Pike's Peak

My brother John came into town this week from California for a visit.  He's so much fun and I'm glad we got to meet up.  We went up Pike's Peak (on a train) and it was really cool.  The fall colors were just starting to come out and it was really pretty.  There was snow up at the top, but it was a nice sunny day and not that cold.  Here we are (John, Matthew, Grant, me, Anna).

 

 Here we are going up on the train - Lexie (John's lady-friend), Anna, John and Grant

Great views at the top!

 We got lots of donuts.  They even had fudge covered donuts!

 And there was snow up there.  Some of it was slushy and messy.

 Lexie, John and Matthew and his donut

 Going back down the mountain.  Why does Matthew look so worried.

 The aspen trees were changing color.  So pretty.

It was so fun having John and Lexie come visit us in Colorado (and so nice to be close enough for family visits).  We tried real hard not to bore them!!  Thanks for visiting guys!  Come back again soon!

USAFA Chapel

I've been to the Air Force Academy many times.  I've been in classrooms, dorm rooms, the cadet dining facility for a meal, the field house, the stadium, the intramural fields, the terrazzo, the hospital...but I've never been to the visitor's center and I've never been to the chapel.  I finally visited the chapel this week with my brother John, who is visiting from California.  The chapel is iconic and one of the biggest tourist attractions in the state (along with the rest of the academy).

 

 The visitor's center was pretty cool too.  It had lots of info about cadet life.  We also watched a little movie about the academy.  I think we all walked out of their glad we didn't go to the academy.  :)

 We took the short walk over to the chapel.  It was really something to see!!

 Inside the upper level

 The stained glass

 The organ...I know it's a bad picture

I liked these little books of scripture for the cadets.  Camouflage.

Anna got sad on the walk back to the car and we had to appease her with a Subway kids meal.  Subway is a staple on many Air Force bases and after eating it so much in Okinawa (for lack of other healthy on base choices) I thought I would never want it again.  I think enough time has passed now that I'm cool with Subway again.  Especially if it can avert a possible tantrum.   I'm glad I finally got to see the famous chapel.  I think we'll go again when Scott is with us.

Stormy Weather

After we got back from Florida it was definitely cooler than when we left.  Then we had a few days of crazy weather - big hail and crazy heavy rain and thick fog.  The hail and rain day happened to coincide with crazy hair day at school.  These two kiddos don't have a lot of hair so we were somewhat limited.  :)  Anna wanted to be a unicorn.

I tried to spike Matthew's but it just ended up looking curly.

Maybe he has some of my curly hair genes.

After I took Matthew to school I went to the store.  While we were in there it started raining and hailing.  LOUD and for a long time.  When we left the store at first I thought it had snowed 'cause I was seeing pileups of white on things, mostly on cars or at the end of drain pipes.  It turned out to just be hail.  Weird.

 From far away it looked like snow drifts.  Snow drifts in very specific places.

So the weather was weird, but luckily we made these tasty cookies (recipe courtesy of Lisa).  Very cozy and autumn-like.

 Yum

Of course, when I had to pick up Matthew it was raining buckets.  It was the worst experience.  I had to park super far away and wade through a foot of water in the street.  I wore my water proofiest shoes, but kept wishing I had rain boots.  I decided the way to keep Grant the driest was to wear him in the baby carrier with a coat and umbrella.  Poor Anna had her rainboots and umbrella but I couldn't carry her the whole time 'cause I was carrying Grant...plus an umbrella, a raincoat to try and cover Grant with and a raincoat and umbrella for Matthew.  Anna had so much trouble getting through the deep rushing water and when I picked her up her rainboots kept falling off.  Usually we pick Matthew up at the playground and this was our first inclement weather pick up so I wasn't sure where to go.  We ended up going to the wrong place so we had to wade/slosh all around the school unnecessarily.  Anna was crying, Grant was crying.  I felt like crying.  Did I mention it was pouring?  We were all soaked.  Finally we got Matthew and got back to the car.  It was unpleasant.  I went home and ate a few cookies.

 

The amazing thing was that Matthew's chosen hairstyle (he finally decided on mohawk) held up through the super rain.  He did have a raincoat with a hood and an umbrella.  So I guess that did the trick.  If only my hair had looked so put together after all that.   At least it didn't hail while we were doing the pick up. 

