Seven Falls

We also took Devon to Seven Falls. It is a beautiful area in S. Cheyenne Canyon. After climbing a steep 224 stairs while looking at breathtaking waterfalls, you are able to go on a couple of different hikes. We chose to hike to midnight falls. Devon was a great hiker and I asked him if he liked hiking and he said, "Yes!!" Then I asked him if his mom likes to hike. He said, "Um, not really, she's not really a 'nature' girl." That about sums it up!! Garrett and Kierstin were trying hard to find some poison ivy, luckily neither of them found any! We did enjoy smelling the pine trees, looking at bugs, trying to find bear marks on trees, looking at wasps nests, and spotting different plants like columbine, lichen and moss.

North Pole

We went to the North Pole, a small amusement park in Colorado Springs. I didn't really know what to expect, a roadside attraction? a carnival? Needless to say, my hopes were not set very high. However, I was pleasantly surprised. It is on the road to Pike's Peak, so the setting is beautiful. The rides were mostly carnival style, a lot of going in circles.....made me want to vomit, but the kids had a blast. There were no lines, none! The kids could just stay on the rides if they wanted to ride again. A great amusement park for young (or not into scary rides) kids.

Pike's Peak

We went to Pike's Peak with Devon. We enjoyed some tasty donuts at the top and panning for gold on the way.

Girls???

Apparently the drive home from Hays made the boys crazy!! We got home and they decided to play dress up with Kierstin. Garrett actually dressed up like a girl and kind of liked it!!! Super funny and what a cute girl he was!

Meeting Devon in Hays

Last weekend we met Nancy, Carlos, and Devon in Hays, KS. Wow!! What a town! We stayed at the Holiday (now renamed the Helliday) Inn. I have not stayed in such a crappy motel for let's see....um 13 years? Darin and I stayed at a real gem when we drove across the country to med school.....and this Helliday Inn ranks right up there. It was the strangest place. It was like a motel that they built walls around to turn it into a hotel. The rooms had windows that looked out into hallways that were hotter than hell (that would be the hallways, the rooms were about the same temp as hell). The rooms had 'air conditioners' that I am pretty sure were trial models for when ac was invented. The first room that we checked into the ac didn't work. It turned on for a few minutes, made a loud clunking sound, and then turned warm for a while. So, we moved to a nonsmoking room that smelt suspiciously of smoke. The ac 'worked' in this room and kept the room at an uncomfortable sleeping temp of 80+ degrees. Well, at least they had a great pool with a waterslide...oh that was just in the photos? The pool did have a waterslide and looked great from a distance. However, on closer inspection I can't imagine what types of diseases could be contracted if it weren't for the 5 million gallons of chlorine. The kids swam for a while, we went back and sanitized ourselves in the shower, ate pizza, and dealt with the boys becoming blind from the chlorine in their eyes. The boys went to sleep early because their eyeballs were burning out of their heads. We finally all drifted off to a sweaty sleep dreaming of checkout time!

The next morning we went to breakfast -with the rest of Hays, seeing how it was Father's Day. Then we went to a park, captured some cute photos there, and then to the Sternberg Dinosaur Museum, which the kids really enjoyed. We brought Devon back to Colorado Springs with us for a fun filled week!

Baseball begins

The boys have started the baseball season. Garrett is playing for the Twins and Gavin for the Yankees. Garrett is really into it and Gavin seems to be enjoying it also. Here are some photos from Garrett's game. Photos of Gavin coming soon.....I can only go to games if Kierstin naps!




The boys have started the baseball season. Garrett is playing for the Twins and Gavin for the Yankees.

Manhattan Tornado

A tornado hit Manhattan, KS, late Wednesday night. From photos people have sent it appears to have been quite destructive, demolishing some businesses and homes. At this point there have been no reported deaths, hopefully that remains true. For some photos of the destruction, check out our friend's blog at www.kansaskeenans.blogspot.com. There are also alot of photos here....http://www.z963.com/php/jc2.html. The Mercury (the local paper) has also added some photos to their site.

To our Manhattan friends....you are all in our thoughts!

