Happy Birthday to...ME!

Yesterday I turned 29 (+2)! I had an awesome day hanging out with my family...Wes and the kids in the morning, a manicure in the afternoon, and a Mexican Fiesta with extended friends and family at night. As I look back on another year, I am so thankful for so many things...healthy children, a loving husband, supportive family and friends, and a great teaching and coaching job (just to name a few). I'll just have to see what year #30 (+2) has in store!
Me...
...and my Dairy Queen Ice Cream Cake!
Make a wish!
Party Time, ole!

Summer Daze

Payton, Brady, and I are certainly enjoying our summer. We get up around 7:00 (on a good day, 6:00 on a bad one...) and eat some breakfast. PR must have her french toast sticks while Brady enjoys his waffles and "nanas" (another word he has mastered). After that, the sky is the limit. Whether it's the playground, the pool, or some water fountains (see below), the kiddos can make anything fun. After running them ragged, we head home for lunch and naptime. This is when I garden, clean house, or more often...mess around on the computer! Then the countdown begins as we anxiously await the arrival of daddy! Summer is awesome.
Hey studly.Where Brady prefers to be.Where PR prefers to be.The princess gets wet.

A Man Of Many Words

Brady has just started turning his screams, squawks, and grunts into actual words. At this point, he can say about 15 words. Here are a few of his favorites! You will also see his love for pummeling anything he can...

Dad, Daddy, Poppa, Pops.

Happy Father's Day!

PR & Brady absolutely adore their daddy. They anxiously await their daily "body slams" when he gets home from work (wrestling in a huge pile of pillows). They love cuddling on the couch and watching Disney Movies with him. They enjoy shooting baskets and doing slam dunks on the basketball hoop. And they have each inherited some of their daddy's traits. Brady has inherited Wes's wonderful curiosity for tools, projects, and fixing things. He already loves to tinker with whatever gadget he can get his hands on. And Payton? Well, she had to get her stubborness from somewhere!We celebrated with a bbq at my parents' house. Burgers, croquet, football, and hanging out. Does it get any better?
The whole gang...The cooks!"Studying" the flowersWatching Daddy throw (no, our kids are NOT named after NFL QB's!)"Big Daddy"Brady & Uncle Bradley

We Clean Up Pretty Well...

On Saturday night, our good family friend Ernie got married. Since a lot of you who read this blog know Ernie, I thought you'd enjoy seeing a few pictures. The wedding was beautiful and the reception was rockin'. Also, I've realized we've been in our bathing suits for the last few posts, so I figured it might be nice to show our "fancier" side...
Ernie & Kim (and their favorite "nephew" Nolan)The "Jansen" KidsThe whole crew! (minus PR & Brady who were at Grandma Inge's for the night)

Lake MacConaughy: Sun, Surf, & Shivering

Last weekend, Wes and I, along with friends Gwen and Tim, headed off to Lake MacCanaughy in Ogalalla, Nebraska. FYI: Lake Mac was creating by damming up the Platte River. Its 14 miles long, about 2 miles wide, and filled with runoff from the Rockies. Its located in the middle of miles of fields and farms. Our parents were gracious enough to babysit the kiddos, so we were excited about our adult weekend full of speed boats, tubing, and water skiing. (We also thought that we might enjoy some good dining and entertainment down in town. Wrong. There is NOTHING in Ogalalla...) In spite of the freezing cold water, we really enjoyed ourselves. The video below highlights our trip. Producer's Notes: 1) This video is rated PG-13 as water temperatures caused the utterance of a few profanities. 2) My favorite part of the movie is listening to everyone giggle in the background! Enjoy.

All Things Great & Small (& Messy)

We have recently had a few new additions to our home. One is big, one is very small, and the other was (I have already gotten rid of it!) very messy.

Big: A tunnel/tent contraption from PR's grandpa (Wes's Dad). It is enormous, and as you can guess, the kiddos think it's awesome! It's final location is yet to be determined. We set it up on the patio, and it almost took flight!

Small: "Katie" the mouse joined our family care of Grandma Tammy last week. I had volleyball camp, so she spent the day babysitting for us. I came home to find PR in love with her new pet. In spite of being stinky, she is kind of cute...

