Mom and Melody's visit

At the beginning of August, Melody and Aiden flew out to spend 2 weeks with us. It was so good to see them and I miss them terribly. We knew it was going to be an exciting couple of weeks when within 30 minutes of seeing each other the kids all started fighting. The fighting got really old really fast but luckily we had many good moments between all the bickering. And of course, within a day of them going home they were asking if they could go see Auntie and Aiden. It makes me sad that we aren't as conveniently close as we used to be. But I'll take what I can get.

We started the visit by going down to the county fair as we hadn't checked that out yet. We let the kids go on a couple of rides and marveled on how expensive it was to let the kids ride a couple of cheesy rides. But at least they had fun.

We then took a day to drive up into the mountains and show Melody one of our favorite spots. There is a state park we like to visit that has tons of trees and just beautiful. I think next year we are going to go camping up here because we love it so much. We definately have to educate ourselves on wildlife rules though because bears and cougars are very much a part of the park and are seen quite often around there. In fact, the day we visited, there were signs posted that bear had been seen in the campground and to be watchful. It is so gorgeous up there and would love to have a house or cabin up there. Unfortunately, you are snowed in a good half of the year and Dwayne doesn't have a job that he could easily work out of an office at home. Maybe someday though!

After another visit to the zoo, Mom flew in for an extended weekend. I wish she could have stayed longer but I'll take what I can get. We drove down Friday to Colorado Springs and looked at the native cliff dwellings that they have. Unfortunately, I forgot the camera that day but luckily Mom and Melody have some pictures of those. Saturday, we drove even further south to an area we haven't explored yet and visited an old western town and took a train ride to Royal Gorge. It was a wonderful day except that it got extremely got. It was in the upper 90's when we visited so by the end of the visit we were all wilting a bit.
This is the view we saw at the view point during the train ride. In the far distance, you can see a bridge over the gorge that you can drive across (with a fee, of course). We decided to do that another visit but the views were just awesome.

2 of my favorite ladies on the train.

This was in the sheriff's office at the western town named Buckskin Joe's. We start em young in this family. :)

A view of the street of the town. What is really neat about this town is that they pulled old homesteads and buildings from ghost towns throughout Colorado to recreate the town. So even though some of the buildings were not necessarily used for what they are labeled as today they are "authentic" as far as the construction and age of the buildings are concerned.

Perfect fit!

This one makes me laugh every time. That is Aiden peeking out the top. He just wasn't quite tall enough.

Sunday, we left the 3 kids with Dwayne all day (Thanks Dwayne!) and Mom, Melody, and I spent the day together. We decided we wanted to drive up to Estes Park to see the Stanley Hotel and do the ghost tour they have there. We didn't have any experiences (for which I'm grateful) but the tour was absolutely fascinating in letting you know about the history of the founder of the hotel and what was happening in the area 100 years ago. Above is a picture of the mountains around Estes Park. Down in the valley just ahead is the town. It is absolutely gorgeous there. They have a lake in the middle of the valley and when you stand in town, you have 360 degree views of breathtaking mountains. I would love to live there if it was possible. I highly recommend a visit to this area if you ever make it out here. It is worth it.

The famous Stanley Hotel.

Apparently, where she is standing is a "hot spot" for activity. I think it was affecting her don't you?

After Mom left on Monday, we spent the last week Melody was here just chilling out around the house for the most part. We spent a ton of money the first week traveling around doing lots of stuff and it was nice to just chill and relax a little and enjoy each other's company. Our apartments have a pool so we spent some time swimming, taking walks, and just playing together. It was a lovely visit, and I can't wait for them to come see us again soon.

Dave and Charlene's Visit

I can hardly believe that it has been six weeks since I last wrote. Sorry about that to all those folks who check this blog regularly. We have been extremely busy this summer so over the next few days I'll post pictures and let you all know what we have been up to.

After Dianne's visit, 2 days later, Dave and Charlene flew into town. They had a place they were staying up in the mountains near Vail. It is a 2 hour drive each way so they only came into town every other day or so. They also took a couple days at the beginning of their vacation to drive up to Mount Rushmore. We spent a morning with them exploring Red Rocks. This is the place where they hold many many concerts and an amphitheatre (sp?) was built out of the natural rock formations. We went up to look at the amphitheatre and then took a couple hours hiking an easy hike around the park and snapping all kinds of pictures of the natural rock formations. Below is just a sampling of the natural and awesome beauty we got to see on our hike.

The kids had lots of fun looking at all the bugs, flowers, bunnies, and chasing after Jaden and Alec. That afternoon we went to the Water World theme park. That is an awesome place. It had several areas for little kids to play but also had several large water slides that we could take the kids on and ride as a family. We had a great time and I just wish we had more time to explore all the slides and different areas. It will be much more fun when the kids are slightly older as well. Overall it was an amazing but exhausting day.

We also took them to the zoo and they hung out at our house to just spend time as a family. It was so fun to see them and the kids were sad when they had to go home again after the week was over. But luckily, they only had to wait 2 weeks and then Auntie Melody and cousin Aiden were flying into town for the next round of visitors.