Moon and Lehlers Visit 2009/2010

Right after we returned back to Colorado from our holiday adventure in California we were given the pleasure of being followed half way across the country by our good friends Nicole Moon and Laura "Paint" Ehlers. Moon was doing her second consecutive New Years in Colorado whereas Laura was on an extended layover on her way back to Pharmacy School in Ohio. Needless to say much fun was had, almost too much fun. The week started by picking up the ladies at the airport who had entirely TOO MUCH luggage. After squeezing in our car and maneuvering the luggage our car looked like a clown car at a circus. The ladies arrived late and seeing as it was one of the busiest travel days of the year it took forever to get their luggage. The first night we just relaxed since we didnt get home from the airport until nearly midnight. Day two however the ladies and I ( no Drew since he had to work) headed out to Breckenridge to go skiing. Now I have been skiing on a few other mountains in my life but no resort was as big as this one. After the two hour drive with traffic and an accident in a plastic cereal bag and finding parking for an hour we finally made it up. The first ride was rough as Laura was on a snowboard and we had to traverse flat ground (she hadnt snowboarded in a few years). Here is a photo below of myself and Moon completely covered. We couldnt get laura in a photo with us because once we started moving we didnt want to stop her.



After a few runs we decided to make the trip back to Denver. It just started to get much too cold even though we were layered up pretty well. After we met back up with Drew we all cooked dinner (by all I mean I did) and met up with Emily and Jim and headed out to The Gin Mill Followed by the Giggling Grizzly. This photo was taken at the Grizzly:



Shortly after this photo our nights concluded at various times. Just as my last New Years Eve in Colorado. This one turned out to be great as well. No plans except to go over to Emilys and the night didnt disappoint. I think things are always better when you just see where the night takes you. Emily was a great host and set up some snacks and plenty of beer and vodka. We celebrated new years at Scruffy Murphys (a local irish pub) at least for those of us that made it in before midnight. The rest of the group celebrated in the streets (emily, Jim, Moon, Laura) so we have to thank the Denver Police for not being too strict.



Drew with the ladies. I must have been taking this photo.

So after new years, our friend Laura (go buckeyes) needed to watch the Rose Bowl to support her Ohio State Buckeyes. In denver, each bar represents a college so we looked up the local Buckeyes bar and headed to Crocs.... O-H- O-I, spelled wrong on purpose, at least this time . The bar was packed and I was tired so returned home but that didnt stop the youngin's from staying out all night. Lauras buckeyes were victorious and here is a celebratory photo:



The girls, and boy, came back to the house after and the ladies kept changing to find the appropriate attire to go out in and apparently kept running into our washing machine and i thought they were going to break it. Ladies, next time dont pack so much. Anyways after a tame saturday we headed to brunch at our favorite place the Coral Room and were lucky enough to catch the last broncos game of the year. Now the broncos needed to win and have either the Jets or Ravens lose in order to make the playoffs. Both the Ravens and Jets, however, did not lose and were playoff bound but that didnt stop our Broncos from an embarassing defeat at the hands of the Chiefs. Nice showing team. It was nice to go to a game though, and now we have been to all of the major sporting events in Colorado, which i havent even done in california. The ladies eventually packed up to leave and as much as i love them i was ready for my life to go back to normal. Sorry ladies, i do miss you though. Until next time (which i am sure will be sooner than i expect).

Jesus is the Reason for the Season

We were fortunate enough to leave the Colorado Snow (got out just in time) and head to California for Christmas. Sadly, we were on two different flights as my Dad's co-worker Denny gave me his expiring Southwest Voucher to use for free and Drew flew on an inferior airline through LA. It was so great to be home and spend time with family and friends that I don't get to see as often. As usual my family did the the Holiday Celebration on Xmas Eve, but unlike other years, the wine drinking was pretty minimal and the festivities ended early because everyone had to put their children to bed. Here are some pictures of the most important people of the trip (the nieces and nephews)



Rowen in his cute geriatric attire.



Liliana taking a stroll with her Great Grandma



Grandma and Grandpa (mom and dad) with three of the four kids...shockingly Hudson is missing (from left to right Cannon, Dad, Giana, Mom, Rowen)



Hudson carrying presents too big for him...note to self, buy him a candle next year since that was his favorite gift.



Mine and Drew's pile of gifts (thank you everyone for still considering us kids)

We were also lucky enough to have a few game nights with our friends and drink some wine though now living in Colorado we realize there just isn't ever enough time to do everything. I also want to thank my mom and dad for our new winter wardrobe and thank the rest of our friends and family for an amazing trip. We cant wait until our next trip back to California, and your next trips out to the lovely state of Colorado. Miss and love you all.

PS - one thing to note, Drew and I were able to play tennis while we were in California and it was such a nice change from playing in the cold and high altitude. We couldn't believe how much better we were at sea level. We couldn't hit balls out if we tried and never got tired. Its amazing the difference that altitude will do. I swear you would have thought you were watching a professional tennis match. Our matches aren't nearly that good here.

Lastly, from now on remember to only fly southwest since they were kind enough to change my flight that connected through vegas to the direct flight at no charge and also give me a credit of $2.50 (not sure why i got the credit seeing as a used a free voucher for the flight but i am not going to question anything).....best customer service of any airline.

Christmas time is Cookie time

So I must say that we have been lagging but I'm going to go ahead and blame Aaron for that....why not right? It's been about a month so I figure I could do a little updating on what we have been up to during the Holiday season. As we all know, you can't really have a Christmas without slopping down 5000 calories of sugar cookies and frosting, so naturally we invited some friends over to enjoy this time of obesity. Emily, Jim, and Cody came over to join us for what could be considered a cookie decorating party?? Let's start off by saying that baking isn't any of our strong suits but luckily for us, Philsbury has a pre-made cookie dough that tastes not much better than trash. It didn't bother us though due to the massive amounts of frosting that is obviously good for you. Oh yeah, we didn't have a rolling pin or flour so we sprayed cooking oil on the counter and used a wine bottle. I guess you have to do with what you have right. This was okay until we realized that the already unhealthy cookies probably doubled in grease/butter due to our lack of flour. But it's XMAS time and no one can be worried about that. My first batch was so thin they broke apart and tasted like pretzels. Emily's next batch was the opposite and the cookies grew over the sides of the pan I think. I would have to give the best cookie making to Jim who made a candy cane that was about 12 inches long and 3 inches wide. Here's a photo of our "rolling pin."



We also tried to see who could pile up the most frosting and not sure who won but of course Emily had to eat it. Here's the play by play of that situation:



And here are just a couple more photos from this night...