Our favorite car seat

After our accident in October, a few people have asked what car seat Ellie was riding in. Here it is, the Safety 1st Comfort Air 65 convertible car seat. I know, when I first saw it (and the price), I thought Jake was crazy for wanting it so bad. It's definitely not the most expensive one out there but higher priced than others I had looked at. Everyone always jokes about the "side speakers" on the car seat too. After that accident, we replaced it with the exact same one, only slightly different in colors. Wouldn't you?

Ellie's life saver.

Shopping and Taste of Colorado

Over Labor Day weekend, we spent most of the time at home. Since Jake has holidays off, Monday we decided to go shopping at Castle Rock Outlets. Kids stores have great sales over labor day and Ellie needs clothes for winter. I think we did pretty good. After spending some time there, we drove home for a break and then headed downtown for Taste of Colorado.
Last year, Ellie and I went by ourselves. This year Jake was able to come with us. I think he was a little shocked to see how big this event is.  We ran into some friends there. We could only walk with them a short time as the crowds were too big to try and walk with 2 strollers.

We did sample so foods too. Jake tried a taste of buffalo brat. We all ate chicken fingers and fries. I think the best was dessert. We sampled some key lime pie and beignets (like what Tiana makes on The Princess and the Frog). They were both great. The beignets are a scone like dessert served with powdered sugar and frosting.

One thing Jake and I noticed while walking around the venues was that we are becoming more a "peculiar people". Almost everyone there was drinking alcohol, had many tattoos, were dressed immodestly, had multiple piercings, or some other thing about them that screamed "LOOK AT ME!!! I AM UNIQUE!!!" It made me wonder what things will be like in the future. How different will things be and will we stand out even more as time goes on?

Grandma Wendy's Visit (days 4 and 5)

Day 4 of my mom's visit was Sunday so it was mostly a stay at home and relax day. Ellie did enjoy having Grandma come to nursery with her. My mom almost packed up one of the kids to take home because his parents were late in picking him up and he looks almost identical to my brother-in-law's, Devin's, baby picture. She figured that Calee and Devin could pass him off as their own.

We enjoyed some nice fish (halibut) and chips (homemade french fries) for dinner. I just thought my mom would enjoy some fresh (-ish) fish from Alaska since as kids none of us really ate fish and doesn't have the opportunity to eat it as often as she'd like sometimes.

Monday we drove out to Colorado Mills, our huge outlet mall. It was time to do some shopping.  We looked at clothes for Ellie, swimsuit for my mom (she was arriving home in Utah just to leave in 3 days for California), and just walk around. I like this mall with its wide halls and different stores, not to mention its an indoor outlet so its a little easier to shop in the winter.

We ate Panda for lunch because Ellie loves the noodles. We had to sit a one of the little kid tables they have so we could be near the carousel. Of course Ellie convinced grandma that she needed a ride, after Ellie snuck in the exit to the ride. We got on and Ellie choose her horse and the ride started. After about 10 seconds she wanted off. So I had her watch for Grandma Wendy each time we would go around. She giggled each time Grandma would pass because we would say BOO!


Not to sure about this, until we would pass Grandma.

We got some good shopping in. Ellie fell asleep, which was good, but then we came to the Build-a-bear workshop. They had these cute spring lambs and if you spent a specific amount then you received a free Easter basket. So we made Ellie a lamb. We wanted to have her record a "baa" sound but she was still asleep.

We timed things so well that we left the mall, drove home to pick up my mom's stuff, and made it to the airport so she could fly home without much waiting. It's always sad when our visitors have to leave. Ellie asks for them for a few days after, but we make sure to have a good time while they are here.

Thanks for visiting Grandma Wendy. We love you. 

Grandma Wendy's Visit (day 3)

After so much activity, we left Friday for a low key day that had quite a bit of driving. We took off for the Mile High Marketplace.  I hoped things would be better than last time since it was later in the year and an exceptionally nice day.  Although it wasn't part of the plan, we ended up driving more than expected because I didn't grab the address before leaving and couldn't remember if it was off the 70 or the 76. About the time we realized it wasn't on the 70 was when I remembered that we had a book of Denver activities in the car and that would have the address.




Grandma Wendy, Ellie and Stanley at the Flea Market.

Sadly it wasn't any better. There were definitely more vendors and food available in the Farmer' Market but I think there were more garage sales and less shops open. I was mostly looking for shoes for Ellie again. My mom did find and buy a cute moose salt and pepper shaker set for us. It was nice to just walk around and enjoy the sun. 
After walking around, we drove home and left Ellie with Jake for a bit while mom and I went for our new favorite activity, pedicures. I really enjoy this little place by our house and even though I don't like touching feet, I have decided that once Jake is making a lot of money I will frequent salons for pedicures.

