Guess who came for a visit...

I just love Fall! Its always full of beauty and surprises.
Look who pulled into our driveway yesterday! TJ and Amanda! They are on their way to Great Fall's, MT and TJ's new post where they expect to be for the next 3 - 4 years. They were in D.C. for 4 years and now they get to start the moving around process. TJ graduated from the Academy in 2003. As an aside, Amanda and TJ will be celebrating their 2nd Anniversary this December. Congratulations!

Of course we had to take them to Garden of the Gods. Turns out that in all the years TJ was here he couldn't remember having ever been there either. So what a neat treat for us to get to play tour guides.



Of course we had to put them through the usual photo ops.

Jolie's Birthday, Bishop's Castle and more...

Jolie's now 9 years old. Wow! What a big girl.

Her choice of family birthday accoutrement was ice cream. So Neapolitan is was with little spiral candle's sticking out and melting the ice cream even faster! In the end we got them all lit and she did have two scoops still in the bowl.

She, also, got a new bike for her birthday. A lovely BMX trick bike. Hopefully she won't be doing any bike tricks anytime soon!

Both Olivia and Jolie are going to be having "friend" birthday parties in the next couple of weeks, so check back for pics of those.

David was out of town in the Boston area for a couple of days this week. So when he got back we headed south on the bikes for a nice ride with Jen and Bob. Bishop's Castle was the destination of choice for this ride. With our weather changing for the cooler temps it is possible that this was our last full day ride for the season. We put about 250 miles on the bikes and had beautiful weather and great roads to explore.

Jen and I in a very large chair.

This room reminds me of being in a cathedral of sorts.

David and Bob.

Yes, that is a dragon head...

No, I don't know if it shoots flames.

I hope not...

Stopping to video the Wet Mountains (Sangre de Cristo Mountains) after eating lunch in Silver Cliffe. Great little burger joint with really good burgers and desserts. Jen and I split a slice of homemade apple pie a la mode. Yum! David had blueberry pie and Bob got the cherry pie. No one left hungry...

We crested a ridge and this is what we saw. Just beautiful. I stopped to video this on the northwest side of Westcliffe, Co.

First Snow... 37* and I'm not walking in that!

Our first snow. (Tuesday Sept. 22)

Taking the kiddo's to school you wouldn't believe all the folks I saw out walking their dogs. We have some pretty tough people up here that don't let a little thing like 34*, windy and snowing slow them down.

But thats cold enough for me to shake my head vigorously "NO" at walking outside today. I'm getting my strength back and have no intention of back sliding and getting sick again just to walk outside. So later I'll jump on the treadmill and do a nice walk in the basement.

The dinner menu for Tuesday night featured "Gumbo"! All the kids lit up with approval that morning when I told them fresh cornbread and Gumbo were in store for them that evening. Wish I'd had some of that great Cantaloupe still around but the kids ate it all for dinner the other night. It was delicious!

On our walk this morning, Jen and I, stumbled upon this guy lying down relaxing. He got up when Miley caught wind of him and showed interest. Again, another large guy. I'm taking my camera with me on all the walks now. You just never know what you might see...

The two videos below are of the kids doing their routine "Snow Dance". First they have to run around the house 3 times with ice cubes in napkins.

Then you flush the ice cubes and do a dance that you make up, and then you put on your p.j.'s inside out and backwards. Oh well. The joys of childhood and, No the dance didn't work. They still had school the following day. Better luck next time guys!

Garden Gnomes or Lawn Cows...

You've heard of Garden Gnomes. This is the little guy from the "Travelocity" commercials. He is cute!
Well we have "Lawn Cows"... they come in all shapes and sizes. These guys just happen to fit the bill better than most. Pull up the picture to get the full impact of their sizes. Both were laying in the same yard, enjoying the great weather. Temps supposed to climb to 81* today. We'll see.

Remember my tree from a couple of days ago? How quickly the changes occur. We're hoping to do a ride up into the mountains next weekend to enjoy the color. I hope we don't miss it. Our highs for the next few days are only supposed to be in the upper 40's to low 50's. Burrrrrr.....

Kristina carved "Mr. Nutty" last night while I worked on knitting a sweater. The Brazil nuts that she had kept her entertained for a couple of hours. Mr. Nutty.

Happy 10th Birthday Olivia and 9th Gottcha Day!

9 years ago yesterday (9/18/00) I had an unimaginable experience. I had a lady place my new daughter in my arms for the first time. What a sweet moment...

This is a picture of Olivia after I had fed her for the first time and changed her out of her clothes into clothing we had brought. Some how it made her feel more mine to be dressed in clothing that I had picked out for her.
Here she is today, 9 years later, celebrating her 10th birthday today. Donut holes were the order of the day. Kristina did the candles and we had quite the blaze going! Eeeeek......

Olivia will be having a big party in couple of weeks so check back for the details...



Another new bike for the household!

A Happy Birthday call from Big sis, Bonnie, and Nieces Elizabeth and Carolyn.

All lined up and ready to go.


Jolie's birthday is next!

Just another lazy day...

