Memorial Day Weekend

Hello everyone!  I hope you all had a wonderful extended weekend!  It was nice to get to spend an extra day with the family!  We took advantage of the day off and the good weather to go hiking!  I'll talk more about that later though.

I don't remember if I put this in last week, and even if I did it's great enough to go in twice!  Brooke loves to help with the dishes!  She puts away the silver ware while I unload the rest of everything.

This week our house finally finished getting painted!!  It was supposed to get painted two weeks ago, but there was just storm after storm.  We eventually got a few days without rain (though not all in a row) and the painters did a fantastic job!  To celebrate we even put up new lights by the garage!

Um... I don't know if this has back story... except maybe Monica now owns a hat.

So Brooke loves to spit out her "toothpaste" with me after I finish brushing my teeth.  She loves it so much that when I turn on my tooth brush she'll immediately climb up the stairs to come find me.  I decided I'd get another tooth brush for her and she could brush her teeth in the morning with me.  She loves to come up, brush her teeth with me, and then we rinse our brushes and spit in the sink!

On Friday morning we swung over to the zoo real quick with Monica's friend Katie.  We got there just as they were feeding the polar bear.  Wouldn't you know it they eat ice!!  Well... there was probably something frozen in it, but we never got to see what.

Like many zoos there are peacocks roaming around at the Denver zoo.  I took a picture of one perched up on a fence because you could see it's tail feathers and I thought it'd probably be the best shot I could get, and then we walked around a corner and saw this!  Thank you for participating Mr. Peacock!

Brooke liked to watch the river otters swim around, but I could never quite get a picture of her with a river otter in it...  Just a bunch of bubble trails.

Also, I saw this turtle.  Its back is all covered in moss and algae and who knows what else!  When I sat there looking at it it just felt like the oldest thing I had ever seen!  Also, after looking I wondered how long a turtle can hold it's breath.  30 minutes... oh wait, except for the ones that only come up for air every few months!!!  That was even more fun to type than I expected, maybe I'll have to start doing turtle facts in each blog post! ;)

If Brooke covets, Brooke covets watches.  She always tries to pull them off our wrists and press the buttons and play with them.  Well, this week she got her dream.  Monica didn't want to wear her watch, so we put it on Brooke.  She was ecstatic!

We got Brooke a life vest this weekend.  We were planning to go swimming today, but that didn't quite make it into the final plans.  Every time she sees it she asks to put it on.  She just loves to wear it.

Since the outside of the house now looks so nice Monica decided that I had to replace our ceiling fan.  It was very dirty, and hung lower than I wanted, so for date night on Saturday Monica watched me replace it.

The new fan looks so much better!  I had a couple... or maybe a few... ok really I had several mess ups in the process, so it took a lot longer than it should have, but at least it's done now and I'm not 10 feet up on a ladder.

Brooke still loves to go check the mail with me.  We went Sunday morning (we didn't go Saturday) because Monica was sleeping in and I was going crazy reading the same books.  When we got home it was kitty's turn to take a ride and Brooke tried to push her around the house.  I couldn't get her to use the handles, so she never had much luck turning.  But they did make it back to the front door.

Sunday afternoon found us playing a little SNES when Brooke woke from her nap, and she just had to have a turn.  She's a natural at it, and took it to the wire against Monica!

Being a champ makes you thirsty!

Today Brooke and I headed out into the back yard to throw around some balls.  Brooke has really been wanting to go out into the back yard all the time lately, which is great!  I'm just glad we were able to find some time while the weather was still cool.

As alluded to at the start of the post, we went hiking today.  We went to Castlewood Canyon, which is just about 25 minutes south of us.  While I was getting things ready I left the tube to the camelbak hanging off the table and Brooke found it!  It was fun watching her walk over and get drinks until she decided she should just squeeze it and left a huge puddle on the ground for me to clean up...

We had a heck of a time trying to get into the park to go hiking today.  There are two roads that lead in, one that has a bunch of short trails going to interesting places, such as a cave, and some old ruins.  The other road comes to the visitor center and the start of some longer trails (longer meaning about a mile out).  We had hoped to go see the cave and ruins, etc. but when we got up to the self service day pass purchase place we couldn't get our money to go in the shoot!  We barely had enough money with us, but most of it was in coins, and the deposit box had a very small hole and an immediate bend.  So we couldn't pay there, and had to drive around to the other entrance.  That led us into a line of at least 20 cars waiting to get by the visitors center.  Well, we finally got in, but it took a lot longer than we had hoped.

