Let me begin by saying a vacation in Colorado with the kids is nothing like a vacation in Colorado with just Ben and I. We knew this going in, and it was fun, but...well, next year we're going back to a vacation for just the two of us. We love a good long hike in the mountains and right now the kids are too young for that, plus next year we hope to visit Arches National Park in Utah and we don't want to drive that distance with the kids. So, on to my recap of our family vacation!
The vaca began in Ames, IA (I know, exciting, right? Boo, hiss, Iowa State!) but we were there for a good reason - my cousin Nick's wedding. It was a good time and we got to see ALL of our family. Luke & Audrey had a great time with their cousins and first cousins removed (I think that's what my first cousin's kids are called!). This is one of the only pictures I have of the four first cousins (click on it for a larger image).
We started our trek west Sunday around noon and went as far as somewhere in Nebraska. Right now I can't think of where we stayed, but that doesn't matter. We arrived in Denver at lunch time on Monday and Kara was waiting for us. We didn't waste time and went to the
Denver Aquarium. It's a great place and we enjoyed it. That evening we met our friends Brian and Jenn for ice cream at a fun neighborhood shop in Denver. Isn't that cool it's a milk can?
The next day was our 8th anniversary and what better way to spend it than at the Denver Zoo? But really, it's an awesome zoo and I love zoos, so it was fun. The weather in Denver was hotter than normal and they were one degree away from setting a record; I think it was 98 that day and 99 was the record. We got to the zoo early and the animals were actually pretty active. The baby giraffe was one of my favorites and the kids loved the reptile house with snakes, dragons, and fish, oh my! The great apes were awesome, as well. Two of the brothers were having a bit of a fight and I can still hear the sound of their feet pounding as they ran at each other. After the kids swam for a while in Kara's pool, we got ready for our first photo shoot as a family. I had been looking for a photographer in our area for a few months because we hadn't had family pictures taken for two years, then had the fantastic idea that we should have them taken in Colorado! I found
Stefanie by looking online at the Colorado Professional Photographer's list and after looking at a lot of online porfolios and contacting a handful of people, we picked Stefanie. We liked her style and that we would have the option of purchasing our photos on a cd and get the reprinting rights was a huge plus. We said we wanted everyone to know that our pictures were not taken in Iowa and she chose the location of Morrison where Red Rocks Amphitheater is. It took Audrey a while to warm up to the camera but Stefanie was great and may have bribed her with candy. :) Whatever works! Luke did great right off the bat. Here are some of our favorites, but really all of them are favorites and we bought all 60 from our session!
Gorgeous, isn't it? And the kids don't look too shabby, either! See that rock Luke is sitting on? Well, the photo shoot took a turn for the freak-Mom-and-Dad-out when Luke was standing on a similar rock, took a step, fell on his face and bounced off into a cacti butt first. The sound of his face hitting the rock is something I hope to forget! He came up (I was happy he was moving) holding his mouth. We immediately thought his teeth would be knocked out or he'd have a broken jaw. That kid fell just right and all he had was a cut under his bottom lip, some scrapes on his knee and elbow, and cacti spines in his behind! That last part was amusing, but not until later. We hadn't yet taken our family pictures, the point of the whole expedition, and Luke said he would be fine and we could take the pictures. Thank goodness because Stefanie captured this:
I'm going to leave you with that for now and will get to Part II soon!
