Weekend at Breckenridge

A few weeks after we moved to Colorado, our friend Brett and his girlfriend Casey made plans to come up and visit. We decided to go up to Breckenridge for a few days and ski! We had great weather and skiing and such a fun time with friends! On our last evening up in the mountains, we decided to do something different and try a fondue restaurant! It really wasn't an ideal place for Boone, but the waiters and owners were so nice to us. They even took him off our hands a few times and walked him around the restaurant (don't worry... it was a small place and we could see them the entire time!)

Here's a few pictures of our weekend!

Jeff on the slopes

Brett and Casey at lunch

The Robertsons!

Oh... did I mention these two are engaged now?! Congrats Casey and Brett!

My guys! Love these two so much!

Kisses!

In the middle of dinner! It was delicious! Casey and Brett were sweet enough to treat us to dinner for our anniversary that night. Totally unexpected and we were so grateful!

Our waiter trying to entertain Boone! They were so great to us!

My friend Melissa, that I grew up with in church, lives about 15 minutes 

from Breckenridge, so she met us at the end of dinner! It was so great to see her! 

Hopefully we will see her again soon!

It was such a fun weekend up in Breckenridge! We are so blessed to have friends to come see us!

February Family Visit (Part 2)

A week after Jeff's parents came to help us unpack, my parents arrived for their first visit to our new home. By the time they got here, we had almost everything put away, so we got to explore with them a little and see some things around the area.

On Friday, Jeff had to work, so my parents, Boone and I headed to Boulder. We checked out the Flatirons and then walked around Pearl Street Mall. It was a bit chilly, but it was fun!

In front of the Flatirons!

On Saturday, we decided to head up to Winter Park and walk around the area. We had planned to eat at a restaurant that my family had gone to all the time when we used to ski in Winter Park, but it wasn't open for lunch. We were bummed, but it was still fun to check out the town.

Winter Park added a mini gondola that travels between two areas in the resort, so we took it for a little ride.

We were anxious to ski because we hadn't been yet at this point.

All three of us on the gondola.

Walking around the village at Winter Park.

They had these neat wagons you could borrow to haul your kiddos and ski gear through the village. We decided to give Boone a little ride.

On Monday, my parents and I decided to head down to Colorado Springs. We wanted to tour the Olympic training center and take them by Garden of the Gods. We had a great time at both places.

The Olympic training center in Colorado Springs is the location for sports like swimming, wrestling, volleyball and men's gymnastics. Athletes can start living at the training center at 16 and must stay in the top 10% of their sport to stay at the center.

Volleyball gym.

The training center also hosts the shooting sports. It was neat to see their indoor facilities.

Indoor shooting areas

One of the gyms in the center

At the end of the tour. It was a pretty neat thing to see for it being a free tour. And it was neat to see it while the Olympics were actually going on.

And it was a great afternoon to swing by Garden of Gods. My parents had never been there, so it was fun to walk through there with them and the weather was great.

We were so thankful to have both our parents in Denver within our first month of living in our new place. They are so faithful to always make the effort to come and see us!

We are loving our new home!

February Family Visit (Part 1)

Both our parents are so faithful in making trips to wherever we land. They always have been that way, although I think their eagerness picked up a bit after a certain Boone showed up. So I wasn't surprised when both sides made plans to come up in February. The Robertsons were first, and they actually came up the first weekend we were in our house. Which made for a pretty uneventful trip for them, unfortunately. They mostly helped us unpack, put away and clean our new house. We were so thankful for all their hard work though. They really did get so much done for us in such a short period of time. Carol took most of the pictures the weekend they were here, so full credit goes to her for all these next couple of pictures.

So... our house is too small for all of our stuff. So a lot of the extra stuff has ended up in our garage. That being said, we have less stuff than the average family with one child. We move roughly every year and a half, so we really do live pretty simply. I promise, I know it looks like we are hoarders, but we really aren't! 

Jeff had Boone "helping" him fix things around our house all weekend.

We had a long list of things that needed to get done around the house and Carol grabbed a picture of my list!

Carol and Bruce visited right after Carol's birthday, so we had a few birthday gifts for her.

Boone is getting a lot better at navigating stairs, but we have a nice big staircase in the middle of our house that he loves to play around.

Grandpa Bruce navigating the stairs with Boone.

Boone's bookshelf. This kid LOVES books. Like really, really 

loves books and his collection is getting pretty extensive.

Watching the Olympic opening ceremonies. I love the Olympics and Jeff likes watching the events with me and Boone has even gotten into it a bit this year.

Grandma and Boone

Moving is always hard, but it was especially difficult with Boone this time. It takes a lot of time to clean and sort a whole house, so it was great to have Carol and Bruce with us that first week. Another move-in is complete and I am thankful for that!

Until next time,

The Colorado Robertsons

Surprise!

Well... we are finally settled into our house in Denver and it is starting to, sort of, feeling home! I say that because it feels weird to say "we live in Denver!" It is somewhere we've always wanted to live and it has not disappointed so far! The weather has been wonderful, and we've been able to enjoy all the fluffy powder up in the mountains and get out to ski at two different resorts.

The first month we were here was pretty hard though. It took us quite awhile to find somewhere to live that was decent and that didn't break the bank. The rental market here is crazy and everything is in high demand. If we were going to be here for any amount of time it would be worth it to buy a home, but sadly, we will probably be in Denver for our shortest stay yet... But then again, you never know! Since it took us so long to find a place and get settled, I've fallen a bit behind with the blog! So the next couple of posts will be playing some catch up on the life and times of the Robertson clan. First up, my mom's surprise party!

