Entertaining Cousins

It's crazy how quickly times flies when you're having fun. We had a great visit with Gabrielle and Quinn (cousins) they are welcome to come back anytime!!
We went to the Rec Center to go rock climbing and swimming, the Butterfly Pavillion, and canoeing. Michael took the older kids on a ghost tour up in Estes Park as well.

This is at Union Reservoir, Michael did take the kids to the river a couple times.

Papillion

"Mom, what's the French word for butterfly?"

Emma, my Parisian tomboy, caught a butterfly and wanted to keep it as a pet. Thankfully she decided to release it into the wild, aka, my neighbor's yard.

The Law Of Murphy

Why is it that smoke detectors never go off in the middle of the day (unless there really is a fire)?

At approximately 4:19 AM the alarm went off and I flew out of bed. Had Michael been home I'm sure I would have rolled over to let him deal with the situation. Immediately I think that the gas has been left on and I'll need to belly crawl down the stairs to check the stove. Speed won out and I run down the stairs to check the appliances and smell for smoke/gas. Nope nothing.

(A friend recently has a house fire and I'm a bit paranoid about it happening. I do not want to spend three weeks in a hotel with three kids. Shudder.)

As suddenly as the alarm goes on, it goes off. Well, I'm walking around checking the detectors and finally decide to go back to bed. No sooner has my head hit the pillow then the blasted alarm goes off again. I swear that I had check Jack's room alarm, apparently the battery was bad and causing all the alarms to go off.

Getting a chair and ripping the detector off the ceiling was a little more than stressful and I'm been up since hopped up on adrenaline.

Again, why is it that detectors go off in the middle of the night?!

Old Barn

We went to a park/ranch last night to scope out the area for a photo shoot. We'd been to the playground area of this place, but I never knew this area existed. It's just over the hill from the playground. Apparently Jack had been there on a Scout field trip. He kept pointing out snake holes, or as I like to think, gopher holes. Here's a couple of the outtakes.

Gently Wake Them

Sleeping in doesn't occur a lot in our house. The kids used to wake up at the crack of down, but times have changed. I think getting to stay up later, the benefit is sleeping in later. Yesterday we woke up before dawn to drop Michael off at the airport. He'll be in Pennsylvania this ENTIRE week for a training session.

This morning, the kids are still asleep as I type. Yes, I'm typing softly as not to wake them prematurely. Opps, Emma woke up.

Rough and Ready Park

Yes, that's really the name of the park. Emma loves the water and can't stay away from it.Jack humors me as I take his picture.

Proof of Life

They're still alive.

We've been running around going to the library, swimming, canoeing, free movies, bike rides, playdates, and other awesome things I think of. In between all the activities we drive each other crazy. It's starting to settle down, but it's always an adjustment switching into "Summer" mode.