Wow, a post! Finally!!

I ran into an old friend today (Hi Michelle!) and she mentioned that I'd been slacking on my blog posts.  Of course I knew that, but having her say it was just the boost I needed.  So thanks!  Here's what we were up to in Sept and Oct.

Thomas the Train



We went to Estes Park with 5 families and had a blast!

Family picture in the mountains

One of our many zoo trips

Pumpkin time!

Painting pumpkins with friends

Grammie came to visit

Will became a pet owner--Baby Dorothy the fish

Halloween party

Boo at the Zoo



Non-picture news: our house is on the market!

More posts to come (promise!!)

Tulsa

Will and I spent 3 weeks in Tulsa housesitting while my parents were in Europe.  We had a great time visiting family and friends.  David joined us for the last week we were there.

Will and Cate haivng a serious discussion about chicken nuggets.

Lovin' the pool!

Such a little boy! Where did my baby go?!?

"On a boat!!"

Me, Marcy and Dawn at Caleb's baptism lunch

Petting goats with Grandma

Swimming with cousins

Three little sleepy bears

Catching up part 2

We spent the morning at a local airport watching planes.  The kids were so excited!  Talia, Will, Tommy and Norah.

We took a family trip to Golden to check out the train museum.  Will is obsessed with trains right now and loved seeing real ones.

His favorite part of the train is the caboose.

Family hike in the foothills.

Why stand up and play when you can sit in the box and play??

Karen and I participated in a scavenger dash through Denver.  It was so fun!

Will loved my costume from the scavenger dash :)

Catching up

Here  are some pictures from the 4th of July.

Will and I getting into the American spirit

We ran the Erie Firecracker 4k with some friends.  Jen, me, Lisa, Karen.

The kids enjoyed post-race popsicles.  Megan and Will are wearing numbers because they "ran" in the kids race.

Calgary/ Banff/ Lake Louise

David and I were very fortunate to be able to take a vacation last week to Canada. My mom came from Oklahoma to hang out with Will for the week. We had the most amazing time! It's gorgeous up there!!

We arrived in Calgary on Thursday evening. David's bag decided to stay in Colorado for a few extra hours so we had to fill out paperwork to have it delivered to our hotel. After completing that and going through customs, we were on vacation! The first 2 nights we stayed in downtown Calgary. It's very similar to Denver. Thursday night we walked around downtown and had dinner. Since Calgary is so far north, the sun doesn' set until about 10:30pm. That took some getting used to! Friday we went to the Calgary Tower (not as cool as the CN Tower in Toronto) and spent the rest of the day relaxing and sleeping in the hotel. I took a 3 hour nap! Friday night we met my cousin Matt and his girlfriend for dinner. It was great to catch up with him and they gave us great tourist info. We finished dinner around 9:30pm and since it was still light out, David and I explored more of the downtown. Then we went to the hotel and watch a movie. It started to get dark around 10:45pm and I happened to look out the window just in time to see a shooting star go by. It was so close to us and was extremily bright. It was the highlight of our time in Calgary!

Saturday we slept in and drove up to Banff. It was about an hour drive through gorgeous mountains. The mountains up there look different from the ones here. David said they are more "dramatic". Banff is the cutest town with a main street full of restaurants and stores. My mom mentioned liking a gemstone called Ammolite so we spent alot of time looking for the perfect present for her (and me!). We bought her a necklace and I got a ring. Ammolite is only found in Alberta and is the rarest gemstone in the world. The mines will be gone by the year 2012. So it's an investment piece :) After shopping, we went to the Fairmont Castle. It's actually a huge castle built on the mountain with stunning views of the scenery. We spent a few hours having drinks on the patio.

Sunday we woke up early and drove to Lake Louise. Everyone told us that this area is gorgeous and they didn't lie. There are a bunch of glaciers in the area and the slit run-off makes the lake water turquiose. The pictures don't do it justice. We hiked to a tea house behind the lake (5.5 km each way). The weather was perfect! After the hike, we had drinks at the Lake Louise Chateau and people watched.

Monday we woke up early again and headed to the Columbia Icefields. It's a huge icefield that connects several glaciers together. It was interesting learning about glaciers. The ice we stood on was as thick as the Eiffel Tower is tall!

Monday night we stayed in a log cabin which was adorable! I wish we had had more time there, but it was the end of our vacation. We celebrated our anniversary (a month early, but oh well) by having a delicious dinner of bison tenderloin.

Tuesday we flew out of Canada and back to Colorado.

Will's vacation

Hi! This is Will. I know my mommy blogged about her vacation, but she forgot to mention what I did while they were away. My Grammie came to play with me for the week. She told me that my daddy was at work and that my mommy was shopping for no-nos (that's Will speak for sandals because you don't wear socks with them). They were both gone for a very long time! I cried a few times, but had alot of fun with Grammie.

Grammie gave me yummy snacks like crackers with cheese

She brought up my Mega Blocks from the basement and we played with them for a long time.These are my friends Cat, Piggy, and Bear.

We did puzzles togetherShe bought me the coolest thing ever--a shopping cart! We shopped for hours!

I swam everyday in my pool

All my friends