Colorado 2013

Bear with me as I catch up on blogging.  Throughout the next few blog post you'll see that we've had a lot going on the past few months.  As if having a baby wasn't enough, we added several visitors, vacations, holidays and a deployment in the mix.

 

The Army graciously provided us with two weeks of block leave around Thanksgiving this year.  We opted to spend one of those weeks in Colorado, since this would be our last vacation as a family of three, and before Shane deployed.  It was a great trip! The first few days we spent in Colorado Springs visiting the Olympic Training Facilities, Focus on the Family, Air Force Academy, Garden of the gods, and the two males went to a World War II aviation museum together (while I shopped!). Then we made our way through a snowstorm to Vail, Colorado to stay with and visit family, and for Shane to ski a few days.

 

The Olympic Training Center had a really interesting tour. We watched Olympians train in the weight room, swim in the Olympic size pool, and got an up close look at several of their gymnasiums. It was a neat facility and history of the olympics.

Matthew, like his parents, enjoyed several nights at a Embassy Suites during our vacation.  We love their huge cooked-to-order breakfast, 2 bedroom suites, and happy hour reception in the evenings. Staying in Colorado Springs and Denver marked Matthew's 6th & 7th cities to stay at Embassy Suites; he thinks he is a pro at hotel living. 

We all enjoyed seeing and playing in Whit's End at Focus on the Family! Shane and I also enjoyed watching videos of their history, and visiting the large gift shop, all while reminiscing about listening to Adventures in Odyssey when we were growing up.

Although it was freezing and windy we visited the the Air Force Academy.  We mostly wanted to see their famous and beautiful cadet chapel, however, we lucked out and were there during the cadets lunch formation.  Shane watched intently talking about how he loved being on "this" side of things - post graduation. He said he endured plenty of the freezing lunch formations during his four years at West Point.  It was interesting nonetheless, and brought back memories of our dating throughout his military academy experience, and when my brother attended the Air Force Academy many years ago.

The next stop was Garden of the gods. We decided to take a slow driving tour of the Gardens instead of taking walking trails around during that cool November day. The red rocks, and views of pikes peak were beautiful.

While Shane spent two days skiing Vail Mountain, Matthew and I did the walking tour of both Vail Village and Beaver Creek with my cousin Andrea and her children.  The weather was cold, but the buildings and scenery were gorgeous. Although toting around a 1 year old in his ski jacket, while being 8 months pregnant in the cold/snow proved to be a challenging task; thank goodness for my wonderful husband and our great family who helped a tremendous amount! We enjoyed every minute of our vacation to Colorado and will cherish those fun memories while we are apart.

St. Louis Trip

Labor Day weekend we took a family trip to St. Louis!  I had been telling Shane I wanted to do as much together as a family 1. before baby #2 arrives, and 2. before he deploys in December, so this was the perfect weekend to get away.  We also have some good friends stationed at an Air Force base there, so it was great to see them and get a personal tour of the zoo.  Though it was extremely hot the whole time we were there, we managed pretty well and found plenty to do!  I would recommend St. Louis to anyone looking for a fun, inexpensive family vacation.

Saturday morning we went to the zoo before it got too hot.  The zoo there is free, and really great!  I would highly recommend it, there were a lot of neat exhibits and animals.

Alex, Sara Beth, Shane and Matthew at the zoo!

Can you see how he is resting his head on Shane's?  It was adorable.



That afternoon we went to Cathedral Basilica of St Louis, which is known for its architecture and mosaic tiles.  It was beautiful, I have never seen mosaic tiles like this anywhere in America.

Working around naps in the car made this trip a little more difficult, but everything ended up working just fine.  Since Matthew was such a trooper skipping entire naps for zoo time, and tours we tried to let him sleep in between activities in the car as much as possible.  Which is why we didn't even get out of the car at the arch this trip, he was sound asleep in the back seat!  We just parked close by and took a few pictures while reminiscing of our last trip to St. Louis where we saw the arch for the first time.

