Spring Break Fun

 Last week Ashtyn was on Spring Break, so Matt took Thursday and Friday off so we could have some family FUN!  And fun we did have...

Thursday we headed up to the mountains to play in the snow.  We stopped at Old Chicago's for lunch and then headed over to Copper Mountain.  They have a really cute park for just kids which includes rides, playgrounds, tunnels and a tubing hill just for them...

We picked a GORGEOUS day to go up to Copper Mountain - Its a good thing I didn't have my ski stuff, because I probably would have ditched Matt and the kids to go ski in that nice snow with the sun shining down!

  The kids enjoyed tubing the most...and went up and down the hill a million times with BIG smiles on their faces...

 Eli was a little hesitant at first, so I rode down with him a couple times and then he was ready to go by himself - he would giggle the whole way down and then crack up laughing when his tube would bump into Ashtyn's at the bottom - it made Matt and I laugh...

 Matt had the chore of pulling the kids up to the top of the hill - he definitely got a work out!  They really need to install a pulley system like the big tubing hill has...that would be my suggestion anyways!

 The kids had TONS of fun and Ashtyn got very upset when it was time to leave!

I initially wanted to take her on the bunny hill and introduce her to skiing, since every time I would come home for skiing she would ask to go - but I think once she saw how big the mountains were and how many people were coming down she changed her mind.  She did however want to ride the ski lift...so maybe next year we will try again!  Eli on the other hand wanted to go skiing and if they made boots small enough I would have started him that day!

So maybe next year I will be skiing with my babies - I know for sure with Eli!

We headed home late that afternoon and thankfully didn't hit any traffic!

On Friday we laid around the house as a family - it was so, SO nice!  We forgot how nice it was just to be home with all four of us...

After lunch we headed to the Broomfield Rec Center to go swimming!

The kids have kept asking to go ever since we saw the pool and I thought it would be a perfect time to go...well so did the rest of Broomfield! 

It was the craziest place EVER, but the pool is really cool and we jumped right into the chaos to have our own fun!

I am very impressed with the Broomfield Rec Center - all the amenities are very, very nice and the swimming pool has so much to do!  The slides were absolutely my favorite, and we went up and down them a million times too!

Swimming totally wiped us all out, so we headed home to do our favorite thing ever...

Eat popcorn and watch a movie!

It was a great spring break and I loved having us all home for a couple days!

Even got some home projects finished up and of course started some new ones...

Thanks babe for taking a couple days off to hang out with us...we loved it!

Spring Snow

Colorado is a bit backwards it seems...

We were all wearing flip-flops in December and now its snowed every week since the beginning of March...but you have to love the Spring Snow!

I did buy a Copper Pass this year and have spent all my time skiing in March - the snow has not been that great until this weekend - and Finally, we had powder up to our knees...it was awesome, cold, but awesome!

Its been fun getting back up to the slopes with my dad and brother this year...even got me some new boots!  I am hoping to get Ashtyn on some skies during Spring Break, so maybe next year she can join us!

I lived in the snow this weekend - skiing on Saturday and then sledding on Sunday! 

My kids had not played in the snow at all this season - Mainly because it hasn't snowed much until now, and every time it did one of us was sick - horrible flu season this year!

But on Sunday there was still a ton of snow to play in and none of us were sick so I bundled us up to go sledding and we had so much FUN!

 

 

 "Cheese!"

 We screamed all the way down and when we were at the bottom Eli would say

"I wanna do that again..."

That was the best thirty minutes of my weekend...



Chicken, Airplane, Solider...

For all of those seasoned in swimming you know what Chicken, Airplane, Solider is...

It's the most important thing to master before being able to advance to the next level of swimming lessons and actually be able to swim across the pool! 

We finally got Ashtyn registered in swim lessons at the Broomfield Community Center - which I remember swimming at in High School!  She did so, SO well!  I was very impressed with my little fish...

 I was very determined to have my kids swim by the time they were 6 months old, and got Ashtyn in the pool as soon as I could, and even though she has always loved the water and was comfortable the idea of "learning" to swim was just not in her to do list.  I struggled with her in swim lessons - she didn't listen, would never do or try to do what they were asking and just plain did not participate!  So instead of wasting the money I pulled her out and that was the end of swim lessons for awhile...

 Then last summer, she broke out of her shell and started going under the water without forcing and/or bribing her, jumping in the pool/lake, going down slides by herself, and actually finally having the desire to learn to swim!  So I jumped at the chance and got her registered, and it looks like we might actually advance out of level 1 swim lessons!  She's pretty good at the Chicken, Airplane, Solider thing and just needs to get more comfortable floating on her back...hopefully next summer we can do swim team!

I've learned with Ashtyn that she will only do things in her own time - there is no forcing her to do something she is not ready for.  So hopefully this is a good start for her and she will stay motivated in learning how to swim - we do live in the water during the summer, so it's so important that she does!  Now if I could just get Eli to focus long enough for swim lessons that would be awesome, but I think that is a long shot...I will just work with him myself until he is ready as well! 

Level 2 here we come...

Life Lately...

Life Lately has been all about adjustment...

It all started with moving into our new home and getting settled in.  Finding the right grocery store, knowing where each Starbucks was located, getting a rec center card, finding the quickest route to work while going through what seems like ten schools zones, and so on... 

