Eldorado Canyon SP

The (stupid) weather forecast has predicted thunderstorms every day for the last few weeks (including today). It's really translated to about 15 minutes of nastyness late in the afternoon each day, but blue skies the remainder of the day. So the predict today said 11 am the storms could arrive, so we hit the trail early (8 am).

The view from the Rattlesnake Gulch trail

We drove up between Golden and Boulder to Eldorado Canyon State Park. We started off on the Fowler train and continued on the Rattlesnake Gulch trail. This trail climbed 1200 feet in less than 1.5 miles to the continental divide overlook.

Family photo op after climbing 1200' in <>

The views during the climb were wonderful! We could see the entire canyon and the eastern plains. Once we made it to the top, we took in views towards the mountains as well as the canyon walls while eating our picnic lunch.

Continental Divide Overlook, top of Rattlesnake Gulch

We took the loop portion of the trail the wrong direction (woops!) but it turned out (for us) that going up was easier than going down. The trail was pretty steep with loose rock, so it was easy to lose your step as you went down.

Cooling off in Boulder Creek

Once we finished this hike, we took the girls to the freezing cold Boulder Creek for a dip. Dave took his shoes and socks off and waded in the water with the girls. He didn't last long and nearly got frostbite because the water was so cold. Funny how the girls didn't even seem to mind! [That's huskies for you!]

A surprise cave

We finished our time at Eldorado Canyon SP by watching some rock climbers while hiking the Streamside trail. We couldn't believe how brave these climbers were. Reminded us of those climbing El Capitan in Yosemite! The end of this hike treated us with a nice little cave. The girls had a good time listening to us make loud echos.

Flatirons Vista trail outside of Boulder

The weather showed no signs of getting worse (go figure, I feel like they have consistently been wrong this summer!). So on our way home, we stopped to hike the Prairie and Flatiron Vista trails outside of Boulder. I really enjoy how different these foothills are than those by our house. We made it home by 3 pm with two sufficiently exhausted Siberians!

Jumpin' for Joy

Last week, the team from one of the programs I work had a party. If you know our team at all, you know that something simple like a BBQ or Potluck just doesn't fit our style. So we took work parties to new heights: we spent an afternoon bouncing off the walls at Jumpstreet.

Manager Mark trying to take out his entire team...

We had a blast scaring little children off the tramps and even more fun smacking eachother in dodgeball. We started off in an astro-turf arena but worked our way to the trampoline dodgeball area where dare I say we got taken to the cleaners by kids.

Slacker Sellers does the bare minimum to achieve the goal of slapping my hand!

Only one person got injured and it didn't come as much of a surprise given that he managed to injure his back reading a book at work. :)

Quite possibly the funniest picture of the day-- look at Andy's face!

I'm glad to be part of a team that can make a fool of itself-- I fit right in!

"On the count of 3: 1.... Andy!"

Thanks Bill for being our wonderful photographer!

Copy dogs

And for the video of the week, we've got a funny video of the girls imitating mom and dad howling. When we took the girls to the fireworks, our friends kids made howling noises and Sequoia immediately copied them. So we tried it ourselves tonight and this is what we got:

[Note: Belle's previous owner had her vocal cords removed, but you've got to give her an A for effort!]

Timmy fell in the well?

Sometimes I wish we had as sensitive of a nose and ears as our four-legged friends (dogs). Today, Belle got my intention to go outside (which she doesn't even do to when she needs to go to the bathroom!), managed to convince me to go down the deck stairs, and attempted to point out something to me by this tree in our backyard.

Click to enlarge and see Belle's cycle of curiosity

I have no idea what she saw, but after watching her do the above pictured cycle of going to the sidewalk and staring up, walking down to the tree and jumping on it for over 20 minutes, I KNEW she sensed something.

Click to enlarge and see Belle's cycle of curiosity

Sequoia wasn't nearly interested (that's the real surprising piece), but they both were intently sniffing the base of the tree. Almost as of some other animal marked its spot there.

It bothers me a bit that I can't find what they so obviously smell or hear. [For those of you who know Belle well know that its very out of character for her to cry and jump at a tree].