And that storm gave us the first snow of the season up on Pike's Peak.  I don't know if I'm ready for snow again.  I'm kinda missing having nine months of summer.  :)

Walt Disney World: Part 5

The last park we visited was Animal Kingdom.  It was a good one for the kids 'cause they loved seeing all the animals.  We went on Everest, a rollercoaster there, and Matthew really liked that one.

We got very wet on Kali River Rapids.  Anna didn't go on the ride, but she found a fountain to get wet in, so it all worked out.

We saw lots of animals...here are a few of them.

 A baby elephant!!  So cute!!

 

The Big Tree - the symbol of Animal Kingdom

Matthew wearing the bug glasses before going into the Bugs Life 4D show.  Matthew wasn't so happy on the way out.  :(  He doesn't like the 4D shows where you get sprayed and poked.  ;)  We saw the Lion King show, went on the safari ride, the Dinosaur ride and some other things.  We were tired and headed back to the hotel a little earlier.

There was an Oktoberfest party going on at the hotel that night.  Perfect timing!

There was soooo much food.  Good food.  I always pay more attention to the food.  I think this was our best meal all week.  :)  Roasted beets, German potato salad, cucumber salad, sausages, potato pancakes, spaetzle with garlic and tomatoes and cakes!!

 And great Oktoberfest music!

It rained buckets and buckets that afternoon, but luckily it was covered.

 The band played the Chicken Dance and invited everyone up to dance.  Anna and I went up and danced for a while and later Matthew joined us.  I've never realized how German that song sounds!  It was so much fun dancing with them.

Hooray for a little Oktoberfest party and hooray for our fun week of vacation in Florida!  It was BUSY (maybe I overscheduled?  Sorry!!) but it was still so fun and I was so glad my parents got to come with us.  When we got back to Colorado it had definitely cooled down a bit, so I'm glad we got one last amazing summer trip.  Love Disney!  Love Florida!!  So fun!
PS:  This is my 500th post on the family blog!!  I can't believe I've posted that much!  I definitely have less time to blog than I used to, so we'll see how it goes.

Walt Disney World: Part 4

Our fourth park was the Magic Kingdom (Disneyland equivalent).  I get so mixed up there now 'cause I know the layout of Disneyland really well and the Magic Kingdom is just slightly different.  Instead of New Orleans Square they have Liberty Square (a colonial themed area).  The layout of the other lands is a little different than Disneyland and they are also constructing a bigger better Fantasyland that looks like it's going to be pretty cool.  Here we are in front of Cinderella's Castle.

 

 Matthew went on Space Mountain with us.  He was very brave.  As we were coming off the ride we met Chip and Dale.  Anna didn't want to meet them.
Anna, Grant, both my parents and parts of Scott are in the background of this picture.  Spot them if you can!

 Anna is tall enough to ride Autopia now.  She was very excited about driving!

 On the Jungle Cruise.  See Matthew's first pic on the Jungle Cruise HERE.

 Riding on Aladdin's Magic Carpets

Matthew LOVED Splash Mountain and here he is right after the splash.  Because of the the baby swapping he got to go on it twice.  He really liked it!

He also got to go on Thunder Mountain which he liked.  We also went on Pirates, The Haunted Mansion, It's a Small World (which non of the kids were afraid of this time), The Tiki Room, Country Bear Jamboree, PhilharMagic, Peter Pan, People Mover, Winnie the Pooh, the Carousel and Buzz Lightyear.  It was a busy day!

 At the Winnie the Pooh ride.

Posing by Dumbo.  We didn't go on Dumbo 'cause we were getting tired by then and the lines were longish, but sitting in the little Dumbo outside the ride was fun too.

 On the carousel

 And in front of the castle again

 At the end of the Buzz Lightyear ride

 Matthew played a little game with some of the park workers as we were leaving the park.

 We took the ferry back to the bus for our hotel.  I like the ferry!

Here are all the kids with their Mickey ears.  These are Grant's first pair.  Anna has two now (Hong Kong Disney and here) and Matthew has four (Walt Disney World, Hong Kong Disney, Tokyo Disney and Disneyland).  Thanks to the military we have lived pretty close to 4 different Disney parks.  Now if only they would station us in Europe.  :)

We were all beat by the end of the day.  All this Disney fun is very exhausting.