Very Messy: A package was shipped to me in this box FULL of packing peanuts. This was as good as a Six Flags roller coaster in PR and Brady's eyes. After two major vacuum/broom/dust pan sessions, this disaster had to go. But, it was fun while it lasted.

Splish! Splash! Sploosh!

On May 26, Payton turned a whopping four years old. It is hard to believe how fast time goes. She is a smart, funny, and energetic little girl, and we are blessed to call her our daughter. We celebrated her birthday with a pool party...

The Amazing Race: Denver Edition

This past Sunday, Wes and I participated in a youth group fundraiser for our church. In order to fund their mission trip to Brazil, the youth group invited church members to participate in the 1st annual Aspen Grove Community Church Amazing Race.

For those of you who have never watched the tv show, the Amazing Race is a race around the world involving navigation, physical challenges, and plain old luck. The last team standing wins a million bucks. If that's all you care to know, stop reading now and know that we had an awesome time. For those of you who are fans of the show, read on and see if you can solve the clues yourself!

We began yesterday afternoon at 1:30 pm. We started at the church warehouse and our first clue lead us to the Highlands Ranch Town Center. (FYI: we were alloted one "help" phonecall which we had to use on the 1st clue! It involved deciphering a code in an information e-mail...) Once we spotted our messenger (people from the youth group dressed in red shirts), they gave us the names of four books. We ran over to Tattered Cover across the street and pulled out these four clues.

We then headed to....any guesses? Red Rocks. After one member of our team raced up and down each step, we were provided with this clue.

Now, at this point in the race, we were in a race between 1st and 2nd place. We started talking about how it would feel to brag about winning, how we knew the fastest routes, etc. Our pride became our downfall. Any guesses where we were supposed to head? Well, we headed to the zoo. A valid guess...birds, bears, turtles, cheetahs, etc. Incorrect! No red shirts at the zoo, and the loss of first place. Our second guess took us to Coors Field, home of the Colorado Rockies. After taking three required pictures with strangers...

...we were given this clue!

The answer to this ridiculously long math problem is 16. We called the phone number and were told to "go to the number 16, where you can get a mocha frappacino, and you'll find me and your next clue."

We headed over to the 16th Street Starbucks, solved a few more math problems involving order of operations (ex: 16 + 16 x 16 - 16 / 16) and were given this clue:

Constitution of the United States. Article 1. Section 8 (I didn't take a pic of this one).

Well, we looked up the constitution on our laptop and found out that A1S8 is the powers of congress. Those powers include all things money. Any guesses where we went next?

The Denver Mint! This is us eating an entire package of Oreo cookies (disgusting) in order to earn our next clue. Here it is:

Denverites, where did we go? The lake at Wash Park. We figured out the clue fairly easily, but spent 50 minutes trying to find two girls in red shirts. There were probably 5,000 people at Wash Park on Sunday!

Author's Note: At this point in the race, 4 of the 8 teams had dropped out. Some had to go home to their kids (we had babysitters), some were sick from eating Oreo's, etc. We knew we were in third place and were expecting the call that the first team had finished and we should head back to the warehouse. Instead, at 5:30, we got the call that no one had won and we were still in the race. With new life, we found the red shirts, answered five questions about presidents, and got this clue.

So, with a bit of thought, we headed to....Park Meadows Mall and found red shirts in the center pavillion. After racing around to find the exact prices of 15 different items (FYI: A Giraffe Throw at Nordstroms costs $245.00), we got our LAST AND FINAL CLUE!

This last clue proved to be the demise of all four remaining teams. We went to the Wildlife Experience, the hospital, the Littleton Nature Preserve unable to make a connection between a coyote and "simple things." (See me, running around unsuccessfully!)

At 7:30 pm, all remaining teams were texted a final clue that lead us all to a graveyard looking for a headstone etched with Dawn. We were all there at the same time, racing around (people had to wonder what we were doing!) Unfortunately, a different team found the clue blown up into a tree. They dialed the number, and the race was over. (FYI: Coyotes are the mascot of ACC, the community college right next to the cemetery).

Oh well. We ended "tied" for second and had an awesome time. We headed back to the warehouse for dinner. If anyone wants to join us for the 2nd Annual Amazing Race, let us know!