Blues Traveler

Last week, we were lucky to have our friends Kerri and Audrey here. We stayed with them in Texas the week before and now they were here in Colorado to visit friends and family. Riley had so much fun with Audrey down in Texas and she was so thrilled to see her again. Riley and Audrey discovered a new musical talent with some harmonicas that Gigi gave them. Here they are jammin with their new instruments....

They also had a great time playing with a box that we made into Riley and Audrey's new playhouse. The grown-ups may have a had a little bit of fun with it too...

One of the warmer days that week, we decided to take the girls to thepark for some play time. Audrey's very tall Uncle Tim was a big help to both girls in climbing up to the slide.

Happy St. Patty's Day!!!!

Hello Texas, it sure is good to see you again!

We spent part of last week and the begining of this week visiting Popdaddy and some friends in Texas.  This was Riley's 2nd trip to the Lonestar state and we all had a great time! My dad's company is based in Houston and because he divides his time between Texas and Colorado, we have been anxious to visit down there to see where he lives and works while he is away.

We loved his apartment and Riley especially loved the location which was near 3 huge fountains that we passed almost everytime we drove to or from Popdaddy's house.  She always knew that they were coming and made sure to announce..."fountains coming up!". 

Riley in her new hiding spot

Riley in her Patara Oil and Gas hard hat at Popdaddy's houston office

My Mom and Dad took us to some of their fave places to eat and we had some really great food.  We even went to real crawfish boil on our first night in town, Kris was in heaven...Riley and I passed on the mudbugs and waited for the Mexican food that came after, but it was fun to watch!  Riley's fave eating spot was probably the Blue Bell Creamery.  On our last day, we spent a couple of hours driving out to Brenham Texas for some really good ice cream.  Riley got her pick of flavors and decided on Homemade Vanilla, she loved 

every bite!

We also hit up a couple of gourmet markets that we all wish we had closer to home. Riley really liked the pint sized grocery carts, too bad they don't have those where we shop at home, it would definitely make grocery shopping more pleasant for both of us!

As an added bonus, some of our best family friends, the Wilbourns, live down there as well and they invited all of us to come and spend a couple of days at their house.  Their daughter, onne of my oldest and best friends, Kerri came down from Dallas with her husband Cory and little Audrey.  We hadn't seen them since July, so we were really excited to see them.  Riley and Audrey are only 5 days apart in age and destined to be BFFs I hope.  They had so much fun playing together and particularly liked playing hide and seek and chasing each other around the house.  Riley would hide and call out "Audrey...where are you?" and Audrey would run to find her.  They also thought it was pretty good to "hide" together by flattening themselves against the wall and standing very still and quiet (Riley thinks this pose makes her invisible) while they waited to be found. It was pretty cute to watch them together as evidenced by the obscene amount of pictures we took.

Little BFFs in matching outfits of course

"Hiding"

We had such a great time exploring around Houston and can't wait to go back, we love Texas!]

Riding the airport shuttle with Gigi, time to go home!

Bunky Ryan and Auntie Kelly

Riley loves her Bunky Ryan and Auntie Kelly so much and like the rest of she has missed them tons since they moved up to Alaska.  They've been away for about 6 months and in that time we've just had to get used to calling and Skyping to stay in touch.  Bunky Ry is one of Riley's favorite people to pretend call anytime that she can get her hands on a phone, she even "called" him from handheld shower head while standing in a display tub at the Great Indoors.  Her calls to him usually go something like "Hey, Bunky Ry!  What doin?  Just hangin out?"  and then she will continue with telling him whatever is on her mind, it's pretty cute.  Anyway none of this phone communication, real or pretend, is as good as having them here in the flesh, so we were all pretty exctited when they came for a visit last week. 

Riley came down with an infection in both ears and strep throat early in the week, which meant that she spent alot of there visit feeling pretty crummy and there is definitely a lack of pictures taken that week too.  Lucky for us though, she was back to her old self by the end of the week and we got to spend an afternoon having lots of fun with Bunky and Kelly on their last day in Denver.  Riley and Ry were particulary fond of the rhinos. 

While they're visit went by a little too fast for all of us, we had so much fun with them while they were here.  We are already missing them, but we're planning a trip to Alaska in August and can't wait to see them then.