Peach Festival

We arrived in Palisade just in time for the big yearly event of the Peach Festival.  It has gotten so big that they now make everyone park offsite and bus people into the park. 

Jaydon loved the idea of riding a bus (he’s been on commuter type buses but not ‘yellow’ school buses) and he was the first one to get on when it arrived. 

He also made everyone smile by singing the wheels on the bus song while we rode along.  Jaydon loved the peach festival and Tylor enjoyed the time outside. 

Jaydon got to have his very first pony ride on Freedom and he rode him all by himself. 

Next activity was the train ride. 

Then the bouncy castle, actually it was a dragon not a castle. 

While Jaydon was jumping another boy joined and guess what his name was – Jaden too. 

We all had so much fun at the festival that we went back the next day. 

First we had get Jaydon his souviner 'Peach-a-boo' shirt and then got our complimentary peach (they had run out the first day we went). 

Next activity was visiting the Alpacas and Llamas.  Jaydon loved the Alpacas and spent 30 minutes just petting them, feeding them grass and talking to them.  The owner was just sure that he had found an Alpaca farmer in the making. 

The only way we could get him away from his new friends was by heading back over to the pony and train ride. 

This time the train had a few more kids on it to ride with Jaydon. 

And the pony he rode on was Tucker this time because Freedom “was taking a break” as Jaydon says.  

Then we headed home and Jaydon helped make a peach cobbler.  Though I think he did more eating then helping.  By the end every peach Grandma cut up had a few Jaydon bites taken out first…guess he takes after the birds.

Fun at Grandma and Grandpa's

The highlight of visiting Grandma and Grandpa’s house was definitely having the pool in the backyard and a Grandma who was happy to swim whenever Jaydon had the urge. 

He started by just hanging out on the stairs but as he got more and more comfortable he had fun jumping in and scooting around the pool in his water wings. 

In addition to the pool, there was always something new and fun to do.  Jaydon got to have his first taste of corn on the cob. 

He thought it was pretty good stuff and after we showed him how to eat it without getting too much of the cob he had it almost every night for dinner. 

Tylor loved having some new faces to look at and be cute too. 

When we decided to venture out of the house we would head down to the Riverbend Park to enjoy the playground and splash around in the Colorado River. 

The water was probably the coldest Jaydon has ever been in so he stayed close to the shore which was good because it is running high and fast this year. 

One morning while we there, a group launched out on rafts and while they were getting set up the youngest showed Jaydon how to shoot his cool water gun. 

It was a bit big for Jaydon to handle but the boy was very helpful and patient and Jaydon had a blast!

Last day in Denver

Our last day in Denver we spent the morning shopping at our favorite US store Target to stock up on various items that we either can’t find in Doha or are too expensive.  The boys were both very well behaved and Jaydon had a great time in the toys section. 

After shopping we took the boys on their first visit to Denny’s (it takes one quick scan of the menu and it’s prices to understand why Americans have a weight problem - I actually found myself having a bit of culture shock from it all).  This was the first of many American experiences for the boys. 

The next being their first visit to a brewery. 

That evening we met up with Matt and Beka for dinner. And they got their first taste of things to come since with having the little guys around.

Our hotel was right on the 16^th street mall in Denver so we had a lot of great places to choose from.  They also have carriage rides which Jaydon absolutely loved.  Steve and I had to take turns all through dinner escorting Jaydon over to pet the horses so after dinner we had Buttercup bring us back to the hotel. 

The next morning we piled into the car for our drive to Silverthorne to meet up with my parents.  Tylor screamed about 45 minutes of the hour drive and was relieved to get out of the car and see his Grandma. 

In Silverthorne, we said bye to Steve (he went back to Doha the next day)

and drove to Palisade with Grandma and Grandpa.  Again Tylor screamed for about 90% of the 3 hour drive but that night he did sleep for 6 hours straight for only the second time in his life (the first time was after getting all his meds for Chicken Pox).  

