for at least 3 hours. After only getting about 4 hours of sleep, I wasn't sure if I wanted to stay in Monterey for another day. Luckily the hotel had an awesome breakfast buffet. I ate all kinds of goodies and offered each thing I ate to Sophia. She didn't accept hardly anything, until I gave her sausage (we told her it was chicken -- every meat is chicken). She ended up eating two sausages and a few bites of different breads. At least it was something.

After breakfast on Day 2 we went to Dennis the Menace Park. It's a great park with lots of nifty climbing structures and slides. Sophia went down the biggest slide first.

We played there until Sophia seemed to be slowing down. Then we walked back to the hotel for a much needed family nap. Everyone felt better. Upon the suggestion of hotel personnel, we headed to Del Monte Beach to let Sophia play in the sand.



It was a nice afternoon to hang out at the beach and Sophia really enjoyed digging. Afterwards we walked back to the hotel and cleaned up for dinner. We had a delicious dinner on the wharf and got Sophia a souvenir t-shirt. Sophia slept much better that night thanks to all the walking.

In the morning we had another awesome buffet breakfast where Sophia ate fruit, sausage and bread. To burn off some energy before we started driving, we took Sophia back for another run around the park.


This time we found that she really liked going on the bridge and jumping to make it sway. Weird little girl.

Midday we loaded Sophia and all of our stuff up in the car and headed towards San Jose. We planned to meet some friends for dinner who just had their second baby. Laura (almost 3) and Sophia hit it off. It was very cute to watch them play and to hear Laura call Sophia "Fia." Laura is actually very articulate, but she just kept forgetting the beginning part.


They ran at the park and took a ride down a gravel path in Laura's wagon to look for ducks.

Here is a picture of Laura's new baby sister, Clara:


She's two months old. Isn't she a cutie? Poor thing had her first shots that morning, but did pretty well all things considered.

We stayed one more night in a hotel (Sophia slept well) and then headed home right after breakfast. The ride home did not include a nap for Sophia, so it felt like a long trip. However, we all made it and were happy to be home.

Thank you to my wonderful husband for such a nice Mother's Day trip.