The Not-So-Pony ride

The campground we were staying at has a stable and they offer guided horseback riding trips into the mountains. I was really excited to go! Anyone 6 and over can ride, but they don't let you share saddles. We decided to "rent" a pony for 30 minutes and let both the little boys ride that way instead, even though Spencer was old enough. (I think he'd have been a bit nervous!)

Here's the pony:

Funniest part: We didn't ride the pony! The girls says, "Let me just get Myrtle for you. We don't actually use the pony, because he tries to throw the kids off." So we keep the pony here because....?

So here's Cowboy Spencer riding Myrtle! (Note him swinging around his new hat...!)

And Cowboy Michael...wearing flip flops. Oh well. :D Spencer decided to let Michael wear his new hat while he rode the horse. That was nice of him!

Continental Divide/St. Elmo

Today we headed for the Continental Divide. I was told that if you stand on one side, your phone will tell you it is one time, but then if you cross the other side and wait a few minutes, it will reset and read a different time.

Liars. :D

Here we are - minus Lee 'cause he's taking the picture! - posing by the sign.

Gosh! Too bad I hadn't read Stephanie Hock's blog post about letting more light into your pictures BEFORE this trip! It was noon-ish...but it looks late! Here's Mom and Dad also posing casually by the sign.



Tram ride to the top of the mountain? Heck yes! And even though Lee was sort of whimpering ever time we hit a little bump, he didn't cry once! :D

Here are the Wright's in their tram car. (Note Kendra's cute hat...I totally want one! I'll also show you a better picture of it later!)

Here we are straddling the Continental Divide. (Sydney is such a HAM!)

Here we are at the top of the overlook...Gorgeous views! Don't know it you can tell, but it was a little breezy up there. (See Spencer holding his hat on?)

Next stop was St. Elmo's, a ghost town. (And before you even ask, Jennie...I saw no evidence of their fire!) You can see Spencer and I in the picture above, but all those other random people were strangers. I'm sure the goal was the BUILDING...In fact, I think I'm only in it by accident! :D

Lee loved wandering through and taking pictures. I posted only a fraction of what he took! It was a very cool little old town!

At the first stop here, we picked up a brochure. I began to read out loud, to help us have a better understanding of the history of this charming place.

But it got kinda long...

Lee is a bit of a sucker. See the boys hats? New. And pricey. But SUPER CUTE!

Here is Kara in her brand new sunglasses. She leaves them on. And gets mad if you take them off her. Funny. Mine liked glasses for about 7 seconds. Oh! And as promised...The better picture of Kendra's cute hat. I wanted to buy one, too, but the one I liked was the SAME...and I didn't want to be a copycat! :D

What a cool place to visit! Very interesting.

Although if you ever go there, I suggest stopping somewhere to go to the bathroom first.

Stinkiest. Outhouse. Ever.

Ew.

We headed back to camp, by way of Safeway, where dad bought each of the kids their own pint of Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream. There are no pictures of that, though. They all ate it too quick! Since it was Dad's birthday, we did some gift exchanging. (What do you get the guy who buys himself everything?) Then it was the end of another great day..

Lazy Day!

The day started out with some bad news. Apparently, all day in the sun at a parade completely fried the little Wright girls! Bad...Kara's little nose and cheeks were all blistered. It was so sad! So I was recruited to jump in the truck with dad and run to WalMart.

(And thus began his week long quest to find light-weight, long sleeve t-shirts for Eva and Kara. Um, it's summer. There aren't any light-weight long sleeve t-shirts in all of Colorado! Very sweet Grandpa, though...to think of them at every store and shop we went into!)

As I mentioned, we didn't find any. But Dad needed to go by the coffee shop anyway...so the trip wasn't a total waste! ;D

The plan was to spend today just enjoying the campsite. The kids rode bikes, blew bubbles, and threw stuff (my boys!); then we had some lunch and the kids all went down for naps.

While they slept, us adults (okay, me!) read, chatted, and dozed in our chairs. Mama had brought some billing statements from work, so she passed those out and we quickly stuffed/sealed/stamped those with her.

We had told the kids that if they slept we'd take them swimming. So true to our word, we headed to the pool/hot tub.

One of the most exciting parts of going swimming when we camp is climbing in the back of the truck, where we never ride, to drive the short distance to the pool. The kids think it's WAY fun! (And it keeps wet kids out of Papa's truck!)

This is Mama swimming with Eva and Spencer. Eva loved the pool...As long as no one splashed her! Papa splashed her, and she spent the next 7 minutes just flailing water back at him. Clearly, she has some strong revenge tendencies!

Tory, getting better at swimming all the time! He was doing flips off the edge of the pool. (He only smacked his head the one time...Jump AWAY from the edge, dude!)




Meg, who could just BE a fish she swims so well!




Sydney, too. She kept challenging Mama to race her across the pool. (I'm pretty sure Mama beat her...Keep practicing, Syd! Maybe you'll beat her next year!)





Mama holding Eva, Chad holding Kara.

Michael and I were swimming, too. But we spent our time in the hot tub. Apparently that was a "no picture" zone, because I don't have any of either of us!

After dinner we decided to watch a movie. Dad has a large TV/DVD player that we set up outside the trailer. Then we set some chairs up around, put on "Percy Jackson and the Lightening Thief", and popped some popcorn. That was fun. There were a few "too scary for a 2-year-old" parts where we had to distract Eva. (I'm pretty sure Syd just sat in front of her and let her poke her in the face or something.)