Diving and Dancing

Here are a couple of video clips from our trip. The first clip is of Gavin explaining a great day of snorkeling. The second clip is of Garrett and Kierstin dancing....this was not the only time, they were boogie masters!

The low down....

Here's the story to accompany the slide show!! We really focused on just a handful of things on our vacation....relaxing, swimming, snorkeling, hanging out at the beach, and having fun!!! We stayed at a Beaches resort and the kids really enjoyed spen. The kids enjoyed spending a lot of time at the beach where they snorkeled, looked for sea shells, built sand castles, sailed on Hobie Cats (catamaran), kayaked, rode on aquacycles, and played in the ocean. They also loved going to all the different swimming pools. There was one called Arizona's that had waterfalls, a bridge, and a cave, one we called the French pool that was huge and had a few beach entry spots and the biggest hot tub I've ever seen in the middle, Pirate Island equipped with waterslides and another cave, and finally Iquana's a pool with volleyball. All of the pools had swim up bars... Kierstin really liked this, she would have us take her over and set her on a little stool and ask for a 'stwaberry.' The first day we were there Gavin went snorkeling with his kids club group and he saw a sea turtle!! Kierstin loved her 'kwids cwub' the first couple of days, but then she didn't want to go back. Garrett and Gavin picked activities that they wanted to do with their kids club. They went on a boat trip, did beach science, snorkeled, looked for sea shells, played soccer on the beach and went to a pirate party.

There was a boat that went a few minutes off the beach for snorkeling several times a day. We all went together once, unfortunately Darin forgot to get himself some contacts before we went, so his snorkeling activities were somewhat compromised! Garrett loved to snorkel, so he and I went on the boat trip multiple times.

We all went on a Native Cruise. We left from the Beaches resort with 2 guides from the Dominican Republic (I don't think anyone is actually from Turks and Caicos!! Every 'local' we met was from Dominican Republic, Haiti, or Jamiaca.) Back to the cruise, we went out and snorkeled for conches, they were all over the ocean floor (about 9-10 feet down) and we had to dive for them. Gavin and Garrett thought it was awesome! We loaded our conches on the boat and headed off to snorkel on a beautiful reef with spectacular coral and fish. Then we took the boat over to Fort George National Park, where the kids helped pull the conches out of the shells. Kierstin and Garrett thought this was great fun. Gavin watched with interest, but wasn't about to pull a giant snail out of a shell! Afterwards, we swam around and looked for sand dollars and shells while the guides prepared conch salad. Darin and the boys found a crab and it pinched Darin!

There are a few photos of some Sesame Street events. Beaches has apparently teamed up with Sesame Street. Kierstin LOVED it. There were parades and shows and characters here and there. The boys, on the other hand, not fans!! I think Gavin liked watching Kierstin, but Garrett would only say they were evil. Gavin had a very good comment. He said, "It's too bad Beaches had to get paired up with Sesame Street because not all ages like Sesame Street, it's mostly really little kids and there are lots of big kids here too!" Very good point, Gavin!

You'll see some photos of Kierstin and Darin when they went out to eat one night. I took the boys to grab a quick bite to eat before they went to their Pirate Party. By the time I caught up with Darin and Kierstin they had given up on me and plopped down in the restaurant to get something to eat. Take note in one of the photos, Darin is holding his finger in Kierstin's strawberry drink....yep he burned it on his fajita plate and after the ice in his cup melted, he moved on to his daughters!

It's nice to be home, but we really had a wonderful time!!

Turks and Caicos Slide Show!

We had so much fun, it took me a while to narrow down all the photos to the 100 or so in this slide show!! Let me know if you have any problems seeing the photos.

Turks and Caicos

Wow!!! We just got back from an amazing vacation to the Turks and Caicos islands in the Caribbean. We all had a wonderful relaxing time.



Check it out on a map, Turks and Caicos is a chain of incredibly small islands (the runway is the nearly the width of the island!!).


The first night there we ate at a restaurant that had sea shells and sea horses in sand on the table (covered, of course by some thick glass). The kids, obviously, were very impressed.


Here's Kierstin enjoying a chicken nugget, her staple on this trip, she really wanted them for breakfast too, but luckily they weren't available!
Gavin...day one in his swim shirt. This shirt will show up in many photos!