July 17, 2006

7:15 Drop off

7:20 Cereal

7:40 Down for nap

7:50 I hung my laundry out on the line (this will become important by 4:25). The boys played in the backyard. Our shadeless backyard is only pleasant from about dawn to 9:30am.

8:10 I called Crissy with my idea for a Fabulous Plan™ today. It's been 100 degrees here for the past 4 days and I wanted to get out of town and up where it's cooler. I proposed going up to the mountains, but Crissy was too busy to join me today. Wah!!! But once I had the idea in my head, I was doing it anyway.

9:00 Ariel woke up. She played while I finished getting things ready for our adventure.

9:15 I fed her the rest of her cereal bottle, about 3 oz.

9:45 Finally, we were ready to leave.

9:50 With all the driving I had to do today, I needed to stop by Starbucks for fortification.

10:00 And we were on our way! Up up up Boulder Canyon (we learned about canyons today, "But why does water cut through the rock?") all the way to Nederland.

10:40 Our plan had been to go to the mining museum. I couldn't find their hours online, nor did either of the phone numbers I found for them work. So we just winged it. Of course we found out once we got there that they are only open on the weekends, but they have some cool trucks to look out outside:

See how big this one is? See the kids in the right hand corner?


We looked at the trucks and some of the other outside equipment, then we decided to poke around Nederland a bit.

I didn't know this restaurant was here, but I'll be taking my internet friends here if they come and visit :)


We found a rock shop and Alex was very interested in the amethyst geodes. I let them each pick out 2 polished rocks.

We walked around a bit, finding an old train that had been converted to a coffee shop and a bike store. Then Adam said he was ready for lunch, so we walked back to the car.

Here's scenic Nederland:


11:40 They boys sat down in the mining museum parking lot for a picnic lunch:


11:50 Alex announced he had to go poopy, so we walked across the street to the gas station.

12:00 Ariel woke up from a short bjorn nap and we went back to the parking lot for her lunch, apple/strawberry/banana mush.

12:10 A man walked by and asked if I knew there was a park with a playground and picnic tables down the road. I did not. We must have been pretty pathetic sitting in a parking lot.

Wha? I don't have to be sitting here?


12:20 Go to park. It was a pretty nice park, but there was a group of older camp kids that were kinda wild.



12:50 Alex said he was done with the park, so we went back to the car. The boys played in the back while I fed Ariel a bottle.

1:10 Everyone got back in their seats, for phase B of our adventure - driving the Peak to Peak highway to Estes Park. Normally, I'm not a big fan of driving. But driving on a very scenic road with no traffic is almost pleasant. Especially when all three passengers are asleep. Here's some pictures I took from the side of the road.

Mount Meeker:


Mount Meeker again, with a cool church:


Here's Meeker on the left, and the Longs Peak diamond face in the middle. Eight years ago I, due to impetunousness (is that a real word?) and lack of sufficient information, I climbed Longs. It's a serious 14 mile mountain hike, we had to start hiking at 3:00am. Very exposed and sketchy on top, and a thunderstorm coming down. It was an awesome experience, but my legs didn't stop hurting for two weeks.



2:15 We got into Estes Park. Nobody seemed very happy to be awake, but I promised icecream in town.

Here are some nice snapdragons:


Estes Park is a tourist town right by Rocky Mountain National Park. It's probably the first time I heard my parents use the descriptive word "schloky." In other words, I you need postcards, t-shirts, a cheap plastic tomahawk, a lifesized stuffed jackalope or some homemade fudge, this is the place.

2:45 We found an icecream place. Alex picked out mint-chocolate-chip and Adam picked vanilla. I didn't getting anything because I had my PB&J sandwich and was anticipating icecream leftovers. And oh, I found a dollar bill in the store, very exciting!!!

2:50 Ariel had a bottle while the boys enjoyed their icecream. And yes, there were leftovers, but next time I'm not listing vanilla as a choice. What was I thinking?

3:00 Here's a hand chair next to the icecream store:



3:20 Almost back to the car:





And Ariel was making some interesting noises, and I thought something exciting might happen (but mostly Ariel is making interesting noises):



3:30 Drive back to Boulder. I got stuck behind two very slow trucks. Frustrating, and will also be important at 4:25.

