Photos

I’m On Top of the World!

Published on by Casey

On our way home from Granby, we opted to take the scenic route through Rocky Mountain National Park and it was a great decision! Not only did we get to see some moose establishing a pecking order,

 MooseFight

but Trail Ridge Road was cleared! Trail Ridge Road is the highest continuous highway in the continental US, and takes up to over 12,000-feet in elevation. CDOT tries to have the road cleared by Memorial Day, annually, and often it still closes at night due to runoff icing. This is not a road you want to slip and slide around turns! But the views at the top are spectacular! And how often does one have the opportunity to stand next to a 10-foot plus wall of snow?

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SnowWall

Granby Getaway

Published on by Casey

In addition to Logan’s first s’more this month, he also had his inaugural camping trip. Over memorial day weekend, we headed up dem der hills to Lake Granby for a weekend off-grid.

First order of business before setting up camp was to remove all the moose scat from the tent pad. Welcome to Colorado, folks!

MooseScat

GranbyCampsite

The lake was a bit dry, unfortunately but it didn’t diminish from our great views of the the mountains and some beautiful sunsets! I truly think Colorado has some of the best skies in the country!

GranbySunset

Logan had a blast camping! He slept well (other than freezing one night, thanks for the false forecasts Weather Channel), loved fishing and playing in the dirt with his tractors. Of course, Miss Priss, Lava felt it was her job to lay inside protect the tent from invaders.

 BaconFace

LavaTent

In fact, our camping trip went so well that we’re going to do it again Labor Day weekend!

FamilyPhotoOp

S’mores!

Published on by Casey

Since we have a big backyard, we decided we need to make it more inviting for fun and comfortable. We upgraded our seating arrangements from a wooden park bench to a multiple piece table and chair set. We also found a great LP fire pit on Craigslist! That fire pit is a highlight of our summer!

MallowToast

We started a new summer tradition to end the weekend with s’mores on Sunday nights. To make the tradition more fun we would also invite friend or neighbors over to share the sticky goodness with us. This new tradition also gave birth to Logan enjoying his first s’more.

FirstSmore

“I don’t want to be three, I want to 16!”

Published on by Casey

Yes, that is a direct quote from none other than Logan. Oh how my little boy tries to grow-up too fast!

This little boy also happens to love tractors.  Any tractor will do really: John Deer, CAT, Volvo… That coupled with daddy working in construction made picking a birthday party theme easy: Construction! I had a lot of fun planning this party and had planned on setting up some great outdoor decorations as well. However, Mother Nature had other ideas and dumped 11″ of snow on the day of Logan’s party. Thankfully only a couple of his friends were unable to come due to the weather, one of which was the only other preschool age boy invited. That left a construction themed party to be attended by 5 girls and 2 boys (one of which is only 10 months old)! Yet, they all had a great time playing with the tractors, tool work bench and balloons. One of the girls even declared she was going to be a “worker” when she grew up. Each of the guests received construction hat and a traffic-cone shaped cup to help get them into character.

I really enjoyed making Logan’s cake this year. By far the easiest and most fun to date (no-piping). Noah and my BFF commented that it reminds them of the Discovery Channel show, “Gold Rush”.

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Additional party pictures can be seen here.

Pictures!

Published on by Casey

I’ve created a Shutterfly picture Share Site and will be uploading pictures to it on a regular basis.

If you would like to be a member of the site (and have the ability to order prints) let me know. If I like you, I’ll give permission. 🙂

More on the Kitchen Remodel

Published on by Casey

A few months ago we finally selected the tile for the back splash. Until last week, it sat in our garage taking up valuable parking space. But Noah finally had some time to install and grout the tiles – and I love it! It is such a dramatic change to the kitchen but in a good way! And, we probably couldn’t have found tiles that better match the color of the cabinets and granite!


Here’s a shot Noah sent me from his phone that shows the start of the installation. As you can tell, the kitchen previously did not have any back splash. Actually, the old counter tops just had the Formica that rounded up along the wall.

 

These images are with the installation complete, but pre-grout:

 

 

And now for some close-ups post-grout:

 

 

Now that the stove has been put back and items replaced on the counter tops, I absolutely love it! It’s gorgeous!

Vegas Vacation

Published on by Casey

It sounds a bit cliche to say we spent “New Year’s in Vegas”, but we did, sort of. Technically we were in Henderson, right outside of Vegas proper, and only went into Vegas to look at guns and airplanes. Oh boy, it sounds bad when put together like that.

In reality, my lovely cousin Bonny and her husband, Sonny, asked us to visit them for New Year’s. As Noah and I both had time off work we jumped at the opportunity to get out of town for a few days and headed out on the open road. Twelve hours of night driving was worth the visit. We had not seen Bonny and Sonny since a quick stop-over in 2010. We had a fabulous time as evidenced by the following photos:


Bonny lovin’ on Logan (like it’s hard)

 
Dog bone crowned princesses

Happy New Year!

May 2013 bring you great times with good friends!

First Snow of the Season!

Published on by Casey

In the metro area, the first snow typically falls around the middle of October. Since I moved here in 2006, that has been the case (+/- a day or two) with the exception of 2008, where our first snow did not fall until November 14th and 2010 where the first snow fell on November 9th. This year, however, the seasons first snow came about two weeks early and fell this morning! We didn’t get more than a dusting, but we are expected to get around 1″ more tonight!

In the summer our garage typically gets taken over with pet projects and Noah and decide that it needs to be cleaned out by mid-October, or the first snowfall, whichever comes first. Well, the first snow has come and my garage has a pallet of concrete sitting in the middle of the floor, plus a few of the old kitchen cabinets that need hung still. Thus, my car looked like this, this morning:

 

This tree is outside my office and looked so pretty!

 And, if you would like to keep tabs of this season’s snowfall, check here periodically.

Fare thee well 1980s kitchen

Published on by Casey

In April, we started a full-fledged kitchen remodel. Complete with new paint, cabinets, counter tops, sink/faucet, range and microwave. Whew! Six months later we finally selected a back splash tile and still don’t have a matching dishwasher. All in good time.That said, I absolutely love my new kitchen – the double range, the large center island, and of course, the granite counter tops!

Here’s a bit of what the kitchen looked like before: peachy-colored walls, white cabinets, white appliances (except for my fridge) and formica counter tops. Our house was designed with an eat-in kitchen, but we have and addition that serves as a dining space, thus we added an island from Big Lots. Don’t know how I ever managed without an island!

Here’s Logan showcasing the island and sidewall cabinets, before the counter tops and baseboards were installed. The sidewall previously did not have any cabinets, but we kept a buffet there for storage instead.

And finally, one of the “finished” images that shows the counters, cabinets, and appliances (just ignore the mess. If you have ever done a remodel, you’ll understand). 🙂

Once the back splash is installed (hopefully later this month) I’ll post some pictures of that. There are also a couple areas that still need baseboards re-installed and trim placed at the top of a couple cabinets. We also still need to buy the exhaust filter for the microwave. One day…I never need to use the exhaust fan anyway.

It’s fantastic to have the extra storage and the large island workspace. And Logan enjoys hiding in one of the sidewall cabinets we kept empty for him.