Our Ballplayer

 Parker was running out of baseball games to play so it was time to head to Ft. Collins to see him play!  We left the house EARLY so we could stop and see the Keppy's and get adjustments!  Jessi was kind enough to even fix us breakfast and I brought some cinnamon rolls up to cook!

It was exciting to see Jill and Robby's new concrete out back for their patio - wow does it look different back there!!  They have plans for a fire pit, more chairs and tubs of flowers - it will look so great when they have it all completely finished!

Parker's last regular game was Tuesday early evening - we ate an early dinner and although it was pretty darn hot out, it was just fine sitting at the game as there was shade!  

After the game we went out for ice cream!  The line was out the door at Dairy Queen as they were only allowing 2 sets of people in at a time - but it was worth the wait!

Jill started back to school on Wednesday!  I headed out and got a cup of coffee and then played cards and games with the kids during the day! (and had more cinnamon rolls!!)

Glenn and Parker had fun chopping at a stump in their back yard!  Boys will be boys!

Dinner on their new patio - how fun!!

Wednesday night started the league's tournament - because Parker's team won their first game, they went right into playing a second game!  Poor Parker was getting pretty tired due to the heat and getting up and down a lot as he was catching!  They lost their second game so were done for the year!  It was sure fun seeing him play!

We headed out for home the next morning after Jill left for school - and soon it will be time for Parker and Aleah to start their remote learning until mid-October when the school will make a decision about heading back in person or keeping the remote learning going!   Thanks Jill for a wonderful time!

Nedelle Comes to Visit

 How wonderful that 16 year old grand daughter Nedelle (Todd's daughter) came to visit us for a couple of days!  A friend of her mom's was heading out to Colorado and offered to bring her for a few days stay!

Nedelle stayed with other family for a couple of nights and then came to our place on Sunday!  Glenn enjoyed showing her all of his projects and gave her a couple of mechanic lessons as she has her own car!

We had a camping trip with the Smiths' lined up for the next couple of nights so it was nice to have Nedelle join us!  Even though the wilderness camping spots are impossible to find on the weekends, we really didn't think we would have a problem finding one during the week - WRONG!!  We headed to the back side of Marshall Pass and parked in the packed ATV drop off spot and went looking but there were none to be found - DARN!  So we headed back out to the highway and headed further up Poncha Pass and went in that way!  Luckily we found a very nice spot that both of us could camp in!

The kids made Nedelle feel right at home and played lots of games!

Laser tag was a big hit, especially in the evenings!

We only had Ned for one night of camping but they did get to ride in the razor for quite a while!  Unfortunately, the razor had problems and I ended up meeting them with the pickup to get Ned over to her ride home back to Iowa!  

Glenn and Matias went to load up the razor where they had left it and bring it back to camp - on the way here, they could see there was a grass fire just around the corner from our campers!!  They grabbed shovels and headed right back over there to help with the fire!  Brad and the kids went over to help too and a couple of hours later, the fire trucks finally got there to put it out!!  Pretty scary!!

Jaime and I enjoyed just relaxing, reading and taking walks!

Glenn and I had plans to stay an extra night but with the razor not running well, we decided we would just head back home with the Smiths.

An interesting camping expedition but I guess they all can't be perfect!

Covid 19 - It's Still Here

 I haven't really written much about the virus - it's still here - masks are required in most cases - lots more testing is being done.

School will be starting throughout the state in the next couple of weeks and each school district seems to be doing something different!  There are lots of pros and cons about kids going full time to school - and the debate goes on and on and on.....   I guess my feeling is that kids are going to get sick anyway when they go back to school, after being away from their friends for the last 6 months in many cases, so why not send them back now and start the process!  More than likely, schools will be shut back down sometime during the fall if this virus gets worse.

Our county received a variance so everything could open up - it was nice to go in and get a haircut and I've done that twice!  None of our fast food places are open to eat inside so it's all drive thru and eat in your car - which I don't enjoy!  We did eat breakfast out in Co. Springs one morning when we were down and that was enjoyable - all the necessary precautions were taken and it was fun to eat out!  But we really haven't ventured out for a "nice" evening meal yet!  So I'm still waiting on my birthday dinner with Glenn!

Unfortunately our Christian College in Woodland Park (Charis) hosted an event in early July and quite a few cases of the virus have arisen from that!  So many in fact that our county has received a letter from the health department stating that we are OVER the number of cases allowed to have everything opened!  But there hasn't been any cases that are coming from the local casinos and our commissioners are doing all they can to keep all the businesses open.

Our Teller County Fair was of course entirely different from what it usually is!  4-H is very active in our county and they still got to exhibit but it looked a whole lot different than it usually does and the public was not invited!  

In fact, everything in Colorado has been cancelled!  As I'm sure it has in other states too!  I can't imagine how many thousands of dollars have been lost in the tourism business this summer - Colorado is full of summer events and not a one of them have taken place!

So what is everybody doing?  They are ALL camping, ATVing, hiking and boating!  You would think the entire county is out camping from all the trailers and ATV's and boats that constantly go through Woodland Park - it's a NORMAL summer in that aspect!  But it's to be expected because there is basically nothing else to do!  We are hoping the camping will slow down a little bit once school starts!  It's even hard to find a wilderness camping spot nowadays!