4:20 We we about 5 minutes from the house and it started raining. Remember the clothes on the line? Well, now I have to wash them again. Wah!!!!

4:25 We finally got home from our adventure.

4:30 Pick up.

July 14, 2006

7:15 Drop off

7:20 Cereal. Ariel liked cereal today, I made her three (small) helpings.

7:45 Ariel sat and played. And spit up. She must know today is 8 month picture day.

I took a little video of her playing and talking about Bob. We don't know who Bob is, but Ariel talks about him all the time. Oh, and at the end you can hear Alex calling me to wipe him.



8:10 Crib nap. While Ariel was asleep, the boys and I went in the backyard. We needed to get some outside time before it became unbarebly hot. And somehow I was motivated to CLEAN the backyard, which very much needed it. I threw away broken toys, cleaned out the sandbox and did a bunch of weeding. It looks MUCH better.

9:50 Ariel woke up.

9:55 2 oz bottle, what was left from the ceral.

10:30 4 oz bottle

11:15 Crissy and I have been talking about this, and today we finally did it. We swapped kids. Crissy dropped off Marcus and took Alex home with her. I hired Marcus for "daycare" for Adam (which ended up costing me $2).

11:30 Ariel went down for another nap. The boys played in Alex's room and I cleaned both bathrooms. Yipee!

12:15 I made the boys lunch, apples and mac & cheese. Marcus didn't seem to care for it.

12:30 I set the pool up for the boys. I put our little slide in and turned on the sprinkler and got a bunch of toys. They boys had lots of fun, especially Adam.





I ate lunch on the patio, and then I did something that I haven't done during the day in a long time. I read a book. And if you must know what I'm reading, I'm reading Anne of Green Gables again because my parents are visiting P. E. Island.

1:45 Ariel woke up, the boys and I came inside, and Ariel had another bottle.

2:15 Picture time! Ariel and I were on today I'm really happy with this set. Becky said that Ariel and Aunt Laura picked out this outfit. Apparently my sisters held up a bunch of outfits and this was the only one Ariel got excited about.





















(I'm not sure if this is the final collage or not)


Becky - all the pictures with their numbers are on my flickr site...

And a small miracle happened, Ariel managed not to spit up during our photo session. Which is remarkable because she spit up all day long today.

2:40 I started proofing pictures while Ariel sat and played with toys.

3:00 Ariel went down for another nap.

3:50 Wake up, another bottle

4:00 Crissy came back with Alex. Marcus and Adam did really well up until the last hour. They did crafts, and Marcus made Adam a pop-up book. But then Marcus was getting bored, and I was busy proofing pictures.

4:35 Pick up.

PS - Ariel didn't have lunch today because I didn't want to be cleaning up colored spit up during pictures.

July 12, 2006

7:00 Drop off

7:15 Cereal. Ariel wasn't very enthusiastic again.

7:45 Crib nap. While Ariel was napping, Alex asked Adam if he needed to go poopy. They both went in the bathroom and sat on their potties and let out a stream of preschool profanities for about 15 minutes. I kept going in and asking if Alex was ready to wipe and he would say that they were "still talking potty talk." In the end, Adam only peed, but I'm sure his vocabulary was greatly expanded.

8:15 Ariel woke up, and I changed a small poopy. I gave her a bottle, then put her in the exosaucer while I got ready for our Wednesday Fabulous Adventure™.

9:05 We finally got out the door to walk to the library. Alex walked too, Ariel and Adam rode in the stroller. On the way, we saw the fox in the meadow again. Speaking of animals, last night as I was falling asleep, I heard an animal shuffling outside. I went outside and saw a big raccoon and 3 little raccoons. Of course I tried to take a picture, but by the time I got my camera, they were gone and it was too dark anyway. I told Alex about it this morning, and now he's interested in raccoons. We read the Stanley books while Ariel slept.

10:10 Got to Starbucks. I got a java chip frap and Alex got his soymilk. I tried to set a new low an my change search. I found two pennies, but they were right under a woman's feet. So what did I do? I sent Alex to get them. For some reason it's much more socially acceptable for a 4 year old to do that than a grown woman.

