Clickety!

I wanted to share LOTS of pictures and the easiest way to do that is to tell you all to click--

Here

...and here

...again here

...and, one last time, here.

Enjoy! :o)

Our weekend in pictures

Enjoy these pictures from our day up at Rocky Mountain National Park for Father's Day. We had been wanting to go to the park for some time but never have, so with it being a holiday weekend and free enterance, we took advantage. We headed up the Grand Lake side of the park, stopped to take in some pretty sights on the way up and then partook in a picnic once we were in the park. Overall, we had a great time but we will have to go back soon to see parts of the park that we missed. You certainly can't see everything in one day! Too much beauty to be seen. We are very blessed to live in such of a beautiful state.












From top to bottom:
-Our family in front of a beautiful roadside waterfall on the way up to Rocky Mountain National Park from the Grand Lake side.
-Cara, pointing to the roaring waters.
-Caitlin up at Berthoud Pass & the Continential Divide. Notice the elevation and presence of snow!
-Our family up at one of the highest points on Trail Ridge Road. The wind was blowing something fierce!
-Caitlin, being sworn in as an official Junior Park Ranger for Rocky Mountain National Park. The ranger made an announcement, people clapped for her, and she got her badge pinned on. Quite the ceremony.
-A snowfield up at the Alpine Visitor's Center. We are up at 11,700+ feet. As were were leaving, it was snowing, which quickly turned into hail and then rain.
-Ben & the girls in front of one the snowfields. Look how high the snow is--in June! Doesn't Ben look like such of a proud dad?
-Elevation at the "top of the trail" of Trail Ridge Road. At this point, we think that Cara was suffering from a pressure headache. BIG change in elevation from our place (a mile high) to here (more than TWO MILES high). We forgot that her shunt might protest to the change. Poor girl just slept it off.
-Beautiful Never Summer Mountains
-A very bold and beautiful rainbow as we were exiting the park. We went from wind, snow/rain and 46 degrees to partly sunny and 78!

P.S. If you click the individual pictures, they will open up to a larger size. :)

Family Outings

We are really very blessed to live in the Denver metro area, with it's abundance of places to go and things to see. Making memories with the girls is so much fun! Here are a few places that we've visited so far this month.

The Denver Museum of Nature & Science. It was their monthly free day, so we decided to take advantage. After struggling to find a parking spots and dealing with the crowds, we headed to the space exhibit followed by the kid's Discovery Zone and finally up through the Animals of North American displays. It was so much fun to explain things to the girls and to watch them explore and get excited at seeing certain things.



We are members (thanks Mom & Dad) of the Denver Zoo, so now, we can go for an hour or to see a particular animal without feeling guilty of wasting money. We went this past Saturday and focused on the bears and primates. We marveled and how much we have in common with primates and loved watching a newborn baby monkey explore his new home. The weather in Denver was perfect for our zoo visit, about 60 degrees, so we were able to see a lot of the animals roaming around outside. Heck, it felt like spring and we walked the zoo without coats!



What have you been doing with YOUR families?

Mother-Daughter Time

I have often felt very guilty that Caitlin is getting shafted, in terms of having quality time with me, because of it seems that 90% of my time is devoted to Cara and her various therapy sessions and doctors appointments. Despite our crazy schedule, I still try so hard to carve out time for Cait & I--just the two of us. Usually, it's just simple things like coloring together, working on a lesson from her Kindergarten readiness workbook or reading. Sunday, however, I noticed that Caitlin was a bit "out of sorts"--whining and crying more than she normally does. I decided that the cure for her troubles was some "Mommy" time. She has been having to share me with not only her little sister but also my best friend's two children who have been staying with us since November. That gets tough on a kid after awhile.


The cure, you ask? A trip to the restaurant of her choice--TGIFriday's were we dined, colored and laughed. Caitlin devoured her ribs with mandarin oranges washed down with a blue raspberry slush. In between bites, we talked about what was going on her in world and about things at home. As I thought, Caitlin is eager to have our household return to normal again so that she can have more time with both of her parents. I loved having this heart-to-heart with Cait as it gave me a chance to tell her that I loved her, cherished the time that we spent together and that she has voice in our family affairs. We did, though, have a talk about how acting out doesn't get one the kind of attention one wants. Hopefully, in the future, she will feel that she can approach Ben or I when she's feeling sad or left out and work on a remedy for the problem.

We had such a great time that I want to do it again. This time, we are going to go for tea (scroll down to The Tea Box), like grown-up Victorian girls! I met a friend there once for a fresh mint tea latte that was wonderful! Not to mention the cranberry scone that we split. I think I'm going to enjoy Caitlin as a big girl, just as much as I have enjoyed her thus far. A whole new world of things to do together has opened up!