4th of July Vacation

Wow, we had such a good time in Colorado for the 4th! And we had a FULL HOUSE! There were 9 adults, 3 kids, 4 dogs and 2 birds. Here is our group shot!


We went to Mesa Verde one day to see the ancient indian dwellings. Here is me and my Great Aunt Gloria at the top of the mountain overlooking Cortez.

We saw some wild horses on the side of the road. That was neat.

These are the cliff dwellings from the top.

We hiked down to the bottom to get a better look. It sure was a steep climb, but it was fun.

This is my Grandpa and Uncle Jerry and Aunt Gloria overlooking Navajo Canyon.

Another day was spent on the boat fishing. Here is Tanner with his "Cars" fishing pole:

And Sage with her "Barbie" fishing pole:

This is how Brooklyn spent the first part of the fishing trip. Passed out on mommy!

The only one to actually catch anything that day was my Grandpa. And I think that's the biggest trout I've seen. I always catch the small ones.

Bailee is not used to all the running and usually tears up the pads of her feet, so we bought her some shoes this time. Boy did she like them. They protected her tender feet and she was able to keep up with the rest of the dogs.

Another day we drove to Telluride. Brooklyn was cracking me up. Every time I'd say "Bob" she'd laugh. I don't know why, but we kept saying it the rest of the week. She's going to think her name is Bob. But she sure gave pretty smiles.

Tanner passed out on the drive.

Brooklyn just loves her daddy!

We stopped at Trout Lake to take some pictures. So pretty there.

Rather than driving all the way to Telluride, we stopped at the ski lodge place and took the Gondola over the mountain into town. That was so neat. Here is me and Brooklyn enjoying the ride.

What a view coming over the mountain and into Telluride!

Our family! This is much different than when we went in January! Not so cold!

Brooklyn passed out after a long day. I couldn't resist taking her pic all snuggled up with her bunny!

We found a really cool park and took the kids there one day while the boys went fishing. Brooklyn loved the swing.

All us girls at the top of the "castle".

What a happy baby!

For 4th of July, we made fun cupcakes:

And of course everyone had on their red, white, and blue. Here is Aunt G with Brooklyn:

Me and the kiddos:

Fireworks are legal in New Mexico, so we all stopped and bought a bunch on our way so we could do our own fireworks show. My camera has a fireworks setting so I was trying to get some good shots. So neat. These were the skyrockets that go up about 100 feet and explode:

We had enough fireworks to last for at least a couple hours.

We were all "oo-ing and aw-ing"

We had ground shows as well:

And then it turned into chaos. We had all the unlit stuff on the same table we were lighting things and something sparked and caught everything on fire. I'm not even kidding, about 50 fireworks went off all at once right on our table. They were flying at us, hitting the cars, hitting the house, starting the field on fire.

I took this picture from inside the house and you can see the fire in the background and the sparks coming toward the house.

We were SOOOOO lucky that nobody got hurt. Things blew up for just under 2 minutes and then it stopped. The guys put out the fires and cleaned up the mess. Here's my brother with the hose. While he was spraying down the field, one of the skyrockets went off about 5 feet from where he was standing. It was scary.

After all fires were out, they found the fireworks that didn't catch fire and started the show back up. Everyone was on the edge of their seats. And then a few minutes later, my dad lit 2 and only one shot up... there goes another blowing up on the table and starting another fire. Apparently this was put in the chamber wrong because it blew that up too.

Maybe this is why fireworks are ILLEGAL in Arizona!

Another day we went to the Elk Farm in Mancos. Here are the females out soaking up the sun.

They were eating grass out of the kids hands.

Brooklyn thought they were interesting:

Some of the males out in the field:

One day we went horseback riding. Here is Kurt and Sage:

And me and my dad. We got to take the horses out of the little corral and really ride.

We had such a busy week and had so much fun. We didn't want to come home to the 110 degree heat though! I guess it's ok cause we get to go back in 2 months.

Oh, I almost forgot, Brooklyn cut her first 2 teeth while we were in Colorado. Can't really see them in the pic, but she wouldn't hold still for me. She got the bottom two at the same time.

Hope everyone else had a fun 4th of July. This is officially my longest post ever!