The Bar Is Open!

When the weather is bright, sunny and in the 70's, it makes us want to open the bar and invite our friends over for the first BBQ of the season.  With a two week break between flag football kick off and our first game, we took up the space in the calendar with a BBQ and flag football game with out kids.

Keith fired up the grill with some  yummy burgers and grilled veggies.  He was SO happy to be back at the grill with his buddies lingering around the bar.

Brad, Keith and Eric

The ladies were in the sun and shade on the patio.

Jennie and Kristen, soaking up the summertime weather.

Patrick, Keith and Eric

The kids popped a squat in the middle of the yard (AKA their football field) for a bright and sunny picnic.

Emerson, Owen, Evan, Oliver and Cole

Emerson, Kellan, Owen, Evan, Oliver and Owen

The Dudes got comfy at the bar, just as they should.

Keith, Brad, Eric and Patrick

The girls kicked back on the patio with their cool dude companion.

Kellan, Jennie, Carrie, Kristi and Kristen

I think that Kellan may be over the idea of a photo.  It's funny how quickly his opinion can change from one photo to the next :)

With Burgers in their bellies, the kids hit the field for a little football two-hand-touch.

Emerson may have taken the "two-hand-touch" a bit too literally with Mr Keith.  The poor guy.  I wonder if he'll now say, "I was tackled and beat up by a girl?"  

HA HA!

Some of us are so excited for Summer that we can't help  but swing our arms out wide and sing out in happiness "Good Vibrations!"

Bring on Summer!

King Cobra, Tiger and Swinging Monkeys

I took a couple days of vacation during Oliver's spring break and I'm so glad that I did.  Not only did we go skiing on a Thursday but we went to the zoo on a Friday.  This was a fantastic idea to go mid-week, until we got there and had to park at City Park and not at the Zoo.  We hi-jacked Owen to join us and I had three excited boys in the backseat.  They were so excited that they didn't care how far away we parked.  So, we parked and then hiked it out to the zoo.  Once at the zoo, the kids grabbed maps and started plotting their route.

They each got to pick their top animal to see.  Oliver picked the King Cobra (no surprise), Kellan picked the Tigers and Owen picked the swinging Monkey.

First up, Kellan's Tiger.  We almost missed Mr Tiger, but we spotted him sleeping in the corner.  Ke was kicked back and snuggled up sleeping, much like Kellan sleeps.  Such a sweet kitty.

The next stop was the King Cobra.  Oliver knows exactly where to find him in the Tropical Discovery.

Oliver and his favorite pet at the zoo.  We (he) lucked out this day as the King Cobra was actually on the move.

This lizard is livin' the good reptile life.

In Elephant Passage, Owen was taking the boys for a ride.  It looks like he had a co-pilot giving directions in his ear.

Kellan took up the backseat with a couple of other kids.  Looking at Oliver, the ride may be been getting a little bit wild and crazy.

Finally, we saw the swinging monkeys.  Really, I was SO relieved.  I thought that Owen wanted the Orangutang's, which are on the other side of the zoo.  We walked through Elephant Passage because I love it.  Fortunately, the Elephant Passage monkeys are the ones that Owen wanted.  Whew!  It all worked out.

Mission Completion!

We hit up the King Cobra, the Tiger and the Swinging Monkeys.  We were having so much fun, we didn't want it to end, so we went to ride the train.

After watching 2 trains come and go, we thought that we were next.  

Just Kidding!

The cut off was right at the boys.  So... we took a photo.

Oliver, Owen and Kellan

The biggest advantage of being the first ones in line for the train...  we get the first pick of the train cars. 

The O's picked the very first car...

....while Kellan and Mommy took up the second car on the train.

What would make a super fun day complete?  An ice cream cone, of course!

But first, Kellan had to consult the map to make sure that he wasn't missing anything critical that we had set out to see.

Don't fret, there were no tourists injured in this map reading and walking.

Finally at the ice cream, the boys actually paused for a cutie pie quick photo.

