Celebrating Abby's Birthday

We took advantage of our first day with temps above the 60s to be outside enjoying the sunshine. Since it was Abby's birthday, we got her "approval" to go to the coast and do some tide pooling. First we stopped at a fun logging camp restaurant, Camp 18, and Ryan wouldn't stop bugging us to go climb on all the old equipment.


Then, much to Ryan's dismay, we made a brief stop to see what was left of the tallest Sitka Spruce in the U.S. Ryan had no interest in this at all and just wanted to get to the beach!


Not the Sitka we came to see, but a neat tree formation nonetheless.
Finally, after some parking issues, we managed to climb down onto the beach. There were lots of people out enjoying the negative tide and the sunshine, but it really wasn't too terribly crowded.



Haystack Rock and the Needles.
Ryan was dying to see starfish (which he did), and he also saw muscles like this huge one he's holding, and anenomes and other critters. He even muscled up the courage to hold a hermit crab that Daddy found among the rocks and barnacles!



Ryan really enjoyed himself, especially once he found his much-sought after starfish. But all good things have to end, and the tide came in after a couple of hours so we left the beach and went geocaching before heading home.


Once we arrived home both kids were dying for Abby to open her gifts. Ryan has known what he wanted to get Abby for months now, and she was very excited to get it, a baby to go with her other Snap 'N Style dolls! Here he's giving her a birthday kiss, for him a more magnanimous gesture than the gift itself.


We were hoping that once Abby got a bike Ryan's competitiveness wouldn't allow him to give in to his fear any longer, and we weren't disappointed! While Abby was getting her new helmet and pads on, Ryan got out his long-forgotten bike and tore around the street like he had been riding it every day for the last two years. We hardly been able to get him to ride it because his fear of falling sucks all the joy out of him riding it (and drives me to distraction!), but yesterday he either conquered his fear or quit pretending to be so afraid and had a blast riding bikes with his sister!