My mom turned 60 back at the end of January! My brother and I decided that we would gather a few of her close friends and surprise her with a dinner at a local restaurant. Boone and I flew in the day before her birthday and my mom and dad took my mom's birthday off work. We went to the Science Center and we all had fun playing with Boone at all the exhibits. Then we went to lunch and came home to let Boone get his nap in. We had to do a little fibbing to get my mom to the specific restaurant where we had planned the party. We told her that my brother had bought a Groupon for the restaurant and he wanted to contribute to the dinner. It somehow worked and everyone was waiting to surprise her when we arrived. It turned out so well and she was really surprised! It was so fun to do something for my mom because she does so much for so many other people!

The pictures are a little blurry, but it was a dark room, so I'm just thankful to have pictures! Happy birthday, Mom! We love you!

Mom opening a few gifts people brought. My Aunt Dorothy made a neat picture books of all different times in my mom's life! Really cool to see all the old pictures!

The cake that I made with lots of help from Mrs. Younkin! It was three layers and completely from scratch! It was quite the endeavor, but tasted REALLY good!

My mom and her sister, Dorothy!

The fam, minus Jeff! We missed him while he was busy getting our stuff moved into our new home.

Garden of the Gods

Every time I had visited Colorado in the past, it was to ski, so I've never spent much time exploring outside of ski towns. This past weekend, we took advantage of some GREAT weather we had on Saturday and headed down to Colorado Springs to see Jeff's aunt and uncle who live there.

Colorado Springs is really close to Denver and only about 40 minutes south from the southern part of Denver. We will be living on the northern end, so it will take around an hour and 15 minutes for us to get there, but that is still the closest we've ever lived to family in all our moves.

We headed straight for the Carlton's house when we got there, and spent some time seeing their place and catching up. Jeff's uncle recently retired from the military, and they are working on remodeling parts of their cabin in southern Colorado, so they have a lot going on!

After grabbing some lunch at a great Mexican restaurant, we decided to walk around Old Colorado City. It is a cute area with lots of shops and restaurants and it was a great day to walk around outside. Boone was a little late getting a nap, so after a little chocolate snack, he was a little sleepy.

 

Old Colorado City

 

Getting a treat from Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory

 

Post-treat. You can see the chocolate smudges on his face.

After walking around and window shopping a bit, we decided to head to Garden of the gods. I was amazed to learn that Garden of the gods is a city park, which seems amazing because of how impressive it is! Perfect January day to get our first look at this beautiful place!

Despite how I may have framed these pictures, it was a VERY busy day at the park! There were lots of people, and we couldn't blame them because it was such a beautiful day! We will definitely be back with visitors that come up to see us!

Oh, and on an unrelated note, we HAVE A HOUSE... or a duplex I guess! Either way, we move in February 3 and I can't wait!! We will have been without our things for 2 months by the time we get into our new home! We can't wait to be settled and I'll for sure put up pictures once the dust settles.

We are loving Colorado already! Come visit us!

Jeff, Em + Boone

Daytrippin' to Boulder

We've now been back in Denver for a few weeks now, and we are getting a bit of cabin fever! We still don't officially have a new home, which means we don't have all our stuff, which ultimately means we don't have our skis and ski boots! So... no skiing yet, but we decided to get out and explore a bit anyway! Part of the reason we haven't found a place is that we set a pretty strict budget for our rental home. We feel that there is no reason to spend tons of money renting a place, when on weekends we want to be out in the mountains anyways. This crazy life we live doesn't make sense unless we get to enjoy and explore the new areas we move to, so we decided to do just that!

We had heard that Boulder was just down the road a bit from northern Denver, so we decided to hop on the highway and head out to the home of the University of Colorado-Boulder. I think I officially fell in love with Colorado on our trip out to Boulder. What a town! So neat, and unique, plus it seems like a great college town, and you have the mountains as a backdrop. I don't think it gets much better than that.

We had an appointment to see a house later in the afternoon last Saturday, so we didn't have all day to spend in Boulder. We decided to head to Pearl Street Mall first. We walked along the historic mall area and took in all the shops and restaurants that were along the strip. It is such a neat area and I can imagine that in the summer, that area is filled with all kinds of festivals and farmers markets. Can't wait to go back!

We ended up eating at a tapas restaurant called Tiaco! It isn't actually on the Pearl Street Mall, but just a few blocks over. We stumbled upon it as we were trying to find another restaurant, and decided to give it a try. It was DELICIOUS! We ordered several different kinds of tacos and ate until we were stuffed. After lunch, we found a neat shop with all kinds of antique maps of all over the world. We even found some maps of Missouri from the 1800s. We love things like that for our home, so I can definitely see going back there and making some purchases. After lunch, we drove through the college campus (which seemed really nice!) and drove to take in a view of the Flatirons. I don't know much about the Flatirons, but it seems like a great area to go hiking this spring and summer, so we will definitely be back.

Here are a few pictures of our first day adventure in Colorado. I'm sure it's the first of many.

Too bad Mizzou doesn't play the Buffs anymore!

The guys on Pearl Street. It was a nice day to get out, but a bit windy.

A little history of Pearl Street

Boone outside of the Mont Bell store.

Not a great picture, but the Flatirons are in the middle!