Watering and Irrigation

We run our sprinklers early in the morning, as opposed to the middle of the night as I would prefer, so I can check on them to make sure they are working properly.  This morning I found Old Faithful erupting from the corner of our lot so off to Home Depot I went to peruse the sprinkler aisle.

my sprinkler part of the day

My sister-in-law gives me incredulous looks when we talk about irrigation.  South-central Pennsylvanians just don't irrigate, they have enough rain they don't need to.  Those of us in Colorado, we know irrigation.  I'm pretty sure that everyone who maintains their own lawn is very familiar with the "Watering and Irrigation" section of their favorite home improvement store by this time of year.

Normally one would only replace parts that get broken, and trust me, those $2 parts are made to get broken.  I'm still not sure how the corner one broke, it's in the middle of a rock bed where nobody walks and no one mows.  Since I was going anyway of course we Moores decided it was a good time to renovate the rest of the sprinklers that aren't quite tweaked to our liking.

It sounds SO simple, you need to irrigate a patch of grass/shrub/bed without hosing down your house/foundation/deck and in our case play structure.  So you buy that 90 degree spray head thinking it will, in fact, spray  in an arc 90 degrees the advertised 8-15'.  Yeah, remember these are $2 parts?   So, now it's nearly 9:30 at night (I will say it's blessedly cool) and Travis is outside with the flashlight working on the sprinklers.  Again.  Oh, the things we do for yards here in sunny CO!

QOTD

But why do we have to have yummy yummy things?

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QOTD

No, no, no. I've been chewing too much this week.

-during snack today

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Locked Out

There is a story that gets told time and time again about young Travis.  Approximately thirty years ago he had a lovely grandmotherly babysitter.  One day young Travis decided that while she was in the attic he would close and lock the door behind her.  She remained locked in the attic, using all kinds of words I'm sure, until Travis decided to open the door and let her out.

Tonight we were out in the backyard, I was doing a little light yard work and Travis and FFM were playing with the Jeep in the greenbelt.  It started thundering and was about bedtime so Travis declared it time to park the Jeep.  Thing went relatively smoothly until FFM bolted inside and bolted the backdoor.  Now, we can go around front and let ourselves in through the keypad on the garage door, but this locking of the backdoor got under Travis' skin.  There's FFM, jumping for glee while both his parents are locked out in the backyard with an impending thunderstorm.  Travis is hollering for all he's worth "THAT'S NOT OK!" and I'm trying hard not to laugh out loud remembering the story of Travis locking out his babysitter...

Heaps and Heaps of Rain

We've had record breaking rain in the last 10 days.  Normally we high desert dwellers never complain about rain, but there has been so much that the ground literally can't hold another drop and we get floods every time we have even a tiny shower now.

The kids have made the most of the less dangerous showers (some are so bad we all just have to stay inside).  A couple days ago I spied our neighbor kicking and splashing and FFM dashed out to join in the fun.  He wanted to put on his swimming suit and join Dylan in the gutter, but since it was nearly bedtime he made do with giant stomping splashes. It didn't show up well, but the water was actually flowing all around him and over his feet.

 On the nights we get a sunset, it's pretty spectacular.

QOTD

MOM!  Are you OK?!  Did you just slip because you are a very old person?

Vail Valley Vacation

After hanging with the in-laws for a while FFM and I headed north to visit with my brother and sister-in-law who were in CO visiting from Phoenix.  We crammed lots 'o fun into a few short days.

Riding the gondola to play up at the top of the mountain with Karen and Q.  FFM is busy checking out his 'hiking pack.'

 Nice mountains!

 There's still snow up on the top, a bit unusual for this late in the summer.

 Enjoying a mid-hike snack.

There's lot of free stuff to do up at the top of the mountain, which was a pleasant surprise (since it's Vail and all).  The slackline course was a bit hit as was the Dino Dig (which I did not photo since it was just digging the dirt for 'bones'...)

 Horse ride, the "YEE HAW, RIDE 'EM COWBOY" and flinging of his hat were totally his idea.  Even the horse handler was cracking up.

 Another hike, along the river down at the bottom of the mountain.  I've never seen the Eagle River this full so late in the summer.  Lots of melting snow still and plenty of rain.

 The next day was a fishing day and Uncle Q found a lake where we could rent a canoe.  It's a favorite fishing lake of ours, but we didn't have any luck that day.  It was chilly, and a bit rainy and I had not packed any extra clothes.  I was worried my wiggly kid would end up in the water so I made him stand RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE of the boat dock NO MATTER WHAT!  He took me VERY seriously and absolutely, positively did not budge from his assigned spot for about 20 minutes while the canoe was prepped and loaded.  I guess when it really counts he does listen!

 Self portrait as we canoed across the lake.  Look closely you can see Uncle Q paddling in the reflection of the sunnies.

 After the rain let up the boys took the canoe out together for a solo trip.  Again, FFM didn't wiggle even a tiny bit.  Until he got out of the boat, then it was a whole different story.

 It's our 'monsoon' season here, which means lots of afternoon and evening thunderstorms.  We had a good one and I managed to catch some lightening around the peaks at the house.

 We chilled more the last couple of days before heading home, spending some time at the pool and playground.

QOTD

But Mommy, I don't like consequences!

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Fireworks

It's tradition in Travis' family to do a pre-fireworks show before the big show.  He gathers tiny little fireworks with glee and spends a long time deciding when and in what order he'll light them all up.  They're all the legal kind and he gets so excited about them that it's infectious and almost as big a deal as the giant professional display.

This year started out with a minor catastrophe.  We lined up a couple of early fireworks, had the kids stand a safe distance back, yet one firework spun out a much larger fountain of sparks than expected.  It caught FFM just below the eye, singing off most of his lower eyelashes, leaving a black mark on his lower eyelid, and generally scaring most of us to death.  Luckily his eye appears to be undamaged and after a short stop with an eye wash and ice pack he returned to the fray.

It got a little chilly up above 9,000ft so blankets and jackets were the dress code for fireworks.

Waiting for the sun to set...

Fantastic Fountains!

Right before the big show we pulled out the sparklers, they were a big hit.

Silverton Fun

We spent about a week in Silverton, celebrating birthdays and the 4th of July.  We managed to fill the days with a few activities.  Just a few of the things we did, we...

Went on a hike,

and a stagecoach ride around town,

played piano with Grammie,

test drove a friends 'camper' (giant bus RV),

had a few tastes of rum here and there at the distillery,

made a couple of birthday cakes, this one decorated by two enthusiastic kids.  Sprinkles anyone?

And played outside a lot.

4th of July

I'm way behind, here are some photos of the cousins at the parade on the 4th of July. They were super patriotic!

QOTD

Mommy, I beed really careful with the big scissors and I didn't cut my fingers off!

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