Home

We finally got back home late Sunday night.  We got to go to church with our family from Wichita on Sunday morning and then headed back Sunday afternoon.  I guess it's good to be home, but I'd rather just relive last week over and over again.  :-)  It's hard to be happy to be home when we walk into a cigarette-smelling apartment and noisy neighbors.  However, my fish did survive without us and nobody burned the apartment building down while we were gone.  There's always a bright side to everything, right?

On The Road Again

This morning we packed things up and got back on the road again for another 9 hours.  It was sad to leave the mountains, but exciting to go to our next destination.....Wichita, Kansas!  (hence the lack of update today.  There's not much to report when all you've done is driven through Kansas)

My aunt and her family live here so we decided to make a stop on our way home for a few days.  We got to eat at a Mexican restaurant tonight....complete with a mariachi band!!  Then we got to experience Orange Leaf, which is a self-serve frozen yogurt place.  Delicious!

Delightful dinner music.  :-)

Just Call Me Negative Nancy

Today we slept in a little later since we were so tired from our adventures yesterday.  We decided to wait to go back to Rocky Mountain National Park until after lunch so we wouldnt have to pack anything to eat. 

We had been seeing all of these mountains with snow on them but I never thought we would actually reach areas with a lot of snow.  As we were going up, we started seeing more and more snow, but the air was still warm.  Then we get to Galcier Gourge.  Caleb pulled off and I thought we were just going to stop and look at the scenery and move on, but he saw a trail.  There were people coming off of this trail talking about how many times they had fallen....Caleb still wanted to go.  The start of the trail was completely snow covered.  There were a few areas without snow, but then it started getting deeper and deeper.  I started complaining, espcially after my first fall, mostly because I wasn't expecting to be hiking in the snow.  This white girl doesnt have hiking boots.  Then a man passed us going the opposite direction on skis...so many thoughts going through my head.   Once we had gone 0.3 miles, we came to a split in the trail.  One way went to Alpine Falls, which was 0.6 miles from that spot, the other way went to Bear Lake and it was 0.5 miles away.  All I was thinking about was distance, so I decided to go to Bear Lake.  This is how deep the snow was:

This was my enthusiasm:

Ok so I probably shouldn't have been as crabby, but I hate falling.  Fortunately, Caleb was kind enough to walk behind me and catch me everytime I was about to fall, so the number of falls greatly decreased.  We finally got to our destination of Bear Lake.

(It's bigger than just the amount of water showing....most of it was covered in snow and ice)

Turns out, you can actually drive to Bear Lake.  Caleb told me that his original intention was to go to Alpine Falls.  I'm sure it would have been prettier, but Bear Lake seemed easier.  There were bathrooms and benches and things at Bear Lake, so I told Caleb I would sit and wait for him to walk back and drive to me.  He said he would, but then I asked him if we could just walk down the road back to Glacier Gourge where we were parked.  He agreed, so we took off on foot.  As we were walking to the parking lot area at Bear Lake, we came across this sign.  Thanks for putting it at the end of the trail.

He saw a "shortcut" in the road, so we took it.  Turns out, it was a whole lot steeper than it looked and at the bottom there were some pretty heft snow drifts.  I think it took just as long or longer to go through the shortcut, but I guess I can always look at it as a team-building excercise seeing as how I had to hang on for dear life to Caleb the whole way down.  He's a whole lot better at keeping his balance than I am, even with someone hanging on to him.  We found another short cut that was for sure not as steep, and once we got to the other side, we noticed a sign that said "Restoration Area, Keep Off".....well, it's not our fault there wasn't a sign on the other side of the restoration area.  They just aren't very good at their sign placement.  We eventually got back to the car, and saw this guy.

That's about all of the adventure we had today. We have to say goodbye to the mountains tomorrow.  :-(  But at least we have had a good time while being here!

Rocky Mountain National Park

Pictures are added!!!

Since Rocky Mountain National Park is just a few miles away from where we are staying, we decided to venture there today.  The first animals we got to see were big horn sheep.

Then we came across this waterfall.

We took some more trails and try to sneak up on some elk.  Finally we came to a trail that led to Cub Lake.  It was a 2.3 mile hike.  While we were walking, we got the closest to an elk that we have so far (outside of driving into town and seeing them along the side of the road)

