Tulip Festival

We went up to the Tulip Festival on Saturday. Charlotte had a blast. She had to run everywhere. The tulips were gorgeous. They were almost all in bloom. Luckily, we had an early start and got there before the real crowds started. Everyone was there with their fatty cameras trying to get the perfect picture. I'm sure Charlotte made it into many of their pictures. Good thing she's cute! She also wanted someone to run with her to all the tulips and wanted to help me take pictures with my phone. You can see from these videos how much energy she had that day.

Instagram

Sorry for the long break. We have been having lots of adventures. I got a new phone and have been taking most of my pictures with that and I haven't figured out how to get them on here, but you can see my instagram photos here. I'll keep working on getting the pictures up on here.

Charlotte's School

Charlotte has been really interested in school lately. She even got her backpack a couple of days and wanted to go with Brad to school, so I decided to do some sort of school at home and see how she did. She loves it. We started with colors and did a rainbow day with rainbow jello. She had a blast.

Feeding the ducks

Charlotte really wanted to feed the ducks today after we saw it on Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood.  You can watch the video here. Luckily the ducks weren't too aggressive:)

Curlers

 We got  Charlotte some curlers at the dollar store the other day. I loved having curlers in my hair when I was little, and Charlotte is the same way. Unfortunately, we didn't leave enough time before church to really let them set in and we weren't brave enough to leave them in overnight, so we'll have to wait on the after picture, but these are the cute curler pictures. I had to include the pictures below so that you can get the full spectrum of Charlotte's toddler camera faces.

Birthday Weekend!

 My birthday this year was great, as usual. You really can't go wrong with a birthday on Valentine's Day:) Brad and Charlotte brought me breakfast in bed with some beautiful tulips and notes written on paper cranes. Brad had class after that, but we left when Brad came back from school for Orcas Island. Charlotte spent the night with Grandma and Grandpa Gerhardt. Brad is really the most thoughtful person and recreated a lot of the memories and writing from when we got engaged at Orcas Island four years ago. It was a gorgeous day and we had a long wait at the very full ferry terminal, which we didn't mind.

 Brad made reservations at a beautiful hotel on the Rosario resort on the island. The view was breathtaking. You could see the sound and the islands. It was a very clear day when we got there too, so we could see the stars and the full moon out. There was a little waterfall next to where we stayed too, and we could hear the sound of water from our room. We hiked up a little trail behind the building which went by the waterfall and up to the lake. It was beautiful, but the trail was straight uphill. It was killer! We made it though, and it was flat for a while at the top.

 There was a thin layer of ice on the water from all the cold weather for the last few weeks. Yikes. The first day was much warmer than the second.

 This is the view from the tower at the top of Mt. Constitution on the island. It was overcast, but it was just high enough for us to see the mountains and mainland in the distance. This is where Brad proposed.

 Spring crocuses!

Snow!

 It snowed in Seattle! Finally! I have been saying that it never snows here and now I have to eat my words. I've been comparing it to our chances of having a baby boy this time around (btw, baby Gerhardt #2 due July 2014!) since there are only girl grand kids, 6 of them, in Brad's family. I guess this means that we're having a boy:) We haven't seen snow in a while so we had a blast walking around and playing in the snow. It's supposed to snow all night, so tomorrow should be fun.

 We walked around the mall at U Village. This is the icy fountain. 

 Oh, I just love that scowl...she does it for every picture now. I have to catch her off guard to get a good one. 

 Charlotte's first snowman! She wasn't so sure about it. She wanted to smash it...Luckily, she didn't.

Below is a picture of our blackberry pastries and my fabulous snow footwear.