Colorado part I

We went to Colorado this last weekend to see the property my dad purchased to build his vacation cabin on. We had never been there and he is getting ready to start building this year and so we thought we would see what the area was like. It has been 6 years or more since we have been to Colorado and I was desperately missing the mountains. The picture above is not seen from his cabin site but it is in the local area.

This is his lot. Nora and Nathaniel are standing approximately where the cabin will stand. The view behind Nora is what the cabin will face towards. The trees behind Nora block some of the big mountains in the background. The property is located inside a development/gated community, I don't know a better way to explain it. It's a development because it's divided up into lots with streets but not like we are used to in the suburbs. This development is 20 square miles in size. It's gated and only owners have access and the homes are not allowed to be rented. It's very private and secluded. There are only about a hundred homes in the development and the roads are dirt. We had a fantastic time and can't wait till the cabin is built and we can visit.

Sand Dunes - Colorado part II

Great Sand Dunes National Park

We visited Great Sand Dunes National Park while visiting Colorado. The park is about an hour from where my dad is building his cabin. We went not quite knowing what to expect. It was really neat! The sand dunes are huge and can be easily climbed but to get to them you have to cross a creek. I say creek but it was about 50 yards wide and shallow enough for small children to wade through. There was no bridge to cross it. If you wanted to climb the dunes you were expected to take off your shoes and wade over it. Clearly we were one of the few non Colorado folk at the park. It seemed to be mostly locals who had visited many times over. They carried sleds and snowboards to "ski" down the dunes and were properly dressed to wade in the water and yet not catch hypothermia (in other words they were not wearing cotton like us). The place was very busy, it just doesn't look that way in the pictures because we stayed away from the crowd. The sand dunes are at the far north east corner of the San Luis Valley. The valley is the driest in the nation for that altitude and it looked that way. The winds over the years had picked up the sand in the valley and deposited them at the foot of the mountains. Leaving the Great Sand Dunes.

I took this picture at the visitor center. It shows my kids personalities to a T. Nora is trying to obey me by smiling at the camera while struggling with the sun in her eyes. Tim is being the bully as usual and Nathaniel is about to start complaining about it.

Chad's expression when he first stepped into the water. The water is basically melted snow and ice cold.

My family is in the bottom right of the picture. I wish you could see all the people climbing the dunes. There are a hundred or more.

We let the kids play in the water. It was the ultimate sand and water combo. They were freezing at the end. Nathaniel is shirtless not cause it's warm but because I wanted dry clothes to put back on him when he was done.

A very cool place to visit, we will defiantly be going back!

2010 Garage Sale

We had our 2010 garage sale this last weekend at Heather's place. She is getting ready to move to Wyoming and needed to offload a lot of stuff and of course I had plenty to add to the mix. Maria also joined in with a van load. It was by far the largest garage sale we have ever had. We made a total of $1,200 for Friday and Saturday.

Dad's Reterment

My dad retired at the end of April from Spirit Aerosystems. He had a big party at work and the kids and I were able to go and visit. I made a cake decorated with a Colorado theme due to the fact that he is building a cabin in Colorado this summer. I had a good time visiting family friends and co-workers of Chad's and Dad's.

Dad had surgery a month before this picture was taken to have some skin cancer removed from his lower lip. They took out over half his lip and a good portion of the skin under it but thanks to a good plastic surgeon he now looks like this. Or even better in the month since the picture was taken. I could show pictures of the lip before, during and after the surgery but I can't hardly look at them without my stomach turning so I'm guessing you can't either.

Gymnastics

Nora and Ella finished up their gymnastics class this last week. Ella had been taking gymnastics for a while when she talked Nora into taking classes with her. It was a long drive for me to get Nora to class once a week but it was worth it for her to take classes with her best friend. I have been really impressed with what Nora has learned and how she has overcome many of her confidence issues. She has always been terrified of being upside down or flipping backwards. Gymnastics has helped her overcome much of that. The class she is in has the kids doing a lot of the moves you see advanced gymnastics doing but with the help of props. For example the balance beam is lower and close to the wall so the kids and reach out and use the wall as support. To practice back flips they roll over backwards on a foam barrel. Or to practice cartwheels they have a mat that shows where their feet and hands should go.

Classes normally take place in a separate room just for the youngest gymnasts but once in a while they venture out into the big gym to practice on the big equipment. In this picture Nora is practicing on the big balance beam with the help of her teacher Mrs. Dorthy. She didn't quite have the nerve to stand up on it and walk so she was allowed to crawl. Ella was not only willing to walk on the beam but to do a somersault with assistance!


Practicing back flips.

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I'm not sure what she learned here, but it sure looked like fun!

After class was over we met up with Maggie and Katie who are friends of ours that are taking gymnastics at the same time but in a different class. Ice cream was the perfect ending to the last gymnastics class.

The girls proudly displaying their ribbons for completing their classes.

Ice Cream!

Last week I had just had it with the boys. They were coming in from the back yard so filthy that they needed their clothes changed just to take naps. Some days they needed baths too. All before Lunch! We have a tall privacy fence around most of the back yard and so I decided I was done doing laundry and the weather was nice enough for them to run naked. So one evening last week I stripped Tim down and turned him lose. Oh, he had so much fun! He thought it was great. While Chad and I watched with very confused expressions on our faces Tim proceeded to slide down the slide half a dozen times on his belly. When I say Tim was naked I mean he didn't have a diaper on either. Ouch! But he kept doing it! Crazy kid. So after the evening of fun I took him in and gave him a bath and put him to bed. The next morning he wakes up with poison ivy all over his butt.

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Life with kids is never, never, ever dull.

He's Big. He's Bad. He drives a Harley.

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(oh, and sucks on a pacifier)