After we took off for dinner.  No one was really sure where to go, so we headed back up in the diection that we had come from and ended up at Ling and Louie's Asian Bar and Grill in Northfield. Ever since Stef's visit and seeing the menu item of "Evil Jungle Princess Beef", I have been interested in trying the dish that would warrant such a name.  I have since learned to read the dish description a little bit because although it wasn't terrible, I don't like curry so much and it was a peanut curry sauce. Other than that the food was good and the atmosphere fun.  Ellie really enjoyed eating edamame.

The night was still young but drawing closer to Ellie's bedtime so we went to one of Jake's favorite stores, Bass Pro Shops. My mom was looking for some Christmas ornaments that she saw at one in Vegas a while back but like most stores don't carry Christmas year round.  Ellie likes these types of stores as well because she can watch the fish and look at the animals on the walls while trying to make the sounds.

NOTE: Please let me know if you can imitate a giraffe or zebra because Ellie makes them baa or moo but other than "Crack-a-lackin" we aren't sure what sounds to teach her.
 

Our laugh for the night. Maybe someone needs to pay attention to lettering while folding shirts.

After wandering around until Ellie was exhausted, we headed for home. We didn't want to stay up too late because the next day was going to be our big adventure.

St. Patrick's Day

For St. Patrick's Day, I made green pancakes. I tried to make them in the shape of shamrocks but they looked just retarded. My mom has been making green food on St. Patty's day for years. She made pretty good looking shamrocks too. One of my favorites was the green bread, which usually grossed a lot of people out.

Jake didn't have school because of Spring Break so we went shopping at the Castle Rock Outlets.  The day started out very nice. I went for my walk and it was so warm and not windy, that I put on capri's and a short sleeve shirt for the day. I also pulled out Ellie's capri's and short sleeve shirt for her to wear. Before leaving, I grabbed jackets just in case. Good thing because it was windy and cloudy by the time we made it to the outlets. We had to make do to try and keep warm. 

P.S. Let me explain the socks with sandals thing. I wouldn't normally dress my child this way but we bought her sandals recently but she would scream bloody murder any time I tried to put them on. I tried socks and sandals and she still cried. For some reason when Jake put socks and sandals on her, she left them on. I hope it helps her become used to the new sandals.

Ellie's cute outfit, although too big helped keep her legs warm.

Although it was a little chilly (this seems to happen whenever we drive down there), we had a good time.  We did a lot of window shopping. Ellie used some of her birthday gift card from Justin and Lisa to buy some balls and a sand playing kit. Jake bought some shirts and I received some kitchen stuff that I am really excited about.  I love cooking breakfast, snacks, and desserts but don't really enjoy making dinner.

Coupons and food storage

I love having a small amount of food storage around my house.  For one thing, it nice not having to run to the store every time you need one small thing. And for two, it helps me save money and use coupons. Because of the storage, I can cut coupons of things I need and then wait until I see them on sale to get the sale price and then use a coupon as well. It's great. A couple of weeks ago, we paid less than $1.50 for 20 oz boxes of cereal. I don't think we have really paid full price for anything in the past month or so.  I'm really hoping this helps lower spending.

New Phones

Jake's phone has officially had it. It had died and somehow for about 2 weeks (or longer) he managed to resurrect it long enough to read a text or return a phone call but usually somewhere in the middle the screen would fade out and it would shut off. Luckily for us this place called Car Toys was having a huge sale. Free smartphones (after mail in rebate) so we drove down to take a look; or if this were Jake's story to buy phones.

Jake has already decided what phone he wanted, the HTC G2. It has a slide out keyboard which works great for him since he has "man sized" fingers.  (He tells me they are fat but then changes to man sized when I say something to someone else.)  I was debating between 2 phones and still not exactly sure I wanted a new phone. Don't get me wrong, I love having nice, new things especially when they are fun to play with. At the same time, I only really need phone calls and texts. My other phone has an awesome music player in it and it still works fine. I have survived in this world with out ever owning an i-pod. I ended up getting the Samsung Vibrant.

