May was one for the books. Very memorable. Some great memories and some that were not-so-great moments.
The Fairmont 5000 was a very memorable moment with freshly fallen snow on May 1st, to be running a 5k in.
Ava ran strong but, slower (23:47) than usual definitely given that the weather was cold, wet and snowy.
Dylan finished strong and was determined to pass an older girl in front of him.
Nice work buddy. Overall Dylan ran slower too (25:03) given the obvious conditions.
The next day, Monday May 2nd, I had the privilege of being a chaperone for Ava and the rest of her 5th grade class on their field trip to Young AmeriTowne.
The 5th graders all had to prep the few weeks prior to their field trip, learning their roles and jobs as citizens of Young AmeriTowne. The prep work then allowed them to be ready on the day of their field trip to work at their assigned jobs, manage other employees as well as break times, save, invest and spend money, have misfortunes of getting sick or hurt and going to the hospital, and much, much more. The day gave the students a sneak peek of what it was like to be an adult citizen for a day.
Ava was a news reporter. She did awesome and took her role very seriously and loved managing her pay check, investing, spending and working her job.
Cute moment on May 5th, of a tiny, baby bunny hiding in our backyard.
Making progress on the remodel. The house siding was fixed from the massive new hole in the side of the house, with new trim and paint so we were ready for the second phase of the back patio to be poured on May 6th. We were trilled with the huge new, double section patio we now had.
One of my many favorites from the remodel was our amazing shoe organizer in the garage. This just made me giddy. I no longer had to step over piles of shoes.
I'm not really sure how I only have one picture from this years Field day from May 6th. I was a parent volunteer for the 50 meter dash but, I thought for sure I had taken pictures of my kids when they were at my station. So, I either deleted the photos accidentally or I really just didn't take any pictures this year except for this one. Regardless, it was still a really fun, beautiful day.
The next day, Saturday May 7th, Grampy and Sharona came to visit and we headed out to Parker for Ava's volleyball game.
They also came to cheer Dylan on in flag football on a gorgeous Sunday.
Dylan was playing good defense again and watching the ball closely.
Dylan was great at tracking the ball and positioning himself well to pull lots of flags.
Sunday, May 8th, was also Mother's Day so we all enjoyed going out for lunch with my parents in town.
For some reason I have these soccer pictures dated as May 9th but, I'm pretty sure that can't be right because that would have been a Monday. Unless, this happen to be a makeup game due to all the spring storms we had that cancelled prior games. Unfortunately, I just can't remember but, here is Ava playing her game as well and...
...a super cute team photo and...
...another great photo of Ava and two of her best buds. Ava really enjoyed getting back on the soccer field this season. Last year she went a year plus more (almost 1.5 years) of full straight basketball with her CBC club team. Although she really loves basketball the most and continued to play for CBC this year we decided as a family to take the spring/summer session off of basketball so that Ava could have a chance to play some other sports like soccer and volleyball and...
...I think she enjoyed her decision. We just didn't want her getting burnt out of basketball with going year round at such a young age.
Dylan loved playing lacrosse this year and we're happy he had found a sport where he could wear gear and a helmet. We're hoping this sport filled he's need to play tackle football. We enjoy Dylan playing flag football but, he wants to play tackle football and Simon and I just aren't up for that with all the information out there right now regarding concussion rates in tackle football.
Wednesday, May 11th, I was able to join Dylan and his 1st grade class as a chaperone for their field trip to the Denver Zoo.
My group was Dylan and three other girls (one other boy didn't show to class that day) so it was a super easy group for me and made it very fun. Polar bear in the background.
Swinging monkey.
Big brown bears.
Huge peacock behind Dylan's left shoulder walking around the zoo trails.
Stopping by the big snakes was a definite must for my Dylan.
Such a fun day with my little buddy.
Back to the remodel again. The madness continued with us still not having a kitchen, or living room, or family room, or master bathroom and hardly even a master bedroom (all our new bathroom including the huge jet tub was now in our bedroom waiting for installation), thus there really was no where to sit and relax except for in the basement. Cathie, had also returned back from visit with her family and then suddenly we got hit hard with an unfortunate sewer overflow that soaked our new (last June) basement carpet with inches of sewer water. Yuck. Yuck. Yuck.
It was a nightmare of an evening to say the least. We finally got the kids to bed and later that night I walked into both of their rooms with clorox wipes to wipe their feet and hands again while the slept because I was so tired and worn out that I couldn't remember if they had washed their hands and feet before going to bed after they had helped us clean up the sewer water with their water guns and buckets (which all got thrown out later).
Simon and I then spent hours cleaning and lifting carpets with objects to dry them out with fans after we had cleaned up as much water as possible. We used buckets and the kids used soaker water guns to extract water/sewer. Suddenly, there was a moment I realized that even though the kids were being so helpful, they were also standing in and touching sewer water. Yuck! Even though they had washed up, I still got nervous and went into their bedrooms and wiped their hands and feet again with Clorox wipes while they were sleeping. We ended up having to borrow fans from neighbors and Simon also had to run out to the store to buy three more fans and then we bleached and cleaned everything as best we could.
We also had to wait up until about 11:30-midnight for the plumber to come asses the situation. There was nowhere to be in the house anymore because our hardwood floors had been delivered and needed to be inside the house for at least a week before the guys could install them. Our new kitchen was still in our dinning room and our dinning room furniture was in our living room so there was no where to sit in there and then we no longer had our old kitchen, and now our basement was soaked in sewer water. So we sat next to the fridge in the family room, next to boxes of hardwood floors eating cereal out of plastic bowls and this was the moment when I just broke down and cried. Which honestly helped me out and then I was fine again.
