The Merry Month of June

June was a fun and busy month. I was in the throes of morning/evening sickness, so I didn't feel much like blogging, but here's a quick recap of some things we did.

The boys took tennis lessons, they started swimming lessons, we went to an outdoor jazz festival in Westminster and heard some great music, the boys went on a camping trip with my mom up in Rocky Mountain National Park where they hiked, fished, and explored Estes, Emme moved off her mattress on the floor and into a big girl bed, Eli and I read the first Harry Potter book together and stayed up late a couple nights to watch the movie, we went bowling using the passes the boys got from summer reading, and we spent time with friends at the park, museum, and pool.

 Justin and I celebrated our tenth anniversary on June 24th. We dropped the kids off at my mom's and took a two day stay-cation to enjoy some kid-free time. We took a long bike ride, enjoyed jazz and dessert French toast at Dazzle, explored Olde Town Arvada, tried some new restaurants, walked around Standley Lake, and visited Trader Joe's for the first time. 

 

 Here are some everyday moments captured in photos:  

Benjy made some awesome shape creations 

 Emmie got a new cat bag from Iris at MSEC

 Eli saw this book at the library and said, "Mom, can we check out that book? I want to learn how to grow a money tree."

 Kids eating popsicles- a regular sight

 Somebody got hungry for cherry chapstick

Bolder Boulder

Update: This post was written weeks ago but never published because I didn't have the pictures. Hooray, I finally got them uploaded!

This was a few weeks ago now, but I wanted to post about our Memorial Day weekend. Saturday was a fun family day and we got some things done around the house and yard. Monday was Memorial Day, and this year for the first time we went up to Boulder for the annual Bolder Boulder 10K. Justin and I had been planning to run it together, but with the surprise pregnancy, I decided it best not to take any risks. Eli ran in my place, and Benjy and Emmie and I got to cheer on Justin and Eli. I dropped the boys off and they met up with my mom, sisters, Carlos, and Tamma. Here is a picture of them before the race:

After I dropped them off, I parked the car at Boulder High School and pushed the stroller up to Pearl Street where we met up with runners headed toward the stadium. There was a steady stream of runners the whole way; it was like a river of people constantly moving along. 

The kids and I walked the last stretch of the race next to the runners. Every few blocks there was live music, including a pipe band at one corner.

After about an hour, the kids and I arrived at the stadium, and we got ourselves some seats where we could see the runners coming in. We hoped to catch a glimpse of everyone we knew crossing the finish line, but we only ended up seeing Justin and Eli, and that was because they happened to be running right behind a group of firefighters jogging in full uniform. I caught the firefighters on tape and just happened to turn and see Justin and Eli jogging in behind them.

It took awhile to find everyone, but once we had finally met up, we sat together in the stadium to watch the competitive racers cross the finish line and then watch the Memorial Day program. 

This was the first Memorial Day since we've been in Colorado that we didn't go to the cemetery, and I was feeling a little guilty about that. The program that followed the race, however, did a nice job of honoring our United States veterans. It was really cool seeing the paragliders from the different branches of the armed forces come in to the stadium. There were some remarkable stories and biographies shared about different veterans that had fought to protect our country, and it was a very fitting tribute to our armed service men and women on Memorial Day.