On Sunday...

Nathan's parents just left to fly back home to Washington. They arrived last Saturday and we had a lovely visit. :) Sadly, I didn't take very many pictures on most of the days. We were busy playing card games and getting boys to various activities and just generally enjoying each other's company. 

But. On Sunday, we went down to Denver. On Sunday, I took pictures. :) 

First, we went to the Denver Art Museum to see the special Star Wars Costume exhibit. It was fabulous! They had these fun audio tour devices where you would type in the exhibit number and the dealio would tell you about it...which worked great for learning lots without having to jostle to see and read placards. We all loved it!

There were so very many other cool things that I didn't take pictures of, and allow me to just say that I would really love to have Queen Amidala's wardrobe...gorgeous. ;) (That top right picture shows the evolution of the storm troopers and the bottom left is the view from inside Darth Vader's mask.) 

Beyond the special exhibit, the boys and I explored a bit of the rest of the museum (such an interesting building!). We saw some works being installed (top right), climbed the many stairs, enjoyed the outside angles, and found a unique statue/sculpture in a flower bed...

After that, we grabbed some lunch then headed to the Downtown Aquarium. Noah and Asher have been there before...years ago...but Micah hadn't been and was giving us a hard time about it, lol. So. We went to the aquarium...and Micah was happy:

Clockwise from top left...Micah was pointing out the tiger (difficult to see but up on the ledge)...inside a bubble...touching a sea star...petting a stingray...and standing in the tunnel thing. I think you can tell that he was pretty happy. :) (Incidentally, he's sporting some of the swag he decided he had to buy himself at the Star Wars exhibit, lol.) 

The rest of us had a pretty good time, too...

(I especially like that bottom right photo of my three boys.) :) I sadly didn't get any pictures (low light) of the flash flood area, which we enjoyed, or of the moment when Nathan leaned in to look at something and bonked his head on the glass, which was hilarious. But I did take some pictures of critters:

And some final random photos...

And after all that we headed home...a tired but happy bunch. :) 

Four on Friday

Just checking in as we're finishing up this first week of 2017...

1. Checking plenty of things off the to do list this week...things like thank you notes, scheduling our annual appointment with the accountant, labeling this year's ornaments before they get put away (probably next week), and other pesky household things. Among our household things, Nathan helped me reorganize our entry area (from the garage into the house). We moved the hooks, put up some shelves, and rearranged where we keep things. It's still not ideal, but it makes me feel so much better. (Seriously, my next house is going to have a whole different entry way situation...one that actually makes sense and doesn't cause everyone to trip over each other coming through the door.)

2. Another thing I did was finally start and finish a Christmas scrapbook/album I've been wanting to put together for years. (A couple years ago I even sketched out exactly what would go on each page and gathered all the materials. And then it sat on my desk for years, lol.) It's nothing fancy (at all!) but it's a single place with our holiday cards, letters, family photos and Santa photos for each year since we got married. Whew.

3. Over the weekend, we started noticing that Micah was squinting a bit at the computer screen. After some informal "tests" on our part (including trying out all the different glasses in the house, lol), we decided Micah probably needs glasses. Fortunately, we were able to take advantage of a cancellation and get him in to see our optometrist on Wednesday morning. And it turns out that Micah wasn't able to escape the "eleven year old curse" (so named by him because the other four of us here all began wearing glasses at about age eleven). ;) When Micah got a pass at his eye appointment in August, he thought he'd made it, lol. 

Anyhow, his glasses are ordered...should be here next week-ish. 

In case you're curious, the decision making process for Micah is entertaining and distinctly different from his brothers...and takes a good bit longer, lol. He wanted frames 

• that weren't like either of his brothers (whose frames, for the record, are fairly similar in shape and style)...
• didn't want blue or black (for the same reasons)...
• wanted the frames to be either hardly visible or very noticeable...
• was perturbed to discover that he can't wear a good portion of frames because he needs the nose pieces...
• was more perturbed to discover that color choices for boys/men are distinctly lacking compared to the color choices for girls/women...
• and stubbornly refused to believe me when I tried to explain that there's a reason both of his brothers have frames that are the same shape and that that same reason held true for him, being as he kinda looks like his brothers, lol. 

In the end, after trying on most of the frames in the office, he picked a pair. (Each brother tried on maybe two pairs of glasses before picking, since I know you were wondering, lol.) I'll post a picture when they're here and you can tell me if he succeeded in his wish list. ;) 

4. Yesterday, Micah had three friends over. They had a fabulous time playing and talking and playing some more. Bravely, for about an hour, they bundled up and headed outside to make snow forts and have a snowball fight:

It was probably about 10 degrees. They assured me they were fine...as I pressed extra hats and gloves on them...and they seemed to have a grand time. They also, though, came back inside declaring that they couldn't feel certain body parts, lol, but warmed right up with some hot cocoa. :) 

(On the plus side, 10 degrees is warmer than it was this morning. When I headed to boot camp, it was about -20.)

And that's some of what's been happening around here...