National Park Day!

On Saturday we headed up to Rocky Mountain National Park for the day! We had gone up last year and loved it, we even got to see moose last year (still a highlight for me). Jeff found out that Saturday was a free day for the National Parks so off we went! We headed up through Boulder and first stopped at Longs Peak just outside of the park. Jeff and the kids got their National Park Passport books stamped at the ranger station. Jeff loves collecting different stamps from all the parks and the kids are now hooked on it!!

The crew with their passports stamped!

 

When we were at the ranger station we even got to check out a llama that was heading up the trail with some rangers. He was hauling tons of supplies; look how cute he is:)

We then headed through Estes Park and into the Park!

We first stopped at Moraine Park Meadow. We visited it last year and had to go back. It offers such a beautiful panorama of all the mountains in the park! We then headed up to the old beaver ponds, they have since left this area but the kids got to put their feet in the water and check out some mountain fish!

We then drove over to a huge washout area that was created by a flood in 1982. It was nice to soak our feet in the icy water on a hot day!

 

 

On the hike back down Jeff gave the kids the binoculars and they were off looking for wildlife:)

 

We didn't see as many animals this time around in the park but here are a look at some of the friends we found!

On our way out of the park we noticed a ton of cars pulled over looking at something so we stopped and found out we were looking at a huge Great Horned Owl nest with two baby owls. The mama was just two branches up keeping an eye on everything. The nest was amazing; truly a special thing to see:)

We had one more stop to make just outside the park. At the beginning of the day we had stopped and gotten Ashley and Cameron Jr. Ranger booklets. Their job throughout the day was to complete all the activities in the book finding animals, plants and exploring the park. When we stopped in at the Ranger station the Ranger was so cute and quizzed them on the book, even making them take a park oath:) Then he asked everyone in the visitors center to stop and congratulate the newest Jr. Rangers! Needless to say the kids were so excited. They wore the badges all the way home:) Here are some pictures of them finishing up the booklet and getting their badges.

Hard at work!

Getting quizzed:)

Taking the park oath!

Official Rangers!

Celebrating:)

It was a great day in a wonderful place! Here are some scenery pictures from the rest of the park.

May 2012

So as you can see I am catching up on the last 6 months!! Yikes, sorry for the long delay in the photos getting on the blog. It has been fun the last two days going through the last half year and looking at all of the fun memories. I feel like this year is flying by and it is only going to get faster:) I hope you all enjoy the photos going all the way back to November of last year, wow:)

May is coming to an end but it has been a very fun month full of outings, Mother's Day and a very special graduation! Here are some photos from this month!

Denver has some amazing museums and we have been taking advantage of the free days they have been offering. It just so happened that the Art museum and Nature/Science Museum had free days this month.

The Art museum was up first! It is the first time that we have taken the kids to a real Art Museum and it was great to see and hear there reactions to different styles. They had seven floors each dedicated to a different style, country or period. We were able to take in everything from Native American artwork and costumes to sculptures of Buddha. They even had an exposition on Yves Saint-Laurent which included a catwalk, I will give you one guess who strutted her stuff down that:)

Ashley the supermodel!

The kids also loved all the giant sculptures outside of the museum including these giant cows!

The next weekend we took in the Science and Nature Museum. It was an amazing museum filled with Dinosaur skeleton's, wildlife dioramas and the hit of the day live lizards and snakes! We ended up spending most of the afternoon there since all of the exhibits were great.

Car picnicking before going in:)

The dino's were amazing!

Mother's Day 2012

Breakfast in bed, cards and a day out with my family what a great day! In the afternoon we headed up to Boulder for the day. We went up and toured the Celestial Seasoning's Tea factory. It was so fun and as you will see in the later photos we even got to wear hairnets, awesome:)

My two babies, I am so proud to be your mommy!

 

Hairnets!!

We then headed to downtown Boulder and Cameron had to stop to see the stadium:)

My football star!

My little star!

My wonderful family!

Love you!

Ashley's Preschool Graduation 2012!

My little baby is heading off to Kindergarten next year! I said it at the top of this post but I am starting to feel that every year is going faster and faster! It has made me realize that I need to slow down sometimes and enjoy the small moments because they are only young once. Ashley's preschool has been amazing and I am thankful that she has had such a wonderful opening experience to school. In the fall she will be going to a.m. kindergarten five days a week, wow!

 

Ashley's preschool teachers put together a beautiful book of memories from the year!

Miss Camille and Ashley

Little miss graduate!

Nothing like a diploma and a cupcake!

My parents were back in Denver at the end of May after their big trip to Europe! It was great to see them again before they headed back to California. Ashley and I were painting one day and my dad decided he wanted to join in. He mentioned he had never sat down and painted before, ever!!! After he was done he was very proud of his painting and even took it back to California with him:) It was very cute!

The painters!

Dad and his first masterpiece!

April 2012

We had a fun April filled with some great activities! My parents also stopped off in Denver for a couple of days at the end of the month before taking off on their trip to Europe. It was nice since we got to celebrate my dad's birthday with him. Here are some pictures from the month!

The Easter Bunny paid a visit to us this year and was not caught by a late snow storm! We had great weather for a fun hunt.

On the hunt!

Checking out the goodies!

As you all know Cameron is a huge football fan (HUGE)! So since we couldn't check out our beloved Ducks in there spring football game we went up to Boulder to check out the CU's. It is a beautiful campus and the rain held off until we were walking out of the stadium after the game! Cameron had such a great time and got to shake hands with the players. The highlight of the day for him is when I got the quarterback's attention and asked him to come over and he talked with Cameron and shook his hand!! He couldn't stop talking about it the whole way home, so cute!  Ashley had her own memorable moment when I asked the cheerleaders if they would take a picture with her, the entire squad came over and and as you can see she loved it!!

Cameron and the quarterback

Ashley and her cheerleaders!

They were not the Ducks but it was a really fun day hanging out and watching some football! We even got to see Ralphie the real buffalo, pretty amazing to see that animal run around the stadium.

Cameron finished all of his requirements in his den to receive his Wolf badge for cub scouts! It has been a great year for him and he is really enjoying his den. We will be attending some summer events and he will pick back up full time in the fall!

 

Cameron at his Wolf ceremony

 

 

Happy Birthday Dad!!