Later that morning we headed to the Anheuser Busch factory.  A tour we were both very interested in, even though I am pregnant, it was still very cool!  The "campus" there was beautiful and historic, we even got to see the famous Budweiser Clydesdale's, and their stables.

The factory tour ended in a tasting room, where you could try several of the different beers and drinks Anheuser Busch makes.  Of course Matthew and I enjoyed the free pretzels and soft drinks as well!

Kansas City Vacation

We wanted to do something special for our 1st Anniversary, and when the Army gave us a 4 day weekend, we decided that was the perfect opportunity for a little getaway to Kansas City.  It was a relaxing weekend filled with a lot of shopping (yes, I have the best husband in the world), eating, driving around, and touring.  Our families favorite kind of vacation!  Some of the highlights were: touring the Harley Davidson factory, visiting Hallmark headquarters, chasing the google car, seeing many different fountains around Kansas City, and eating at Grinders Pizza (a Dinners, Drive-ins, & Dives recommendation that did not fail!).   

 No pictures were allowed inside the Harley Davidson factory, but it was indeed very cool.  Shane enjoyed seeing the power train operations up close, as he'd studied so much about that at school.  The tour walked us through the ground floor of the plant, where we saw machines making every part of a motorcycle. 

 Nerd alert!  As we were driving Shane spotted the "google car" and so of course we had to chase it for a while to get close enough for a good picture.  I can't tell you how many times I virtually walk down streets on google images, so we were both over the top excited to see a google camera car in person!  There may or may not have been some smiling & waving going on.  Although, rest assured we did not look like this.

 While Hallmark headquarters didn't have a factory, we enjoyed walking through the history of Hallmark museum, and watching gift bows being made from machines in a matter of seconds.  It was neat to see Hallmark products, cards, and movies from a long time ago, and from different countries around the world.

Pretty botanical gardens we walked around.

Omaha

I'm catching up on post here, so this little trip was right after we moved to Kansas.  We were able to spend a weekend in Omaha with my parents on our first weekend in the Midwest.  My dad had meetings there anyways, so we are always up for a little vacation.  Although there wasn't much to do, we went to the zoo, relaxed at the Embassy Suites, and toured around town.  The zoo turned out to be fantastic, and a lot of fun.  The weekend turned out to be perfectly relaxing and a break from our new crazy life in Kansas.  Thanks mom and dad for letting us visit!

Can you tell we liked the Giraffes!?

Two baby giraffes with their daddy!

Mom and I near an Orchid garden.

We also visited a statue park, that had Oregon Trail look a likes.

Just hanging out with some Oregon Trail characters!

North and South Carolina Tour

Shane graduated from Bradley leader school a week ago, which let him off just in time to enjoy a four day weekend!  Since his graduation was early enough we actually ended up leaving Thursday afternoon, and didn't get home until late Monday night.  It was a wonderful, relaxing, fun, and beautiful trip.  I can't tell you how many times we said how pretty the scenery was, and it just kept getting better and different!  We were able to hike to several different waterfalls, drive along the blue ridge parkway (and many other windy mountain roads, Shane enjoyed a little too much!), and stay in the mountains in North Carolina, then we drove to the quaint southern town of Charleston, South Carolina.

Shane was braver than I and hiked under the falls in North Carolina!

I watched from a distance, but it was still beautiful!

This was the second largest yellow poplar tree in the country.  Except there were signs saying how it had died three years ago.  Either way it was huge, and a fun hike through the mountains.

Shane in the middle all of the oak trees in Battery Park Charleston, South Carolina.

Looking out over the Atlantic Ocean in Hilton Head, South Carolina on our drive home.  The beach was beautiful, although I was not properly dressed for a walk on the beach.

One of many southern plantation homes in Charleston.  It was truly like a movie walking around that town, I didn't know it existed in real life!

Sunset by the water in Charleston.