Horsetooth Half Again

Mark ran in his 2nd Horsetooth Half Marathon last Sunday. Of course, the boys and I were at the finish line to cheer him on. Unlike last year, he didn't train much for this one. Work, life & small injuries kind of got in the way. And the jerk only went 4 minutes slower then his time before! I say that lovingly because I can't imagine just willy nilly deciding to go ahead and run without training. They'd have to rescue me from the course. But not this guy.

Way to go daddy-O!

A Whole Hand

Coop turned a whole hand on Thursday and he's pretty proud of that fact. To celebrate the special occasion, we had our first "kid" birthday party and invited a whole bunch of friends and parents. Coop wanted a Transformers theme and so it was. Mark and I decorated for the party the night before after Coop went to bed so that he could wake up to the surprise of all the awesome (to him) decorations.

We had hoped to do a scavenger hunt outside but due to all the new feet of snowfall on the ground we opted for sledding instead. We played party games, ran amok throughout the house and eventually ended the party with sledding outside to burn off all the sugar we fed everyone.

The highlight of the day for Mark and I was seeing the look on Coop's face when everyone sang happy birthday to him. It was the first time a large group had ever sang to him. I wish I would have captured the look of pride/slight embarrassment on his face with a photo. I'll just have to hopefully keep it embedded in my brain.

Winterpark

Spring Break came late this year in Estes Park. I'm not sure why it was so late but it ended up being great timing. We decided to take a family ski trip for Coop's first official spring break and since it was so late in the season, we scored some sweet deals on accommodations and ski passes. We went to Winterpark which is about 2 1/2 hours from us and invited 4 other families to join us. We stayed in a big house with a hot tub and ping pong table and lots of rooms for everyone to have their own space. Plus, it was a private home (not a condo) so we didn't have to worry about the natural noise decibels created when you get 8 kids together. We laughed, ate great food, took turns watching kids so we could ski and even enjoyed some great adult conversation after all the kids went to sleep.

I have so many memories of my childhood taking trips just like this with other families. I hope Coop 'n Cruz will have the same fond memories and that we'll have many a trips just like this in our future.

Coop wanted to ski again and rather than put him in a lesson this time, I decided to ski with him. Cruz still isn't feeling the skiing love so we took turns watching him while he napped. Coop did awesome as the following pictures will show.



















The house.......



The above shot is of the house on the morning we drove home. It started snowing the day before we left and pretty much hasn't stopped ever since. It is for sure the storm of the season with about 3 feet and counting. I'm not complaining one bit. We need this moisture!

The Hunt, part two

Oh ya, Easter happened. Our 2nd Annual Beer/Egg hunt was a success. The weather was perfect for hanging outside which is key to entertaining at our place. We had 60+ guests which equated to a lot of beer and eggs.

With any outdoor event that involves riding toys and pavement, several bandaids were handed out. Luckily, the egg to bandaid ratio was still about 65-1 (I'll leave it a mystery as to how many eggs/bandaids were in the mix but let it be known that it was more than 65 & 1).

There was one injury that I was specifically told not to mention on the blog. Although, I do think enough time has passed where I can at least allude to it. Let's just say that one of the adults in our family may have face planted into the pavement while chasing our brown dog who was off leash for a moment (a no-no in the park). Said adult was completely sober. The dog stopped short and the adult tripped (read: launched) over the top of her. Enough said.

It is now a joke that a full on first aid station is a must for our 3rd Annual Beer/Egg Hunt.

The Hunt part one

Easter came early this year. Our town Easter Egg celebration was over a week and a half ago. It's a good thing too because although it was chilly, we just missed a dumping of snow that happened a week after the hunt.

The celebration was held inside with arts and crafts, Easter Stories, pancake breakfast and pictures with the Easter Bunny. The grand finale took place outside with a well organized hunt divided by age group.

The boys feel the same way about the Easter bunny as they do about Santa Claus. He's a great dude and all, but it's best if he just keeps his distance. We didn't push sitting for a pic with the guest of honor and chose to wave from afar and whisper thank-yous after the hunt.

Stay tuned for hunt number 2 which will take place on Easter during our 2nd annual Easter Beer/Egg hunt. I'm hoping the snow I mentioned that came our way this past weekend quickly melts because we have a tiny house and quite a few people that have RSVP'd. It should make for a very cozy event.









View of the field after the hunt....pretty spectacular view isn't it?




Post hunt sampling................

St. Daddy's Day

St. Patrick's Day will forever be known as St. Daddy's Day to Coop 'n Cruz since it is also Mark's birthday. For now they think everyone wears green and celebrates leprechauns in their Dad's honor and why not? Their Dad is worthy of all the hype in their eyes. For now we'll just go with it.

I picked up some rugby/football shirts for the boys when I was in Ireland last October. They seemed HUGE at the time but I wanted some wiggle room for them to grow into.

Fast forward to last week....I had forgotten all about them but happened to stumble across them in Coop's closet. It's a good thing I did because I couldn't even get Cruz's on over his head. It's big everywhere else. I guess Irish toddlers have large torsos and really itty-bitty heads. I was so bummed but luckily St. Daddy came to the rescue and ripped up some seams so Cruz could fit his large cranium through the neck hole.

We went to a BBQ at some friend's house where we enjoyed some wild game. That's traditional Irish fare isn't it?

Basketball

We made it through an entire season of basketball (Cooper's first) without even a mention on the ole blog. The season consisted of evert Saturday morning for the past 6 weeks and encouraged parent participation. In fact, parent participation was pretty much required. It was great for the kids to help build their confidence but made it difficult for me on the weeks that Mark wasn't here. I had to juggle Cruz and prove to the community of Estes Park that this White Mom can't jump. Basketball is not one of my strong suits that's for sure. Coop didn't seem to notice my lack of skills. He had fun and still needs to practice his dribbling (much like his Mom).

Cruz was a basketball crasher. The program was for 3 & 4 yr olds but he didn't quite get that memo. I couldn't really not let him play when they required full parental participation so I didn't really make him hold back. Luckily, the coaches were pretty cool about it and included him for the most part. For all I know people were calling us the basketball crashers behind our backs. Two kids for the price of one! Oh well, Cruz was the ball boy as far as I'm concerned.

Here are some horrible phone pics. Playing basketball and Paparazzi are hard to do at the same time. Especially with my skills.

















Notice in the last pic that Cruz even crashed the huddle.