Zoo and Casa Bonita

The 2^nd day in Denver we headed out to the zoo. 

I called my brother, who currently lives in Pueblo, around 8am to see if he had plans for coming up to Denver for the weekend. 

He said he did and the zoo was just the kind of activity he wanted to do with his nephews so he jumped in the car for a quick 2 hour drive. 

Our friend Dan from college, who also lives in Pueblo, also came up to see us (for some reason we have no pictures of Dan though I remeber taking some - must have been with his camera not ours).  Turns out it takes the same amount of time to get 2 boys dressed, fed and to the zoo (about 20 mins away for us) as it does to drive from Pueblo so we all arrived at the entrance within about 15 minutes of each other. 

We spent the morning looking at the animals and trying to keep Jaydon from realizing how tired he was, Tylor was just happy not to be in the car... 

By lunch time Jaydon had had enough and we headed home for a nice long nap because we had a fun filled evening planned ahead (or so we thought).  We were going to meet up with Nate and his family at Casa Bonita to join their son’s birthday party.  We arrived about 2 hours late (Jaydon was not civilized the first time he woke up from his nap so we let him get another few hours of rest before heading out).  For those who haven’t experienced Casa Bonita it's a kid centric Mexican themed restaurant with a waterfall stage for silly skits and high divers. 

When we showed up the line to get in was fairly long and it was loud – too loud for an overtired Jaydon.  I think we had 3 melt downs before even getting our food (it’s kind of cafeteria style).  When we were getting seated we asked to join the birthday party (they had several going on) but we didn’t recognize any of the names listed.  The hostess brought us around the entire restaurant to look in on every party and we didn’t recognize any of them.  Steve was also trying to call, text, and e-mail Nate to figure out what was going on.  We finally gave up and got seated by ourselves; Jaydon had no interest in eating so Uncle Mike took it upon himself to entertain Jaydon while his very tired parents tried to eat. 

Jaydon learned in Barcelona that riding Uncle Mike’s shoulders is a great way to see everything (he’s like 6’5” or something). 

A few, more melt downs later we decided to call it a night.  We learned later that we had the wrong night, party was on Sunday not Saturday but we decided not to try the adventure again the next night.  I don’t think Jaydon had quit the thrilling experience that Cartman did for all you SouthPark watchers. 

1st Day in Denver (Aquarium and Dinner)

After a tough night’s sleep we started our first day in America (as Jaydon says) – well Denver to be more specific.  I hadn’t been back to the states since Christmas of ’09 so on this trip we decided to spend a few days catching up with old friends from college while enjoying the beautiful weather and fun activities Denver had to offer. 

First stop was the Aquarium, which was right up Jaydon’s alley. 

He loves the fish and sharks (especially ones he can pet - even if they are fake.) 

He has also started playing a lot of imaginary games.  His latest was about a snake so he really loved seeing them – especially the green boa.  

Stefani had just gotten married (the same week that Tylor was born) so it was great that she was able to use her day off to come see us and meet the kiddos. 

Jaydon enjoyed having someone new to show off too and Tylor put on his best cute baby (with giggles) show before covering her in spit-up. 

We had to make the adventure short since Jaydon’s lack of sleep made him a ticking time bomb but before we left we got in some lunch and was able to do a little catching up before heading back for nap time. 

In the evening, once everyone felt a little more rested, we meet up with our good friend Mike for dinner. 

Unfortunately, his family was off visiting their grandparents in FL so we didn’t get to see Lisa and the kids but Mike and Jaydon had fun (and Tylor did a lot of sleeping).

