New fridge

Who would have thought that a new fridge would be a great anniversary gift? But, we were both so excited, amazing what 8 years of marriage will do to you. (I wonder what we will get excited about 8 years from now, kind of a scary thought.) Now the girls can get their own ice and water, no more cracking ice trays or cleaning up the ice that spilled out of the tray all over the floor.

First Day of School

Both girls started school this week. As you can see it was a very cold day so they were bundled up in sweaters and jeans. The both love their new teachers and are so excited to go each day. As you can see Alina's backpack is almost as big as she is. She is one of the smallest in her class and looks so cute standing in line each day waiting to go into class.

The Wig

Every time my Grandma comes out someone has to put on her wig. This trip it was Mckayla, I think Alina was a little freaked out at seeing my grandma take her hair off.

Alina is always so excited to see Chuck and always goes to see him before finally making it over to her Grandma to say Hi. As you will notice, Alina is sitting next to chuck or on his lap in most pictures.

Exhausted

Alina was so exhausted by the time we got back on the train that she slept the whole way back down.

At the Top

It was about a two hour train ride up to the top of Pikes Peak. We were able to walk through the summit house before getting back on the train to head back down. The views were amazing, but it was so cold and stormy that we didn't stay outside very long to enjoy them.

scenery

Here are some pictures of the view on the train and at the top of Pikes Peak. It was quite stormy while we were at the top, but on a clear day you are supposed to be able to see five states.

McKayla

McKayla is way into us taking her pictures lately and always has an unusual pose, (You have probably noticed this in the past several postings) So, here are some pictures of McKayla while on the Cog Railway on our way up to Pikes Peak.

My Grandma came into town on her way back home and we had a great time. She took us out to eat at Red Robin because Alina insisted that it is her favorite restaurant.

Random pictures

Here are some random pictures from our trip.

Wild Life

There was a lot of interesting facts about wildlife and nature. Here the girls are comparing their size to that of the different birds in the area.

The way down

I think the girls least favorite part of they day was the way back down. The stairs were really steep and a bit scary for them. They took them much slower than the way up.

The hike

As if climbing 409 stairs wasn't enough we also did a half mile loop to another water fall. There was another 1 mile scenic trail that we skipped as the kids were getting really tired.

the climb to the top

We had to climb an additional 224 stairs to get to the top of the falls
(no elevators for this) This is a picture of the two flights that we had to go up. They were extremely steep and seeing that we were above 7000 feet we were very winded by the time we got to the top (the windedness had nothing to do with the fact that were are out of shape)

7 falls

We went to seven falls today and had a great time. First we climbed the 185 steps to the top of the observations deck. Mckayla climbed the whole way and Ky and Alina took the elevator to the top.

Dragon Meal

So, we have had a few problems with manners lately, mostly McKayla eating everything with her hands because she wanted to eat like a dragon. So, I told her that if she had perfect manners for one week we could have a dragon meal and eat like dragons. Well, as you can see she had great manners and earned her dragon meal. She ate an octopus, a bear, a snake and coyote legs. I don't think she used anything but her mouth and had a great time. Alina asked at one point if she could even bang on her cup with a fork during the dragon meal, so she did.

Sisters

This was taken while the girls were watching shark week on discovery. They cuddled up together and watched the sharks attacking people. Good quality fun.

Just a silly picture of Alina.

When we were leaving swim lessons Mike fell on the stair and because her hands were holding her towel around her she could not catch herself. The result was her falling straight on her head and getting a huge goose egg right between her eyes. It looked really bad that first day, this was taken the next day.

Silly pics

The girls discovered that they could put the eyeball ring on their nose. They thought this was really funny, and you have to admit, it kinda is.

Dork tooth

It has finally happened, thanks to Jackson's hard head. The dork tooth is gone. She was playing over at the Wiedrich's and fell onto Jackson's head with her mouth, it knocked the sucker almost out and gave Jackson a nice wound. I need to get a picture of Mike without it. This sucker was huge and jagged. It tore a huge piece of her gum, but it's gone. Yea!!!!!!