Anna's First Haircut

BEFORE

Shagamuffin McGee

AFTER

Lookin' good!

The Birthday Festivities Part 2

Since we're moving and I love birthdays (see Part 1), I decided to throw Anna a party with a bunch of her little friends. Anna loves Mickey Mouse, so I based the party around the mouse.
Anna even wore a Mickey shirt and Mickey socks. I know, I know overboard. It's just so fun!

Anna in the queen's seat.

The party was pretty basic. The kiddos made Mickey crowns, Anna opened presents, and we all ate cupcakes.

Making Mickey crowns.

It was just right for a bunch of wiggly toddlers. Anna was so excited and had been talking about the Mickey party for days. She was so thrilled to have her friends all over at the same time.

Overall, the party was a success!

Anna coloring her crown and Avery modeling hers. I never did get a shot of Anna's. :(

The Birthday Festivities Part 1

I LOVE birthdays. I think it's so fun to celebrate someone for a whole day! I love the presents, cake, gifts, decorations, the whole nine yards. Anna's birthday was no different. I'm sure I went overboard, as I'm sure Jeff will attest to, but I had so much fun!





The day started with a special breakfast. I let Anna pick out a special cereal at the store earlier in the week for the occasion. She chose a cereal that had the characters on Monsters Inc. on the front. She concurrently loves and it scared to death of that show, so it was a pretty funny pick.

Jeff didn't have to work so we took Anna out to lunch for some chicken nuggets. She was especially excited to go with Daddy since he's usually not around for lunch.

After Jeff got home from school, we had a special dinner with Anna's favorite things. This basically turned out to be party platter. Cold cuts, pickles, tomatoes, olives, and cheese were on the menu. She wolfed it down!

After dinner it was gift time. Anna got a "My Little Pony," a fairy playset, and a Winnie the Pooh sticker book. She was thrilled!

Of course cake and ice-cream followed and my masterpiece was unvieled. I spent a good portion of the day on the Mickey Masterpiece. Anna wasn't too happy about being ignored during the four hour ordeal and I decided it was pretty dumb of me to spend so much time ignoring Anna on her birthday so I could make her a cake. I'm pretty sure she wouldn't have cared if I'd frosted an oreo and stuck a candle in it instead. Lesson learned: Two year olds would rather play with their mom than wait for their birthday cake to be made, even if it is fantasitically cute.

The Big Two Year Old

Anna confirmed the fact that she was two by running away from me and yelling "NOOOOO" pretty much the whole time I tried to take her picture. These are the good ones. How I love my sweet, independent, funny, beautiful girl.

Happy Birthday, Bammer!

We'll be living here.

Red Rock Ampitheather overlooking the Denver skyline

We're very excited to move back to the west. We love all things mountains so, needless to say, when Jeff got the Denver residency we were so excited at the prospect of hiking, camping, fishing, skiing, snowboarding, and climbing again. (Not that you can't do all those things in VA, it's just different.) After we found our place and got all the logistics squared away, we took some time to explore the edge of the Rockies just west of Denver.

Red Rock Ampitheater

Jeff first showed me the Red Rocks Ampitheater (he'd been there before). It's BEAUTIFUL! We can't wait to go to a show there. The accoustics are completely natural and supposedly perfect with the rocks. Jeff already bought concert tickets to a Death Cab for Cutie show later in May. I guess the pressure is on to quickly find a babysitter.



We then took a beautiful drive up the canyon to Silverthorn. It's about an hour and a half away from the city. Jeff lured me there with the promise of outlet malls. He didn't fool me though, I knew the real reason we were headed to Silverthorn was to check out a world class trout stream. It didn't disappoint. It was a really pretty river. We spent a few minutes spotting huge trout in the crystal clear water and took in the crisp mountain atmosphere. There were outlets malls there, but funny enough only Jeff found anything to buy.

Blue River in Silverthorne. Jeff is giddy.

This is where I would normally play the wife-victim of a somewhat obsessed flyfisherman who dragged me out to look at fish, but I have to say, I thouroghly enjoyed myself this time and I have no complaints. The mountains were beautiful and it was fun to just take a long drive together with out the element of a demanding two year-old.

16th Street Mall in downtown Denver

Lastly, we headed downtown to the 16th Mall. It's a pedestrian only street with all sorts of shops and restaurants. I must admit I was a little disappointed with the selection of stores. I'd much rather browse through boutiques and little shops, but the mall was mainly just a mall including a Ross Dress 4 Less, CVS, and Dress Barn. We did find a little more intimate shopping street a couple blocks away and treated ourselves to some gelato. Mmmmmm...

We found a place to live!

After a very discouraging day (Denver is much more expensive than we were anticipating), we found a place to live. Here are the specs:

• 1300 sq. ft.


• 1 car garage


• full-size washer and dryer (YES!)


• 2 bedrooms


• 2 1/2 baths


• gas fireplace

The townhome is in the city of Brighton which is Northeast of the city center of Denver. It's pretty undeveloped with lots of open space (it's very flat) and housing developements in pockets. It's not as close to the mountains as we were hoping, but it's a nice, safe area and it's affordable so we are very happy.

Move in date: May 8th

Can't Wait!

Anna was beyond excited to stay at Amelia's house while Jeff and I went house-hunting in Denver. These were taken on the way there.

Actually these were taken while we were stopped for a few minutes. I promise we make Anna sit in her carseat while we drive.