The Art of Aging

Summer has begun and with it brings lots of birthday's and birthday parties, including Dan's, mine, and Katelynn's. Dan and I have had many conversations lately regarding "Getting Old" and I tease him all the time about the big 4-0 looming over him. For men, it is receding hair lines and/or going bald and then the infamous big beer belly (that nicely Dan does not have!) For woman it is usually gray hair and a big behind. Of course, I cannot follow the easy path on the art of aging. I do not have any sights of gray hair, but instead I seem to be getting varicose veins already. I knew the time would come eventually because they are hereditary and are on both sides of my family, but really this soon? I noticed it awhile back, but with winter you can cover it with your pants and jeans. As short season and summer are now here, I have obviously been sporting my legs to attempt to get some color on them. The other day Dan finally noticed it on my leg, "What is that?" - That darling is a lovely reminder of me getting old, it's called varicose veins. After that was a big conversation on how to get rid of them and about my mom and all the times that she has fixed hers and I am sitting their in the back of my head thinking again, here goes all my money to medical bills. I think I would gladly trade my girlfriends for a few strands of gray hair that I can then have an excuse for additional trips to the salon than to have these veins tormenting my legs.
Sign of the time # 2. Most woman will gain weight as they get older, which I have now determined is because we do not have time to exercise, our days are full. But once again this is not the problem that I get to face. I instead have been dealing with being unable to sit on my ass because when I decide to get out of the chair my tailbone has decided it doesn't like me anymore. This pain started when I was pregnant with Junior and I went to the chiropractor a few times and it was solved. Well, it's back and has been for about 2 months now. It was a funny joke for awhile with people that maybe Dan needed to take it a little easy on me, but alas, it is funny to me no more! I have finally went back to the chiropractor and let me explain what a joy (sarcasm) it is to have some random guy asking you questions about your tailbone and why it hurts and then having to feel around the area (of course in an appropriate way, but you know where your tailbone is!). Last week I had an appointment and discovered that I have issues with my ass (my terminology), my muscles do not get stretched and I do not exercise enough or stretch and it's making all the muscles stressed and is causing some of the nerves to freak out and thus causing my tailbone issues. The chiropractor is going to show me some stretches and continue to do some adjustments at the same time, but I have to get off my butt and work out - oh joy, at least it's summer. I'm not sure how the Doctor took me when he's explaining that my "glutes" are tight and blah, blah, blah and I turn and say to him "So, you are telling me that I have to go home and tell people that it's not my tailbone that is the issue, it's my ass?" I couldn't help myself, really. And yet again, in the back of my mind I hear a little "poof" which is the money from my wallet once again leaving me for the cost of medical help. I think again that I would rather have a little weight gain issue that I could at least work off on my own, because I now have to start working out and pay for it!
So this week, woe is me as I start trenching up the ladder of age.

The Ditch Saga Continues

Ugh - - the ditch situation in our subdivision will not die and even with having a sub-committee formed last month it still seems that I am doing most of the work. After last months meeting of getting yelled and screamed at for 2 hours by about 60 residents I was ready to run the meeting tonight a little bit differently. In my oath of trying to keep residents more informed I had sent out the agenda and we sent out a newsletter stating when our next meeting was. Well, only about 8 people showed up and then the Chair of the sub-committee for the ditch called me on my way home and said he would be unable to make it, so again it was up to me. Yes, I put an Assessment out for $75.00 to complete this project and yes, it adds up to a lot of money, but really people it's only $75.00 dollars per person (unless you own multiple lots). I just do not understand how people do not want their subdivision to look presentable and avoid a flooding. The funny thing is, is that everyone that has emailed me or attended meetings is under agreement that something needs to be done with the ditch. I don't get wanting to put a band-aid on the ditch and do little things here and there over the next couple of years knowing the problem will get worse and then we will still need to pay for a long term fix. I haven't let on to residents that come into the meetings yet that my family does own and business and I work on business process and such at my job, but it's funny to listen to them state that they are business owners and blah, blah, blah. Well looking at this business wise and taking the personal piece out of being a resident, I would state that we have foreclosure properties and we have empty lots and we need people who pay dues to move into those homes and build homes on the lots that will pay the dues in ordering to keep up with our bills. So, if it takes a little bit of money, such as $75.00 to make our common area and ditch look presentable and welcome prospective buyers into our subdivision, doesn't that make sense?! To me the return on investment could be pretty good for all of us currently living here and paying dues, it means more cash flow and more respectable people moving in, granted I can't guarantee that, but if you look at subdivisions that have beautifully landscaped common areas, they tend to care more about their own property and appearance. We will see how everything continues to unfold. We may be starting a Facebook page to open communication between the HOA board and the residents - I am hoping that I will not regret that!

