Spring Break Part 2: Garden of the Gods

After our trip up Pikes Peak we grabbed lunch and headed to the Garden of the Gods. The rock formations were so neat and it's amazing to think they all formed naturally. There are a lot of pictures here and I didn't upload all of them. We all really enjoyed walking around the park and Andrew especially liked being able to climb on some of the rocks. There really isn't much to say because I think the pictures speak for themselves.

Spring Break Part 1: Pikes Peak

On our first full day in Colorado Springs (before I got sick) we started out the morning by driving up Pikes Peak. We had originally planned on riding the cog train to the top, but due to snow the train was not going all the way to the top so we took our chances driving. When we started up the mountain the road was not open to the peak. However after 2 stopping points they were finally able to clear enough snow and open the roads to the top. Here are some of the pictures from our drive up, the stopping points, the peak and then a few on the way down. It was really cold on the peak, about 14 degrees, but well worth it.

Entering the canyon that leads to Pikes Peak

Love this sign!

One of the many pictures I took on the drive up

Our first stopping point. Andrew liked this big pile of rocks.

The view from our stopping point.

Looking down on the road we were driving up.

Stopping point #2 with the Colorado Rockies in the background

This direction supposedly looks towards New Mexico

Finally made it to the top!

The view from the top of Pikes Peak....AMAZING!

Andrew wanted to get his picture with the Bigfoot statue. This statue was carved out of 1 (very large and very old) tree

The water in this lake was so blue. The picture really does it no justice.

Semi-Perfect Spring Break

This year for Spring Break we decided to go to Colorado Springs for a few days. I've always wanted to go see the "sites" and now that we're living so close it seemed like the perfect time. We left on Tuesday and came back on Friday so we had 2 full days to explore everything there is to see. However it didn't start out quite as expected. Adam started getting sick Monday afternoon with a sore throat, fever and body aches. This continued into Tuesday during our 7hr drive to Colorado Springs. Fortunately he woke up Wednesday morning feeling much better, not 100% but good enough that it didn't seem to effect our plans. As Wednesday went on I began to feel bad and by that night I was completely sick with the same thing Adam had. It turned out to be Strep throat. Wednesday night was a long restless night for both of us and I woke up Thursday still feeling horrible. We had to change our plans for that day due to me feeling bad and the fact that it was cold. I was hoping and praying that Friday would be a MUCH better day seeing as how we were driving home. When I woke up the body aches were gone for the most part, but I still had a fever and now developed a pretty bad cough. Sadly the cough has continued for the past several days. I went to the doctor today and found out that on top of the strep throat I have bronchitis. Woo Hoo for me :-) Anyways, despite all of this sickness we did manage to have some fun while we were gone. We went to Pikes Peak, The Garden of the Gods and the Olympic Training Center. Because I tend to be a little picture happy I'm going to have to break this up into multiple posts so for now I'll just put some pictures up of the kids hanging out in the hotel room. Stay tuned for pictures from the rest of our trip!

Ava loved sitting on top of this table

There was a train track just across the parking lot from our room (it was surprisingly quiet) so the kids enjoyed looking out the window and watching it go by.

A whole lotta nothin going on

I realized the other day that it's been over a month since I blogged last. There is a fairly good reason for this considering we haven't done much of anything that was blog worthy. It's pretty much been the same old same from day to day which is rather boring :-) As I sat down this morning to find something to blog about I realized that I haven't even taken very many pictures. I know shame on me, but between Andrew's homework and my own homework it seems like that's all we do. I did manage to find two pictures to post that tell about two different things that have happened since my last posting.

On March 5 my Aunt Paula (my Mom's sister), Uncle Mike and my cousins Blake and Becca drove up to Overland Park, KS for a soccer tournament Blake was competing in. I haven't seen them since my Grandma's funeral in May 2009 when I was still pregnant with Ava so Adam and I made the 2hr drive over to watch Blake's game. It was really good seeing them again and to let them meet Ava for the first time. Definitely worth the drive to visit for a little while over dinner before having to drive home. I am happy to say that on Sunday March 6 Blake's team won the tournament for their age division. Who knows maybe us coming for a visit was their good luck charm.....I doubt it, they are a really good team :-)

Back in February, I think on Andrew's last snow day off of school, we took Ava to get her ears pierced. This picture is not a good one to show off her earrings, but she would not sit still long enough for me to take a good one. If you look very closely you can see a dark spot which is the earring. Ava did really well getting them pierced (yes I forgot to take my camera that day) and only cried for a minute or two once it was over. I think it hurt her daddy's feelings more than anything since he was the one having to hold her still. All in all it was a positive experience and she fights us when it comes to cleaning them less and less each day. I will try to get a better picture of Ava showing off her earrings and post it on here.

Snow, snow and more snow

The title of this post pretty much sums up the month of January. After a fairly dry and mild December, this past month as brought quite a bit of snow and cold. Of course it's hard to compare it to the NY winters we dealt with but still it has been an inconvenience at times. Today is snow day #5 the kids have had out of school (the past 3 all in a row). The first snow days managed to fall around the weekend so fortunately they did not have to miss much school because of it. However the Blizzard of 2011 has had them out every day this week so far. We really haven't gotten much snow out of this storm, 4-6 inches give or take a little. Monday they were out of school due to freezing rain and drizzle that fell most of the day. Thankfully despite coming down most of the day we didn't get much ice accumulation. Tuesday brought on the snow, but not as much as originally expected. School was cancelled primarily due to the strong winds and cold temperatures. The winds are why it is hard to know just how much snow we really got. Today they are out of school again simply because of the frigid temperatures. I think the high today is around 9 and the wind chill isn't supposed to get above 0. I have no idea if they will go tomorrow or not, but I sure hope so. Granted Andrew has had a blast playing with our neighbors (we all have actually considering post was closed yesterday so Adam was off work too),but it is time to get back to a normal routine. I am ready for some quiet around this house, not to mention it is hard to find the motivation to do my own homework when everyone is out of school. Speaking of homework I should probably stop playing around online and get some of it done. Here are a few pictures from our first snow day a few weeks ago. We went to a hill just down the street to go sledding with our neighbors.

All bundled up and not sure about the cold

Andrew and Matthew making snowballs

Abominable snow baby

Adam and Andrew sledding

Andrew trying to pull Adam

Sweet kids, but Ava was done with the cold at this point