Em in the Newspaper

On Memorial Day Em ran the Bolder Boulder. Alas, she didn't win the race and collect the prize money however she did get the second best thing - Her picture in the newspaper! The photographer obviously wasn't very good and didn't quite get her in focus but I have done my best to make her stand out.


As you can see I am pretty much a pro at editing photos. It only took two free hand paint brush attempts in both Photo Shop and Corel to convince me that I should go back to software that I know. I had to use Word to put the fancy boarder and red circle on the picture, then I didn't want to post a word document so I had to use Microsoft One Note to copy the picture into a picture format, then I was back to Corel to convert the funky format to the friendly JPEG.
So yeah, no problem getting this post up.

Another Busy Weekend

Last weekend my sister-in-law Kim's whole family was in town. We all went to a Rockies game Saturday and it was a gorgeous day. We had a great view of the mountains (hard to see in the pictures). Even though I'm not a huge baseball fan... we had a great time and even made it through the whole 9 innings! Zach is continuing to impress us with his high tolerance of activities.

Hard to believe it was about a year ago that Cal and I stood here... just starting to get anxious for Zach to come...

House Drama

Unfortunately our big beautiful house is no more! We were supposed to close tomorrow, but ran into some snags. It passed the inspection and we thought we were home free to close on Friday, but the appraisal came in at significantly less than we were going to pay for the house (never a good thing). The sellers wouldn't come down in price at all, so yesterday we ended the contract and walked away. We were really disappointed, but last night we saw a few more houses... and we'll find something! We saw one we really liked, even though it is about half the size of the last house.... Decisions decisions...

Bolder Boulder

The main attraction for Kim's family (besides seeing Kim and Gary, of course) was to run the Bolder Boulder. At least a few of them have been running it for years. For those not from Colorado, the Bolder Boulder is a 10K race that is one of the largest road races in the world. This year there were 54,000 people!! No, I did not misplace the comma. It is huge. There are bands, music, and people cheering you on the entire way and it is always so much fun. This year I made a very last minute decision to run it. I felt pretty good about my time... considering I didn't train AT ALL. The adrenaline of the crowd keeps you going, I guess.

We also wandered through the chaos of the Boulder Creek Festival.

Congrats Cal!!

This last Saturday Calvin graduated from the University of Colorado at Denver with an MBA in Hospital Administration and a Masters in Finance. He did this while working full time and with a new baby. He has worked so hard and we are so proud of him! We are excited that we will all be seeing more of him!

(note the Pepsi Center in the background... the home of the Nuggets)

All of both of our families were able to be here. We are so grateful for such supportive wonderful families!

Zach was a real trooper for the busy weekend, but the excitement of the ceremony was just too much for this little guy.

Aunts, uncles, and grandparents....

We had an action packed weekend... Eating, family pictures, swimming, eating... Among the activities Saturday afternoon we joined Laura and Dave and their boys at a park for a picnic and some bocce ball and frisbee. Oh, and seeing our NEW HOUSE!

That's right, we bought a house!!!! We finally took the plunge. So we are busy packing, looking at paint colors, and doing all that has to happen before we close in a few weeks. We are really excited!! Zachie is trying to eat some paper so I'll have to post more on this later....

Somebody get this kid a helmet

We have entered the new and dangerous era of bumps and bruises. Like most babies (and I think- from stories I've heard- especially his daddy), he is a climber. He is starting to creep along furniture and his energy is growing each day in alarming amounts. I can only imagine him as a 2 year old. Some days all I can think to myself is, "Be afraid. Be very afraid."

"The Day Hike"

School is winding down for me thus I am procrastinating finishing up my last two projects. Thus today we went on a family DAY hike with a picnic lunch - and we are even getting the pictures posted the same day. (To Emily anything on a trail is a hike, to me any one day outing is just a walk, but can also be called a "day hike," but not "hiking." A source of much confusion in our household).

I started out with Zach- his hat is kind of Amish looking with the hood underneath.

Who can resist a family photo.

We had a nice picnic lunch. Zach got a little cold in the shade but Em insists we can't spend too much time in the sun.

But I stole him and let him play on the sunny rocks!

He tried his hand at bouldering but his fingers are a little delicate still.

Zach loves to suck his thumb while grabbing Em's hair. This time he got her ear but that seemed to do the trick.

Em and I come from different schools of outdoor adventuring. I will include one of our conversations from after lunch as an illustration:

Calvin: "If we head that way we should hit the trail in awhile."

Emily: "I don't think we are supposed to be off the trail at all in this area."

Calvin: "Ah don't worry about it, see look there is the trail down there."

Emily: "But we can get on the trail sooner if we go up there." (pointing up hill)

Calvin: "But my way is more direct."

Emily: "We get on the trail faster this way, let's just get on the trail." (we got on the trail)

Much to Emily's dislike we had to venture off the trail again to get this great picture! I think Zach will see it my way in the long run.