Magnolia

I have probably the cutest cat on the planet. And maybe I'm saying that because she's mine and I love her... but honestly, she's cute. So cute in fact that she deserves her own blog post.

Here are some Magnolia classics....

She loves watching tv. A segment on bed bugs was on The Today Show... she loved it.This one really cracked me up. Lionel Ritchie was singing on the Grammies. She couldn't get enough of that guy.Here's a picture from when she was a kitten.

She likes to get all stretched out. And she's a Texas fan. Smart cat.Magnolia under the covers:

This is what I put up with when I get ready every morning.

One thing that sets Magnolia apart from other cats is her love of playing fetch. I don't really know how this started... I definitely didn't teach her to fetch. But if you're willing, she'll play forever. Here's a video I took:

Florida Part III - Saturday

(Make sure to scroll down and start at Part I or else all this makes no sense...)


Saturday began with Joe running into our room and waking us up.Since we were now awake, the girls (Heidi, Amy, Courtney, and me) decided to go on a walk around the neighborhood. We loaded Joe up in his stoller, took a walk, and saw some of the ugliest ducks I've ever seen.

After our walk, we got ready to go out in the boat again. Only this time we weren't using Scott's boat. Scott works at a marina, and one of his clients let us borrow his boat for the day. And by boat, what I really mean is super-fantastic-gigantic boat with 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, kitchen, and satellite tv. It was awesome!!! Here's a couple pictures from inside:

Amy and John were pretty excited that the boat got the Big 10 channel and they were able to watch Iowa slaughter Wisconsin. Meanwhile... up on the deck... Joe did some driving (with a little help from Heidi).

We took the boat south from Delray beach on the intracoastal waterway into Boca Raton. Every single home along the waterway is beautiful! I couldn't get over all the mansions. Here's one of my favorites:

Here's Amy waving like Miss America.

John and Scott (kinda shadowy... oops)

Amy and I spent most of our time (when not watching football) laying out in the sun at the front of the boat. It was SUCH a nice day and I loved getting my last fix of summer before the cold weather comes. Here's us along with Courtney and Captain Joe:Me checking out my future mansion.
Amy and my feet as we lounged on the boat:

Joe and Scott:

The next day John and I went to the airport... sadly, we both had to work on Monday. Heidi, Joe, and Amy stayed in Florida until Monday night, though, so the trip wasn't over for them yet.

On the bright side... guess who was on my flight back to Denver? Alex Bush!!

I had such a great time in Florida. Thank you to Scott and Courtney for having me, and thank you to Heidi, John, and Amy for letting me tag along!

Florida Part II - Friday

Friday began early with Heidi busting into Amy's and my room around 8am (which is 6am in Denver... so early!). She gave us the itinerary for the day -- we were going to go to the Everglades that morning and then we were going to take Scott's boat out on the ocean in the afternoon. We were so excited to get going that we didn't even mind how early it was!

We drove about an hour inland from Delray Beach to get to the Everglades. We went to a place called Billy's Swamp Safari.... it was a zoo/alligator farm on a Seminole Indian Reservation.

These geese did NOT like me.

Babies weren't allowed on the airboat tours, so Heidi, Amy, and I took the tour while John and Baby Joe stayed behind and checked out the turtles. The turtles gave Joe a lesson on the facts of life... but luckily I don't think he understood any of it.

We saw SO many alligators. They would come right up to the boat which probably should have freaked me out, but the airboat guide seemed to know what he was doing, so I wasn't too worried.

Heidi and Amy:

They were feeding the alligators while we were there. This one has a huge frozen chicken in his mouth.

We got back to Delray Beach later that afternoon, and took Scott's boat out on the ocean. It was such a great day to be outside. Perfect weather. I'd never taken a boat out in the ocean before, and it got to be a bit of a wild ride!! Poor Joe wanted to take a nap, but the water was so choppy that it was tough to keep a hold on him. Here's Amy trying to stay upright and not lose Joe in the crazy waves while he slept. It was ridiculous!

After passing Donald Trump's estate in Palm Beach, we found a sandbar to hang out at for awhile. We did some seashell hunting and the guys did some fishing for bait.

We had dinner on the water that night. I had the best key lime pie of my entire life. Here's the mess Joe left behind:

By the time we got home, we were all exhausted!

Florida Part I - Thursday

In the grand tradition of tagging along on Amy's family vacations, I spent last weekend in Ft. Lauderdale with Amy, her brother (John), sister-in-law (Heidi), nephew (Baby Joe), Heidi's brother (Scott), and Scott's wife (Courtney). Got all those people straight? :) I was really excited about the trip since I'd never been to Florida before. Plus, I've spent some time with John & Heidi before, and they're hilarious. So much fun!