It has been fun trying to figure things out but here are a few pet peeves (if you know how to fix any of them, let me know):

1. Contacts cannot be placed into groups and given separate ring tones unless you move them off the SIM card and on the phone memory.
2. Although it syncs with facebook, you can't post stuff pictures or videos directly to facebook. And you are very limited on what you can look at on facebook.
3. More than half of the application pre-installed on the phone (the calendar) won't work unless you already have or sign up for a gmail account.
4. The users manual is the shortest I have ever seen and really doesn't have useful information, just the super basics of turning on and off the phone and moving, adding, or deleting apps.
5. At a pre-set time the screen turns off and the phone becomes locked. Extending this time drains the battery but to unlock the phone you have to press the power button and then either slide the screen or input a password.

I do like some of the features on the phone:

1. There is a 5mp camera and a postcard app that allows you to take funny pictures.
2. The camcorder is HD, but you do have to manually change a setting if you want to be able to send the video via message.
3. The swype texting feature is pretty cool. I just wish sometimes it had better guesses at which letters you were pushing.

Is having a smartphone really worth it?

Kids Fair and Bass Pro

As I was searching around for more things to do, I found out that there was a baby and kids fair taking place over the weekend. After a little more searching I found some discount coupons so I thought is would be nice to go walk around and look for deals. I have found you can buy stuff at better deals than they sell at their online stores so if you luck out things work out great.

The fair was a lot smaller than I expected. I guessed it would be big like most of the ones in Utah. This was tiny, like the chocolate show I went to a while back. It had great potential. There was a small petting zoo and mini horse rides. My only problem was that you paid to enter and then they wanted an extra $2 a person to enter the petting zoo and $5 a ride for the horses. Sorry Ellie, maybe next time. Oddly enough, DirecTV was there so we were able to negotiate some contract/pricing changes. We were also able to collect a little information about health care and daycare as we may be looking into both these areas in the near future. Needless to say, it was a complete waste.

Since we were out in the area, we decided to head to Bass Pro Shops. If you know anything about the Watterson family, you understand that trips to Bass Pro and Cabelas are big deals. In addition to looking for those items you didn't know about before but after seeing them you can't live without them, we also spend time walking around looking at the decor (mounted items and fish tanks).

Ellie, my little shopper, didn't mind as she loves shopping.


Can I help push the cart?

What? I didn't do anything. I'm just pushing.

I liked being out to see about a new shopping center to see if there were interesting looking shops or possible future restaurants to try out. Driving around some of these areas I'm not sure if Denver is a big city, a growing city, or a blimp in the middle of nowhere. 

Butterfly Pavilion and Flatiron Crossing

Friday's trip was to the Butterfly Pavilion and it was a good day to go. As we pulled up and unloaded from the car, I took off my jacket because it was so warm outside.  Inside the building there are several exhibits to see. You start off with the bugs and insects. This is a room filled with cages of roaches, beetles, spiders, scorpions, bees, and ants. On each cage is a plaque with the name and some information about the creature. Ellie loves looking at this stuff. I don't know how she would react to touching because mommy doesn't touch them.

 

Jake's picture of some beetles.

   

The other guys call him "coach".



   

A huge tarantula as compared to Jake's hand

 

I can't remember what this bug was called but it had something to do with mask.



Here's daddy holding Rosie, the tarantula and an Ellie bug.

After you walk through this room, there is another room where you can look at and touch a horseshoe crab and starfish. This is a small exhibit but with some fun information and games for elementary age kids.

After this, you enter the "Wings of the Tropics" exhibit. This is a room that is mostly sealed off and very humid, like the tropics. Butterflies fly freely around the room. Food is provided as well as plenty of plants that the butterflies would be used to. 

 Anytime a butterfly would pass or we would point one out to Ellie, she "oohed" and "aahed" or "wowed".


Ellie bug with the butterflies.

Some of the butterflies just sitting on some flowers.



Ellie did like walking around in here. As you can tell by my hair, it was very humid.

Of course, after spending enough time in there that our skin felt lovingly refreshed we walked out of the room. You have to exit through 2 sets of doors. In between each set is a small area that has a strong gust blowing back into the tropics and mirrors on each side. The signs inform you to check for hitchhiking butterflies.

Before you exit the building, there is always the gift shop. I always look around even though we rarely buy anything. I almost bought this though.

100% recycled and odorless products made from elephant poo. Now that's recycling.

 The pavilion was a little fun and potentially interesting. It would definitely be better with an older child that questions or at least understands what the bugs were. They have mini programs throughout the day but we weren't there during any of the times. The descriptions of them were quite interesting.

Since the day was still young, we decided to go check out yet another mall, Flatiron Crossing. Denver's newer malls have been designed to bring people in and let them stay all day. This was just outside the entrance we walked in. In the middle there were lounge chairs in sand. Parents were relaxing in the sun (remember is was about 70 outside) and kids playing in this giant sandbox.

