Working at Home

I thought I would take a moment to let you all see where I work now.

First the desk. Trust me, it is not always this clean. In fact, it is never this clean.

Next, take a look at Caleb's table, aka the printer.

Now for the view. This is the only window that I can see from my desk. It's a good thing the views are nice. Depending on the season I get to see this tree in it's various stages. I love it!

This is the floor where the little one plays, obviously. This picture was taken after only 5 minutes of play, so as you can imagine it get's much worse!

And finally, if I look over the balcony of the loft where my office is, I can see the culprit of the floor "organization".

We are on our way to Glenwood Springs for the weekend. I'll post a report when we return. Happy weekend to all!!

Titanic Runner

Saturday Campbell had a fun run for school. She had to be there at 9 am to do a mile and a half run. She got up, put on her marathon shirt and a skort. Even when running little miss girly girl has to wear a dress. She also put on her runnign shoes that Poppie got her. After breakfast we headed over to the school for her run. She lined up and took off running when Mr. H said "GO!" She ran the entire thing. We were very proud of her.

After her run, we headed over to a local park for Aaron's work picnic. We spent about 3 hours there just having fun. Campbell made a new friend. Caleb loved playing on the tractor playground. He also loved the balloons and feeding ice cubes to the dogs. There were plenty of games for the kids. They played water balloons and had three legged races. They also did the mentos/coke trick. We all had a great time.

On Sunday we took the kids to the Museum of Nature and Science. Campbell has been begging us to take her to see the Titanic exhibit. The whole exhibit was very cool! We each got our boarding pass before we went through the doors. We got to see artifacts from the ship. We even got to touch a piece of the ship. at the end of the exhibit was a list of passengers and whether they survived or not. We looked at the names on our boarding passes and found the names on the list. My person survived but Aaron's and Campbell's did not.

After the tour, Aaron and Campbell went to watch the IMAX movie they had on the Titanic. I decided not to go and to stay out with Caleb. I don't think he would have made it through the movie. Instead I took him to Discovery Zone which is just a play area for kids. We also went down to Space Oddessey and played astronaut. Campbell loved the movie and Caleb loved the play time, so it worked for everyone.

It was a great weekend filled with exercise, play, and learning.

First Day of School

Today was the first day of school, for both kids.

Campbell went to third grade today. When did she get big enough for third grade? And when did Aaron and I get old enough to have a third grader? She was very excited to get to school today. She said that she had a hard time going to sleep. She has had her first day outfit picked out since July. She was up and dressed within five minutes this morning. I fixed her waffle and told her I wanted her to eat the entire thing. She ate it in about 30 seconds. We fixed her hair, brushed her teeth and headed to bus stop. We certainly didn't need the entire hour to get ready this morning.

Caleb was thrilled to be going to the bus stop this morning. He kept talking about the bus all morning. However, when it came time for Campbell to get on the bus, he wasn't so thrilled. He wanted his sister to stay with him.

Caleb had his first day of Child Watch today. I got a membership to the Y so that I can work out and he can play with other kids. Today was the first day. He really enjoyed himself. He didn't even blink when I left the room. I came back after my hour of exercise to find him playing with another little boy. Miss K said that he did really well and had no problems. Hopefully he will continue to enjoy his "school".

Campbell only had a half day at school today, so she was home in time for lunch. She said she had a great day. Ten minutes after getting home, she was already working on her homework. That's our girl.

From Monkey to Fireman

The other morning I walked into Caleb's room and caught him climbing out of his crib. I have caught him in the act a couple of times. We had been trying to decide when to get him a big boy bed. I guess he decided he was ready now. Aaron plans to build him a boat bed ala P*ottery B*arn. I know, though that with his schedule this will take a while. Therefore, I opened our local craigslist. Let me just tell you all this is a great place. It's like a garage sale online. Aaron was even able to get a workbench for free the other day. I found the perfect bed for Caleb at less than half the retail cost. Score!

When Aaron came home with the bed last night Caleb could not have been more excited for the "vrooma". He went to sleep in it just fine last night and didn't want to get up this morning. He is one happy fireman!

Elmo Potty

Caleb has been showing some interest in using the potty. The kids and I headed over to the giant baby store the other day and got some stuff for him to try the potty thing. We got a little seat for the potty. The seat has Elmo's all over it and he is thrilled! He loves this potty and wants to sit on it all the time.

We also found cute little potty book for him to read. He loves reading it while he sits on the potty. The first day that we really gave it a try, he went "pee-pee" both times. Campbell and I squeeled with delight and made a big fuss about what a big boy he was. We also made a call to Daddy so that he could also tell him what a big boy he was.

What was Caleb's favorite part? His favorite part of the process was to flush the potty and say "bye-bye Pee-pee!" We are being cautiously optimistic that this kid might actually like to be potty trained and will learn quickly. One can hope, right?

We have since started trying pullups. He gets to choose in the morning if he wears a diaper or pullups. I ask which he wants to wear and he either says "Baby Dada" which means "baby elmo diapers" or "Bob Builda dacda" which means "Bob the Builder Tractor pullups". He is about half and half on which one he chooses. We are taking this slow and letting him decide his course of action. Now we have a problem, though. I think I bought the very last package of Bob the Builder pullups in size 4 that was ever made. I can't find them anywhere. All I can find are Diego from Dora. Caleb has no interest in Diego.

Sugar Cookies

On the way back from our dune fun we stopped at the little creek at the base of the dunes. We wanted to let the kids get wet and have a lot of fun. This really was like going to the beach only we were in Colorado instead of Carolina. Both kids jumped right in and waded in the water. In most places the water was only ankle deep. The places it was deeper, was where people had dug holes to make a little pool for themselves. It was when Aaorn put on his swimming trunks that things got dirty.