Quick Trip to Colorado Springs

Have I really been married for 7 years? Yes, I have and it's even harder to believe that I met Dan when I was only 17 years old and that we have now lived in Colorado for 10 years. It was time for a break from spending the weekend at the house with the kids and since our anniversary was coming up I decided to book us at the Embassy Suites in Colorado Springs for 2 nights. It was time for a mini-vacation. We chose the Embassy because of the suites and the fact that we could put the kids to bed and then we could stay up and enjoy some time together. I got off of work early on Friday so we could get moving, which was a must since traffic through Denver on a Friday is a bear. We made pretty good time considering. We got to the hotel around 6pm, checked in and walked around a little. We had an Old Chicago that was a block away so we ordered some food and had supper. After supper it was time to hit the pool, even though it was way past Junior's and getting past Katelynn's bed time. We had fun, but at 9pm we had to get them to bed. Dan and I stayed up for a little while. Katelynn was so funny the night before our trip, it was 10pm before we could get her to bed. She was so excited. She kept saying, "Mom, I just can't sleep"; "Mom, I am just too excited" - Go to bed kiddo! The next morning she was awake at 5:30am because she was so excited - poor thing had a long wait.

Dan & I enjoying our Merlot the first night at the hotel!

Katelynn enjoying her time after a nice swim in the pool!

Junior, happy as usual. He thought the first day was pretty cool! Saturday morning we got up and had breakfast. This is also one of my favorite things at Embassy - their omelets that they make right in front of you. Everyone enjoyed. Then it was off to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. Up to the mountains we went. Have I said lately how much I love my GPS in my car, took us right there even after we missed a turn. This was the most amazing zoo I have been too. The animals were all so alert and it seemed so much more intimate. All of our favorite part was feeding the giraffe's. The first stop when you walk in is the giraffe's and they are literally face to face with you. You can buy them crackers to feed, which was cheap - 3 large crackers for a dollar. The kids were a little nervous at first, but got the hang of hit. We headed back to the giraffe's to feed them again and get some more pictures before we left for the day. When else is a person ever going to get that close to a giraffe again?!

We walked through the rest of the zoo. Katelynn, Junior and I took a little train ride, also only a dollar and later Katelynn got a pony ride and a ride on an old style Merry-go-Round.



Yes, I realize that I do not really fit in this thing ,but Junior couldn't ride alone.

Yay, the fun!Katelynn getting her pony ride, it made her so happy!

I thought this was just a nice back drop for a picture of the two boys.

It was getting close to nap times (we skipped Junior's morning nap) so it was time to get back and have lunch and do some resting. While Junior took a nap Dan took Katelynn swimming in the pool again. After nap we were off to the USA Olympic training center for a tour. I was really thinking this would be cool and it was free. Our tour guide was good, but we didn't really get to see much of the facility, a lot of it was looking through windows and nobody was training. The one really interesting piece was the men's gymnastics training place that we did get to see. The floor exercise mat (which is the same size for the women) is so much smaller than it looks on TV. Our guide said the TV stations stretch it out when they broadcast. I would like to see a competition in person and see how the can run and do all those flips in that small of an area, no wonder they step out. Katelynn was getting pretty wore out without having a nap and walking so much at the zoo so we snapped a few pictures and left without getting to the gift shop. I was hoping to sport some authentic USA vest or shirt or something, bummer.

Back to the hotel for supper. We went to the restaurant at the hotel, this was not very good, which was another bummer. It was time to just relax for awhile and of course the Embassy has their free Happy Hour that we didn't want to miss out on. Dan and I would take turns going down and grabbing two drinks to bring back up to the room, they had some good merlot! The kids watched a little movie (well, Katelynn did and Junior played around the room) and then it was bed time. Dan and I hung out again and then my friends Tim & Sienna that live in the Springs came over for a couple of beers. We had fun seeing and visiting with them and they seem to be doing well.
Sunday morning was about the same as Saturday. Down for breakfast and then we took the kids swimming. It was pretty early in the morning so we had the entire pool to ourselves, which was so nice. I could completely see us having a swimming pool, if only we lived like the rich! We packed up our bags and checked out of the room. We were headed to Garden of the Gods. This is basically hiking and touristy, sightseeing of Red Rocks that our kind of in the middle of everything. It was very pretty to look at, but I don't get into it too much. The tourist center had a video about how the red rocks got there, but they wanted $5.00/person for a 14 minute video - no thanks, too steep. A storm was starting to come in so it was getting pretty windy. We decided to take a couple pictures with Garden of the Gods in the back ground and then do the 10 minute drive through them to take a look. That was enough for us! (Lazy aren't we). Off homeward bound from there. The kids napped on the way home and we had a great weekend. It actually felt like we had been on vacation and had made the most out of our time. We will definitely be doing a couple more short trips like that. It seemed to work really well for us with the kids. I will post some more pictures later because you know I have a ton.

Spring and nicer Weather

I am so happy that it is finally starting to get nice outside again. The kids are loving hanging outside after they get picked up from daycare. Junior is obsessed with water. Dan will fill up a bucket in the backyard and he will run around and then come back and splash and splash and crack himself up. Katelynn is finally getting the chance to get on her bike we bought her for her birthday last September and learn to ride. She has only been out a couple of times, but what a difference from last year. We all went for a walk the other night after supper and she did just great! I can't wait until she masters it with the training wheels and we can really start making some trips around the neighborhood and get some exercise in for myself as well.

Lots of things coming up for us in May with Katelynn. She has a little ceremony with her preschool one night and she has a dance recital at the end of May as well. I can't wait to see her up on stage! Once dance and preschool are over I think that we are going to look into horse back riding lessons twice a month for the summer. We are also looking at some swimming lessons, but of course most of them are during the week and mid-morning, not ideal with 2 working parents. Our daycare provider is looking into a 2 week swimming lesson for the older kids which would be awesome for us and for Katelynn!