how much can you fit into a day?

Today began with a Hammond's Candy Factory tour.

They were making candy canes today.

Next came a tour of the Rockies stadium. We were able to go through the suites, locker rooms, and onto the field. It was really cool. But now we need to go back and do tours for all the teams in Cali.

Time to head back to the Nature and Science museum. We saw an IMAX on Greece and its secrets. Then we walked through the rest of the museum.

For the evening we headed over to the 16th Street Mall. It is a mile long of outdoor shops and restaurants. They have a free bus that will take you up and down it. So we walked down one way and rode the bus back.

The capitol building was only a few more blocks away so we decided to go get some photos before it got to dark.

If you stand on the 15th step you are 1 mile above sea level.

For dinner we headed back over to 16th street to the Hard Rock Cafe.

great way to spend a day

We headed out to the Denver Nature and Science museum today. They had an awesome laser show put to music called SonicVision. It is in the planetarium and is really cool. The play list was put together by Moby and includes U2, Zwan, Moby and many others.

After the show we looked around the museum until it closed.

We walked down towards a lake that is in back of the museum and noticed giant animal paddle boats so we decided to see what was up. We decided to rent the swan for a half hour and went around the lake on it. We followed some other ducks that were swimming around and joined the back of the line they were forming.

After our half hour was up we went and got some hamburgers while a jazz concert was getting set up. We walked around the park and listened to the concert for awhile.

Then it was time to head back to the hotel.

airplane flies high

Bradley and Christy picked us up at noon o'clock today and took us to the Ontario Airport. We flew to Denver via Salt Lake. Our plane landed around 10pm. We picked up our luggage, got our rental car and drove out to meet up with Cyndi's bf Trisha (TK). We met up at a Denny's near her house and had dinner. Everyone had a chance to catch up some and get some grub. Around midnight we headed for the hotel. It should have taken about a half hour. We didn't get there until 3am. Someone decided it would be a good idea to entirely shut down a major freeway for about a dozen exits. We didn't have a clue how to get to the hotel if we couldn't use this freeway. So Cyndi called TK to get directions, unfortunately for us she was not sure how to tell us to get out of where we were. Cyndi then called the hotel, thank you Mario for sending us the wrong way on another freeway! It also started to ran on us which didn't help anything. We did finally get there and it was a very nice hotel. So off to sleep we went.

It was a massacre I tell ya....

Cyndi went to the pet store yesterday to get a feeder for our fish while we're gone. While she was there, she saw some small frogs for aquariums. She asked their fish guy if the frogs would work well with what we already had. He said yes, so she bought one of them as well as 3 of the neon tetra that were in the same display tank. They looked good and added a little life and color to our tank.

When we got back from the movies last night, there was a problem. All 4 of the newbies were gone. We thought they might be hiding in the castle or the plants. Nope. Then I saw it...half a tetra caught in one of the plants.

I blame this guy:

He's supposed to be peaceful, but he's the only one left who's grown enough to have pulled it off. This is the second time our pets have eaten each other. If we don't get this under control, we'll never be able to move on to furry animals or children.

Songs you need to know #3

Not the actual video for this song, but you only need to be listening to it anyway.

Vacation!

There's always a question of whether or not I'm going to get my vacation time approved. Every year it seems like several staff quit or doing stupid things to get fired right when I'm wanting to take time off, so I get stuck covering every shift. This year was looking to be the same with us being down a day staff and having our overnight staff and the social worker both moving on to new jobs next week. Somehow, it did get approved this year anyway. I only have 2 more days of work and then we're off to explore Colorado. One of our goals is to spend some time in every state as a couple. So far we've hit California (obviously), Nevada, Hawaii, and North Carolina. So now we can add Colorado to the list. We have a 3 hour layover in Salt Lake City on the way back, so we've been debating if that counts or not. Most people say no, but it is Utah after all.

Help!

Cyndi's mom wants to go see Clerks 2 because she saw that it got a good review, although she knows nothing about it and has never seen any of Kevin Smith's movies. Please comment and help us talk her out of it!

What do Jeff Kent bobbleheads, Crystal Lewis's greatest hits cd, and a pair of Dutch wooden clogs have in common?

Our garage sale!

On Saturday, we went down to San Diego to do a garage sale at Cyndi's mom's house. If you advertise in the paper down there, you are guaranteed to get a big crowd coming up from Mexico looking for bargains.