10:20 Got to the library, but it was CLOSED. You would have thought that they would have mentioned the closure to us last week. There were a lot of moms sitting around trying to figure out what to do next.

10:25 Crissy and the boys got to the library and were similarly dismayed. Luckily, I had a plan B. First, I took Adam and Marcus to mail some packages. Then we got Marcus some ice water from Starbucks. And then...

10:55 Plan B. We walked up to the park. In the library parking lot, Alex spilled his milk. There's no use telling him not to cry over spilt milk, he sobbed all the way to the park.

11:15 Got to park. For the most part, Crissy, Ariel and I sat in the shade:

(Did you ever think Ariel would look this chunky?)


And the boys played nicely in the sandbox:


11:30 Ariel fell asleep in the bjorn.

11:45 After a rock throwing incident involving all 4 boys, we had to leave the park. Alex rode in the stroller.

12:20 Home, Ariel had some sweet potatoes and an ounce of water for lunch.

After the boys finished lunch (peanut butter sandwiches with NO jelly, banana and yogurt) they went outside to check on the garden. For the most part, our backyard is dry and weedy, but we do have one corner for Alex's garden. I tried to label it...



While the boys were outside, Ariel sat and played by herself. Adam had given her a snake, I thought Crissy might like this picture:



1:15 Ariel had a bottle

1:20 I put her down for a nap.

1:30 I came in and put Adam down for a nap. Adam went right to sleep, but Ariel was still awake, sucking her paci and kicking.

1:50 I finally decided that Ariel was not going to sleep, so I took her out of the crib and let her sit and play some more. Alex had some frozen yogurt (and I don't know where he got the black eye, last week he came to me and said he bumped it):



and I put together my Turkey Toe proof book (my lastest mpix order had just arrived in the mail.)

2:25 Apparently Ariel wasn't ready to sleep yet because she needed to poop.

2:30 Put Ariel down again, she went right to sleep.

3:45 I think Ariel woke up first, but Adam was up soon after.

3:55 bottle

4:15 Another group potty session. Alex may be on the one to potty train Adam, but I'll be left with a potty-going-sailor-talking toddler.

4:30 Pick up.

July 11, 2006

7:10 Drop off, asleep in carseat, Adam's room.

7:20 More Jeremy drama. His interview was rescheduled for today, which presented a problem. He only has one short-sleeved business casual shirt. He would not even consider long sleeves, and tried to convince me that a few of his t-shirts were suitable. I finally got him to agree to go to Target on his way to work and pick something up. Sacrifices have to be made for the family. I would have felt better about him leaving if he hadn't put on his pirate-monkey-robot t-shirt, one of the ones he tried to pass off as business casual. (Update, he didn't find anything at Target, but did find a nice $7 3 button polo shirt at Walmart. And he thinks his interview went well.)

7:55 Adam took off all his clothes (he has a George Costanza thing going on) and went potty on his own initiative. He's toying with me. I put his diaper back on.

8:10 Ariel woke up, had some cereal. She didn't like it as much today.

8:20 Got everything ready to take Alex to summer camp (normally Jeremy would take him on the way to work, but his interview was scheduled for 8:30)

8:45 Left for summer camp.

9:00 Arrive at summer camp. I dropped Alex off, then fed Ariel a bottle in the car.

9:20 We took a walk on the bike path by the school. We found a park to play at. Ariel really likes the swings:



Adam likes things to bounce on:



10:05 Left the park. Storm's a brewin':



On the way back, I checked the soccer field coke machine for change. I found a quarter under the machine, but it was just out of reach. I had to take a pen out of the trash to get it. Have I reached a new low? (Update - found $.37 today, brings me up to $1.40.) For the record, Jeremy would like to tell everyone how much he hates this new change game, and he thinks I'm a bit? no a lot crazy.

10:30 Got back to the car, we went to Safeway for Jamba Juice. I was trying to kill time, Crissy's train was supposed to get in at 7:30 this morning, and she said we could come over when she got home. We got our Jamba Juice, then walked around Safeway for a bit. I finally called Crissy and found out her train hadn't even gotten it yet, it was delayed 4 hours. At some point I looked out the window and saw it was raining. (See, I said a storm was a-brewin')

11:30 Left Safeway for the toy store.