Kellan, Owen and Oliver

I SCREAM...

YOU SCREAM...

WE ALL SCREAM...

FOR ICE CREAM!!!

What a fantastic (and long) day we had at the zoo!!!

The boys were awesome and we all had a great time.  They were even troopers for the LONG walk back to the car. There wasn't a single peep of a complaint.  Kellan did slow down and he would stop to squat and rest now and then.  Eventually, I volunteered to give him a ride, even though he didn't ask for it.

King Cobra, Tiger, Swinging Monkeys...

CHECK!

Train Ride and Ice Cream...

BONUS!!!

Hermie and Hermett

For Oliver's spring break, we volunteered to care for the class pets, Hermie and Hemett.

Hermie and Hermett are Hermit Crabs.  We don't have any Hermit Crab experience, but we figured that it couldn't be hard and the boys would love it.  For the most part, the crabs just slept in the corners.  That was until we discovered that they LOVE grapes.  Within moments of putting the grapes into their home, Hermie went right after them.  It was awesome!  We hadn't had an opportunity to see them eat and it was quite an education for all of us.  He picked the grape with his claw and then two pinchers came out from near his mouth to take the food into his mouth.  The boys said that it was like his fork and spoon.  It was fascinating.

We loved having Hermie and Hermett here for the week.  We kind of missed them after they were gone, but not enough to go out and buy our own Hermie and Hermett :)

Good Ride, Cowboy

17 years ago, I finally admitted that I enjoyed Country Music.  Before then, it was socially tabu, in my book.  It was around this time that I moved to Northern Nevada where country music was on every other radio station.  It was also in Nevada that I discovered my love of country dancing.  Really, it's fortunate that country music and country dancing came two-steppin' into my life because that's how Keith Wyoming Waltzed his way into my life, but that's a story for another post.

In this post, I write about how all of those years ago I knew that Garth Brooks would be an epic concert.  Then... he retired.  So, when he came out of retirement and made Denver a stop on his tour, I knew that we had to be there.

Lucky for us, Kristen and Brad wanted to be there too (as well as Kristi, not pictured) and Brad has some mad skills when it comes to clicking "purchase" on the ticket sales website.  His skills are SO good that we were THIS close!

Carrie, Keith, Kristen and Brad

Garth (yes, we're on a first name basis) played all of the clasics for over two hours.  Maybe it was nearly three hours.  I'm not sure, but I do know that it was AWESOME!!!  He rocked the house and then went on to play another show that night.  Amazing!!

Meanwhile, while Garth was bustin' out another amazing show for a packed house, we were down the street being hypnotized by my martini.  (Disclaimer, it looks better than it tasted)

We stayed out well passed our bedtime and then caught a Pedi-Cab back to our hotel room.  (oh yes, our kids were at home with Brad and Kristen's kids and their nanny.  It was fantastic!)

What happens when four parents go out on the town without kids on a Friday night and jump on a Pedi-Cab?  We take a blurry photo, of course.

What an amazing concert Garth put on.  We all had so much fun, but the fun wasn't ready to stop.  Before heading back to the responsibilities of parenthood, we went to a famous diner in Denver.

Carrie and Kristen at Sams No. 3.

******

Then.... two days later, we were back at it. 

I had won tickets to attend the Sunday Garth Brooks show (he played 8 total) and my sister-in-law Stephanie was supposed to go with me.  I was SO excited to share this with her.  Sadly, in the first hour of a seven hour drive to Denver, her daughter was projectile vomiting in the backseat of their suburban, so they turned around and went home.

Lucky for me, I had a back up date who was eager to attend.

It was fun to see the difference between the two nights, besides the location of the seats.  Much of the show was the same, but one of our favorite highlights was that he played "Good Ride, Cowboy", his tribute to Chris LeDoux.  Keith and I spent our dating years attending Chris LeDoux concerts until he passed away.  It was a perfect ending to our date.

We have checked the box, twice, for seeing Garth Brooks in concert.  I would check that box again in a heart beat, given the chance.