We borrowed a hiking baby backpack thing from a friend in the ward.  It worked great!  It was very easy to carry Brooke around and she had a lot of fun.  It's a good thing it was easy too, because we were hiking from the longer trail side of things.  Here we are at a dam that I guess broke some time?  I don't really know the history, but it was cool to see the old ruins.  This was about in the middle of the park as a whole, and was a little over a mile hike for us to get to.  In total we hiked about 2.5 miles.

One of the trails we took was through a little canyon, and crossed several bridges.  Here is Monica admiring nature from afar!

As we were getting close to the car Brooke started to cry because she was so tired, so we tried to pick up the pace.  Pace pick up was going great until we got here!  There was a quite long stair case in the way of the parking lot!  Who put that thing there!?

We got home and everyone was so tired they fell right asleep... well, except me.  I ran 5 miles.  Brooke slept until 4! So that put a damper on us going swimming this afternoon, so I guess we'll have to go sometime in the next few weeks to make up for it.

I hope everyone had a great week!  Remember, stay cool!

Murder High '87

Shout out to the class of '87!  Friday night we attended a murder mystery party that was themed as a high school reunion!  Don't worry, Monica and I got a stellar prom picture out of it!  More on that later.

In preparation for the party we headed over to Salvation Army earlier this week to look for some happening clothes (such as Monica's whole outfit, and my pants)!  While we were there we found some little chairs, and Brooke loves to sit on the little chairs at church so we picked them up for her!  She loves them and loves to carry them around and climb up on them.  She technically doesn't need to climb to get up, but she doesn't know another way to get on.

Also, since she is a walking fiend (and for all of you wondering, yes, she's started getting to running the past few days) I thought it was probably time to teach her to kick a ball.  I set the ball on the ground and asked her to kick it.  She didn't know what that meant, so I told her to hit the ball with her foot, and this was the result... At least her comprehension is very good!

Sometime this past week I also asked her to give blankie a hug, and this was the result.  I've been trying to teach her that to hug is to put your arms around things, but for her it's still just things wrapping around her...  We'll get there.

On Friday night Brooke went running into her room while the lights were out and started playing with her elephant.  It was a pretty good game for the dark since it is supposed to shine stars on the walls and ceilings.  Brooke did try to grab a star a few times, but mostly she sat and held the elephant and pushed the buttons.  For a while I set it to cycle through the colors and quizzed her.  We haven't worked on colors very much, but it's a start.

On Friday night we headed over to another house in the ward for the murder mystery party.  As I mentioned it was 80's high school reunion themed.  It was a great party, and I'm sure a lot of time when into getting everything ready.  They even were able to dig up all of our graduation pictures from '87!  I'm Bart, and Monica was Pamela.

They even had a balloon arch for pictures!

I've never done a murder mystery before, so it was fun to give one a try.  I think it would be fun to do it again!  The night was packed with great times, from catching up with classmates, murder and accusation, to old grudges, and dance offs!  I didn't guess the murderer right, but Monica did win best costume!

Here's a picture I managed to snag of Brooke trying to get into her chair!

On Saturday morning we headed up to the zoo!  It was a blast, and I hope we go more this summer.  It's also nice having a membership because then you don't feel like you have to stay all day, just stroll around for a couple hours and head back home.

While we were there we of course had to see the tigers.  The tiger kept running back and forth in front of the glass, just inches away from Brooke.  Unfortunately tigers are very fast, so I didn't manage to get it in the picture.

Brooke also enjoyed spending some of the day walking between exhibits!

And here we are checking out the clouded leopard.  It was eating a coconut!  And a volunteer that was there said they feed it cabbage too!  Who even knew?

While we were there we were able to catch the seal show, but I didn't get any pictures.  We spent a good deal of time at the cat house since Brooke loves them so much!  And here we all are at the snow leopard!

We never did find the lions, and there were hyenas in their enclosure (we need you back Simba!!), but they at least had this life size lego lion out there!  So nice of him to stay put.

I tested my jumping skills, on my next jump I was just shy of 9 feet, so I did do a little better.  The take away message is that I need to do some jumping exercises so that I can crush this when we come back next time!  Only jump as far as a polar bear, embarrassing!

We saw the grizzly bears, and they were pretty active when we came by, so that was fun.  That's the other benefit to coming in the morning, that's when most of the animals actually do anything!  While we were there Brooke decided to check and see if her hands were bear sized yet.