I miss seeing new movies at Gold Hill Theaters - I miss the freedom of even walking into a bank (an appt. has to be made) - I'm tired of all the debates on Facebook - I miss seeing the smiling faces of people in public because of the mask wearing - I'm just tired of it all!  You don't realize how blessed you are and what privileges you have until something like this happens.

July Photo Dump

 July is gone - August is already on a roll!    Time to post the misc. July photos!

Jill's and Jessi's always "dress for the occasion" on the 4th of July!

Parker is doing baseball this summer!  We'll be headed up next week to see him play!

Yes, that's snow on Pikes Peak!!  We have seen snow every month of the year EXCEPT August!

Joleen hadn't been out to Colorado for many months so I enjoyed her for 5 nights this time!  We always love having coffee on the deck!

I usually see a lot of fawns late June but this year it was July before I saw any!  I love seeing twins!

And that's a wrap for July!

Boys Will Be Boys

 After we camped over at Taylor Park, Glenn decided it would be fun to do a "boys" trip with the grandsons and son-in-laws!  I thought it was an excellent idea since I wasn't doing "boys week" this year and told him to get it planned!

Everybody met over at Johnson Village and they caravanned over Cottonwood Pass together and found the site where Glenn wanted to camp!  They all just brought tents to rough it and we all hoped it didn't rain too much!!

Glenn didn't take ANY pictures so I had to borrow from Gary, Robby and Brad!!  From the looks of the pictures, it does look like they had a great time!

There are small ponds right where they were camping so all the guys and boys did a lot of fishing!

Glenn took his old motorcycle over and Evan had fun riding it!

He also took the canoe over!

Everyone said they really enjoyed their time together!  Let's hope this becomes an annual event!

Good-Bye Jeep

Glenn purchased an old Willys jeep quite a few years ago and it's just been sitting around the property!  He got a great deal on it and I believe paid $400 for it, with the hopes of fixing it up someday!

That someday FINALLY arrived!!  He's been working on it this spring and summer - not doing a complete renovation but at least getting it running and recovering the seats - it actually looked pretty good!

We put it on Craigs List and our local neighborhood website and didn't get much action on it for a couple of weeks!  And then all of a sudden the calls started coming in!

To make a long story short - he sold the jeep - for an excellent price!!  He was thrilled to get $4400 out of it and I always told him that whenever he fixed it up and sold it, he could use the money towards his old chevelle project!

About the same time, we decided to sell the trailer we use to put the Razor on - it fit the Can Am ATV perfect but since the Razor is bigger, Glenn would have to back it on using ramps as the back ramp had to be taken off and then tie it down as it hung over a little bit.  It didn't take him a long time to do it but I suggested it would be so much nicer to have a bigger trailer that he could just drive it up on!

So again, we listed the trailer and got lots of offers - I held out for what we wanted and it soon sold!  Now it was time to buy a new trailer and Glenn really wanted an aluminum one - they have a dealership in Lake George so we went over and picked one out!  But of course didn't buy it until we knew the old one was sold!

After the new owners picked up the trailer, I told Glenn to go ahead and go over and buy the new one which he did in typical Glenn fashion!  Because the trailer with the spare tire and attachment was $300 higher, he chose to just buy the one without those accessories.  But after talking to the gal inside, he noticed they didn't have any blinds in their office.  So soon an exchange took place - Glenn had some blinds in the shop (who knows how long he's held on to them!!) and he said he would put blinds on the 3 windows in exchange for a spare tire with the attachment!!  DEAL!

It's a great looking trailer and so much easier to load the Razor now!

Packed To The Hilt

Late Friday morning Glenn headed out to LVR to pick up Evan, Kenzie, Aleah and Parker - with strict instructions on what each child was to put in the car!  (4 items apiece - they have left stuff at LVR before and it's a LONG drive out there)  He did great and got it all!

After arriving back at our house, I fed them a quick lunch while they all recounted stories of their camp days!!

Next was trying to rearrange ALL of their luggage as we had to get Gwyn's car seat in there along with her stuff and MY stuff since I was staying up there for 3 nights!  WOW was that an ordeal!   But we finally got it all arranged and headed to Denver - traffic was not bad at all and we made great time getting up there!

Jill was already there - she had come down from Ft Collins to not only pick up her kids but to spend the night so the 3 of us could spend some time together for our birthdays - mainly COFFEE together!

Jessi and Gary fixed a great dinner and then we all had ice cream!  I was thrilled to see a carton of chunky monkey waiting in the freezer for ME!!

Yes, I eat it right out of the carton!!

The girls decided to spend the night outside on the trampoline!  And I guess they slept OK!!

Saturday morning we went out for coffee!!  Still can't sit inside or outside at the coffee place so we went to the park where we had our family pictures taken a few years ago!  It's a beautiful park and was pretty busy!  Hooray for great coffee with 2 beautiful daughters!

Jill headed home that day and I spent the next day and 1/2 just hanging out at the house -  enjoying my new computer that Robby had gotten for me (it's SO much faster!!), downloading more music from Amazon, playing games with the kids and taking walks!

Monday morning I had an appt. with my endocrinologist who is up in Denver so that all worked out fine!  I do have to admit I was ready for some down time after all of the company!