But the real adjustment came when Matt's work schedule changed mid-January.  For the last five years he has worked your typical 8-5 sorta thing with weekends off, which in turn had completely spoiled me.  I LOVED his schedule - loved it!  We ate dinner every night as a family, we went to bed every night as a couple and we spent every weekend together with friends and never missed a holiday celebration.  But being a police wife you know the reality of what they do and the schedule it involves and at some point it was going to change, I just wasn't quite ready for that amount of change or adjustment coming our way.  Whether I was ready or not the comfy schedule I had gotten so used to and LOVED was replaced by the opposite schedule where you and your police husband are now "single" parents with opposite days off!  I am not going to lie, I don't like the new schedule and the first week of spending four straight days with my kids with no help or "tag-team" from Matt (who is an amazing, helpful dad) while still trying to take care of all the house chores, about killed me... 

But I have been adjusting and the schedule is slowly becoming easier.  I am not going to say I love it, but it is doable.  The positives - yes there are some...we rely on nobody for daycare, which is a huge sigh of relief and the four straight days with my kids actually allows me to bond more with them then when we were all home together - weird huh?

We seem to stay pretty busy while Matt's at work...

We go to Sweet Cow for ice cream and to bounce on the little cows...

 Have been invited to a ton of birthday parties for Ashtyn's preschool friends...

 Emma, Ashtyn and Kiley!

And of course we try to make some sort of dessert to enjoy when Matt gets home, or just so we can lick cake batter off spatulas...

Aside from keeping the kids entertained, I have also dove head first into home improvement projects, which just adds a whole other layer of chaos to our lives.  With opposite schedules we are never on the same page of wanting to work on them...so I have a handful of "unfinished" projects all throughout the house!  So yes, life lately has been a little busy and out of control for me, but I am adjusting and trying to find a good balance...

 And as soon as I do find that balance - BAM!  Schedule change again...

That's right every six months we will be adjusting to whatever crazy schedule it is Matt has to work and the process will repeat!  But the reality of it is - Matt is awesome at his job, he loves his job and I love and support him, so no matter what crazy hours he works, or how many holidays he misses we will just figure it out and ADJUST!

I may pout a little while doing so...

...but everything always seems to work out and plus, we have a ton of family and friends to help when we need a little break.  They really should have support groups for the police wives, but until then I will just blog...

President's Day

President's Day, typically, is just another Monday, but this year it was special. 

 It was the first day in a month that we were all home as a family! We decided to make it a special day for the kids and do some things Ashtyn has been asking to do for awhile now...

Ashtyn and Eli LOVE pancakes, as well as Matt, so we are started our "Day of Fun" out to breakfast at IHOP!  We thought for sure the kids would die over IHOP's pancakes - they are the best right? 

But, NO! - after two bites both kids said they didn't like them and would have preferred to go to McDonald's - seriously?  Well now we know, but IHOP's pancakes versus McDonald's, didn't see that coming at all...Matt enjoyed his though!

After pancakes we headed to the Denver Museum of Natural History, which I haven't been too since my St. Louis days - and that was a LONG time ago!  Every time we visit the Zoo we park at the Museum and Ashtyn always says she wants to go there, so we thought it would be a good time to make the trip.  It of course was very crowded, being a holiday, and this time we had to actually park at the Zoo and walk up to the Museum!  Museums are not usually my thing, but I did have fun watching Ashtyn get so excited about every exhibit - she loves to learn!  She also likes to read all the signs on every exhibit - all the signs and all the words...

We started with the Dinosaurs which were my favorite.  Eli was definitely a little overwhelmed and scared at first, but warmed up...

 We also visited the Hall of Life, which I remember being way cooler then it is now, but Ashtyn and Eli still had fun running around to all the activities...

 We spent sometime at the Discovery Zone, which again I was not all that impressed with - the WOW museum in Lafayette is way better - but again the kids had fun with puzzles, science projects and digging for dinosaur bones...

Ashtyn's most favorite exhibit of the day was the "Rare Gems of the World"!

She has always loved rocks, even since she was a little one, so this exhibit just made her eyes light right up!  She so wanted to take them all home with her and store them in her boxes...

I am not sure where our daughter gets her love for history and desire to learn, because Matt and I are not like that, but she absolutely LOVED the museum and wants to go back over and over again! 

Hopefully, schools still take field trips there...not sure I need to go back for another twenty years or so!

The museum wiped us all out, so we headed home and laid around watching movies and eating popcorn the rest of the day.

  It was a great family day - A much needed "Day of Fun" for our family!



Valentines

Valentines day has come and gone, but I recently needed to clear some pictures off my phone which then reminded me - I need to blog...

The Valentine traditions stayed true this year with Nana taking the kids to Build-A-Bear, so Ashtyn could get the highly anticipated Hello Kitty (note: her fifth Hello Kitty, and yes she is spoiled) and Eli got another puppy!  Nana then took us out to lunch and we ended the day playing at the dinosaurs...Ashtyn was the most popluar kid there with every little girl wanting to play with her Hello Kitty - you can imagine how well that was recieved!

 We also made Valentine cookies over at Nana's which Ashtyn looks forward to every holiday, and although Eli could careless about making or decorating the cookies, he LOVED eating them and licking every bit of frosting off of them...

 "Cheese!"

- Eli will now say "cheese" when I ask him to take a picture...

To round out the holiday Matt took us to dinner at Outback - our family favorite!

We got there right as they were opening along with all the other families and old people - hoping to avoid the long waits and it worked out perfectly! 

It was a low key Valentines day for sure, but how lucky am I to spend it with two sweet kids and a hot husband - LUCKY in love I am!