We thought we were going to have to show the neighbors a little something something in the morning. Cyndi's mom lives at the end of a long cul-de-sac that curves around. Some of the neighbors at the top of the street found out that we had advertised our sale and put up signs, so they decided to pull all their stuff out in the driveway. That way everyone would just think that was the sale being advertised and not work their way down the street. We quickly made up a whole new set of signs and put them up on our cars one house down from the other garage sale and managed to draw most of the people down our way.

We ended up making about $160 and cleared out a bunch of junk. It rained on us most of the morning, but that didn't stop people from coming out. I'm guessing that since it was a change from all the extreme heat that people didn't really care if they got wet or not.

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank our corporate sponsor, Miraclebeam, for providing boxes of light up sports gadgets, pins, and glowing cubes for us to sell. Know that your donation was much appreciated, and that many of your fine products will continue on supporting the fine people who run the Tijuana swap meets.

Ouch!

Sticks and Stones may break your bones (they will heal) ... but Words Echo Forever

Songs you need to know #2

...

When I win my Oscar, you can say you knew me back in the day. I won't forget the little people. You can count on it.

You, Me, Jack & Frank

wes' a goin' on a date!

On my way home I took a planned detour over to the Askews place to have a mini girls night. We had dinner, hung out and talked, made brownies and of course watched Billy. We acted out the whole movie. Sadly three of the four of us (moe, charlie, morgan and c) fell asleep. Boy, are we not in college anymore. Oh well it was a great time.

Here are a couple photos I took during the dinner portion of the evening.

Charlie and Morgan the chefs! You should have seen these two before the pizza. =)

Long Time

7 years is a very long time. I haven't seen them since inbetween my Freshman and Sophomore years at Biola, which would be B.P.(before Paul).

My youth pastor and his wife moved back to SD from Arizona last May but I hadn't had the opportunity to visit with them until this weekend. They are expecting their first little one in just a few months, it is so exciting. So on Sunday morning I headed over to their house to drop off a few things for them and had the chance to talk for a bit. It was a little strange since I am a different person than I was in H.S. and I really want them to know the real me. The big difference is I smile and laugh a lot more. I have fun, and am comfortable with who I am.

Since Paul and I have been married almost 5 years and since they were unable to make it to the wedding I really want Paul to meet them since they have had such a positive impact on my life.

This photo is a bit old, but they pretty much the same
Marc & Tiffany Henning

Butterfields

I drove down to SD this morning. Traffic was horrible took me like 3 hours. Oy!

It was too hot to get any thing done around the house so my mom and I ran a few errands before heading over to the event for the afternoon a Retirement (Betty) and Graduation (Leslie) Party. I haven't seen our old neighbors Betty and Gary since a wedding last July.

I grew up with their kids David and Leslie as they lived one door over. David is one day less than being exactly 1 year younger than me. Leslie is about 4 years younger than me. It was so good to see them and catch up a bit. Leslie was at Williams & Mary for college and said she had a wonderful time. We looked through some scrapbooks that her mom put together for her, talked about things we remembered from childhood and what we were doing now. I had a great time reconnecting.

Congradulations on finishing college Leslie! & Congratulations on retirement Betty!

From left to right

Justin, David, Michelle, Leslie, Me, Andrew

Songs you need to know #1

For a while now I've been trying to think of some ongoing series of posts that I'd like to have on here. I realized it had to be musical, because no matter what mood I'm in, I can always come up with the "perfect song" to fit how I'm feeling. I guess you could say that if I was ever stranded on a deserted island, these are the songs I'd want to have with me. Some of them will never be called classics, but they're songs that have had their run and I keep coming back to. Now to get us started, I present to you Mr. George Harrison...

How you like me now?!?

Yeah carnies, I'm talking to you. You try and rip people off with your rigged games of chance, stealing from families just out to have a good time. But not me. I've got skills baby. You only got $2 out of me. You're lucky it's one prize per person per day, cause I still had a whole lotta rings in front of me.

A day at the O.C. Fair...

The (save) ferris wheel at night.


This is what you'd get if the Scarecrow and Tin Man had a child.


I'm really not sure.


The line for the bathroom.


These guys were huge for being 4 days old.


Cyndi showing Johnny Law who's boss.


Charlie practicing her skills from boot camp.


