one last vacation before william goes back 2 work

we have been doing these little home away from home vacations - i try to find the cheapest nice hotel in an area of nor cal we want to toodle around in and we go for 2 or 3 nights. that seems to work the best for thomas in terms of duration. plus, we tend to get a little homesick after more than 3 days in a hotel room too. here we are on the monterey wharf.


for this last little vacation, we went to beautiful Monterey, CA. it was the BEST weather, we enjoyed good food, a lot of walking and thomas saw his first seals - or rather heard them. he was actually trying to imitate their loud barking. i swear....
oh and of course, we took some more bed pics with Thomas. he just loves those big king size beds! do all babies love big beds? do they just know that they are on vacation? :)

by the way, his face is changing right before our eyes and yes! to cynthia's question from a while back - we do already miss his baby face! it's no fair that they change up so fast on you. william is blaming it on my last haircutting attempt, ha ha... he says it is too short. so i am letting it grow out to see if it makes a difference. i don't think it will - he is just plain ole growing up!

as you can see, Thomas' face is still cute - but not the same baby cuteness. and william has a very mischievieous smile on his face because he has plans to scoop up thomas for a roll-about-the-bed fest...


so home away from home vacations are nice because you don't have to drive far, but you are in a hotel so you can make a nice big mess and they come and clean it all up so when you get back each night - everything is all nice and neat again!

oh - tip for travelling baby parents: ask for extra blankets or bedsheets and you can lay them out all over the floor to give baby extra crawling around space, without having to worry about what gross things might be on the hotel carpet. maybe you guys have already discovered this, but we never thought of it before and this time, it was great! we had two blankets laid over the main section of the room and it was a perfect place for us to lay around with the toys we brought. no more constant vigilance to keep him from the edge of the bed. in this picture, both william and thomas have been hypnotized by teletubbies.

I also started teaching thomas how to shop... he is a very fast learner and has already started reaching for things he likes, like shoes :)


and while i was shopping, william noticed that for the first time, thomas saw himself in a mirror and really might be starting to understand that it is himself he is looking at...