Hmmm... guess I'll never know!

South Valley Park

By the time church and errands were complete, most of our Sunday had passed. So we decided our weekly hike had to be someplace local. We decided on South Valley Park about 15 minutes from our house. Located adjacent to Deer Creek Canyon, the JeffCo open space area featured meadows, red-rock formations, and views of evergreen-filled foothills.

We hiked two trails totaling 3 miles -- the Shallow and Coyote Song trails. The panoramic views along the Shallow trail were unexpected. A little less protected, the girls got pretty hot and we had to stop a few times for them to lap up some water. Sequoia learned quickly how to drink from my CamelBak. I think she enjoyed this more than their hiking water-bowl (perhaps because the water was so cold?).

After we reached the north parking lot, we stopped to let the girls experience the doggy drinking fountain. Who knew there was such a thing? Belle was so thirsty I think she drank upwards of a gallon from that fountain!

We picked up the Coyote Song trail from here and took that back to the car. This trail took us closer up against the sandstone formations and at this point, the sun had gone behind the foothills, so we stayed much cooler.

This park surpassed our expectations and provided a nice local hike for the girls. As you can tell, they are now pretty exhausted!

Sequoia on the drive home -- exhausted.

Work hard to play hard!

In thanks for our efforts the last few months at work, our program threw a BBQ at Progress Park today. All of the managers grilled hamburgers and beer brats and Rachel coordinated tons of fun activities for the kids (and adults, too!). They launched rockets, played tug of war, had a water-balloon toss contest, and of course, water fights!

Layne popped a water balloon on himself

My favorite round of tug-of-war was the Systems group (right) versus the Space group (left). We were horribly out-numbered (as my boss would say-- Space is always over-mass!) and fell hard to the space segment folks. I think we should've tried our hands at the ground segment; I'm pretty sure we would've won!

Space segment (L) vs Systems (R) Tug of War

The evening ended with a water fight. It started out innocent with little water guns, but quickly grew to water bottles, buckets, and coolers of ice. I'm pretty sure I got my boss more soaked than he got me, so I consider that a good day! Seriously, how often do you get to have a water fight with your boss? Despite the occasionally long hours, our group has a pretty great dynamic!

We're all together!

It's not very often (anymore) that we get the entire family together. We were very thankful that we got to enjoy a nice long weekend all together celebrating Jen and Shaun. The weekend concluded with a nice Sunday brunch in Appleton. Knowing that it's hard to get everyone in the same city, we made sure we had a family photo taken.

After lunch, we took off for the 4-5 hour drive back to Rochester. We ended our weekend eating dinner at Victoria's-- not only our favorite Italian restaurant, but the site for our rehearsal dinner some 4 years ago. It really was a wonderful weekend and sure went by too fast. It was hard saying goodbye this morning, but we will cherish the memories we created this weekend. [And I'm pretty sure we will be repeating the phrase 'I don't care' for some time to come! ;P ]

Congratulations Jen and Shaun!

Jen and Shaun's outdoor wedding at Lambeau Cottage was just beautiful. Jen's sister, Abby, sang the opening song-- "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and it was magical. If you recall, both Jen and Abby sang at our wedding; they are the two best singers I have ever heard.

Abby sings "Somewhere Over the Rainbow"

We thought it was really unique that they had "Oh, the places you'll go" for one of their readings. And I just loved their sand ceremony. The metaphor of two types of sand mixing to become one and never to be separated is really neat.

We all had a great time at the reception, too. It wouldn't be a Nimtz dinner without a few silly antics. I sure hope we didn't scare Abby's boyfriend, Sam, though!

Jenny surprised Shaun after their first dance by singing to him for the bridal party dance. It was so sweet!

First dance

We stayed til the end of the night enjoying several dances together. I even got my mom to do the Cha-cha slide with me! It was a blast! Just as Grandma told us on our wedding day, we hope that Jen and Shaun's marriage is as beautiful as their wedding!

Jen sings to her new husband!

