Our Colorado Vacation

January 15th marked a special day for our family. It meant that Kris had his job applications mailed off to universities and we could visit our parents after having not been home to Colorado in over a year.

After traveling a bleak and redundant path for over three years through Illinois, Missouri and Kansas, we chose another route to take us home. Our handy dandy GPS system helped us map out routes to our destinations. Soon both Alyson and Kourtney were copying the lady's voice. "Then turn right onto the motor way," and "You have reached your destination" became phrases of second nature for our two little girls.

This time we spent two nights on the road: the first in Iowa City, Iowa, and the second in Denver with one of Kris' cousins and his family. We enjoyed time in both of these places as we explored Iowa City, and swam at the hotel (a huge highlight for Alyson and Kourtney), then visited with Erik, Kelly and their two children Kaden, 3, and Taylor 4 months in Denver.

After two and a half days on the road, we pulled into Grand Junction and were greeted by our folks. We spent the first part of our vacation sleeping at Kris' mom's house, and then the second part with my parents. My sister was also able to visit us for a few days, and we enjoyed our time with her, her husband, and four children which have all grown in both stature and maturity. Wow-can you believe what a year can do to a child?

We played games around the dining room table, basketball at the Stake Center, swam, watched our mom's bowl, watched movies together, and enjoyed eachother's company during various other activities. Alyson and Kourtney were spoiled by their grandparents as they were showered with time and attention and with clothing and toys. They also enjoyed time with their cousins and stayed up way too late for their own good.

Kris and I had fun playing Spades against our mom's and taking dates. We saw several movies together and ate out a few times. Kris, his mom and the girls also took a morning to visit his cousin Melanie and treated the girls to pizza and games at Chuckie Cheeses.

After such a long 4-5 months of hard work, Kris really needed the time off but continued to work 3-4 hours here and there to be prepared for job interviews and other projects he's been working on. However he seemed much more relaxed and yet carried the cell phone with him every where he went in hopefull anticipation that he'd have universities calling him to schedule interviews.

Our stay in G.J. was cut about half a day short as a blizzard was predicted to hit the Rocky Mountains early the morning we planned to make our trip back to Indiana. So, we said goodbye to our parents and began our adventure back to Indiana on Sunday around 5:15 pm. We spent one night on the road in Colby, Kansas, made a breif visit to Dan and Sarah Babbels home, and then pressed forward through the next night.

After two weeks our vacation was over, but we came home rejuvinated and ready to see what the near future has to hold for us.

More Pictures will be posted later when I can pull them off of Kris' laptop.