And on our way out we took a picture all together with the metal giraffe!

They also had this cut out picture there too!  How could we not stick Brooke in there!  The zoo was so much fun!  I hadn't been here in quite some time, and I hope we'll be able to make it out several times this summer.

Brooke has been attending nursery for the past few weeks.  So far everything has gone fine.  I have stayed in there with her through second hour, and then leave her there for 3rd.  Today she almost made it all the way through church.  Monica said they brought her in with just 10 minutes to go!  We're getting so close.  However, one thing that's become pretty clear in nursery is that Brooke is introverted.  Here's a picture I grabbed during singing time.  All she wanted to do was sit on her chair.

Well, it's been a great week out here.  I hope everyone else has had a great week as well!  Until next time, thanks for stopping by!

Mothers' Day

Happy Mothers Day!  I hope everyone is doing so great this week!  We had a wonderful week, capped with a great Mothers Day!  Just look at those smiles!

Brooke is becoming a lot more independent.  She loves to do things on her own, for better or worse.  She's started to enjoy the playground at the park a lot more recently, and loves to climb around.  But sometimes the bars are just in the wrong position, and they catch you as you try to climb down!

Brooke and I usually go check the mail every day when I get home form work.  She loves to go check the mail with me.  When we get to the mail box I always pull out the mail and hand it to her.  She'll hold it in her lap until we get home and then hands it all to Monica.

I started taking Brooke to nursery last week.  While there they had sippy cups for all the kids, which is not one of the cups Brooke got very proficient with.  She typically prefers cups with straws, but if she wanted water she'd have to learn to tip that cup back!  She picked it up quick by watching all the other kids and dad helpfully pushing her elbow up.  When I got home I told Monica and we figured we should probably start using all of her different cups so she'd be good with whatever.  One of her cups can be drunk from any side.  When you bite down on the rim it opens a little and you can suck water out.  Brooke quickly learned how to drink from the far side of the cup!  Good thing it's spill proof!

Brooke has also been doing much better about feeding herself snacks.  She usually only eats one thing at a time now, instead of stuffing a fist full into her mouth.  One night she had her snack holder at dinner time and decided using her spoon would be the best way to get the cheerios out!  She thought it was a lot of fun even if she didn't get anything!

Brooke has also been attempting to feed herself much more often.  She does best with food that can be stuck on the end of a fork, or anything that's thick enough to stick to a spoon when dipped in.

Saturday was a crazy day!  My brother in law, Michael, flew out for his 40th birthday.  He had no clue what was going on, and the whole day was a total surprise for him!  My brother, Spencer, even flew in from Minnesota!  Michael was blind folded and taken to the airport to fly out to Denver.  We had a full day planned, starting with going out to breakfast!  After breakfast we went golfing, and Tyson met us there!

And of course the only way to finish off a round of golf is to head over to Top Golf and hit some balls at the driving range!

After that we came back to my place and rested until dinner.  In our down time it seemed appropriate to play some SNES, and Brooke even joined in!

Tyson's family came down to have dinner with us too!  I think everyone had a great time, and it was fun to be around so much family!  After dinner Tyson was nice enough to take everyone back to the airport, and I basically curled up in a ball and didn't move until Sunday morning.

Sunday was great! And it was Mothers' Day!  After church we celebrated by everyone taking an afternoon nap (which is why the post is a day late!)!  When Brooke woke up we had a little snack and headed to the park.  Brooke started going down the slide all by herself starting Friday!  She loves the slide now (well she did before, but it's even better now that she controls it)!  She'll just go in circles climbing up the stairs and sliding down to us.

Here's another picture where she was in a little less control of her slide!

She loves just about everything on the little kid play ground, from the steering wheel, to the animal spinners, to shoving her face into the dome (Monica taught her)!

And after we came home and had dinner which I made (and it turned out delicious!! from Monica), and once Brooke was in bed Monica and I had special Mothers' Day dessert!  We had white chocolate raspberry ice cream on lemon cookies!  It's sooooo good!

Now typically blog cutoff is Sunday morning, but since I didn't post yesterday I'll add some pictures from this morning.  I was unloading the dishes this morning and Brooke came over to help!  She loves to help with the dishes.  She was pulling out the silver ware and handing it to me to put in the drawer!

And when we got to the end she even started bring the silverware over and putting it in herself!  What a great helper!

With that we're all caught up!  Hopefully I don't reuse those dish pictures again next week!  Everyone have a wonderful week!  Thanks for stopping by.