Bouquet toss

Lambeau Field!

The morning of the wedding, we joined my parents in touring Lambeau Field. While Dave and I had taken this tour a few years ago when we were in town for a friends wedding, my parents had never taken the official tour.

We really enjoyed the tour guides stories, the few from the luxury box seats, and were impressed at the waiting list for season passes. They say the average turnover is 70 people a year, and the waiting list is over 80,000 people. You can will your tickets, so it's often several generations later when someone finally gets season tickets. And no, Favre leaving didn't change this. They had a 3,000 person increase just last year alone! I cannot imagine waiting a lifetime for tickets.

My favorite part of the tour is walking through the players tunnel. They pipe in the stadium crowd and the jock-jams song as you take the same steps each Packer takes each Sunday. It gives you chills! [and I suppose on many winter Sundays, it does for the players, too!]

We took pictures down on the field and we even touched the grass. Of course, we also chanted "Go Pack Go!" as a group. I just love the Green Bay Packers!

It's a small world afterall!

After a week alone with the girls, I left them with their wonderful sitters, Mark and DeAnna and took off for Minnesota. I met Mike, who flew from San Diego, at DIA where we took the quick 2-hour flight to Minneapolis. It's quite often I'm reminded of how small this world really is and Thursday was no exception. Who do I see boarding the same aircraft in Denver as us? Mark Wilson: a friend from college who now lives in Sunnyvale, CA. He and his girlfriend were flying home to MN for the weekend as well. Neither of us had any idea we were both going back home.

Family at Lambeau Cottage in Green Bay, WI

After arriving to my parents home very late, we went immediately to bed (2:30 am) as we were going to be up and on the road bright-and-early the next day. We stopped in WI Rapids to have a nice lunch with Grandpa. Grandpa had never had lasagna, so my mom made her delicious lasagna recipe with hot breadsticks. It was yummy! After lunch, we picked up dad's parents and headed to Green Bay.

Dave and I on the shores of Green Bay

After checking into our hotel, we got cleaned up and headed to the shores of Green Bay for my cousin, Jenny's rehearsal. Her and her to-be-husband met not far from the Lambeau Cottage where their wedding would take place. After 9 years of courtship, they were both pretty excited to tie the knot! It was a beautiful location and despite the evening heat beating down, the rehearsal went well.

Dad, Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Dave

We made sure to take a few family photos in this beautiful setting before heading to a local bar and grill for the rehearsal dinner. The burgers were fantastic and the company wasn't too shabby either! :)

Grandma and Grandpa with the bride-to-be

We ended the night with play-time in the hotel pool. As most of you know, Dave and I have always enjoyed goofing off together at pools. Tonight was no different. We played water-basketball with my dad where I think we spent an hour trying to each make full-court shots!

Good Job Shoemakers!

I'm bummed I didn't get to be there today in MN as Dave, his brother, and father all competed in the Lifetime Fitness Tri. The results are in-- everyone did GREAT! Dave's 1+ mile swim was at a 2:01/100m pace, his bike averaged 21 mph and his 10K run was at a 7:22 pace.

I know they all worked very hard these past few months and should be very proud! I've got to give props to my hubby-- his transition times look to be much improved. I know that was one of his big goals. And I'm sure racing in all that humidity couldn't be easy for someone used to training in the dry-climate of CO!
It would've been neat to watch all 3 Shoemakers out there together. Maybe next year they will all come out here to do a race!

Cold Day in July

My quick one-day work trip to Cali wasn't weather-wise what I had expected for mid-July. It was actually cold!

I can't believe that in all my time living in CA that I had never heard of "June Gloom" until this week. Apparently, desert air pulls in cool air from Alaska causing a smog-like appearance of clouds called the marine layer. All this time, I had chalked up the gloomy clouds to smog, but perhaps it was this so-called June Gloom I had always seen.

After enjoying an early dinner of blackened avocado halibut on the ocean, the clouds had burned off and we enjoyed a few minutes of blue skies before having to head back to CO. Despite being cold, taking in the fresh ocean breeze sure beat sitting in a cube all day.