We left work a bit early on Thursday, October 16th, and caught a direct flight from Denver to Ft. Lauderdale. But not before hitting up McDonald's for a nutritious dinner of chicken snack wraps and fries.Amy and I were in the second row of the plane, and as we waited for everyone to board, we read our matching books. (It's for book club...)

As the plane filled up, we both looked up from our books at the same moment to find our co-worker, Alex, boarding the plane. We started yelling, "Alex Bush!!! Alex Bush!!!!" until he spotted us. It was so funny seeing him on our flight! Especially when it wasn't a work holiday (we all had to take off Friday as vacation). Such a small world!

We had a great flight. Southwest is the best. Check out all the snacks we got!!! Also take note of my DVD player -- the flight went by pretty quickly because we spent most of it watching Baby Mama.

(I was obviously a bit camera happy.)

We arrived in Ft. Lauderdale around 11:30 (we lost 2 hours with the time change). After taking a quick picture with Alex Bush, we headed for baggage claim to meet Heidi and Joe. They'd taken a flight in from Kansas City with a layover in Chicago. John, on the other hand, had taken a flight out of Kansas City with a stop in Atlanta (i think...). At any rate, we all got to Ft. Lauderdale around the same time.

Here's Amy with Alex:

We picked up our rental minivan and had an interesting time trying to get the car seat in. At this point, we hadn't met up with John yet... so it took 3 girls and 1 baby quite awhile to figure out that stupid car seat.

I love this picture -- I was trying to get a candid, but Joe saw me and immediately smiled for the camera. After we got Joe in his seat, we headed to pick up John at his terminal... but we couldn't figure out how to turn on the lights!! So there we were... driving around the airport... in a minivan without headlights and a car seat that may or may not have been installed correctly.

After we picked up John (and he showed us how to work those lights) we headed for Scott and Courntey's house in Delray Beach.

I thought the night would be over since it was 1am when we finally got to their house. But they had a fire going in the backyard and a cooler full of beer. And I never say no to free beer! After sitting out back for a bit, we all headed inside to get rested up for the next day....

Stay tuned for Day 2!!

Concert at Red Rocks

I'm on the clock (aka at work) so this one has to be quick. But I wanted to post this now because:

A. This concert was back in August
B. I have like 3 other posts I need to write sometime soon

So anyhoo.......

Amy, her mom, and I went to see Cross Canadian Ragweed, Rodney Atkins, and Dierks Bentley at Red Rocks back in late August. It was such a blast, and Red Rocks has to be the coolest venue I've ever been to for a concert. Here's some pictures I took:

The Longhorns Invade Colorado

It was an eventful weekend around here -- The Longhorns came to kick some Buffalo butt, so I spent Friday and Saturday in Boulder celebrating.
Friday night was the Texas Exes party, and I volunteered to help out. I spent 4 hours at the door taking donations for our scholarship fund, selling raffle tickets, and selling tshirts. It was really fun to talk to all the people in from Texas as well as some fellow Longhorns now residing in Colorado. On Saturday (game day!) Amy and I boarded the party bus up to Boulder -- the Texas Exes chartered 2 buses fully equipped with music, beer, and Texas spirit! After arriving in Boulder, we headed to the Texas tailgate... at least 500 people were there and it was great! The game was of course awesome. And after getting *slightly* lost, Amy and I made our way back to the bus that took us home to Denver. I did an absolutely terrible job of taking pictures. All I ended up getting was the few pictures I have here. Pathetic. I'll make sure to take more pictures when the Longhorns are back in 4 years.

Here's Amy and me showing off our multiple stamps and bracelets. You have to go to a lot of bars to get that much gear. We don't mess around. Also note the olives in our Coors Light. This is apparently something they do in Iowa (or maybe it's just a weird Amy thing), and I have to say I like it!!

Things I'll remember from Texas/CU weekend:

1. Free beer on the bus and the nachos at Foundry

2. Getting yelled at by mean CU fans (some people just don't appreciate burnt orange)

3. Sneaking into the side door of the Lutheran Student Center so Amy and I could use their bathroom

4. Getting ditched at The Sink

5. Walking through the pitch black of Boulder trying to find the bus

6. Beating CU!!!

The next day, Tony took me up to Estes Park to see the beautiful fall colors. It was gorgeous! We walked around the town and had lunch. Then we drove through Rocky Mountain National Park and took a (very) little hike. So pretty! Here's a few pictures I took.

What a great weekend in Colorado!