Aaron decided first to act like an alligator in the creek. Caleb thought his was a whole lot of fun. Then Aaron decided to introduce Campbell to the art of Sugar Cookies. To do a proper sugar cookie, you must first get yourself wet head to toe. Once your are sufficiently wet, your run to the nearest dry sand and roll around in it. You must make sure you get sand over your entire body. You are then a sugar cookie. Both kids decided that this was a great game. Even Caleb wanted in on this one. All three of them were extremely sandy. In fact, I am still trying to get sand out of the kids' hair.

After the sand fun we decided to head back to the lodge to check in. Before we could get in the car though I required everyone to shower off in the showers that were provided. Little did I know that the water was not heated. The family was not pleased with the shower rule. We decided instead that we would just go into the changing rooms to change our clothes and wipe down with the towel. This worked much better. Although, Campbell was not pleased with the fact that the changing room did not have a roof.

We made our way back to the lodge. We got checked in and took proper showers. From our room we had a great view of the dunes. They also had hummingbird feeders outside the rooms, so we got to watch the hummingbirds. We then headed down to the restaurant for dinner. While there we noticed people coming in soaking wet. Apparently shortly after we left the dunes a huge rain storm blew in and everyone got soaked. Even the campers who were camped out near the dunes were coming in for some hot food.

We headed back to the dunes after dinner for a little more fun. We got there only to find that the water was much deeper and running a lot more quickly than when we had left. We decide to just do some drawing in the wet sand and take some pictures. We did not go back up the dunes. We then headed back to the lodge to sleep. On our way back we saw two very large bull elk. They were only about 50 yards from the road, so we got a great view of them. Everyone slept very well that night.

Sunday morning we were going on a 4 wheel tour of the dunes. We got up and headed down for breakfast. After some not so stellar service, we finally finished our breakfast and boarded the truck for our drive. It was a 4 wheel drive truck that had a bed on the back with seats. So our seating area was open air. Apparently the rain the night before had been really bad and they didn't know how far we would be able to go.

The trip started out fine. We saw a doe mule deer just laying amongst the trees. Campbell really enjoyed seeing her so close to us. Then we saw the cars that were stuck. Some campers who had been camping in the area got stuck in the rain. These cars, though, could be easliy pulled through the puddle they were stuck behind so we didn't think it could be that bad. That's when we realized how bad it could be.

We rounded a couple of corners and found a backhoe that was stuck in the sand/water mix that acted as quick sand. This didn't look good. We all got off the truck and walked down to the creek while the drived tried to see what he could do about the backhoe that was in our way. On our walk down to the creek we saw several areas where the ground had just been washed away. On our way back up the hill we found an entire picnic site that had been washed away. The area here was so washed away that the road no longer existed. The campers that were in the back country had no way of getting out of the area, even with 4 wheel drive. There simply was no place for them to drive. It was deteremined that a new road would have to be bulldozed to get them out.

Our 4 wheel drive excursion was over at that point. We all loaded back onto the truck and headed back to the restaurant. We decided to go ahead and drive home at that point. We drove through some very desolate farm country on our way back. We stopped and had lunch and ice cream in a very small town. Finally we hit the prettier mountainous area to drive through. The drive wasn't so bad for the kids and I as we slept most of the way. Aaron is the one who go to see all the landscape, good or bad.

This was one of our favorite trips ever. We had such a wonderful time. We plan to head back there again. Next time we are going to take sleds and will NOT be wearing flip flops!

Warning: Do Not Wear Flip Flops

This past weekend we decided we would take the kids to Great Sand Dunes National Park. Each time we would tell someone where we were going we got the same response "I've heard that place is great, although, I've never been". We determined that it was the greatest place that no one has ever been to. Well, after having been there it is the greatest place ever!

We made hotel reservations at the only place in "town". You see it really wasn't a town. They just had the lodge, campsites, a gas station, and a restaurant. The nearest town to the park was a good 30 miles away. Saturday morning we packed up the car for our adventure and made the 3 or so hour drive south.

We stopped in the last town before the park and grabbed some picnic grub. We arrived at the park around 1:00. We paid our entrance fee, stopped at the visitor's center, and then found a picnic table. They had dozens of picnic sites set up with tables, grills, and bear proof trash cans. We quickly ate our sandwiches and chips and headed to the dunes. Campbell made sure to read us the warning about bears and leaving your food out.

At the bottom of the dunes there is a creek. Apparently, this creek is not always running and you are not guaranteed to see any water on your visit. On saturday we did have just a bit of water. Enough to play around in and get wet. We waited to get wet until after we had climbed some dunes. You see, these dunes are the largest dunes in the US. We were very excited to do some dune climbing.

Aaron and I both wore flip flops (see the warning above) and the kids both had on sandals. We all learned very quickly that the sand was HOT! We would later learn that the sand can easily reach 140 degrees. We climbed a small dune and threw down our blanket and pulled out the sand toys. Caleb decided that this was the best sand box he had ever been to. What kids wouldn't love 65 square miles of sand box. Campbell and Aaron rolled down the dunes a couple of times and just generally had a blast.

Then the warning above came into play. I sent Campbell across to another dune so that I could take a picture of her. After taking the picture, I decided that I would go meat her across the dune. Well...we knew to throw our shoes down the dune and then roll down to meet them. We would then put our shoes back on to go up the dune. While I was going up a dune, one of my flip flops came off. I searched and searched. Aaron searched and searched. We never did find that shoe. The sand was hot though, and I was trying to figure out how I could get one of Caleb's diapers on my foot to make it back to the car. That's when Aaron saw it. A lone shoe was sitting at the bottom of another dune. Apparently someone else had lost their shoe as well. Aaron retrieved it and we headed back to the car. We will let the picture speak for itself.

Come back soon for the rest of our adventure.