Daddy Daughter Fun Days - and other stuff

This is going to be full of a bunch of random stuff.  Josh is on "terminal leave" right now, burning through a bunch of the time off he accrued over the past 10 years in the Marine Corps before his official retirement from active duty on July 31st.  He starts his new job next week. We have enjoyed having him around.  The first month of that leave was pretty much just getting us moved.  But after we got settled, we made time for some fun stuff.

One day, I headed down to Provo to the office for the day and Josh told the girls they were going to have "daddy/daughter fun day".  He took them to the Tracy Aviary to check out some birds.  I got home earlier than planned and they were quite annoyed that I was ruining their fun day together. :)  Daddy bought them cotton candy - not something that would happen on "mommy/daughter fun day".

Then, last Friday, he told them they were going to have another daddy/daughter fun day.  Once again, I crashed the party and ended up joining them at Wheeler Farm.  There wasn't a lot to do - just some farm animals to look at and a fun playground.  The girls thought the goats were HILARIOUS.  There was a loud guy there.  Not quite like these ones - but he definitely had an opinion.

Also, we are starting to get a taste for what it's going to be like for these girls to be good at different things, and interested in different things.  They started a little dance class at school, something they both initially expressed interest in.  I got there the first time about halfway through only to find Piper BAWLING.  It was the saddest thing ever.  I pulled her to the side and she watched the rest of the class with me while Josie danced her little heart out.  She told me she couldn't do the dancing class because "people were looking at her".  Sad. :(  The next week, she refused again to participate, while Josie was up there having fun.

We've also been getting them out a bit on their Strider bikes.  Piper cruises and already has the balancing down. Josie absolutely HATES that Piper is faster than her and will set her bike down and sit on the sidewalk and pout just because she can't keep up.  The other day she said "Piper's fast and I'm slow".  It was sad, but these are lessons I guess they will have to learn.

Finally, here is a sweet picture of my little princesses playing together.  Dress-up is serious business at our house.  Piper earned that gold dress because she FINALLY decided she wanted to be potty trained.  She is one stubborn cookie.

Mt. Olympus Summit

Josh and I are taking a few days off together for a bit of a staycation before he starts his new job next week.  We dropped the girls off at camp this morning and headed up to hike Mt. Olympus.  We did this hike years and years ago and didn't make it all the way to the top because Jackson starting laying down in the middle of the trail.  In the interest of not killing our dog, we turned around and missed the summit views.  Today, we left the dog at home.

The trail is steep.  It climbs 4,000 feet over 3.5 miles on the way up ending up over 9,000 feet.  We felt like we were on a stairmaster right away - calves were burning and not much talking going on.  But it was so nice to get away and escape for a little, and have some time with just the two of us.  Once we got to the top, you have to scramble up a bunch of steep rocks and the trail is pretty nonexistent.  This part was a little sketchy and I worried about going back down.  But of course the views at the top are incredible.  Also, we have a little cool front here right now, so the weather was 75 degrees and perfect!

We are planning some more fun things for the rest of the long weekend.