Happy 2nd Birthday, Violet!

Our sweet little lady is officially TWO!

She got up this morning, had a lovely breakfast of french toast and then got to open some gifts that were sent from Michigan from her Grandma Pat and Oma Joanne.
And then... we decided to see just how many people we could fit into this lil' ole house of ours. Turns out the number is about 35 (with 11 of those being 2 and under). To say the seams were busting out... well, luckily there was lots of cupcakes to make it worth it! :)

"What? For ME? Oh I couldn't!!"
You know, I always hear people say "She's all girl!" or "He's all boy!" and I never really got that until lately. Violet is, for lack of a better term, all girl. She LOVES babies. She LOVES princesses. She LOVES all things sparkly and pink. And luckily her Aunt Heather and Uncle Trent caught wind of this girliness and got her some great dressup clothes for her birthday. She opened the box and IMMEDIATELY tried whipping off her shirt so she could wear the dress. She didn't take it off for the rest of the party!Even for her cupcake eating!

Here are actual pictures of the awesome crowd we had to celebrate with us. It just gave Jon and I such a great feeling to know that even though we've only been here a little while, we already have such great friends to come celebrate with us! Although we missed everyone back home TERRIBLY!
And dear, sweet Porter let us know his displeasure with being locked out on the back porch for the festivities that when we got home from dinner he left this little mess for us. Ah Porter. I guess we deserved it!
Special thanks to our friend Lisa for taking such great pictures during the party!

And a special "WE MISS YOU!" to Grandma, Grandpa Guy, Oma, Grandpa Rich, Leah, Joel, Ethan, Anna, Claire and the whole gang back in GR.

p.s. Check below for ANOTHER new post! I had too many pictures for one, so I split them up!

p.p.s. Special CONGRATULATIONS to my BFF Kara and Brian on the arrival of their adorable TWINS!!

Stock Show, Take 4

Yeah, I admit it. I went to the Stock Show FOUR TIMES this year. I couldn't help it! And Violet? She went twice ;)

We went once just her and me and again with my sister-in-law Heather, who, despite living in Denver for many years, had never yet been to the stock show. FOR SHAME all of you Denver-ites who haven't been! Although I think this year I went enough to cover for most of you!

Here is Violet looking over the stockyards.
And the cows down below.
Sooo they had pony rides at the Stock Show. Violet and I watched the "neighs" go around earlier in the week. I asked her if she wanted to ride. She said yes. When we went again with Aunt Heather, and again we had "the talk". She still said "ride! ride!" when we watched the other kids go around and around. So we gave it a shot. She cried the entire time!Oh well. There are always the very safe rabbits in cages.And zonked out piglets in the petting area. Seriously, how cute is THAT?? Too bad they get so big so quickly. He looks like a good snuggler on the couch. At least for a few more weeks!
We also spotted this absolutely ADORABLE long-horn calf with its long-horn mommy. It even had teeny tiny long-horn nubs. Sooo sweet!
Violet and I in front of the little long-horn calf and mom.
Earlier in the week my friend Jenna and I went to the Grand Prix jumping event at the stock show. It was really fun to watch! It's a timed jumping event where they jump HUGE (5' high and up to 6' wide) jumps. Only two of the 15 riders had a clear round where they didn't refuse a jump or knock anything over. It was exciting!

Here I am in front of one of the jumps. This one is about 5' tall. I'm such a scardy-cat when it comes to jumping that I'm okay with just the bottom two rails.
AND we took the first round of Violet's two year old pictures at a park this weekend. They didn't turn out great but at least we got a few!

Silly!
Jumping on the last bit of snow!

Why do I love Denver?

Because THIS was what went parading down the streets of downtown today:
Yup, to welcome in the Denver Stock Show, they shut down 17th Street downtown and herd some longhorns down the city streets. It was really quite a funny site. Here are the longhorns and cowboys with all us city folk (including a ton of people who work downtown who ran down to the street level to watch them go by) looking on. It was worth it!

We had a great view - they turned the corner right in front of us and in front of the Brown Palace (where Uncle Mike happens to work). Here they come!
The girls wait to see the "moos" and "neighs"

The crew: my friend Heidi with her little son Oliver in her sling and Aubry in the stroller, my friend Sarah with her daughter Piper on her back and Kevin. Notice that Heidi is wearing only a t-shirt. It was about 55 today, although it was a bit colder in the shade. I like how she has Aubry totally wrapped up!More parade pics!This brought on a discussion about how uncomfortable it would have been to ride across the country in a stagecoach. No shocks on those puppies! The grand marshall of the parade is standing up top in the red, white and blue shirt.Old tractor. Older farmer driving it.
Me n' Violet waiting for the parade to start.This past weekend Jon and I went with Heidi (above) and her husband Bryant to the Stock Show to see Freestyle Reining (for you non-horse people, it's horses being ridden to music - they do spins and sliding stops which is very fun to watch). We all loved walking up top over the actual stockyards to get to the Event's Center. There were SO MANY COWS!! And some of the bulls were just so huge they looked like elephants!
One of the reiners doing a sliding stop
I am going to take Violet back sometime this week - they have a ton of animals and I think she'll love it! Yay for Denver!

And a Happy New Year!

Happy 2009! Let's hope it's a happy, healthy, FUN year for everyone!

Here are a bunch more pictures from our trip to Florida over Christmas. We're back home now but luckily the weather in Denver has been pretty mild (it was 60 today!) so we can't complain much!

We all went down to the beach and watched the sunset one evening. I just can't resist the great photos you can get! Here are the "girls" - Violet's cousin Claire, Violet and her cousin Anna. She LOVED playing with them all week - they are great entertainment!
From the front
30 Sandy ToesWe also spent a LOT of time in the pool. Leah and I gave our girls "dolphin rides" and got this great shot. Leah with Anna (nice goggles!) and me with Violet.
Violet also tried out Claire's swimmies - she did really good with them!
With Aunt Leah

Squatting by the pool with her VERY long hair. Plus it was so humid that it was gorgeously curly down there too. It looked great on her, Jon and I, not so much. We're glad to be back in the dryness so our hair is normal again! :)
More dolphin rides with DaddyMy grandparents spend the winter down south and it was great to see them. I haven't seen them since this summer and missed them both terribly! Claire and Violet entertained them by the pool.

And last, here is a video of Jon and Violet in the ocean. Violet loved to kicke her feet in the water and get tossed in the air. So fun!


I added a new feature to our blog - in the upper right corner you can now "follow" our blog. I think it will let you know when we update the blog (which we do about every week anyway!) or just to show that you like what we're writing ;)