Cheyenne Mountain Zoo

Today we spent the day at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs with Jeffs sister and brother-in-law. We had a great day there. Our favorite zoo; they have so much more to do there than just look at the amazing animals.

We startd our day off with feeding the giraffes

Next Lauren for a train ride

My favorite part of the day, feeding birds

Aunt Stephanies favorite animal (the moose)

And a first for Lauren, and her favorite part of the day, riding a pony. Her ponies name was Sunny, and Lauren did such a great job riding her! I'm so proud of her.

Thanks Aunt Stephanie and Uncle Gary for spending such a fun day with us. We had a great time seeing all the animals and being with you.

Weekend of Parties

Lauren started her weekend with a slumber party. Her friend Candyce came over and they had a great time playing together.

On Sunday my family gathered to celebrate my grandmothers 83rd birthday! Lauren had a lot of fun playing with all of cousins.

It was extra special because we got to have a brief visit with my uncle Lee who lives in New York. He is in Denver for the week the Democratic National Convention.

Olympic Hype

For the past two weeks we have spent each evening watching the olympics. Like many American kids, Lauren has found her new hero, Michael Phelps, or as she insists his name is "Michael Helps." We keep asking her if she wants to learn to be an olympic swimmer, which she does not, because "she will get water in her ears."

One of Jeffs co-workers and good friends son has made it to the semi-finals in the 110m hurdles. Wishing you lots of luck David Oliver!

Bad Mom

I am a bad mom. Okay, so maybe only a 90% bad mom. Today was Laurens first official day of the new school year and I forgot. She has been basically going to pre-school all summer long, but they haven't had a curriculum per say. During the summer the kids have a lot more outside play time, crafts, and field trips. When I arrived to drop her off this morning there were several kids who I did not recognize and missing a lot of the older kids who are usually there to greet us in the morning. Lauren spent the day with my mom on Friday, which was the last day for all the five year olds who are heading off to Kindergarten. Her teacher reminded me that this was the first day which they are starting the new school year curriculum.

Which means a year from now Lauren will be having her first day of Kindergarten. Yikes!!

I had aimed to be a sappy mom who would take her child to buy a special "first day of school" outfit and take pictures on the first day of every school year. I tried to redeem myself and I did take a few pictures of her after her first day of school, minus the token first day outfit.

This I guarantee, next year I won't forget, and I am sure that there will be a few tears to go along with the day.

Park Pictures

Saturday we attended a birthday party fat a park for one of Laurens classmates. She played her first game of baseball, and even got a hit.

Since Lauren began daycare she has been the only girl in her class. She is still with all those same boys in pre-school. During a soccer game at the party, Lauren decided to pick up the ball and run with it and got tackled by all the boys and ended up at the bottom of a pile up. After a short episode of crying she sought her revenge and took down another little boy. A pretty funny sight to see. It's a relief to know she can hold her own. That's my girl!

A Little Rain...or a BIG Lake

Yesterday we had quite the rainstorm. Jeff was thrilled to have some rain for his beloved lawn. I love rain; the smell, the sound. We have a large green belt behind our house which temporarily became a lake.

Back to Reality...

We just returned from a very fun and relaxing 10 day trip to Kansas and Oklahoma. We started our trip in Kansas where Lauren was a flower girl in Jeff's cousins wedding along with Laurens cousin Lily. They looked adorable

Pictures with the bride at the reheasal

Lauren and Lily: adorable flower girls

Lauren and the beautiful bride Megan

We then headed to Oklahoma to spend a few days with Lily and her mom (Jeff's sister Erica.) We had a great time and it was great for Lauren and her best friend/cousin Lily to spend a few days together. We did a lot of swimming and went to an amusement park and a children's museum.

Getting a charactuture drawing

For the last few days of our trip we headed back to Kansas to spend a few days with Jeff's parents. Lauren had a great time swimming and had her first golf game.










Now we are home and and back to reality; back to work and school for Lauren. We are coming to the realization that yet another summer is winding down. Jeff mentioned this weekend that there are only 147 days until Christmas... where does the time go?