Colorado

One of the happy things to come out of daddy being injured is that his leave from work happened to coincide with his families trip to Colorado. We were not going to go due to vacation hours, but then since he was not going to be at work anyway....we figured why not go. So off we went on the longest 8 hour drive of our lives. Why was it so long, we have no idea, but it felt like it took forever!! it could have been partly because it probably one of the ugliest drives we have ever taken. pardon the pictures that i took through the window of the car, but after Chad commented on how ugly it was I had to get some pictures to show.

Yup, pretty ugly. The kids did get a kick out of the rock formations and wanted to know how they were formed. That is when Casey started telling us all about how he learned this kind of stuff in 4th grade and that Tyler would indeed learn it when he grew to be as old and wise as Casey.

And then ugly turned into beauty!!! We arrived in Colorado and the kids were even more impressed with all the green and the trees. they then wanted to know who planed all those trees all over the mountain, there was so many!! I told them heavenly Father made all that ( I know he made the ugly drive too, but lets focus on the pretty )

Some of the high lights of our drive were the Sonic the actually had and inside dining area, not something we are used to. They were so happy to get out of the car.

Can you tell how excited daddy was? he took some time to elevate his booted foot.

The high light or should I say un-highlight of the drive is that we decided to stop at 4 corners. I kept talking it up to my oh so mature and wise graduated from 4th grade educated son. He was very excited and impressed that he would be able to stand in 4 states at once and how he would go back to school in Aug and go tell his old teacher all about it.....unfortunately when we showed up to our little detour....it was closed! yup closed! We were able to view it from a far, it's somewhere in there, beyond the chain link fence.

The best were able to do was take a picture by the sign of the planed remodel of the sight. Major let down! :(

So we finally arrived in Beautiful Colorado and it was that, beautiful. We went to church in a little town called Silverton. The church building was a single hallway with about 5 rooms off of it and the chapel at the end. It happened to be branch conference and so there were actually a good 45 people there as apposed to the normal 5 that have been in attendance the other times family has visited. They puled together an impromptu primary and nursery for our kids. IT was great. After Church we stopped at Anderson Lake for some pictures. The kids had a great time throwing rocks in the lake and almost hitting a few people in the process.

Look at the beautiful surroundings! I love it :)

On another day we went for a walk near the condo we were staying in. I had to get a picture of these cool trees. I loved them, they made me think of the sacred Grove.

Chad insisted he could could go for a bit of the walk. you cant see the water, but he was posing as a fountain. He walked for a bit, but we had to split from the group and go back before to long.

also near the condo was an area with hotels and shops. While checking out the cute little shops we found some cute bennie hats and had to get some shots of Brody in one.

Also up the hill is an alpine slide. the kids had a blast going down the slide. You would take the ski lift up the mountain and then slide down on these bobsled type things. It was hard to get a picture with my camera and the timing, but I got a few.

Grandpa took Aiden a couple of times, till Aiden got it his head that he wanted to go on the trampolines that we had passed on our way up there. they were the bungee type. I still have to get pictures from Terri Anne, but he did get to go and he loved it! I went on too and there is video at the end of this post of my experience.

The boys brought there bikes and got to ride on this little track they had laid out.

Aiden had his birthday while we were there, so we took his presents up with us. He got a buzz light year toy, buzz jammies and some hot wheel cars and a carrying case.

He even shared with his cousin and I caught them playing cars on the bed.

Instead of cake I made rice crispy treats for him. He still got to blow out the candles.

It was a long day for him and he put himself to bed. I found him crashed in the bed. awww

One day we headed in to town (Durango) to go to the community center. They had a huge climbing wall.....

and a big indoor pool area. complete with play area, high dive, hot tub and more.

Even a big slide.

It took a lot of bribing and coaxing to get Courtney to go down the slide, but by the end of our time there she was going all by her self.

We had lots of fun. Were there from Saturday night to Thursday morning. the kids loved spending so much time with thier cousins and I loved getting out of the heat! It was so beatiful there and we even got some rain storms, I loved rain storms!!