11:40 Got to toy store. Fed Ariel in the bjorn.

11:50 Adam announced he had a poopy, and could I please change it. Back to the car.

11:55 Back to the toy store. I came to buy two birthday presents but also ended up with a pink horse lovey for Ariel. And if she doesn't want it, I'll take it. It's made of The Softest Fleece Ever™. I thought it would be perfet for Ariel, since she likes her rags to sleep with.

12:45 Left toy store to go pick up Alex from summer camp.

1:00 Pick up Alex, then headed over to Crissy's.

1:20 Crissy's house. Good to see Crissy, but her kids were wound up and Alex was still acting exhausted. Alex was having trouble keeping his hands to himself. Crissy was excited to see Ariel, but not so excited to see that I hadn't changed her diaper yet and she had soaked her pants and carseat. Whoops.

1:40 Fed Ariel her prunes and apples.

Ariel does love her lovey!



2:15 We decided the kids would do better at a park. We got to the park first, as Crissy had volunteered to pick up our $5 pizza. I fed Ariel a bottle, then she fell asleep in the bjorn.

2:30 Much pizza was eaten.

3:30 Becky picked Ariel up at the park.

3:40 We had to leave the park because Adam is not for hitting. Alex really must have been tired, 15 minutes after we got home he fell asleep until 7:00pm. That does not bode well for tonight.

July 10, 2006

Happy Monday, everyone. I hope you had a good weekend. I did something exciting, for the first time in nearly a year, I got my hair cut.

Here's before. I'm sad because my hair looks so bad:


And here's after. Now I'm happy and sassy:


7:10 Drop off. Not asleep.

7:15 Crissy called. She'll be home tomorrow. Yipee!

7:20 Jeremy left for work. Poor Jeremy. Due to his company being bought, not only does he have to re-interview for his current job today, but he also has to wear business casual. The horror! (And I didn't get a picture of his blue tennis shoes, which I assured him were NOT business casual, but that he refused to change).

7:45 We all ate breakfast. Ariel was excited because she likes food:



Until she realized she was getting cereal:



I made the cereal thinner than I did on Friday. Once she got over the inital shock, she ate quite a bit. I mixed it with formula, she had enough cereal to use 2 oz.

Adam had Grape-Nuts for breakfast. When I went to the store on Saturday (yes, I went!) I bought Grape-Nuts and Cheerios. On Sunday, Adam wanted to eat out of my cereal bowl. I was definately surprised, Grape-Nuts are pretty darn crunchy, especially for someone who is still missing 8 teeth.

8:15 I gave Ariel the rest of her bottle.

8:30 Crib nap

9:15 While I was folding Alex's laundry, Adam started putting on Alex's underwear. All of it.



Since he was showing interest in underwear, I asked if he wanted to wear them today, and then told him he would have to go potty first. Adam went pee-pee, then we got him dressed in underwear:



10:00 I got to clean up Adam's poopy out of his underwear. Then he sat on the potty again and peed and we put underwear on again. Hmmm, this could be interesting.

10:55 Miss Ariel woke up

11:00 Bottle

11:10 Adam peed in his pants again. I was going to take him to the bathroom just as soon as Ariel got done with her bottle.

11:20 Walked to the photo store.

11:35 Arrive at photo store. Find out pictures aren't done yet, but will be ready in 20 minutes.

11:40 Go to grocery store. I got Adam a cookie and I bought a box of Tricuits for lunch.

11:50 Adam peed in his pants again. *sigh* This is not going as well as I thought it would.

12:15 Get home. In the interest of Alex having some underwear by the time he gets home tonight, I took off Adam's wet clothes and didn't replace them with dry.

The Bare Bottom Bandit makes his return - in my shoes, no less.



12:30 Ariel ate bananas and orange medley.

12:35 Adam took himself to the potty. An upswing?

1:00 Ariel went down for nap.

