Girls first camping trip!

After our time in Buena Vista, it was off to the Great Sand Dunes. Because we left a day earlier in anticipation of large holiday crowds, we were able to get nearly a first pick of all the campsites.

The girls LOVED camping!

We found a site with shade (trees), a great view of the Sangre De Cristo mountains and the Sand Dunes, and one that came with a firepit and picnic table. We got the tent assembled pretty quickly and the girls almost immediately fell asleep on their tent beds.

The view from our campsite of the Dunes

After relaxing for a bit, we headed down to the National Park to wander around. It was the girls first experience on sand, so they had a good time! We snapped some sunset photos of the dunes and the wildlife before grabbing a hot meal at a restaurant near the campgrounds.

Our campsite

Dave's big camping thing is smores. We didn't pack any of the necessary gear or supplies (woops!), so we had to stop at a convenience store. We got a good fire going (yay Dave!) and we roasted marshmallows for those oh-so-gooey-and-perfect smores. I think Dave took down half a dozen of them!

Yummmm!

Beautiful Buena Vista

Our Labor Day camping weekend started in the Pike National Forest. We drove far deeper than we had ever gone on 285 exploring areas like Santa Maria, Kenosha Pass, and Buena Vista.

Santa Maria; Pike Nat'l Forest

We've always heard from locals that we should go to Kenosha Pass in the fall and I think we just might now! The entire area is covered in Aspens and I can imagine turns beautiful gold in late September.

The dogs love car rides!

As always, the girls were great travelers. They pretty much sleep in the car until it slows down. Then they sit up, put their noses all over the windows, and try to figure out where or what we are doing. Once we get going again, they lay back down.

Kenosha Pass-- those are all aspens!

One of the highlights of our day was Buena Vista. The Collegiate Peaks were a big surprise for us. I hadn't realized there were THAT many 14'ers in that area. And the dramatic contrast of the peaks to the plains was just breathtaking. We had meals at Pizza Works and K's. The wait at K's was ridiculously long, but the ice cream more than made up for it!

Collegiate Peaks outside Buena Vista

Daddy's Little Helpers

I've always found it unfair that dogs don't have the luxury of toilet paper. And yesterday reminded me how I miss this fact, too. Sequoia had an issue with some left over doo-doo that got on our white down comforter. Luckily, I'm a magic stain getter outer (thanks Mom!) and after some sa8-magic and a load of laundry, it's looking brand new.

Girls helping dad make the bed

Dave and I always put the duvet cover on together. It's our thing. We enjoy shaking it like those parachutes you would shake in 2nd grade gym class. Sequoia thought it was quite fun to pounce on it until mom and dad out-smarted her. We would time the top of the parachute arc to coincide with her entrance on to the bed. Then boom! We'd cover her up. She had a blast. Both girls helped break in the newly cleaned comforter with dad.

Walk this way!

As Dave and I have been recovering from two weeks of passing a nasty cold back and forth to eachother, we haven't done any hiking in 2 weeks. The girls, however, don't understand mommy and daddy being sick. So we toughed it out and took them for a 3 mile walk around the open-space trails by our house.

Ok, so maybe I do need the new iPhone so I can take better pics...

We originally intended to do the "Denver loop" [this is the 4 mile route that takes you back up towards the hogback up high enough where you get a nice view of all of the metro area including the downtown skyline], but we were both just lacking energy.

On our way to Safeway

We even combined the walk with a stop at the grocery store. The girls always hate to see mom go in without them, but they are always relieved when I come out. It's like they think I might not return? So strange. Love them!

Hit me with your best shot!

My coworker Stephanie held her first annual golf tourney this morning at Littleton Golf and Tennis Club. Pretty informal, we played a 4-person scramble for 9 holes. With only one bogey and a few birdies, we shot an impressive 29.

This was enough to win by 6 strokes! I thought we all played better than we usually do, so we rarely had to take a bad shot.

Given that its been a very long time since I golfed, I was pretty happy with how I was hitting the ball. Even my short game was on par with the rest of my game!

We had a good time with everyone and look forward to winning the 2nd annual next year!

Full House

Tonight Dave hosted a bunch of our friends and coworkers for an evening of poker. He held two games: a post-dinner cash game for those who needed to get home early and a late-night tourney for the more serious players.

It was definitely a lucky night for beginners. Tim's wife won the first cash game and our new-to-CO friend from Sunnyvale, Brian, won the tourney. The usual suspects didn't even find themselves in the top 3 this time!

We had a good time hosting everyone-- it had been too long since the last game!

Third times a charm

Dave wrapped up his summer racing season today with the Georgetown to Idaho Springs Half-Marathon. This is his 3rd year racing this course and he's improved every year. He felt horribly unprepared for this years race (been more focused on his swimming and biking), but he pulled off an impressive 1:33 time over the 13.2 miles. That's a 7:08/mi pace for those of you who are counting!

While it was tough getting myself up at 5 am to go watch, I always enjoy being Dave's cheerleader. The girls joined me this year as well. I think they enjoyed the 7 hours in the car with us rather than spending the equivalent in the kennel. I still think this race is a parking and traffic nightmare, but this year I was able to see him at the start, mile 2, and mile 13. I'll call it a success, even though I find it pretty pathetic that I can barely drive 12 miles on I-70 and find a parking spot before the 1st place runner has completed the entire 13 mile run.

Let's go Rockies, Let's go!

To celebrate Friday the 13th, Dave and I enjoyed our annual Rockies game with our neighbors (and awesome dogsitters), Mark and DeAnna. Game started off pretty slow, but we enjoyed each others company. Dave and I left during the 8th inning because we had to be up at 5 am for Dave's half-marathon. We left thinking the Rockies had very little chance of making a 9th inning comeback. But apparently they did and we missed an exciting 3 run homerun to win it!

Somewhere over the rainbow

...there's a pot of gold, right?

Tonight, after one of whats becoming a nearly daily 15-min evening thunderstorm, we had a beautiful double rainbow. By the time I got my camera, only one remained, but it was really neat to see both ends of these rainbows.

Where an adult can be a kid?

After a nice date-night dinner at Claim Jumper (with the exception of hearing the tragic news of the removal of the heath bar mud pie from their menu), we made a stop at Chuck E Cheese before they closed. Yes, I know it's where a kid can be a kid, but it's also where an adult can play 10-cent skeeball. What's not to love about that?

We always have a blast here! They had rearranged it and added newer games since the last time we were there, but we always find ourselves spending the most time at skeeball. Who needs an expensive place like Dave and Busters when you can hit up this place after all the kids go to bed?

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.