happy belated 26th birthday to the best little brother (and brother-in-law and uncle) in the whole wide world, daniel annmarie hollis. we are continuously proud of your accomplishments and honored to be related to you <3

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love you so much!

finally, easter sunday had arrived! ellie received her basket from grandma the day before, but she was eagerly anticipating the one from the easter bunny himself. so we left a plate of carrots out the night before and hoped he would find the special treat before hiding our eggs :)

as you can see, he DID eat the carrots and even left a few crumbs behind, but all ellie really cared about was her loot. her basket included a stuffed bunny, a flower headband, dora the explorer lip balm, two bouncy ball eggs, squinkies, an abby cadabby cup, jelly bellies, dumb-dumbs, a (plastic) pink pearl necklace, a slinky, a shirt from old navy and a book i loved when i was little called the country bunny and the little gold shoes. needless to say, she was thrilled.

after the excitement of the goodies wore off, we ran out to the backyard where ellie was sure the easter bunny had hid her her decorated eggs. it was pretty gloomy outside, but we made it out early enough to beat the rain that started shortly after.

as soon as we stepped out the door, ellie was off and running. she found the entire carton of eggs in a matter of minutes, even thought the easter bunny did his best to hide them well!

the egg hunt was so much fun, she was so disappointed when it was over. i guess we’ll just have to do more next year.

later in the afternoon we went to dinner with ryan’s side of the family. i had a small salad, ryan had an appetizer and ellie munched on some bread so we would still have an appetite for dinner at my mom’s, which wasn’t only for easter, but also for my brother’s birthday.

we brought balloons for danny and nan & pop set up a little easter egg hunt of their own for ellie. she was thrilled!

we had a delicious spaghetti dinner, watched danny open presents and blow out his candles, and ellie spent a little quality time reading with pop <3

then it was late and time to head home with all the new easter friends ellie had made over the past few days. can you tell which one is her?! ;) hope everyone had as magical an easter weekend as we did. all our love to you and yours!

i guess the easter eggstravaganza has been going on for years in the city of dublin … i just never knew about it because i didn’t have a kid, or a nice friend named tara who knows all about these kinds of events in the tri-valley :) luckily she told me about it months ago because it’s one of the city’s most popular events and it sold out in a matter of weeks.

there was a big easter egg hunt for the kiddos (for the plastic kind with little goodies inside) and all kinds of other activities from face painting and coloring to bounce houses and a balloon clown lady. there was even a little petting zoo. ellie had a great time collecting eggs and looking inside them to find candy, stickers and other little surprises.

we missed tara but ran into our friends eric and alicia, which was nice because we hadn’t seen little miss brylie in months and she’s almost 1! however short, it was nice to spend some time with them.

after ellie got her flower balloon (which i later popped when we went to sit down on the grass – oops) and a little coloring, we sat down to have a snack and relax a bit. we enjoyed the break, as you can see :)

i think we’ll have to go next year, too <3 thanks for the 411, tara!

with our zoo membership we got a one-time pass to bring another family with us and get them free parking and admission, so we decided to invite lily, auntie carerra and uncle travis. after all, it would be lily’s first zoo trip and we totally wanted to be a part of that <3 we'd been planning the trip for weeks, but every day we tried to go it was either threatening rain or actually storming. what the heck, spring?!

FINALLY, last sunday, the sun decided to make an appearance for us, so off to the zoo we went.

ellie was kind of a handful (as she tends to be during the appropriately named “terrible twos”), but we all enjoyed seeing the usual suspects, especially the giraffes, zebras, elephants, and carerra and travis’ favorites, the baboons :)

after we made our way around the park, we stopped at the top for a little lunch. ellie was doing great until she had a mouthful of too much food and gagged, resulting in vomit everywhere. nooooooooo! it permeated her shirt, skirt, leggings and shoes. needless to say, we headed straight for the car and she rode home in her hooded sweatshirt and diaper.

regardless of the messy mishap at the end of our visit, we had a wonderful zoo day with la familia. thanks for joining us, guys, we love you! <3

ellie only has one first cousin (so far) and her name is lily. you may remember me mentioning her many times before! well, she is now a big girl of nearly six months old and cuter than ever. case in point:

we were lucky enough to receive a visit from lily and her mommy a few weekends ago. grandpa geoff came, too, because it was a big weekend for college basketball and the guys wanted to watch it together, father and son. awww. of course us girls cared more about playtime on the floor.

and the award for best picture of the day goes to…

…because ellie can’t handle being closer than two feet from another kid, whether it’s a family member or not! we’re going to love having that hilarity to pass around at holiday celebrations when they’re all grown up :) love you, cousin lily!

yesterday was the second day in a row of really warm sun-shininess after weeks of wind and rain, after being cooped up in the house for days unable to go to the park or play outside, after countless episodes of little bear and little bill and the little mermaid and other “little” tv i just couldn’t take anymore!

and so, to celebrate, we spent the morning with my mom at cesar chavez park. we walked dogs along the bayshore, climbed green grassy hills, chased our shadows and stopped at various rocks and benches to watch the sunlight dance across the water.

the view of san francisco from the berkeley side of the bay is gorgeous, especially on a clear spring day, and even though i didn’t have the DSLR, i was pretty impressed with the digital zoom on my little point-and-shoot.

after our walk we met up with my dad who had been running errands nearby. he showed up at just the right time, so we headed over to a little grocery store/smoothie place/sandwich shop called “seabreeze” for lunch.

we all had turkey sandwiches while ellie enjoyed a great, big strawberry-banana smoothie with whipped cream on top (i didn’t know it was going to be so big … lucky girl) ;)

then we did a little bird watching from our picnic table and one pooped on the bench RIGHT between me and ellie. it was a close one. of course i took a picture of the little jerk.

it was a great day we all had together. cesar chavez park on cesar chavez day and we didn’t even plan it that way. oh, and that same morning i got $100 for some of my old clothes at crossroads! that was nice. i decided to take the store credit so i can go back for a few summer pieces this week. the weather’s getting much warmer, after all.

so lucky we are to live in such a beautiful place <3

we threw a party at bingo tonight! thankfully the old folks didn’t get too wild ;)

happy 61st birthday, pop! we love you so much!