Interview with a 5 year old

 What's your favorite color? Light pink

Favorite food? Spaghetti and Mac and cheese
Least favorite food? Chicken
Favorite dessert? Chocolate cake
Favorite stuffed animal? Blue teddy bear
Favorite animal? Baby Pandas
What do you like to do the most? Watch TV
Favorite thing to do with Dad? Playing crab where he takes the tongs and gets my toes
Favorite thing to do with Mom? Going to the store to buy stuffed animals for me
Favorite thing to do with Caroline? playing Barbies
Favorite thing to do with Liam? playing cars and Legos
Favorite TV show? Maya and the Three on Netflix
Favorite Movie? Aladdin
Favorite thing about school? Coloring
Favorite place to go locally? Children's museum
Favorite place for vacation? "the place where the house is logs and there is dead animals on the wall" (Colorado)
Favorite book? I like to look at chapter books
Favorite outfit? Snowman Christmas shirt
Favorite game? Shadows and Candy Land

What are most excited to do now that you are 5 that you couldn't do when you were 4? eat some gum
What are you most scared of? scary dreams
What's the best thing about you? "that I am special because Jesus sent me to you Mom"
Who is your best friend? Anna and Adrian
What do you want to be when you grow up? a doctor, a teenager and a teacher

From this sweet baby to this big 5 year old!

First day of school

 I might as well keep updating since I'm so far behind. 

First day of school brought much excitement and some nervousness depending on the kid. While there were some tears at the beginning of the day (Liam, I'm looking at you); the end of the day was all smiles!

Liam's 5th grade teacher is Mrs. Pacey. 

Caroline's second grade teacher is Mrs. Moore. 

Lucy is still with Mrs. McCoy for her last year of preschool. 

We are just thrilled that they are back for in person learning and will hopefully have a normal school year. There may still be masks and some social distancing but they are in the building and we are so thankful. 

Colorado, Day 4

 Thursday was the day that everyone was most excited, apprehensive or nervous about depending on the person; White Water Rafting Day! We drove to Buena Vista for Browns Canyon National Monument Half Day Rafting Trip and the weather was perfect. Our family had two groups. The group that wanted to just float down the Arkansas River and the group that wanted to experience the rapids. Grandma, Emily, Adriane, Evan, Caroline and Lucy went the float route and took a separate school bus to their location. Grandpa, Blair, Stephanie, Violet, Eli, Ivy, Jeff, Melissa and Liam went for the rapids and left in our school bus for our trip. 

Both tour guides were great. On the float trip both Caroline and Lucy got to steer the float with the help of the guide and saw lots of rocks and cliffs. Unfortunately we don't have any pictures as they highly encourage you to leave your phones in your car so they don't fall into the river. There is also not a  professional photographer on that loop either. 

There was a professional photographer on the Class III rapids loop so they were able to get some great photos of our boat going through one of the rapids. At first our guide was concerned that Liam would not be able to sit on the side and help paddle with the rest of us but once he saw how well he paddled down the river he encouraged him to give it a try knowing that if he began to feel overwhelmed he could move to the center of the boat and enjoy the ride. 

A fantastic way to spend 3 hours for sure. Our drive back to the cabin was just as beautiful.

After a good nights rest we all packed up our cars and headed for home. The kids did a great job during the 15 hour drive in the car and we listened to Harry Potter and Little House on the Prairie audio books. We also watched movies, wrote down as many different state license plates as we could find and played iSpy. A lunch break at the last town in Colorado led to a discovery of a fun history/childrens museum where the kids could explore what it was like to be a pioneer on up to being a kid in the 1950s. 

A quick stop in Iowa on our second day of driving to have lunch with Great Grandma was another perfect break from our drive. 

It was a great vacation and we all loved Colorado!

Colorado, Day 3

 Our third day of our trip most of the group decided to go to Vail to see the Betty Ford Gardens and shop in their downtown. The Walleses decided to stay in Breckenridge and go hiking. There are MANY miles of hiking trails in Breckenridge and it was very hard to pick one that would be both equally fun and also interesting for the kids. Luckily we decided to drive to the visitors center off the Main Street and ask a local for a good recommendation for a family hike. We decided to take Sawmill Trail, a 1.3 mile trail,  which was just a short walk from where our car was already parked. We saw little streams while we gently gained in our elevation and also tiny mushrooms and ended at a reservoir at the top of our mountain. It was probably Evans and my favorite part of the trip. The kids had a blast and were engaged the entire time. 

That night we drove to Denver to watch some baseball. Liam loved the atmosphere and has declared that the Rockies are his second favorite team after the White Sox of course. The Rockies ended up losing to the Cubs but we all still had a great time. Glad we could check another stadium off the list. 

Colorado, Day 2

 Oh man, I can't believe I've never come back to finish the recap on Colorado. Wait, yes I can, we are just that busy. 

On Tuesday we checked out the downtown area of Breckenridge. Right off the Visitors Center is a short walking trail to see the Isak Heartstone troll. A very cool, tall, friendly sculpture that is a must see while visiting. We then took the trolley to get to the downtown shopping. 

After we all got our souvenir T-shirts and ate lunch we relaxed back at the cabin and waited for our afternoon gold mine tour. 

Here we learned that children and men worked the mines to find gold instead of going to school and if you had red hair you were not allowed to go into the mines due to superstition; however if a miner passed by a red headed person on their way to work it was considered good luck...makes perfect sense to me.

After the tour we were allowed to pan for gold in their "lake" but you could also go into their museum and pan for gold in the provided tubs. Since it had started raining many of us went into the museum where the kids had fun dressing up in attire that was right for the times of the late 1800s. 

Summer Part IV-Colorado

 In August, our big highlight was a trip to Breckenridge, Colorado. We went with the Finks and shared a log cabin for 5 days. We had a lot of fun together! Colorado is absolutely beautiful and we loved driving through the mountains and enjoying the scenery around us. 

This was the view from our living room

There were many animal heads on the walls

Within 10 minutes of us exploring the cabin, Caroline declared that she did not like it and was uncomfortable with the dead animals. Grandma was trying to get her to pet this one to make her more comfortable. This one was probably the scariest one.

On Monday, we went to the Alpine slide on one of the mountains. We had to take a gondola ride up to the top of one of the peaks where they had mini golf, a roller coaster, food, zipline and bungee trampoline. Since the slide was a bit pricey as it was we opted not to do the other things and the kids were ok with that. We then had to take a ski lift to the next peak to get to the beginning of the slide. Evan was a trooper, as he is scared of heights. The gondola ride was not great for him but he really enjoyed the ski lift. Liam was tall enough to go down by himself but Caroline and Lucy needed an adult to go with them. Caroline rode with Evan and at the last second Lucy decided she wanted to ride with Aunt Adriane. Everybody had an awesome time on the slide!

Monday afternoon we went horseback riding. 

Lucy got to ride on an American Mule all by herself. The mule was tethered to the lead guide's horse and although I was 6 horses back I could see that Lucy was talking to the guide the entire 1 1/2 hour ride. She has never met a stranger! She also got a bear claw from the guide who first put her on 'Maggie'. Caroline's horse was called 'Tonto' and Liam's horse was named 'Cheyenne'.

First day of Colorado was a success!