1:15 I couldn't get Adam to sit on the potty again, so I gave up and put a diaper on. When Alex trained, it was not nearly this hard, so I'm giving up for a while. It's frustrating because Adam can and will go, just not all the time.

1:20 Adam took a nap on my bed. Isn't he sweet when he's sleeping?



1:45 Ariel woke up, bottle

2:15 I got the car loaded, then had to wake Adam to load him in the car. He went right back to sleep.

2:35 Arrive at mall. Adam wasn't too grumpy when I transfered him to the stroller.

2:45 Stopped by Starbucks and got a decaf java chip frappachino. Mmmmmm.

3:00 I had an appointment at the market research place, and this time I couldn't bring children. Grammie and Alex met us there, then the whole gang went for icecream and then played outside.

I signed a confidentiality form so I can't say much about my survey, other than it involved diapers, shopping, took 20 minutes to complete and paid $30.

3:25 I met Grammie and the kiddos outside. Ariel was looking tired so I put her in the bjorn and walked around the mall with her. Looking for change, of course.

3:45 During my walk, I noticed an older gentleman who appeared to be on the same quest as I. He was walking very fast, looking down, and detouring into corners. I let him go down a department store dead end while I cut across, to get ahead of him. But since I was carrying a baby and wearing flip-flops, he caught up again. I witnessed him checking the coke machine change pocket while I checked the telephone. I gave him a friendly smile and then said, "I see we are competing." He just gruffed at me. Ah-ha, nothing like a little competition to fire me up!

Since he was scouring the downstairs thoroughly, I went upstairs and then outside. I had better luck out there and it was nice and overcast too. At some point Ariel did fall asleep, but I'm not sure when. I wasn't really paying attention to her.

My afternoon paid well, I found $.27, including a Canadian penny and a penny so corroded that I had to use a toothbrush and jewelry cleaner to even tell it was a penny (thanks for the idea, Becky). That brings my total since last Thursday to $1.07. Can you believe it? It helped that I found a quarter and 3 dimes over the weekend. I'll have this free latte in no time!

4:30 I met Becky at the sandbox.

4:50 Becky had changed and fed Ariel, we decided to all go to the California Pizza kitchen. I told Alex we had to go to eat dinner and he started sobbing because he didn't want to leave his new friend Madeline. He cried all the way to the car and then all the way to the restaurant. I see this as a sign that he may have had too much fun with Grammie this weekend.

5:20 A wonderful time was had at CPK.

July 7, 2006

7:00 Drop off, asleep. Which normally would be a good thing, but I had a plan for this morning and it was already off track. Ariel was supposed to arrive and eat breakfast, then nap while we walked to the post office.

7:40 Ariel woke up.

7:45 I attempted to feed Ariel her rice cereal. She did not care for it.

7:55 Bottle

8:10 I ate my breakfast, oatmeal with delicious freshly picked raspberries. Yum, yum (and yes, the raspberries are all gone now). I offered Ariel a raspberry, but she acted like I tried to shove a ping-pong ball in her mouth with all her gagging. I do not think she is ready for finger food yet.

8:20 I attempted to get us ready to walk to the post office. It's like hearding cats trying to get Alex dressed and getting sunscreen on everyone and filling up water bottles and preparing the stroller...

8:50 Finally leave. I thought Alex could walk and Ariel could ride with Adam. We got down our street and Ariel started fussing and I realized I had forgotten the bjorn so we walked back home.

9:05 Leave for the post office again. This time I carried Ariel and Alex rode. I think he was too tired from all the walking at the zoo to walk today. At least Ariel followed the part of the plan where she slept.

9:30 Get to post office. Mail stuff (book coming at you, Tiskah).

10:00 Get home. It's only a mile there and a mile back but I was walking slow. It was hotter today and I didn't have much energy. It is possible my children really have drained it all.

10:05 Ariel "played" with the boys. Alex invented a game where he sat on the car holding one end of a string of beads and Ariel held the other end and shook it. Primative, to be sure, but everyone thought it was fun.

10:15 Super Grammie called to say that she and Pop-Pop were going to Turkey Toe this weekend, and would we like to join them? I have too much excting stuff going on, but I knew one person who would love to go - Alex!