My precious son... reading on the deck. He couldn't wait to get home from the library to start reading his books. After getting the table set up and his chair in place........ all was right with the world and he was ready to start reading. This is a picture of total contentment and relaxation.
Our first sign of autumn. The Crab Apple tree in the front yard started showing signs of the leaves changing a couple of days ago. With our nights being in the 40's and low 50's, I knew it was just a matter of time. Unfortunately the colors aren't showing as vibrant as they are in person. So pretty...
For the last few days we've experienced a lot of rain storms and lots of lightening and thunder. These are just some pics of the clouds that I took for my daughter, Jessica, who loves clouds and rainy days.

What I loved about this storm was the way the light played on the clouds...


and the shadows...
Pull up the picture to see Pike Peaks first snow of the season.
The clouds parted just enough this afternoon for us to see the snow.

Monday...

Sunday - All ready for Chinese School and Mom just won't get the picture taking over with!

At last we're here and our teacher is so nice and ready to teach us all we need to know. We're all in the same class.

Here we are. Sitting and anxious to get started. There was one other student in our class and she can understand a little bit of Chinese.

Kaitlyn was basically sent home early (9:45 a.m.) from school today because of her coughing. The teachers are afraid she has Swine Flu. So off we go this afternoon to get proof that she's not a plague carrier and a note to that effect for school tomorrow. Everyone up here is so gun shy of anyone who appears sick. To bad they don't react this way normally. I know my kids wouldn't be sick, as much, if more parents kept their kids home when their own, really were ill.

I'm still struggling to get back to normal. Just no energy. But I am getting better and life does go on...

PS: Kaitlyn has Bronchitis. She'll be staying home tomorrow and then we'll catapult her back into the normal schedule. one more day, one more day, just one more day...

Friday...

Breezy, very cool, and Kaitlyn and I are both sick. Sound just the same --- pretty much look the same. Do you have any idea what its like to look over at someone and know that your basically looking at a mirror of yourself and its really not pretty?! uggg.....

Laying/sitting on the couch knitting my socks. Only to discover that the book I needed to complete the socks was missing. I tore up the guest room, car, family room, master bedroom, etc. looking for the book. Frustration set in and I resolved myself to the fact that I was going to have to go buy another book. Thankfully I found the book (in my motorcycle saddle bag) and then realized that it isn't just a little booklet but a rather expensive book that I purchased some years ago. Whew! I'm so relieved.

I hope to have this pair of socks completed before the weekend is over and be able to start working on the knee high pair that I started some time ago. We'll see!

More birthdays around the corner. Olivia on the 19th and Jolie on the 26th. We're going to let the girls have parties this year. They are so excited and anxious for their special days to get here. I need to make invitations and get them to finalize what kind of party they want to have. We are setting limits on the number of guests as Olivia surprised us with her list of 18 people. I cringed at the thought of 18 - 9 year girls in my house for 2 hours.

Cooler nights....

bring all kinds of interesting thoughts into play....

I think fall is coming. Though this summer has been strange where weather is concerned with more than normal rain and cooler temps. Our nights are now consistently in the low 50's and though our days are still warm..... I'm finally ready for a change. So perhaps this is all wishful thinking on my part?

Fall days mean bundling up for rides watching the changing of the leaves and having them fall around you as you travel down a mountain road, feeling the cooler temps on your face and smelling the clean wonderful fragrances all around you. You know that your an intimate part of it all.

Sending the kids off, to school or play, all snuggled up in their sweaters, hats and scarves. Giving them a hug before they go and feeling them in your arms all warm and safe.

I really do love this time of year!

My knitting "focus" has returned and I've begun working on my cashmere socks again.

I also have the desire to do a couple of sweaters. Me thinks Olivia and Jolie may be the recipients of those. Do I still have a quickie pattern that could be fun to do?

(This IS where cashmere comes from! Cute isn't he...)

Since my Blog is called, "Coffee, Cycles, Kids and More" and coffee is such an integral part of my every day life I thought it was about time that I included it in a post.
Coffee stops are becoming or have become a habit or better yet the culmination of nice rides. There's nothing nicer than a warm drink in your belly (and perhaps a nice pastry or slice of cheesecake on occasion) to send you riding home with.

We've discovered many new coffee shops and Starbucks, for us, have become passe. We stop at all the local small coffee shops for really unique experiences. One of our favourite stops is Pikes Perk on North Academy which on occasion has live music.

I think I'll start taking the camera with me for photo op's at the different locations that we relax at.

Happy 6th Birthday, Hunter!

I can't believe my baby is 6 today! We celebrated Hunter's birthday last Sunday as a way of surprising him and getting his new bike to him quicker.

Hunter is not overly fond of birthday cake and this year asked for cookies and donuts. Well we did the donuts for breakfast and surprised him with the cookies a bit later. I guess we're moving away from the traditional birthday accoutrement's of cake and ice cream for our group. Probably has to do with pretty much getting birthday cake on a monthly basis, here!

As you can see he also got combat gear.
So in keeping with a happy and balanced home we had to get Parker his own ATF gear.


I think they're both ready for whatever "evil" comes knocking on our door.



Jason came over for another play date and we all went on a walk to work off some of the excess energy.