Yesterday we went hiking again.  It was awesome and fun and my calves are KEEEEEELING ME because of all the stairs.  I don’t like heights, but I was considering rapelling a few times just to avoid going up another flight of 200 stairs to get to the top of a canyon.

Analie was a champ once again!  She had her first picnic at the top of Starved Rock, and the bees were swarming around her because she’s so cute.  Or because they wanted the tasty baby food she was eating.

Joey literally killed 6 bees that were swarming her.  So we decided to take our picnic on the road after that, and we ate while we hiked to Lovers’ Leap.

Analie was SO CUTE on the hike.  She’d lean back, put her arms in the air and wave them while yelling at the tree leaves, or birds, or squirrels we saw.  And she greeted everyone who hiked past us, too, with something that sounded an awful lot like “hi”.    Needless to say, she had a total fan club by the time we made it to Lovers’ Leap.

But she got sleepy about halfway out.  So we called it before turning off to go to French Canyon and hiked back to the car, which was the right decision.

Poor Analie was drooping, hanging around outside the sling looking pitiful and bored.

But what a good girl!  We hiked about 2.5 miles, and she didn’t fuss or whine much at all except when she got sleepy at the end.  But Mama was tired by that point too, so I didn’t blame her.

Joey found some purple flowers near the trailhead and leaned down with Ana to show them to her, and she broke into the biggest grin.  It was so cute.

She laughed and giggled at the flowers, especially when Joey brushed them on her cheeks.

After the sleeping baby disaster that was our trip to Iowa in the springtime, we were totally paranoid about her ability to nap/sleep on vacation.  Our expectations were low, low, low.  But Analie has been fabulous!  Taking long naps, sleeping all night, happy during the day.

Such a sweet kid.  I think we’ll keep her around, what do you think?