Here we all are at our outdoor theater. To my hubby, who I was unable to squeeze into my poorly taken photo: Sorry! I'd have taken one more step back, but there was a trailer behind me! :D

Do you love that we belted Kara in? It you look closely, you will see that it is just a regular belt wrapped around the chair and her to keep her from climbing out and falling down. Hee-hee! With the belt on, she actually would sit and watch. (Especially if you had snacks!)

My Version of a Retraction...or Correction...

I made an error in my last post. I neglected to mention that despite Dad coming to look at the shower head, and Lee trying to buy a new one at True Value Hardware (they didn't have one that fit!), we were dumbfounded. We couldn't figure out what had gone wrong. We were sitting outside at the picnic table, talking over what we could do so that we wouldn't have to face another 7 "Water Pick" showers...Lee, Dad, and I. The next step was going to be taking their shower head apart and comparing it to ours piece by piece to make sure we had all the pieces and that they were put together the right way. Then Dad says to Lee, "I wonder if we maybe attached the hose wrong. Remember how hard it was to attach that one end to the faucet?"

Then Lee went over to manage the dogs, (which barked pretty much any time they were outside!!) and came back a few minutes later declaring:

"Dad, you are wise beyond your years." Lee had taken off the hose and turned it around...and Dad was right.

And I was so grateful that I didn't have to shower in a water pick for a whole week that I won't even mention that if I had installed this shower head I probably would have followed the directions and not had this problem. Nope. I won't even bring that up!

:D

Thanks again, Dad!

Water Picks and Parades!

Before we left on our trip, Lee and his dad installed a new shower head in the trailer we use. Supposedly it is the same as the one that Pop installed in his own trailer, and they swear by its awesome pressure, and how they wish their shower at home had the same pressure. We succumbed, and purchased.

So here we are on the first morning of our trip. I go into the teeny little shower and turn on the tap...only to find that the water barely dribbles out.

Hmm. How lousy must their HOME shower pressure be?

I manage to wash my hair in the tub faucet...where water actually comes out.

Then it's Lee's turn, so he heads in and turns on the water. He finishes up, and comes out and says: "When dad asks about the shower head, I'll tell him it's great, if you like showering with a water pick."

(I may have used my creative licence a little with this quote...meaning that I don't remember EXACTLY what he said. But he made me laugh right out loud with his line about the shower being a water pick!)

Whew! So everyone gets ready. With 13 of us in two trailers, that in itself was a feat! We had heard that Gunnison was holding a parade to celebrate their "town days", so we headed into town.

I prefer to think they had heard we were coming, and were so happy to see us they threw a parade! It was fun! Lots of people throwing candy, my kids running into the street to grab all they could.

Evidence of sweet kids: Spencer was grabbing candy, then he'd come hand it to Chad and tell him it was for Eva. Also, there was a girl who may have been Downs Syndrome just down the parade route a few feet from us. Consequently, when my kids were racing for candy they would sometimes grab what she was heading for before she could get to it. When I pointed her out, and suggested that they leave some for her, my kids would all stop at some invisible boundary and forage for candy elsewhere. Cute!

After the parade, we headed to Crested Butte, a really cute little old town. The little shops were adorable, and the whole setting of the city was fun to see.

Lee took a lot of pictures of the many wildflowers growing everywhere! Apparently, they are so numerous that toward the end of July/beginning of August every year they hold a Wildflower Festival!

He is quite the photographer!

Also...It was HOT!! Like, 100 degrees, hot. I am aware that the temperature here was also about that high...but I guess last time the McAlisters were there, the temperature was usually in the 80's. Guess what...Record highs! Thanks.

Colorado, Here We Come!

We McAlisters went on a week long camping trip to Colorado! Just a few of our adventures are chronicled in the next few posts! :D

We were out of bed and on the road by 5:00 am...Yeah, still dark out and everything. A few Pop Tarts and some Chocolate Milk (Breakfast of Champions!) and we were on the way. We headed to Mama and Papa's house to form our little caravan. To save on gas, we divided up the Wright family...some went with the folks, some came with us...so they wouldn't have to drive a whole other car. It was a long drive. You might think I'm exaggerating when I say we drove for about 10 hours (and I might be...I WAS reading a good book!) but I really do think by the time we had stopped all along the way that's pretty close. But our kids were really quite good. They've never really minded a long car ride. We got there, set up, and had a nice dinner at camp. Then it was off to bed.

Goodnight!

Rude.

Here's how this went down:

I went to the zoo yesterday with Anna and her girls...minus Mia, she was at a fun summer camp thing. Anyway, I am a season ticket holder, so I go to the gate with my ID and my membership card. As usual, my little boys are arguing over which one of them gets to hold the map. The lady hands the map, along with my card and ID, to me and says:

"I'll give it to Grandma and let her decide."

I was too surprised to even say anything. If I hadn't had my sunglasses on, she might have registered some surprise in my expression. Who knows. So we walk past her.

We walk inside the zoo, and Meg says to me, "Did she just call you a grandma?"

Yeah...Yeah, she did.

Um...time to color my hair?

(I was laughing about it all day...And of course, making the customary old people jokes...About the heat, all the walking,...)