10:30ish Bottle

11:00 Tried to put Ariel down for a nap. She didn't wanna.

11:15 I gave up on the nap, gave Ariel some of Adam's sweet potatoes. She ate most of the jar, Adam didn't eat any. He was too busy eating his bunny mac and cheese. Which, when making, I had to mix the powdered cheese with water instead of milk because we have NO milk. I had a few frozen waffles since because of yesterday's picnic lunch, we now have no cheese as well. Surely this will motivate me to go to the store???

11:30 I ringmastered my own private three ring circus - keeping the boys eating lunch, feeding Ariel and packing Alex's suitcase. Not as easy as it sounds.

12:00 Finally get out of the house. Before heading down to South Denver where I was going to meet Grammie for the Alex trade, I ran a few Boulder errands, including treating myself to free Crunch Bear from Peaberry's.

12:30 On the road. At some point in Denver, all three kids were asleep. Ariel fell asleep first, then Adam, then Alex.

1:00 I got off on the first wrong exit, two before I wanted to.

1:15 I got off on the second wrong exit, the one before. I swear that last time I went to this mall, I completely missed the exit and I didn't want that to happen.

1:30 Got to the mall. As I parked the car, all the kids we woke up. We weren't meeting Grammie until 2:30, so we went in to find a restroom and a play area. While walking through the food court, I found 10 pennies but lost much more than 10 cents of dignity. It is very embarrassing to pick up pennies around people's feet while they pay for their pizza at a ritzy mall. I'm really going to be earning this free latte.

1:50 We determined there was no play area, so I fed Ariel a bottle at a wishing well pond. Adam and Alex sat nicely on the bench with me. Alex kept telling me that the boys climbing on the rocks in the pond didn't know the rules. I talked to a woman feeding her baby, and she turned out to be from Boulder too, a few miles away from me. Weird.

2:05 Went upstairs to DQ and got the kids icecream cones.

2:15 Got everyone back in the car to meet Grammie.

2:30 Completed the Alex exchange with Grammie.

2:40 Called Becky to arrange to meet her at her house since it seemed silly for me to drive right by it on the way back.

3:15 Got to Becky's neighborhood, but Becky wasn't due until 4, so we went to Taco Bell. I had nachos. Ariel sat in a highchair and chewed on Adam's plasic cup.

4:00 Got to Becky's house, fed Ariel another bottle while we waited for Becky.

4:05 Becky arrived.

And sorry, today was a day without pictures. I was too lazy in the morning, and then in my attempt to reduce my workload from three children to one child, I forgot my camera. So here are some pictures I took this evening of some flowers I bought myself the last time I went to the store. (When was that, Wednesday? Why do we not have milk?)





And Bons, Speak was indeed a capabarra. And I think I'm horribly mangling that word but I'm too lazy to spell check it. Tick thought Speak was a dog, but he also thought Speak could talk. Here's Speak addressing the UN in Tick's hallucination:

July 6, 2006

I dedicate this post to my parents, who will hopefully soon find an internet cafe and check in.

7:00 Drop off

7:50 I put Ariel down for her nap. Normally I give her her paci and blanket and don't hear from her for at least an hour. But this morning she was very fussy. Her eyes were closed but she kept waking up crying.

8:10 I ran between getting they boys breakfast and replacing Ariel's paci and rubbing her belly. Finally she fell asleep.

8:35 Wake up. I changed a small poopy.

8:45 Bottle

9:15 Crissy called. We discussed what one does when one wants to pack a picnic lunch and one discovers one doesn't have any bread. By her suggestion, I packed cheese, triscuits, fruit and raisins. Hmmm, maybe I should do a real store trip?

9:45 We were finally ready to leave for our adventure for the day (I think it's not Fabulous™ unless Crissy is involved) - the Zoo!

10:40 Arrive at zoo entrance. First, we went to Tropical Discovery so Alex could see the bats.

Here's a capabara. I took this picture for Jeremy, who likes capabarras. We will name him Speak (a Tick reference):


11:30 Finally got out Tropical Discovery. Ariel had a bottle while the boys had our pitiful lunch.

