My Birthday Dinner

My birthday this year fell on a Thursday right before Labor Day Weekend, so it was a little busy. Ross took that Thursday off of work, which he normally does (so sweet), and we spent the day together. It was nice, even though we had to go to get our car registered at the DMV...

But, we didn't get to have a birthday dinner for a couple of weeks! Still, when the time, it was really a lovely evening with delicious food and great company. The kids are always especially sweet and good when we are going out for a special dinner...

We headed into downtown Denver, or LoDo, I think, to hit the Vesta Dipping Grill! Fun entrees with dipping sauces... love!!

Ross and I had been before, in fact, the last time was right before he deployed (sad cloud), but we hadn't ever taken the kids. They were excited to try this, since I talked it up so much!

We were early for our reservation, so we walked a little bit...


Waiting to cross the street...




A funny side note about Max's shirt... it is a little big on him because I bought it to wear for me! When I was in Arizona, I needed a collared shirt for golf and couldn't find a women's one I liked, so I just got a boys shirt and figured Max could grow into it!!


love these three:)


But, I still can't get a posed shot! Where is everyone looking??? (not you, ross)


Her face after I asked her where she was looking in the last picture.


Hey Mom, I can smile good for the camera, if Zoey can't! Yep, that's what he is thinking....


Zoey probably went and hit him next, so I pretended to take pictures of the street and let Ross deal with it!



Moving on... still trying to make it to the restaurant. And for the purpose of preservation, Max just asked, "How much more longer until we get there?"



now a willing participant...


Made it! Max is already at the door!


This is a fun place (its dark though), with neat atmosphere... Around the table we go....













Look, I was there too!







I love when Zoey's real smile comes out... it is so lovely and lights up her face!

During the Flood

A couple of days before the Boulder Flood, Ross found a mini exercise trampoline by the trash in our apartment building. He grabbed and put it in our little courtyard. He figured it would be novel entertainment for the kids for a little bit. He was right. The kids jumped and jumped and then made us jump on it to enter our apartment every time. On one of the days they were off from school, they needed to really let off some steam and get some energy out. Since we couldn't go anywhere in our car and it was raining like crazy, we just had to jump!

The trampoline was just under the covered part; you can see the rain coming down in the background.

October 10 on the 10th

The idea is to take ten photos on the tenth of the month and share it, documenting a day of your life and the ordinary moments. There is beauty in the ordinary.

I will post this and then do a little back tracking again. This tenth of the month is one that will be remembered for a long time!


It started out early, but we have pretty sunrises in the mornings sometimes. I love being able to see that from the house!


poor max has to get up earlier than Zoey now. Sleepy mornings...



Ross was actually home this Thursday. He had taken the day off to work on Air Force school-y type stuff. This ended up being huge for later on...


I had to head to the eye doctor. I was just getting an exam, that I don't get very often, so I was not prepared for the whole eye dilation thing and not being able to see up close for a while!! I couldn't even tell if the next few pictures were in focus... so my ten on the tenth documenting sort of went down hill at this point!!



Pretty leaves, but I still couldn't tell what I was focusing on!


Okay... so the night before I was checking out the website for the Boulder Humane Society. We had been checking rescue sights constantly in hopes of finding a dog. The Boulder Humane Society is the NICEST dog shelter I have ever ever seen. The amount of dogs that go through there is amazing. And when a cutey comes along, you have to be quick. So, we found this little puppy on-line at 9 pm. We researched his breed a little and decided we should try and meet him the next day. You have to call and put a hold on the puppy if you want first dibs. I was in the middle of the eye appointment, which is why it was good that Ross was home to make the call.... And even though he called right when they opened, someone was actually there to see him! Yikes. We thought we missed our chance. But it was meant to be and we got the next hold on him. We were going to wait for the kids to come home to check him out but decided we better do it, because once the kids saw him, we probably couldn't walk away if we needed to!

Ross and I met him and I tried to take pictures, but I still couldn't see. Anyway, we adopted the pup and had lunch and then went to pick up the kids and surprise them!!

Here is Max meeting Leo for the first time!


Big smiles, waiting to be in on the surprise for Zoey.


Max and Ross and Leo, hid behind a tree while I went to get Zoey. I told her we didn't get the dog because someone beat us to it. She was about to go hunt someone down! And then she turned the corner... to see the cutest puppy waiting to meet her!



She was pretty excited!


and this was happening as a train went by, which is random...


So, a fun, and memorable 10th for sure. Needless to say, Ross didn't get much done on his paper that day!

Welcome our Leo!

Uncle Ross and Cousins

Ross' sister, Bree, came to Denver for a visit over Labor Day weekend. We were able to visit with them one evening while they were here.

Little Dexter, we met him for the first time!



Uncle Ross quickly introduced him to all things yummy and out of reach... chips, cookies, the good stuff:)




I can just hear Ross saying, "don't worry buddy, I'll hook you up!"



The girls (Kolbi and Zoey) went right outside to play some soccer...


And do piggy back rides:





Can I play too? I have a ball!








Max was there too, but he had a new toy and the lighting was bad, so no good pics!

President's Cup Winner!

Here is a link to an article about Zoey's soccer team winning a state tournament. Both sets of grandparents saw the game AND it was on her birthday!! Very cool!






the link is not working, so you can cut and paste this into your browser!

http://www.broomfieldenterprise.com/broomfield-sports/ci_24315958/two-blast-soccer-teams-win-presidents-cup

Funny Max-man!

some funny stuff, from Max...

As long as we can remember (before being 1 year old, even) Max has loved slapstick humor. And he has always thought these signs were funny... So we finally got a picture of him demonstrating it...




Caution people.

- Max and I went to the grocery store and at the front they have a sign saying they won't sell Tobacco to people under 18. But the sign basically says, NO TOBACCO and then an 18 on it. Max, misread the sign, and knowing that I love all types of hot sauce, said, "What? No Tabasco here?"

- After living through a crazy night during the flood and then talking about it at school, Max considered himself a survivor of a natural disaster. A couple weeks later, we were walking home from school when a crazy dust storm out of nowhere appeared! We had to walk home holding hands, backwards with our eyes closed. When we got into the house safely, Max matter-of-factly states, "Well, survived another thing- A Dust Storm!"

That kids cracks us up every single day.

Nature Pretties

Some pretty nature shots while out and about...

This was just sitting in the car waiting for Zoey to go to school after dropping off Max one morning.






A lake close to our house with a nice trail to walk around.