The End of July

I have to say, that it is much different being away from Utah for the 24th of July. No fireworks. No day off work. No barbaque. However, for the 24th of July I did get a visit from my friend Erin from Utah. I was sooooooooooo happy and excited for her to come for 3 days. Mostly we just hung out with my kids, but it was so nice to be together again. We are so much alike. We LOVE LOVE LOVE American Idol, and doing homaking kinds of stuff, and hiking. Thanks for sending her Chad, I definately owe you one. Here are pictures of the highlights.

These two pictures are of a hike we went on the St. Mary's glacier (and I stole them from Erin's blog-thanks!). It was one of the highlights of my summer because I love to hike, and I love beautiful places. It was about a mile hike, which was half up rocks, and half along a river with a bunch of waterfalls. I had Ruby in the baby carrier and Erin carried a bag with water and lunch. Levi walked the entire way, and loved it. Except for the chipmunks (which he calls Chip and Dales). He was scared of them and had to be held whenever one was remotely close to him. It was absolutely breathtaking. Worth the trip. It is a year-round glacier with a freezing cold lake at the bottom. The picture above was taken by some older women who walked by us and saw us with the kids and said "good for you guys" and asked if they could take our picture. The picture below is one of the waterfalls you pass on the way up.

While we were at home we started working on a 1000 piece puzzle, which we finished on Erin's last day here. This is a picture of Levi being "helpful" while Erin was working.

When I was in Utah in April Erin and I talked about making aprons when she came to visit. So we did. Here they are, they turned out pretty cute.We also had a camplfire in Noah's parents' backyard and roasted hotdogs and such things. Erin and I also made our first attempt at making potatoe salad, which was pretty tasty. Ruby loved watching the fire.

Aside from my fun with Erin, this month has brought a lot of growth in our little Ruby. She is so adorable and is getting so big fast. This month she got her first tooth (and second), has learned how to crawl on her hands and knees (instead of her army crawl), takes a tubby with no tubby seat, sleeps through the night (Hooray!!), and pulls herself up to standing on furniture. I can't believe that my little girl is getting so big. It is hard to imagine life without her. Levi still adores her. On Friday she followed him outside and he picked her up and put her on his train, and started pushing her around on our deck. Noah and I were up stairs and just heard all this laughing. We came down just in time to see her tumble off the train. But they are best friends.

The 4th of July!

This was Ruby's first 4th of July and cousin Ashley was here. Noah had to work during the day, but made it to the fireworks. We had a barbaque at Grams house and then went to Georgetown for fireworks. Georgetown is a little town up in the mountains, and the sound of the fireworks is amazing when it rolls down the canyons in the mountains. It is so majestic and beautiful. I love the fourth of July. I am so grateful to live in this country where we are so abundantly blessed.

Cousin Ashley

My Cousin Ashley Depew came to visit us this last week. She loves to take pictures of everything, so I got some amazing pictures. She is the sweetest girl ever. She is actually coming to college out here in the fall and we are so excited to see her more often. We had fun while she was here playing with the kids.

There is this amazing park in Highlands Ranch (a little town just East of us). Levi loves to go and play there, so we took Ashley to play one morning. The weather was beautiful, in the eighties.

This is Ruby in the man made creek. She loves to sit in it and slpash around.

Ruby and Ashley in the Creek!

This is Ashley and Levi running through the fountain. Levi was being a little timid, and just running around the edge of the fountain, so Ashley started running through with him. The water is freezing cold!!

Here is mommy and Ruby at the other fountain at the park.

This is LEvi climbing on the jungle gym. He loves doing this, and does really well. He is always the smallest kid that climbs to the top. Honestly, when he does this it scares me to death!

It is actually pretty tall. Levi is the highest one, towards the top!

That same say we went to the temple to the Denver Temple to take some pictures. The flowers there were gorgeous, and there were lots of butterflies and giant bees. The temple is closed for maintenance right now, so we had the grounds to ourselves. It was very peaceful.

SO Beautiful!!

Also so BEAUTIFUL!

My kidlets and me!

Ashley and my kidlets.

Ruby and her Cheetos!

Another park, and Levi using his muscles!

Our Beautiful Home

I thought that I would post these pics (taken by my cousin Ashley) of our Hiking trip to Roxborough State Park. These pics are taken about 2 miles from our house. We truly like in a beautiful place, right at the foot of the mountains. So if you like hiking and come to visit, we will probably take you there.

THE ROCKIES

On June 30 we went to a Colorado Rockies Baseball game. It was so fun. Our relator gave us tickets for 4, so the four of us and Grams went. We had a good time cheering on our Rockies (who lost after having a 8-3 lead-pathetic). That is one fabulous thing about living in Denver, there are a lot of sports. Once when the Rockies scored a home run, it was too loud for Levi and he covered his ears. He was being so funny that all the people around us were watchihng him and laughing. He is so full of life! Oh, and as you can see in the pictures, Ruby couldn't go to the baseball game without her Cheetos!!