Yep, we’ve been busy! For most of the month of August, I’ve been playing hostess to a litany of contractors as we are aggressively trying to complete our basement. At the end of the month I went to Nebraska for 1 1/2 weeks of work. While I was there I completed (and passed!) one of my numerous Air War College essay tests.
Okay, so I’m a little behind. A couple days after the boys’ started school, I had to go for a 10-day trip to Nebraska (more about that later).
In an ideal world I’d have loved for the boys to dress up some for the first day of school, but (a) I have sons, not daughters who are more likely to dress up and (b) kids simply don’t dress up for the first day of school the way they used to. I feel like a won a battle (not the war) with their at least wearing “nice” shorts.
Our family took a leisurely drive in the Mustang with the top down. We didn’t set a location precisely, but ended up in Cripple Creek, Colorado, a very quiet little mining town that’s filled with casinos.
There’s a tourist railroad in Cripple Creek, called the Cripple Creek & Victor Narrow Gauge Railroad. Trains leave every 40 minutes and take tourists on a 45 minute ride. We didn’t plan to stay long enough for a train ride, but we enjoyed looking around at the depot.
You know what else is cool, the railroad is pet friendly! When we come back to ride it we fully intend to bring Howie!
Otherwise, Cripple Creek has numerous small casinos and little else. The state voted to allow gambling in Cripple Creek in 1991. The town is tiny. It was tough to find a place for lunch in the area…most of the restaurants are in the casinos. But we did find a burger joint on called The Creek on Bennett Avenue (the main drag), that was pretty good. Dave had an elk burger which he testified was pretty darned good.
There are so many places to go hiking throughout Colorado Springs. I’ve made it a point to get the kids out and about 3-4 times per week this summer. The City of Colorado Springs parks and recreation website has a great listing of area parks, which is the best starting point when planning your day.
The boys would often get tired after these hikes. Jacob has recently revealed that he can’t stand “desert walks”, which we encountered on most of these hikes. We’d quickly go from aspen-kissed creek beds to sandy junipers and pear cactus. I had found a couple memes to make fun of these hikes. Here’s one that sums up Jacob attitude about the more desolate parts of our hikes…and here’s one that sums up the bike ride we took last week (which I don’t have any pictures of, and it was quite traumatic for all…so we’ll pretend that it didn’t happen).
Enjoy some photos from some of the hikes we’ve done lately….
Pulpit Rock Open Space, near downtown Colorado Springs
About 3 weeks ago, our family took a day trip to the Manitou Cliff Dwellings. A Facebook advertisement featuring wolves from the Colorado Wolf and Wildlife Center visiting for the day got my attention. The boys were immediately interested.
There is an admission to visit the Cliff Dwellings. I downloaded a coupon from the website and was able to get $1 off per person. You will pay the admission at a little guard shack just after turning off U.S. 24 into the facility.
The Manitou Cliff Dwellings are a representation of what life was like for the Anasazi tribes of southern Colorado and northern New Mexico. Dave and I were quite disappointed to learn that the structures we toured weren’t actually native to the area: the structures were disassembled from a collapsed area near Cortez, Colorado and relocated to Manitou Springs via railroad around 1900.
Nonetheless, it’s about 15-20 minutes to fully walk through the “neighborhood” of cliff dwellings, which feature living quarters, cooking areas, garbage disposal areas, and a “kiva“, which is a room used for rituals. The kids immediately noticed the sense of community to the area, when they asked about the three-family living quarters and communal cooking areas.
After the quick turn through the dwellings, the boys wanted to go visit the two wolves who were near the gift shop. The CWWC was holding a fundraiser: for a $5 donation, you could take as many photographs as you liked. There was quite a crowd on hand, so the boys got several minutes with the wolves…but we had to assure them we would visit the CWWC later this year and they could spend more time with them later.
We then visited the gift shop, which is very big. If it weren’t for the admission you have to pay just to get onto the property, I’d recommend it as a nice place to find a wide variety of Colorado-esque gifts for friends and family.
Here are some pictures. Enjoy!
This is from June 5th.
I’m just sharing some You Tube videos I had taken of Timmy’s class’s “Patriotic Performance”. It’s a tradition with the school’s 2nd grade classes. Sadly, the school is so large you can’t get all the 2nd grade classes to perform on the stage at once…nor can you get that many kids’ parents/grandparents into the room to see it. There are four classes performing in these videos.
I think there were over 300 second grade students at Timmy’s school. Nearly 1000 students in all for grades K-2.
Enjoy!
On July 10th my mom brought the boys to Colorado for us. They were staying in West Virginia so they wouldn’t have to endure the pain of the four-day westward drive.
I think they would have been okay on the long drive, but only because they would have been immersed in DVDs and their Nintendo DSs.
We got tickets for the Pike’s Peak Cog Railway during the weekend my mom stayed with us. It’s a great way for anyone to get up to the top of one of Colorado’s “Fourteeners.”
Enjoy these videos from the boys’ piano recitals at the end of May. The boys will definitely miss Miss Ashley.
We haven’t found a piano teacher here quite yet…but we aren’t looking quite yet either.
Timmy:
Jacob:
Earlier this week, I was hauling the boys on errand after errand all over Colorado Springs. One of the errands was a short stop at Hobby Lobby to “dry mount” one of Timmy’s Atlanta Braves posters.
While waiting for the work to be done (about 15 minutes) I took the kids to the model crafts aisle. I thought they would look at the airplane kits, but they instead wandered over to the model rockets.
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