I'm not crying. No really, I'm ok. Can you please get me a tissue?

You guys, I found this draft from 2011 when I was labeling my old posts (do you realize I have been blogging here for over 5 years?! crazy!!!). There were no words, no title, and I have no idea what I was planning on writing, but I couldn't just delete these pictures.

Sometimes, when we're driving around here in San Antonio, I still find myself looking for the mountains. It is definitely much more rare now than when we first moved here almost three years ago, but it still happens.

Even though these pictures made me gasp when I saw them, made me feel nostalgic for Colorado again, I didn't feel angry about being in Texas. Man, I was so bitter about leaving Colorado for a good year after we left. I refused to even try to like things in San Antonio. Unfortunately, because of my stubbornness, I lost a lot of time wallowing in self pity when I could have been pouring out a positive outlook on a new situation. I could have given San Antonio a chance sooner and discovered the things that I now love about being here.

True, I will never love Texas the way I love Colorado. I don't have plans on ever moving back to Texas in my future unless circumstances say we must, but I will be sad when we do eventually move away. I will miss our neighborhood, Ft Sam itself, downtown San Antonio, our parish, Central Market, Alamo Heights, and all the other places and areas we've become familiar with and grown to love. This is the city that Vivian was born in, where she's lived her whole little life, the only house she's known. I'd be heartless to say I won't cry when we drive away from it for the final time. Of course, we don't really know when we'll be moving. Technically we're scheduled to live here until the summer of 2016, but you know how the military is--unpredictable.

I think it's funny how much a place can mold and shape you. I loved Colorado Springs from the minute we drove up, but I really missed things about Illinois--long, rainy days, the greenness, trees, being able to breathe. Illinois was the only state I'd ever lived in, where I grew up, so I think I will always think of it as my home, but Colorado will probably always be my second home. So many people there became family to us and I miss them all the time. While I may never think of Texas as another home, I can confidently say that I will think back on living here with fondness. This is the house we've lived in longest as a family. This is the school district Elisabeth has attended the longest. This is where my sister and I got to live in the same city since we both moved out of Pekin in 2005; where I got to be here for her pregnancy and meet my nephew. This is where we became a family of five. This is where Roosevelt died and where we brought Eisenhower home. This is where we joined the Church, where Elisabeth received her First Communion, where we became part of a parish. There are so many happy memories that happened here in San Antonio.

It was nice to find these pictures, though. Ugh, I really miss Colorado. How lucky was I to have this be the view down my street?:

Denver Aquarium

One of the other things we did while Jana and Keith were visiting us in June, was go to the Denver Aquarium. My lovely friend Rachel and I had planned on taking a trip to the aquarium as one of our summer field trips and it turned out the best day to go was on Julia's birthday.

I must warn you that we are kind of spoiled by Chicago's Shedd Aquarium. It is enormous and you could easily spend an entire day there and not see everything. It is one of my favorite places in Chicago. Not that the Denver aquarium wasn't nice, but it was kind of pricey for not being near as large as I'd expected it to be for a big city. (So definitely try to find coupons and deals before going.) Rachel had one of her kids, the little girl she babysits and 3 of her siblings with her. We had Jana and Keith with us, so we were able to all get in at a group rate (10+ people), which helped out the price.

The aquarium starts off with local fresh fish that live in the Colorado river. Then you "follow" the river to the ocean.




I've never seen a starfish hug something before. Well, except in Finding Nemo.

Um, there were tigers at the aquarium...yeah, it was odd...
Unfortunately, my camera died in the middle of this field trip. I was very irritated with myself about that. Overall, it was the perfect amount of time for a short field trip. We ate lunch at the restaurant they have in the basement of the aquarium and the food was pretty good, but the fish exhibit in the middle of the restaurant was gorgeous. Julia had a lot of fun, and since it was her birthday, I am thankful. If we were still living in Colorado, I wouldn't be making a second trip to this aquarium, but am glad that we did check it out.

A little bit of catch up.

I realized that, due to my all day being pregnant sickness throughout June, I neglected to tell you about some of the things we did before we moved to Texas. So, since my camera cord is packed in some warehouse and I can't download my pictures until I unpack it (dude, I am so mad that I forgot that thing!!), you will just have to enjoy some Colorado pictures until I can share Texas with you.

Evan's parents came to visit us in June. They surprised the girls by showing up to see Elisabeth's dance recital and stayed through Julia's birthday. While they were here, Jana found this place to visit:

Rock Ledge Ranch is located in The Garden of the Gods and I hadn't even heard of it before!!!

As they explain so nicely on their website:

The Rock Ledge Ranch Historic Site is an educational, non-profit living history farm and museum that depicts life in the Pikes Peak region in four time periods: American Indian area in 1775; 1860’s Galloway Homestead; 1880’s Chambers Home and Ranch; 1907 Edwardian Country Estate.

The girls loved it. Elisabeth was most interested in the volunteers dressed up in the time period of the house they were representing. She asked lots of questions and watched the demonstrations in awe.


Julia liked being able to touch and explore. She was in love with this "house".

In fact, she didn't want to leave and was most upset when we had to move on, which you can see in the picture below.


Elisabeth wanted to be one of the children who got to dress in the time period and give tours of the houses. I could totally picture her playing that role.








This is definitely a place I'd recommend taking your kids. Both my girls loved it, despite their age differences. There were lots of trails and open spaces to run around, a little grocery that sold nickel candy and sodas, and very interesting demonstrations. I really wish we'd have discovered it sooner because they offer tons of events throughout the year.

Driving up Pikes Peak

First off, I need to apologize about the lack of blogging. But, alas, it is summer and I am not home near as much as I am in the school year. Plus, we move in a little over a month, so we're trying to do as much as we can before we head to Texas. So, I will try to at least post our weekly field trips and more if I can.

Last week we decided to make the drive up to Pikes Peak as our weekly field trip. Evan, the girls and I had taken the Cog Railway up to the top 2 years ago in July, but we'd never driven. Evan took the day off and we went with Rachel and her kiddos and Kim, Chris and their Kayleigh. We met at Kim's house around 10:00AM and headed off.

It was one of the best days I've ever had.

The lovely thing about driving to the top was there were lots of stops along the way. One of them was the Crystal Reservoir.
We stopped halfway up to have a picnic lunch.
And to climb some trees.

As we climbed higher up, the road became more steep (as did the drop offs to the side).
We were quite excited to get to the summit. And, because we didn't take the train, we had lots of time to explore.

Of course, we had to eat some of the world famous donuts from the restaurant at the summit.



Julia checking the map while standing on the train tracks.



On the way down, we stopped at the Bottomless Pit. I won't lie, I did not leave the car for this stop. I had no interest in looking down a bottomless pit due to my immense fear of heights.
I did venture out to climb around Devil's Playground. There was a lot of snow to play in.



I am so glad we were able to have this experience. The entire day was fabulous.