The saddest part of the overflow was that it soaked the carpet with sewer water under Cathie's brand new custom made storage closets that had just been finished being built. The bottom of the closet had to be sawed out so the carpet could be ripped out and then, bleached and then the carpenter had to rebuild a new bottom again and redo the trim etc...
The kids sport's practices during the week continued to help us feel sane during the chaos as we tried to keep up with our normal schedules and routines as much as possible. Saturday, May 14th could not have arrived any sooner as the whole family enjoyed having a race to look forward to and getting out of the house. We were able to get out of the house and have a little normalcy to our weekend during our massive mess of our current living situation.
Early the next morning Simon and I were able to get out as well and enjoyed running in the Colfax Half Marathon. It was one of the slowest half marathons I have ever ran but, given the stress and lack of sleep and lack of training, it really didn't come as a surprise. It didn't matter either because really I just enjoyed getting out and having a fun race. I ran smart and steady during the beginning and then picked it up each mile after that, so I finished feeling great and it was exactly what I needed during a crazy time of our lives.
Plus, it was just fun to be amongst great company of great friends during a great race.
Simon and I rushed home for Dylan's flag football game and then...
...later that evening met up with friends to recap a fun day of running together.
Some positive news... there seemed to be light at the end of the tunnel with the kitchen underway and the floors were being installed. Hallaleuh!
Soon after the floors started being installed the kitchen island was then built too. The guys were making progress. There had been so many little, small and timely things that had to get done for such a long span of time so it was hard to see much progress until the big pieces of the kitchen and floors and island started to get installed and then things started to come to life again.
May 20th, was a hard but, joyous day of getting to watch Ava smile during her 5th grade Continuation ceremony. She did a great job and looked beautiful during her ceremony but man was it hard to imagine that Ava was continuing onto middle school already.
Shaking hands with Dr. Hillard.
Our beautiful young lady growing up so fast.
I as able to pull Dylan out of class to come watch his sister's ceremony that morning but, he didn't last through the whole ceremony because he was very excited to get back to his 1st grade classmates, change clothes, and head out for their walk to the park that day. Therefore, I had to walk him back to his class and help him change out of his fancy clothes. He couldn't even stay in them long enough to take a family picture.
Happy Continuation day Ava!
We all love you so much!
More great news... by May 22nd we had our gorgeous new patio furniture and...
...we finally were able to set up our fire pit that Grampy and Sharona bought us that past Christmas, and...
...check out our cute little awning we got for our grill.
This project just warmed us all right up and it turned out to be our top favorite of all the changes we made to the house. It was Simon's great idea to install this huge window in the wall next to the patio door.
This just made me so giddy with the wall being down and the big window installed as well as the huge three pain patio door both now letting in so much sunlight. I now love standing in the kitchen (well it was still not a kitchen at this point) and looking out towards our backyard. We all just love it.
Also, on Saturday the 22nd, we loved watching Dylan play another football game with touchdowns and pulled flags. Not sure why but, Dylan runs, dives on the ground and then pulls the guys flag and it really seems to work well for him. Great job Dylan!
Later that evening Simon and I took Ava out to the Melting Pot for her Continuation gift/dinner. She enjoyed fancy drinks and...
...time with just mom and dad with no brother to interrupt.
Cheers to Ava! She loved the delicious four course meal starting with cheese fondue with veggies and bread, and then an amazing salad, followed by the main course of various meat fondue including lobster and then finished off with...
...chocolate fondue for dessert.
We're so proud of Ava and enjoyed a special evening with our amazing, bright, hardworking, excellent student and daughter.
More great pictures of Dylan at lacrosse that following week.
Dylan had an additional week of practice due to some cancelled practices from bad weather.
On the morning of my birthday I woke up to head to the gym and saw these cute baby ducks following their mama as I drove through the neighborhood on my way to the gym. It was cute because not very long after this moment, I received a call from the kids while I was at the gym that some baby ducks were in our yard. They had made their way over to our house too.
Later that evening we went out for dinner to the big Breckenridge Farmhouse Brewery with the family and then later after dinner...
...some of our friends joined us for drinks while the kids left for home with Cathie.
Ending the month with one of our favorite times out at the ranch with Jen and Scott. It just happened to be the weekend that the baby cows were getting branded and dehorned.
It was a new experience for all of us and a little hard for me to watch at times but, we learned a lot about what goes on at the ranch.
The mama cows were extremely loud as they were continuously calling for their babies because they were all corralled away from them but, we got to see the babies being roped and brought...
...to the ground. The guys treated them kindly and quickly and then they were released back to find their mama.
During all of the commotion of the cows being roped and dehorned and through all the mama cows mooing loudly for their young... we suddenly looked over and witnessed that a baby cow had just been born. Amazing.
The kids were so excited.
It took a while but, we eventually saw the baby take his first steps too.
It wouldn't be a true ranch experience without the kids getting to ride horses.
Sharona, Grampy and Cathie drove up to the ranch later to join us for lunch but, didn't stay too long.
Dylan's turn to ride.
Ava taking dad and...
...Dylan for a ride around the property.
Saying hello and...
...feeding carrots to the kids favorite, old horse...
...Split Ear.
Time to feed the chickens.
Dylan, in the background, counting the eggs that Jen had just collected from the coop.
Lady Gaga's Hen House and...
...here was Lady Gaga herself.
Time to take sweet little Buttercup for...
...a stroll up to the house to nibble on the growing grass.
Finishing the day with some fishing at the pond.
Dylan gently releasing his fish back to the pond.
Gorgeous views.
We had another spectacular visit at the Colorado River Ranch.
Thanks Jen (and Scott) for another great day on the ranch with you all. We always enjoy spending time with you both and getting to see a little glimpse of all the hard work you both do.
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