Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Mothers day hike

 Brian planned a nice (late) mothers day hike for me.  We ended up just going to Red Rocks and doing a little loop ending at the amphitheater.  Any given saturday you can find plenty of crazy folks jumping, running, doing yoga, tricep dips, you name it, on the steps of red rocks.  The boys joined in.  Landon hopped up the steps and Adler ran up them.  Afterwards we went out for brunch!





Memorial Day Weekend

A scooter ride to the park sporting our #18 gear.


Landon had his birthday party a little early. He wanted to have a small number of friends at the pool to play/swim and have burgers, chicken and hot dogs for dinner. Also donuts for desert rather than cake.  So that's what we did and it was a nice evening. Didn't get too many pics.


Thursday, May 26, 2016

extortion

Every year for the school auction they have the kids draw self-portraits, which they mount together with a school photo and offer for sale back to the parents. They also, of course, tell the kids about it so the kids will ask their parents to buy them and know they aren't loved, if their portrait isn't purchased. I'm not sure where the line is between a clever fundraising effort and extortion but this has to be right up next to it.

Thanks to Grandma and Papa for falling for the tactic before we did and buying the portrait for us so we wouldn't have any questioning of our love from our children this year. 

Wednesday, May 25, 2016

The Ghost Rabbits

Adler's soccer team this spring.

I played rec soccer for many years as a kid. To say that I wasn't very good would be a major exaggeration of my talents. I happened to be on a team that had some legitimately talented players though. In fact, a number of the players from that team would later form the nucleus of an East High School team that won the '95 (I think) state championship. So despite me not being any good, I was on a good team that won a lot of games. And that certainly helped make it fun. Watching Alder play has reminded me of my own time playing. Soccer just doesn't seem to come naturally to him but there are some great little players on his team. So while technically they don't keep score, it's been pretty clear that they've won most, if not all, of their games this spring. Even with the team's success, soccer isn't his favorite thing and this may well be last hurrah with the game.

Monday, May 23, 2016

Brents Place


A few friends of ours donated a brick in Elsie's memory at Brent's Place.  This is a picture of the brick on a pathway with lots of other children's names that have died.  We haven't been to see the brick, but we plan on going soon.  When I thanked our friends one of them said, "Elsie gives to the world in many ways and is in all of our hearts.", this statement couldn't be more true.  She continues to give and and teach me how to be a better person.

Sunday, May 22, 2016

DYI

When we put the trampoline in two summers ago we moved the rickety old swing set that'd been left by the prior owners to a different place in the yard where it continues to see lots of use. 


One of the swings broke off irreparably (to me anyway) but we recently used the space to add a baby swing for Blane. All in all, it's been a great item considering it was really just left behind junk.

Over the winter, however, the swinging and pounding apparently caused one of the legs to dig far enough into the ground to cut a big hole in one of the sprinkler lines, which I discovered in the form of a big fountain when I turned on the system for the summer. 

Honestly, I'm pretty intimidated by this kind of home repair (most kinds actually) but for some reason I decided to try and tackle this one myself. And it is successfully fixed thanks to a few youtube videos, $8 and a trip to the hardware store on the corner, and the help of my oldest son!









Saturday, May 21, 2016

Fixing stuff

 A few nights ago Bs excersaucer stopped playing music.  I began working on dinner not thinking anything of it.  A few minutes later I noticed the big guys had gotten out Brian's tool box and found some batteries and were fixing the excersaucer!  

Sometimes its hard having a big gap in age with our kids, but mostly its just really fun and the big guys are helpful.

Thursday, May 19, 2016

The beginning stages of crawling


 Blane has just figured out that if he moves his body, he can move around and get things.  Its not perfect, but he scooches and launches forward to get items he sees.  Unfortunately he wants my phone the most and so getting photos is tough but here are a few from yesterday.








Wednesday, May 18, 2016

Jack o lantern

Ads lost another tooth.  He's now missing three right in the front, one on top and two bottom.  He looks like a jack o lantern.

Tuesday, May 17, 2016

Few more from Colfax


 This was such a fun route.  It started and ended in City Park with the 2nd mile running through the zoo.  This guy was up bright and early cheering all the runners on.

 I'd like to think I was running so fast causing this photo to be blury, but I think I am just a terrible photographer.  We did run through 1 fire station at about mile 8 or 9.  All the firefighters were giving high fives.
 Miles 8-10ish were along east Colfax.  Its always entertaining when you're on Colfax.  There were a few spectators smoking right along the course which was really disgusting.
And we finished!  That was my only goal after not running for over 2 years.

Colfax Half


Kari ran a half marathon on Sunday. It started and ended in City Park so the boys and I walked over to try and see her and cheer her on for the finish. But she was too fast (or maybe we were a little slow getting out of the house) and we missed her running. We did find her afterwords though to congratulate her. 


Saturday, May 14, 2016

Randoms this week

 You can never start too early with occupational therapy.
 Blane was worn out after picking up my race packet for the Colfax half marathon.  We thought the right angle days were over, but apparently we were wrong.
Waiting to pick up brother number 3.

Thursday, May 12, 2016

climbing


On the last session of their climbing class they got to go on the big wall.


Tuesday, May 10, 2016

Mt. Whitney

 A friend of a friend climbed Mt Whitney in honor of babies who have died.  They left this beautiful flag at the top with all the babies names.  Sweet Elsie is up there now too.