Monday, February 4, 2013

January...came and went!!

Consider this you're warning....this will be a marathon post as January was much busier than we had intended it to be. Let's just say 2012 ended with a bang and 2013 began with a boom. We have either been hosting visitors, training a pup, or chasing powder days with our good friends....rough life, huh?? I must say having a busy January was a pleasant surprise as January is my least favorite month of the whole year!!

January began with a visit from my sister in law Jen and my niece Emma. Part of Emma's Christmas present was tickets to Justin Bieber in no other place than DENVER!!!! She was more than thrilled and we had such a fun time. We did mani/pedis, shopped a little, hit up the Denver Zoo, the Denver Aquarium, and we even managed to find shoes for Emma for the wedding (now all we need is her dress!!) Needless to say we crammed a lot in to a few days and Emma had the time of her life at the JB concert. She tried to pull an illness pre concert as she was worried about all the commotion, but we knew she was just coming down with Bieber Fever!!! :)))

emma and jen in cherry creek. so cute!!

our little photographers....capturing the moment at the zoo!!! :)


Our next visitors of the month came with a little addition to our family. Jacki (a.k.a. Fancy) and her son Austin came out for a little Denver time/ski trip, and Ruby came along for the ride!! Ruby was my parent's dog back in Iowa, but she was a little bit of a pistol considering Gehrk's leg injury so we adopted her...more on that later!! So in other news, Jacki and Austin were such a treat to host. Fancy treated us to some fabulous dinners (THANK YOU!! again!) and we were able to spend some 1 on 1 time with them which doesn't always happen when we go home for visits!! We showed Austin around Vail and Keystone and our friend Stephanie was able to join us for a night in Breck where clearly it was time to "get yo robe on!!" Such a good time. Unfortunately towards the end of the weekend Stephanie came down with Influenza A, but luckily she had two fabulous nurses to take care of her and make the definitive diagnosis. And fortunately Austy was introduced to Patagonia and good wine!! :)

get yo robe on!!! with coors light of course!!!

girls + Austin. too funny. we could not stop laughing!

old glory!!!! #hysterical!

rudolph!!! #superfunny! (these people had props in their cupboards....clearly the boys found them!)

loveland pass with Austy and without any fresh pow pow.....if only they came a few weeks later!!!


RUBY!!!!!!! IS!!! HERE!!!! Little miss Ruby came roughly two weeks ago with Fancy and Austin in tow. She did great riding cross country and her only quirk was that she required to ride shot gun.....the whole way!! :) Definitely a habit we may have to break, but this silly dog loves to be in thick of the action. I actually think she thinks she is part human.....not kidding. She acts like a little person and is my shadow when I'm home with her during the day and she is the biggest snuggle bug by night. She hates the vacuum and loves toilet water! ;) She is quite the little runner and has enjoyed playing countless games of fetch with AK. Pretty much, I'm not sure what we ever did without her. She's the first person we talk to in the morning and the last person we say good night to at night. We've only had a few dog parenting spats with me being a wee bit territorial....I mean she was MY parent's dog after all!! :). Either way we love having her and is one of the best friends I've ever had!!

we love Ruby!!!!

AK trying to show Ruby her kennel (ie. her "home") is a good, safe place!!! hahahaha. something is off about this!!!


Powder days are some of the best days in Denver. And this weekend was no different. We had the opportunity to head up to Steamboat Springs, CO just in time as they received 3 feet of fresh snow the day before we got there!!! BOOM!!! The only thing about powder days is you feel obligated to ski the entire day 8a-3p and it was a long day, but the views and powder didn't stop so it was so worth it. I was pretty proud of myself as I skied some stuff I had never skied before and to quote AK "I crushed it this weekend!" I mean, I wouldn't say he fell in love with me for skiing abilities, but perhaps he fell in love with me because I'm willing to try and improve and push myself until I'm better. This weekend it all seemed to come together and we had some of the best ski/snowboard runs (AK boards....we don't hold it against him) we have had in over two years. Not to mention Steamboat is one of the loveliest mountain towns we have visited to date!! If we ever have the funds, maybe our mountain house will reside in Steamboat.....a girl can dream, right!?!? We rounded out our Steamboat weekend with a little snow shoe hike which was amazing and the only thing we were missing was our pup!!! We did watch the Superbowl, but I was say that was the least exciting of all this past weekend.

snow shoe tracks....so much powder and such a hard hike!!!
mid hike....giving AK something to shoot!! :) look at those mountains!!

love this pic....the start of our hike over looking steamboat mountain!!

trekking through pow pow!!!

product of AK's photo abilities!!! the hike was so hard, we were dripping sweat by the top. hence open coat, no hat, no gloves, hair on top of head!!
our tracks!!! :)

our view from the house we stayed in!!

AK ready to ride!!!

atop of the mountain. ready to shred!!! ;). love the white trees.

linds+me....waiting at the lift!
the views wouldn't stop....this picture does not do it justice!

the view from the top of our hike on Sunday!!!! Steamboat is so pretty!!!


For the 100th time we feel blessed to be back in CO and our so happy in our current situation. We felt the love this weekend as all of our friends said it was great to have us back and it felt like we never left. I say it all the time, but we are such lucky people!!! Hope your January came and went with as much excitement as ours. And to think 2013 has so much more to unfold!!!