12:00 Off to the the rest of the zoo. I'm glad I don't have to pay for Ariel to get in, she's happy just playing with her feet:



We saw the polar bears (this is for Crissy, she knows why :) :



A baby giraffe:



Awww, my boys:



We discussed the pea-family; peacocks, peahens, peachicks (didn't see any of those, but we saw baby ducks and baby geese). Know what comes out of pea-birds' butts? Pea-poop!



This poor fella was showing off for the reindeer, who were very not impressed. One reindeer beaned him on his pretty little bottom:



We saw another peacock showing off to a bored pidgeon. We only saw two peahens. The rest must be hiding from the overzelous males.

We fianlly made it across the zoo. It probably took an hour, Adam insisted on walking. At one point he was walking behind us, then bent down and licked the curb in front of a picnicing family and announced he was a polar bear.

Here's the boys on our carosal ride:



At this point, both the boys were getting pretty tired. We also needed to use the restroom. And while in the rest room, Alex managed to get his fingers pinched in the door. I was sitting on the potty thinking, "Wow, glad that's not my kid screaming. Isn't that weird that I know that's not my child's cry?" And then I got out and find that I have a pretty crappy maternal instinct.

1:45 I fed Ariel a bottle in the monkey house while the boys watched some particularly active inhabitants. Then we headed out towards the zoo exit.

2:30 After nearly 4 hours, we left the zoo.

2:35 Here's a mundane detail I'm adding just for dad. I was going to take I-70, but as we went over the highway, I could see that traffic was completely stopped. So I stayed on Colorado. We hit 270 and it looked slow too, but I got on because I didn't really know how else to leave. I then took 270 to I-76 to Wadsworth, so I could stop by the parent's house. (Oh, and later on the radio, I heard there was a bad accident at I-70 and Vasquez that had traffic backed up till at least 4:00).

3:10 By the time we had gotten to the parent's house to pick raspberries, both the boys were asleep. Which is funny because when I talked to Crissy about this side trip this morning, I decided the only reason to drive an extra 40 miles to pick raspberries was so they boys could see that food grows in places other than on the super market shelf. I left the boys in the car and Ariel and I picked raspberries. I got nearly a Holly Hobbit bowl full. And Parents, I do love you, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to be eating all these and not freezing them for you. Better than letting the birds have them, right? And some asides about your house:

- I may or may not have taken the last Hersey dark chocolate bar for my own nefarious purposes. I did, however, not touch the Christmas M&Ms. What year are those left over from???

- Tabitha is still alive. Though I suppose you would have heard much drama from Laura if she was not.

- I also saw Yum-Yum, but I did not venture into the cat room to check on the others.

- There is quite a bit of cat puke in your house. Since Laura wasn't doing anything with it, I didn't either.

- Your grass is dry, but that's probably good because it's getting long.

3:30 We left the parents house. The boys kinda woke up, but were quiet about it.

4:00 Got back to Boulder, and picked up some pictures. I promised Alex we would get "his" firework pictures printed. He's much better about the whole fireworks thing now (in the day, while looking at quiet pictures). He's even decided that he will go back to our country's birthday next year.

4:10 I ran by my doctor's office to pick up some pills.

4:30 Met Becky at CiCi's. Since Ariel (desperately) needed a diaper change and some food, Becky joined us for dinner. At dinner, I told Becky about my lastest Fabulous Plan™ - I have decided to pick up all the spare change I find, including pennies. If I pick up at least a penny a day, I'll get a free latte every year. But then I started thinking, sometimes I find more than one penny, sometimse I even find a dime or quarter. So I have no way of knowing out how long it takes to earn a free latte. Unless... I have a dedicated place to put my found change and keep track. I told this to Jeremy and he said, "Ok, Tom." And then I told it to Becky and she said, "So you are going to have a Dad-like change holder?" So Dad, here's my Starbucks-found-change-recepticle with my one found penny from CiCi's:

July 5, 2006

Happy Day after the 4th of July!

This was the weekend of vacations around here. Grammie and Pop-pop went to Detroit for a wedding. My parents are on a 6 week long odyssey traveling the north-east and up into the Maritime provences. Last I heard, they were in New York. Crissy and her little boys took a train to Grandma's house and Ariel went with her parents to Texas. My family's vacation was somewhat more local, we went up to Breckenridge for the weekend.

