Braedyn and Marek

Braedyn has had a new buddy move to town a few months ago who is also from Seattle. We were both seeking the sun and both daddy's worked for Microsoft. Not surprising since half of Seattle is probably employed by the corporate giant. These two get along amazingly well.

The hat is how we do beach in the winter....shirts get wet!

snow?

Mema and Papa sent Braedyn a book for his birthday called, SNOW.
Living in sunny CA, he rarely gets to see the stuff so this is now one of the favorite books in our house. Thank you mema and papa for helping Braedyn remember his roots. (and for all the other stuff too!)

birthday boy

On the day of Braedyn's actual birthday, last month, he got to make a birthday crown, do a birthday dance and eat a birthday sucker at school. I tell ya it pays off to turn a number when you are under 18!

Raise your hand if you have a birthday today?




 Ellen is asking Braedyn how old he is and he first told her 3 and she was was like no, not anymore!


Enjoying his birthday sucker in his "hand made" crown.

bridge opening

The new bridge is finally done which makes the bike commute to school about 5 minutes shorter. Now instead of a 10 minute ride to school it's 5! Can't beat that.

Kate

Our new neighbors have a 5 1/2 year old little girl, Kate, whom Braedyn just adores. He is always making pictures for her and delivering them at all hours of the day (before school, after school, and in between). Kate returns the gesture with pictures of her own. For his birthday she went all out, much to his delight. I have to say Braedyn gets the better end of the trade since Kate can write. (she gets a lot of stickers!) Maybe when Braedyn turns 5 she will be more impressed.

the big 4

We gave Braedyn the choice this year; if he wanted to have a BIG birthday bash down at the beach with a lot of friends from school and church or if he wanted to have a small party at our house and then take a road trip down to Lego Land in Carlsbad, CA. And not surprisingly Lego Land trumped! Which I was very happy about because I got a trip too and didn't have to do much party planning, win win. Braedyn made the guest list for our more intimate party with a little trimming down from mom.  He would invite all of Carp if left to his own judgement and that was not the deal!

Old neighbors

Ben, Leigh-Anne and Luke were are old neighbors. Now we live a whole 2 minutes away, in town. Even with the commute we still find time to hang. And Braedyn LOVES going over there, can you see why? They have quite the kid friendly hang out pad.

January beach fun

Braedyn loves running up and down the burm at city beach.

Happy Birthday Braedyn

Today is Braedyn's 4th Birthday (oops I'm 6 minutes late posting this, it was yesterday). Happy birthday to our favorite boy in the whole world.

Snow in Paradise

Well apparently Carpinteria was feeling bad about hogging all the perfect weather and our city decided we should suffer with everyone else having snow storms so they imported a little patch of snow one Saturday for the kids to play in. Braedyn had a blast and there were lots of neighbor kids and school friends there to play with. After that he tried out some ice skating on fake ice and then we went to the beach.

Puddles

Don't all little boys love puddles?  Braedyn does for sure.  He loved riding through the puddles in our neighborhood after a big rain.  Made for some great afternoon fun!

Campfire

We've been talking about camping and so Braedyn wanted to have a campfire one night so we broke out the firpit again.

Rocky Beaches

The storms and big surf have cleared out most of the sand at our local beaches. This makes for some great tide pooling.

Biking Carp

We took this video in December of Braedyn biking Carpinteria.  This is how we get around our town most days.  Braedyn bikes just about everywhere  he has to go; preschool, kindermusik, swimming, church, park, the beaches, library, candy store, the list goes on.  If the choice is bike or take the car he always chooses his bike.  It's one of the, many, great things about this town.  It's not everywhere you can bike the streets at 3, and get to all those places!  So this is him makin memories on his bike.  He is trying to show off some of his stunts, as well, in some of these clips (standing up, no feet, one hand, bankin it).  Daddy taught him or Braedyn just did it.  Mommy is just glad to get from point A to point B all in one piece.  I will never get use to him flyin around town at 3 (almost 4 now).  Fortunately my anxiety over him biking the town is easing up.  He really is quite capable and we almost never have to tell him where to stop anymore, he just knows.  He is growing his wings as they say.  To soon he will no longer need us at his side even for bikin Carp.!

Ventura Beach Day

We had a nice day down at the beach in Ventura. They have a great playground on the beach near the pier. The pier was closed that day due to high surf, You can sort of see it in the first picture where the waves are hitting the bottom of the pier which is at least 20 ft high, the picture shows some smaller waves.

Making Juice

Braedyn has pretty much taken over the juice making job. He loves smashing all the fruits and veggies into that thing and watching the juice squirt out.

hot head

Sporting mommy's hat on a cold day.

Snow?

The mountains above Carpinteria were dusted with snow after the recent storms... We still made it to the beach that day though.