Great motivation for parents to hang out by the mall.

Most of the malls I have been to so far are really trying to incorporate ideas or activities that invite parents to bring the kids to so they are out of the house, which is genius because if your already at the mall most people can't help but walk inside to see about any sales going on.

I just enjoy walking around and seeing what crazy ideas and clothing people come up with. We stopped by Fuzziwigs candy store. Soon Jake and I realized we have a potential problem child.

Ellie trying to sneak candy out of the bins.

After we left the store (no she didn't manage to actually steal or eat any of the candy), we walked through a few other stores.  At one point, I was going to put Ellie back into the stroller when I saw 2 packs of markers on the seat. Upon inspection, they had Fuzziwig tags on them. Neither Jake nor I know how they made it into the stroller. Neither of us saw Ellie even touch markers. So we had to head back and Jake returned them to the store.



Flatiron is a nice mall. A new retro type look on the inside. All around the mall are small strip malls with almost any store imaginable and plenty of restaurants within a 5 minute drive. That's how quite a few of the shopping districts are around here. At least I know I have options when I want to go shopping.

Mile High Marketplace

Now that we are back in Denver, it is time to continue our Friday afternoon activities. Last Friday we went to Mile High Marketplace, Denver's year round outdoor flea market and farmer's market. I have wanted to go see what it is like for a while but we were busy doing other things. Luckily for us, there was wonderful weather on Friday. It was in the 50's so walking around wasn't a big deal.

Mile High Marketplace wasn't exactly what I expected but I imagine that part of it was because it's January. More than half the stores/booths were closed. The farmer's market wasn't that great but I imagine it's hard to grow too much during Denver winters. There is an entire open air section where there isn't a building covering but sectioned off spots on the ground for people to sell stuff.  This area looked like a bunch of people came out with garage/yard sale items to sell. It was a little weird. Then again, if space only costs $70 for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday it could be worth it so that its easier for people to find your yard sale.

It did make me laugh to see an Asian shop owner with signs written in Spanish.  Jake was curious and wants to know if flea market lingerie is more dirty.

We did find some cute shoes for Ellie. Hopefully things look a lot better in the spring and summer because I really enjoy flea markets. Although I did have a feeling that reminisced of the Utah State Fair.

Because it didn't take long to walk around, we drove out to the Colorado Mills Outlet mall. It is a newer mall here that mixes high end outlets with your regular outlets (more like Tanger in Park City). By higher end, there is a Neiman Marcus and Sachs 5th Ave outlet store in this mall.

It was a nice low key day but great to be out and walking around. Ellie really enjoys having the extra space to run around. Not to mention, she really loves running up and down ramps. She would have stayed on this one ramp at the mall all night but we were ready to leave after she spent 20 minutes running up and down it.  Then she climbed up and sat on some big chairs out in the walkway and then climbed down and then back up. She cried almost the whole way to the car because we picked her up and made her come with us.

Black Friday (Duh, duh, dun)

As some of you know, I don't go out shopping the morning after Thanksgiving (so affectionately known as Black Friday).  I don't care how much potential money you can save. That is because for 5 years of my life, I worked the morning shift of every day after Thanksgiving. Three of those times, I was a manager. Because of some of my experiences, I have a great hatred for that day and the things people do in order to buy gifts I am positive they really don't need or their kids don't need. (I won't get on my soapbox about Holiday shopping and how it really seems to take away my Christmas spirit or how crappy customer service seems to be lately.)

In the past year or 2, I have started going out in the afternoon to do shopping on Black Friday.  Some places still have decent deals going on.  After Ellie's morning nap, we took off for the valley again to meet up with Annie, Stef and Jeff.  Luckily my favorite kids clothing store was having an additional 25% off sale that day. After shopping for 2-3 hours, Ellie was becoming a little bored.

Jeff was watching her while I was looking around the store.  He blocked her in the display window and let her enjoy herself.  This is what I saw.

This is Ellie trying to do ballet.

After a while she was just plum tired. We left shortly after this. I stopped and bought her chicken nuggets from Chic-a-fila (which she loves). She ate 5 of the nuggets, half a kids french fry, and drank half the lemonade. I guess she was hungry too.

When we got home, she did one of her favorite things; chased the family pet around.  Unfortunately she found Tippy (yes, the male cat's name is Tippy Coconut) in the bath tub. She pinned him there for a few minutes trying to pet him.

Thanks for being such a good cat Tippy.