Day 7 = home

One last little tidbit from our trip...

We had a fairly uneventful trip home from the Grand Junction area, which is close to the western edge of CO on I-70. We did manage to get Kai some new shoes as well as some bright yellow rubber boots. Does anyone else know Big Sarah's Little Boots? - very good book. I recommend it. Same duo that write/illustrate the Franklin series. I digress... Naturally, we also found a few other things in the outlets (Old Navy outlet, Gap outlet, Carters outlet. we'd be lost without you! Well, naked rather.)

Here's a little glimpse of our trip home. This was 8000+ ft, but I hear there's going to be some of this white stuff around Boulder tonight.

Trip Day 5 and 6... is this getting old?

Here we are on the last evening of our trip, and Kai is wondering who is going to bed at the same time as he. We often have to pretend to go to sleep to coax him into believing that there's nothing interesting going on anymore.

We're on that lull of the vacation where we're all looking forward to going home, although some of us are still excited about the part tomorrow where we're going to stop at the Silverthorne Outlet Mall. :) After all, baby needs new shoes. (Sadly, that's true... Kai desperately needs some new shoes, but I digress.)

At the risk of droning on and on about the last couple days' adventures, I'll just put up a couple pictures to sum up. Briefly, yesterday Mesa Verde National park and today Arches National Park - the former in southwestern CO and the latter in eastern UT. It's pretty spectacular, this country that we live in. I still can't get over how phenomenally different it can look from one area to the next.

Trip Day 3 and 4

Right... so I'm cramming two days into one. I had to choose between working last night and blogging, and (sadly) work has to win out occasionally.

But now, the blogging!

/Insert:/ To those of you with modems (mowhat?), I apologize for the massive array of photos. As it is, I've only included a small selection of my favourites.

We're just all settling into our hotel in a little place called Cortez in the southwest corner of Colorado. Well, it's not the ACTUAL corner - we went there earlier today to a little place called the Four Corners. Upon arrival to the little stamp on the group we all picked up three more states (that's Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, for those of you who aren't familiar with the geography of the western states). This brings my total to somewhere around 38 (?), my father's to somewhere around 42 (plus/minus a couple), and Kai's total to 14. Not bad for a three-year-old. As for me, I'm going to need to plan a trip to Alaska, the Dakotas, and Arkansas somday, because I don't think they're going to happen naturally.

All in all, the Four Corners was fun. Kai and I even did Ring Around the Rosy on the little survey marker. We got to try frybread, of which we'd only recently heard (thanks Alton Brown), and I've seen more desert and buttes than I've ever seen before (which was almost none.) Just wait, though - there are more deserts to come!

Yesterday's adverturing was a little more exciting, albeit a little longer. We did something that my father has reportedly been wanting to do for over 30 years: D&SNGRR (the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad.) I think we all lived the trip vicariously through Kai, who was wide-eyed every time we turned a corner and he got a glimpse of the engine... And even though the trip was 3 1/2 hours each way, with mom and dad dragging him from shop to shop for nearly the entire 2 hours we spent in the town of Silverton, he was a trooper. (I think we're on day 4 with no nap!)

All in all, good fun was had by all!

Trip Day 2

So my parents, Keith, Kai and I are on a little roadtrip, touring southwestern CO and a little of southeastern UT. I realize there was no Trip Day 1, but there really wasn't a whole lot to report yesterday. Today? Lots...

This morning we visited the Black Canyon of Gunnison National Park and Kai became a Ranger Buddy for the first time. This is something kids can do at any national park, but it just happened to be the first time he's visited one since he turned 3. (Notice the little badge he's wearing in the second picture...) He had to complete 4 activities in the little handbook, answer some questions with the ranger, and then he even had to raise his right hand and repeat a little creed with the ranger.

The colours are just perfect right now... This was on the road between Ouray and Durango, where we're staying tonight. We couldn't complain:

So what's up for tomorrow? You'll have to come back to see!

Unless

"Whatever that meant, well, I just couldn't guess
... But now, says the Once-ler,
Now that you're here, the word of the Lorax seems perfectly clear.
UNLESS someone like you cares a whole awful lot,
nothing is going to get better. It's not." - Dr. Seuss, The Lorax

I just read this article. I'm not surprised, and I don't think it'll be the last time we'll read something like this. The part about the positive feedback loop - it's scary, but REAL.

Item number 12

I'm overwhelmed.

Too much to do, getting too hard to think.

Must prioritize. Yes. Let's make a list.

1. write research proposal
2. write statement of interest
3. look up "statement of interest" to find out what it is
4. calculate wall losses. wait. they're not constant. run experiments at different pressures
5. realize you forgot to change a flow to compensate for change in pressure; fix it and rerun the last experiment
6. write methodology paper
7. do labview programming
8. solicit reference letters
9. scramble all of the above and then attempt to do them all simultaneously
10. become overwhelmed
11. make coffee
12. drink coffee and write a blog entry while you gather your thoughts and reprioritize

Where does the time go?

My baby started preschool today.

I wasn't there.

I'm sure I'm supposed to be sad about that. I probably am, but sadly, I'm almost too busy to think about it. Keith is excited. He's called me twice already, and I've missed both phone calls. The first call was to tell me about the drop-off. Kai clung to him for about 10 seconds, then got distracted by a toy that caught his eye and rushed off to play with it. (A vacuum cleaner, I believe. We have two at home, but there's always time for new ones) Keith dutifully snapped a couple pictures and then slinked away quietly to go back to work.

He didn't leave a message the second time he called.

Every other Friday is Spanish day. The opposite Fridays are music days. Between Dora and Diego, Kai already knows a little Spanish, but I'm excited for his opportunity to have some formal teaching. I'm excited that he's so ready for this. He's growing up so fast.

I'm guessing there will be some pictures posted tonight tomorrow...

why i like my church

there are many things wrong with the church today both in canada and the united states and there are many things right as well. one thing i think more churches should do is something like this.
look for theology on tap.

"Isn't camping wonderful, mom and dad?"

- Kai, early yesterday morning as we each settled back into our folding chairs to warm up by the campfire Keith had just made.

We both agreed.