Off to the US

Our adventure to the US has begun and it definitely got off to a shaky start. I’ve always been a day before packer but learned the hard way that with 2 kiddos you just can’t get it all done the day before. By 11pm the night before we left I finally gave up and crawled into bed telling myself whatever we don’t have we can just buy there. Set the alarm for 4am to give myself 2 hours to finish up packing before the taxi came. Tylor woke up 3 times before morning arrived, the last time at 3:30 when I debated whether to sleep or get up – of course I chose sleep. All of a sudden it was 5:00, no alarm and we were in panic rush mode from the beginning. Steve threw everything still laying around in piles into the suitcases; I fed Tylor, woke up Jaydon and got all the last minute snacks prepared.

We made it to the airport on time but as we were catching our breathe in the lounge I realized that Tylor’s spare diapers did not get packed in the carry-on, no diapers to purchase in duty-free so we only had the 6 in my diaper bag for the 16 hour flight that was ahead of us. The flight itself was fine. Jaydon now has a long enough attention span that the TV can entertain him for long stretches. On the plane, he skipped his afternoon nap and 7pm bedtime came and went without him sleeping. Finally at 9pm Doha time he fell asleep and we landed at 1am Doha time so he was NOT a happy boy getting off the plane.

In Houston we had a 2+ hour layover and landed early. While waiting for our bags at customs one of those cute beagle dogs came around and tagged us for having food. I had packed hotdogs, cheese, yoghurt etc. for the flight not knowing what and if Jaydon would eat airplane food. This meant that after we had our luggage we had to go in the back room and get everything x-rayed, answer ‘20-questions’ about where we came from and what we had in the luggage, then get a dressing-down from a snobby customs agent about how our tupperware of cooked hotdogs and strawberries was putting the whole country at risk of deadly dieses (at this point is was 3am Doha time and none of us were in the mood…).

We re-checked our luggage and found the line to get our Denver boarding passes issued. At about this time we realized that our flight was departing in 50 minutes and we weren’t even in the right concourse yet. I found an agent who confirmed that we didn’t need boarding passes to go through the next stage of security so we got out of line and ran to the gate. When we arrived they had already started boarding. We get to the counter while they are calling for all the stand-by customers to get their seats and they can’t get our reservation to come up on the computer. The agent is too distracted with boarding the plane so she sends Steve off to customer service to get our boarding passes figured out. I stand at the gate with 2 very exhausted boys trying to keep them entertained while they board the entire plane.

Finally, Steve gets back as they are calling the last rows and the gate agent still can’t find my ticket (however is able to find Tylor who is the infant linked to my ticket???). She off handedly tells us something about needing to catch the next flight which puts us into panic mode. Finally a senior Continental rep shows up and basically has me begging him to get us on the plane. He clicks around on the computer and finally finds the tickets (or gives up – we weren’t sure which) and just has them open the doors for us. He never actually gave us any boarding passes and told us to just find any open seats to sit in. Well as can be expected there are NO seats open and available next to each other and Steve and I both know now is not the time to see if Jaydon is up for flying by himself. The flight attendants are busy trying to find any open space for our carry-ons and I’m frantically looking for seats. From the back of the plan I hear “Hey Mariah what do you need?” look up with relief to see a co-worker/neighbor. He’s already getting out of his seat and in the process had to have the gentleman in the aisle move for him. I make eye-contact with this stranger and ask if he wouldn’t mind also finding a different seat. He agrees (like he could say no to a desperate mother with a 3 month strapped to her and 2.5yr old in tow) and we finally get on our way.

Oh yeah, and I should mention that in the chaos we did not grab more diapers for Tylor out of the luggage.  Fortunately he’s not much of a pooper so we made is the whole 24 hours of travel with 6 diapers and actually still had one left when we landed in Denver. 

Baby Laughs

Tylor has graduated from the eating, pooping, sleeping fetus stage to interactive talking, laughing baby stage.  Of course he's always his cutest right before we get the camera out or when we've given up and put it away but here's a video you may enjoy of him being his adorable self. 

Steve has also developed a new level of multi-tasking, working, drinking, and baby holding all at the same time. 

And a cute picture of the boys, Jaydon still has the band-aid on his head from his wart removal adventures.