Windmill that was pumping ground water.


Entry gate to the animal section.

Update before bed...

This weekend I was pretty much out of it. On Friday, Cyndi and I went out to lunch with friends, and ran around doing errands. I kept falling asleep in the car, but figured it was due to the heat. However, all I wanted to do was sleep all day Friday, and into Saturday. I finally took my temperature around noon on Saturday and found it was 101. I hadn't eaten anything since Friday lunch, so by dinner Saturday I decided I should probably eat something even though all food seemed completely unappetizing. It was also hot and stuffy in the apartment even with the windows open and fans blasting, so once it cooled down outside some, I convinced Cyndi that since my temperature had gone down some thanks to meds that we should get out and go see a movie. I don't know if she bought it or not, but we did end up going to see Pirates of the Caribbean 2. It was good though it seemed a bit long. That could have been the fever talking too. Sunday was more of the same. I lounged around and napped until I had to go to work.

For the next three days I'll be at a training at our main campus in L.A.. It deals with how to work with problem kids and situations. It expires every 3 years, so this will be my third time taking it. It used to be somewhat interesting when half the time was spent learning restraints and take-downs. Now that part has been reduced to about an hour with the rest of the time being lectures and role-playing exercises. I hate having to get up and perform skits in front of everyone, but at least I can scare all the new hires with my horror stories.

I should really go to bed. It's 12:30am and I have to be out the door by 6:30am at the latest. I really wish I was tired right now.

Pool -n- Pizza

on wednesday ( i think) moe had an ultrasound so i met up with her at BK which has an indoor play area. i hung out with the chillins and sarah while moe did her thing.

afterwards we headed over to the new eldridge house so the kids could go swimmin.
Group Shot and a Drewski

Jam Man and Babbs


after a rough day of swimmin we met up with paul at a local pizza parlor. uncle paul had fun buying tattoos for the kids. they also love the "candy game" which they get to play until they win a piece. we always have tons of fun hanging out.

Alright Tate. Let's get down and dirty.

Sweet Sunshine

So this past weekend Moe flew up to Oregon to look for a house with Nick. A neighbor watched Abby, In-laws watched Drew and I had James. I went down to San Diego in hopes of meeting up with some friends for lunch dates.

On Friday I picked James up at 9am. Helped Moe get everything into the van and then she headed to drop of the other two chillins while I headed down to SD. We went to the mall to grab a bite to eat and walked around a little bit. Then we went over to my moms. I set all of his stuff up so he could take his afternoon nap. We played, went in the pool, and ran some quick errands.

Saturday was more of the same. My mom bought James a cute pool floaty and James had a blast splashing and swimming. My mom and I did some chores, cleaned out old papers and labeled "the library".


I talked to Erin and she said that she was available for lunch Sunday. James and I met up at her place. The kids played for a little while and Erin and I talked. Erin went to Subway and picked us up some sandwiches. Everyone ate and then we hung out a little more before it was time to take James back to my moms for his afternoon nap.

My mom and I had an early dinner and then it was time to head back to Moe's. When I got there I got James ready for bed and put him down. Then Sarah and I watched a few cartoons with Abby before we got her ready for bed. After Abby went down Sarah and I just hung out talked and watched some TV

Confidential to the Rocket Surgeon

From Fox Sports...


Baltimore Orioles

So the O's bring in pitching Mahatma Leo Mazzone to help the staff. The results? Baltimore ranks 28th in the majors with a 5.59 starters' ERA and 25th in bullpen ERA, and they're on pace to give up almost 900 runs this season. You can't hemorrhage runs like that and be a team of consequence.

Midseason Grade: F


Boston Red Sox

It's by no means a secure one, but Boston's lead in the East is the largest of any divisional pace car in the AL. They're scoring runs in bunches (thanks mostly to MVP-caliber seasons from David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez and the on-base chops of Kevin Youkilis), and the front of the bullpen (i.e., Jonathan Papelbon and Mike Timlin) has been exceptional. The back end of the rotation remains a concern, but expect that to be addressed at the July 31st non-waiver trade deadline.

Midseason Grade: A-

You're going to be o.k.

Pirates of the Caribbean set box office records taking in $55 million in one day, and $132 million for it's opening weekend. You can afford a sammich now.

This post is better than bad -- it's good!

Beautiful

My husband the photographer

Imagine what he could do with a professional camera