We left Saturday morning, and on the way up the hill, we stopped in Silver Plume and rode the Georgetown train and did the option silver mine tour. The boys likes it, but it was a bit long and Adam especially got antsy.

Sunday morning, we rode our bikes to Frisco (well, Jeremy and I rode, the boys sat in the trailer). We found a nice park in Frisco and the boys played. And Jeremy and I discovered that if he rides his cross-bike pulling a 70 lbs trailer, we are just about equalized. Good to know for future rides. In the afternoon, we went down to Breckenridge and got caught in a rainstorm. We hid out in Starbucks for nearly an hour until Jeremy ran back and got the car. In the evening we took a little walk outside to the beaver pond, only to discover that it was no more. But we had seen one on the road, so we drove over to that one and saw two beavers. The boys got to see them too, but just barely. We kept telling them to be quiet so the beavers wouldn't hide and Adam finally said, "I can't be quiet!" After the boys went to bed, I went back down to the pond and took over 100 pictures. Hey, I've never seen a beaver in the wild before, either!

On Monday, given the weather pattern, we decided we should do our outdoor activity as early as possible. We took a 50 minute "hike" around the top of the hill. Sadly for us, we forgot to pack bug stray, and non-whining children. Adam didn't like the pack, Alex didn't like walking and we all got tons of skeeter bites. On the way back down, I tried to duplicate my dad's Bertina hiking stories for Alex, making them age appropriate by changing Bertina's 1950 horror movie adventures to a squirrel named Milkweed who went on a hike with his friend Squirrel Nutkin. That worked, and Alex told us more squirrel stories all afternoon. After our hike, we went down to Breckenridge to see the Art festival, but got caught in another downpour. This time we were at the mini-mall with a bookstore.

Originally we had planned to do some summit county 4th activities, but with the weather we decided to head back early on Tuesday. I took Alex to the firework show in town. He stayed up until 9:45 and was a good camper until the show started. It was much larger and much louder than he had anticipated and he immediately asked to go home. We stayed for the show (and I took another 70 pictures) and he almost enjoyed it (huddled behind my back) until the grand finale, which WAS a bit bright and loud.

Pictures from this weekend can be found here.

7:00 Drop off, Ariel was asleep in her carseat.

9:00 Ariel finally woke up.

9:05 I changed a poopy

9:10 Bottle. I put Ariel in the exosaucer to get ready to go and Alex told me Ariel had another tooth. I have no idea what Alex actually saw, but Ariel does indeed have another tooth, the upper right center.

9:40 We walked to the library. And didn't stop at Starbucks. I had Alex ride in the stroller because we had left to late to walk at his snail pace. Ariel dozed a bit in the bjorn.

10:15 Storytime at the library. Today the library lady read a book that scared Alex so much that he had to get up and come over to me. Something about swamp monsters. Alex is very sensitive.

11:00 Walk home. Ariel dozed again.

11:40 Got home.

11:55 I tried to feed Ariel lunch, but alas there was no baby food. And I didn't have any sweet pototoes for Adam either, so I just gave Ariel a bottle. We sat on the front porch so we could watch the roofing truck loading shingles accross the street.

12:15 Ariel played while the boys had a picnic lunch.

I'm going to make a wild guess here that the "my first doll" is a gift from Grandma.


Ariel is a chewing machine.


The boys had PB&J, apples, raisins and squeezey yogurt:


12:45 Ariel went down for a crib nap.

1:15 I got Adam down for a nap too.

2:00 I read Alex more of the library book we had just gotten. It's a Beaverly Cleary book and it's almost a chapter book. It's about 4 year old twins and Alex has a whole lot in common with both of them.

2:45 Adam and Ariel both woke up.

2:50 Ariel had a bottle

3:00 We walked to the grocery store for dinner (no, I still haven't gotten my act together enough to meal plan). We got shrimp for dinner (cajun shrimp, cheese grits, green beans, spinach/tomato salad).

4:00 Got home. Ariel sat on the floor and played quietly with toys.

4:30 Pick up.