We finally got to Cub Lake.  Caleb wanted to keep walking so I decided to sit on a rock and wait while he went walking.  But of course after about 10 minutes I got bored, so I decided to try to catch up with him.  I figured if I walked fast enough, I would meet up with him because I knew he would be stopping and taking pictures.  While I had been sitting on the rock waiting for him, 2 couples had walked past.  So on my journey to find Caleb, I ended up passing these 2 couples and couldn't find Caleb.  This older couple came walking past me going in the opposite direction so I stopped them and asked if they had seen Caleb (I described him, obviously, not asked about him by name).  They said that they hadn't seen him in the past 50 minutes since they left the last lake on the trail. Here I am thinking that Caleb probably somehow took some other trail and is back at the rock I was supposed to be sitting on, and I'm not there and I'm now over half a mile away and he's probably freaking out (not that I think Caleb is capable of freaking out, quite the opposite, but I get irrational in my thinking a lot).  Neither one of us had our cell phones on us.  His had died and I didnt have any service so I just left it in the car.  So I kindly thanked the couple and took off back to the rock, and on my way back, I heard something rustling around off the path....I look over....and it's Caleb!  I should have known he wouldn't have stayed on the path.  So I was relieved by this point.  Although, I must say, the time I spent on that rock by myself and walking along the path was quite relaxing.  It was the first time in a long time that I had actually been alone and felt safe at the same time.  Never would I ever walk around Hannibal by myself, especially not in the woods, and I hate being home alone in the apartment because my neighbors arent exactly ideal neighbors.  However, I was still very glad to have found Caleb again!

We drove around for a little while longer and decided to leave since we had just hiked about 6 miles.  We're going to go back tomorrow since our pass lasts for a week, and we're going to go see some more of the park.  Time is certainly flying by!  I haven't had a week go this fast in a loooong time.

Day One

This morning we got up and decided to explore Estes Park a little bit.  We went walking around some of the shops, but it started lightning so we headed back to the car before the rain let loose and drove around for awhile.  We found a road and just followed it.  Turns out it took us all the way down the mountain, but with less traffic than the main road going up to Estes Park.  It was really nice to just be able to pull over and look at the river and mountains.  We also found a few trails that we may check out in the next couple of days when it's not raining.  When we got back...there was a surprise waiting for us.

It had snowed!  So now we are sitting by the fireplace watching tv and relaxing.  It doesn't get much better than this.  :-)

Are we there yet??

Why yes, yes we are.

After 12 1/2 hours of driving with only 2 stops long enough to take a leak and fill up with gas, we're finally here! 

Fortunately the drive wasn't eventful.  The rain stayed to the south of us (I think it was South.  Please don't correct me Caleb.) 

Here's the kids all ready to go.

I forgot to pack an extra pair of sweat pants to change into before we got into the mountains.  I'm sure I looked like quite the tourist showing up in low 50's wearing shorts and a t-shirt.  Sigh. 

Sometimes you forget just how beautiful God's creation is until you get to experience it again.  The building we are staying at is in a wonderful location.  You look out and can only see mountains, and the Fall River that runs right through Estes Park runs right behind the building. 

AND...these little fellas sit on our coffee table!  Do you think the hotel would notice if I took them home?

We went out looking for food once we got here.  The first restaurant we went to was completely dead with only one person sitting at a table and nobody sat us, so we left.  We found a Mexican restaurant which was pretty good but no comparison to Gabriella's in Hannibal

Well, I think it's about bedtime since I've been awake for almost 18 hours now.  Doing nothing but taking naps and doing word search puzzles all day makes me tired.

What's That Spell??

Excitement jitters?
Check.

Turtles?
Check.

No-bake cookies?
Check.

Husband?
Packing the car.

Ipod?
Check.

What's that spell??

ROAD TRIP.

Stay tuned for updates.  :-)

Cliff note's version

I'm really not as good on this whole blogging thing as I had anticipated.  I actually tried writing a blog a few times, but I never finished them and then once I came back to them, it was irrelevant to the day.

So, here's the cliff notes version of the past few weeks.

I graduated.  I now officially have my bachelor of arts in business administration with an emphasis in finance and a minor in accounting.  Or in an abbreviated version...a B.A. in B.A.  ;-)

My parents came up for the graduation, which I was really excited about!  They brought my grandparents, too, so they got to see where I live and stuff.  They spent the night and then they all got to go to church with us. 

After graduation, I've been working 38-39 hours each week.  It's not much of a change for me, because the days that I wasn't used to working were days that I was at school all day, so now those days are spent at work instead. 

Last weekend we got to celebrate the marriage of two of our friends, Ethan and Lydia!  They had a really beautiful wedding, and it was good to get to see some friends from school, too.  They're living in Hannibal, so we'll have some Hannibal friends for the next few weeks!!  yay!!

Now this weekend, we're getting ready for our honeymoon to Colorado!  It's a little delayed, but January is clearly not a good time to trek it to the mountains.  Also, we're at a time where we both really need a break from everyday life.  I'll try to keep updated on here on what's going on, but we all know how good I am at keeping things updated.

Well, that's the cliff notes version of everything from the past few weeks.  I hope that satisfies those of you who have so kindly reminded me of my slack.