Family Vacation

On April 1, 2011 we took off for a vacation. Josh had to go to Colorado for some labs with his schooling so we decided to make it a family vacation. We left our house at about six p.m. and took a beautiful scenic route.

From our house to where we were staying is approximately ten hours. We arrived at our hotel at four a.m. and got a few hours of sleep. The kids did great on the drive there because they slept most of the way.

On Saturday we just relaxed and drove around a bit. It was nice to take a day after the long drive to just relax.

On Sunday we did a few things. Sunday afternoon we went to the Miniature Doll and Toy Museum which was free for the community. It was located in a house that they had turned into a walk through museum.  

 What's a vacation with out seeing the closest temple! On Sunday we took some time to drive to the Denver Temple but we couldn't get out of the car because it was raining.

I did roll my window down for a few pictures but I thought this looked pretty cool!

On Sunday it was Josh's 30th birthday as well.  So that evening we drove to Colorado Springs to visit Josh's cousin Chad and his family. We all enjoyed seeing them and our kids had a blast playing with all of their kids.

On Monday was Josh's first day of labs for school.

While he was at school we found some fun things to do!

Most especially we knew where several parks were located some even within walking distance of the hotel. Also I took some pictures while finding my way around the Denver area.

I also made it back up to the temple and got some much better pictures.

On Tuesday we went back to Josh's cousins home. Chad had made some wonderful dutch oven chicken and potatoes for us for dinner. Yummy!!!

On Wednesday after Josh got done with school we went to a restaurant called Casa Bonita.

While we were eating our meal there was live music and several different shows such as a fire juggling act, puppet show, and a diving show!

The kids were facinated with all of it! In this picture they are standing behind the waterfall from the previous picture.

On Thursday the kids and I went to Dinosaur Ridge. It was super fun and the kids both got to do some fun things.

They thought it was so cool they could pet the dinosaur. This particular dinosaur is laying on the ground because the wind knocked it over and broke its leg but they were still excited.

 This was inside the museum. Most everything in the museum was hands on except this. I was very impressed with their displays.

 Then we went on a small bus ride around the ridge to see where the dinosaurs walked. Next to Kaytlin in this picture is a large dinosaur print in the rock. At the time of the dinosaurs this was the bottom of a body of water and in the rock she is climbing were a few hundred prints that were very visible.

 When we picked Josh up from lab we toured the Tower of Memories on the grounds of the Funeral Home he was doing his embalming labs at. The funeral home is only a small building in the cemetery along with the Tower of Memories.

Let's just say we spent a bit of time in the cemetery while waiting to pick up Josh and got to see some neat looking headstones and a coyote which Kaytlin kept calling a dog.

That evening we went to the Colorado Railroad Museum! The only word that describes this experience is AWESOME!

 Oh No! Watch out for that train!

 This train was neat! It was a coin operated engine. Josh and Brayden put in a quarter and pulled and pushed a few buttons and it pretended to start up and gain speed. Noise and all was involved!

 Here is Brayden driving the coin operated train!

 All three kids sitting on the front of the train. Can you pick out Alayna? She was squeezed between Brayden and Kaytlin!

 Here is the operating roundhouse! I think this was my favorite part. They refurbish train cars in the roundhouse and we were able to witness them push one into the house to begin the process of refurbishment! We also got to watch them move several trains on the turntable!

After the train museum we headed over to the Air and Space Museum!

It was fun to see so many different planes! This particular plane was one used in the Star Wars movies. It was autographed and everything.

On Friday evening we met Chad's family at the Aquarium in Denver.

Here is Chad, his two boys Lance and Trevor with Brayden checking out the fish in the tank. For those of you that can't pick Brayden out he is the boy in green.

 The underside of a shark. We were in an underwater tunnel which was awesome!

 This picture was funny! Chad wanted to hold Alayna but she doesn't go to people well at all. So he told me to get ready to take a picture because he was going to take her from Josh and to get it before she started crying. Let's just say that after I took the picture she started crying.

 That may look like blood on Brayden's arm but it was a painted whale on his arm.

While we were there at the aquarium there was a mermaid show! Here is just a very small portion of the show for you! It would be best to turn off the music on the blog so you can hear the music on the show!

After the mermaid show they came out and we were able to get our picture taken with them! From left to right: Brenda (me), Kaytlin, Mermaid 1, Amber, Mermaid 2, Trevor, Brayden, Lance, and Mermaid 3.

I gotta tell ya that this picture of stingrays was taken by Kaytlin!

On Saturday April 9th we packed up and headed home! We took off from Denver at 10:30 a.m. and lets just say this trip wasn't nearly as good as going! The kids were cranky, the weather was bad, and they were sick of being in the car because it was daylight! I wish we could have drove overnight like we did the first time around so the ride home would have been a little more pleasant! Although, they could have been a lot worse! For the first few hours Kaytlin would ask us where we were going. We would reply that we were headed home. She repeatedly would say no i dont want to go home!

All in all it was a great trip! We had so much fun seeing new things, trying new things and just enjoying being in a new place. It is certainly nice to be home though!