We love Colorado Springs! (Journey part 5)

We stayed in a cabin in Manitou Springs for 5 days and would have loved to stay more, but I suppose Andrew did have to go back to work at some point :). Our cabin was next to a little stream and tree with a rope swing that our kids loved. It was really a great place to relax and have fun with our kids after a full day of activities. We were also close to some of our day-time destinations; like Manitou Cliff Dwellings. The kids loved climbing in and around the cliff dwellings used by people over a thousand years ago. Andrew and I tried the in and around stuff too, but all I can say is, people must have been a whole lot smaller back then because the doors were an awfully tight squeeze! At least the kids had a good laugh at us.
We also spent part of a day hiking around Garden of the Gods. What a beautiful park, and best of all, it's free :) ! I learned a valuable lesson there - You see, those rock formations were so tempting, I just had to climb one...
...without climbing gear of course and as I was smiling for the picture, I was inwardly thinking, I'm going to break something. Lesson - going up is much easier than coming down. Let's just say I was not tempted to try it again, besides it's illegal - seriously. And no, I did not know that until afterward. Moving on.....

We loved the day we spent at Focus on the Family. When we were planning out our vacation, Andrew thought I was nuts to set aside an entire day for Focus. We got there at 9:30 and left ~5:30 and we could have stayed longer. There are great activities for Adventures in Odyssey lovers - if you have school-age kids and you aren't listening to Odyssey with them - Get Started! It's an awesome , Christ-focused radio series that you will come to enjoy as much as your kids. Enough for the plug. As soon as we got to Focus, we headed to the Welcome Center and downstairs to the kid area where we went roaming through the different rooms, trying on costumes from different characters and just having fun. Then we headed over to the Administration building. There we got an official tour of the building and heard about Focus' mission to help families. It was neat to see how Focus has changed in the 10 years since Andrew and I were there last. They still work diligently to support families, but now they have a very strong ministry to adopting families and Crisis Pregnancy Centers as well.

Before our tour began, we tried to get a hold of Andrew's cousin Rudy Haerr because we knew he worked at Focus and thought it would be fun to see him. After the official tour, not only did we get to say "hi" to Rudy, but he gave us a fantastic "back stage" kind of tour. For you Focus on the Family Broadcast listeners out there, look at the center picture in the collage and you'll see that I'm actually sitting in Dr. Dobson's chair! Too much fun!! Rudy also showed us the room where they make the sound effects for Adventures in Odyssey and gave us a lot of fun insider info about production of the Odyssey and Focus broadcasts and the voices behind our beloved characters. Then we headed back to the Welcome Center to eat at Whit's End - we even tried a WodFamChocSod - yum :). Our kids went down the huge ABend-a-Go slide at least a dozen times. We found the Wardrobe which led us into a small "Narnia" themed room that our kids thought was really cool and then we headed to the Kyds Radio booth where Timothy, Kayla, Lucas and I got to record our very own Adventure in Odyssey! After we finished the recording we were given a CD of our adventure to listen to in the van, which of course we did as we drove back to our cabin. Right before we left, I had to visit the Bookstore and as I wandered the aisles, I suddenly found myself standing face to face with Dave Stotts! Ok, so it was just a life-size cardboard cut-out of Dave, but pretty cool nonetheless. For those of you who don't love Drive Through History as much as we do, Dave Stotts is the nutty host of the series who, between his historical figures and fast facts, throws in just enough clean junior high humor to keep my boys' complete attention. My boys had to have a picture - and if you look closely at the boys' pic on the right (check out the bunny ears), you'll see evidence that Dave Stotts isn't the only boy stuck in a man's body. :P

Amazing Journey Part 4

From the Grand canyon, we drove through Painted Desert, Monument Valley (where we saw 1,000 ft high funky rock formations jutting out of the desert sand), 4 corners, and up into the mountains of Colorado. It was really an amazing drive. We stayed overnight in Pagosa Springs and got up nice and early to hit our first hiking destination - Treasure Falls.

10 years ago, Andrew and I stumbled upon this well-maintained 3/4 mile hike up to Treasure Falls. When you start the hike, you can't even see the Falls. As you get closer to the top, you start to hear them and then finally, you round a corner and see this -

Isn't it just gorgeous! We got to see it just as the sun was coming up over the mountain. We all just stood there and silently "wowed" for a while. After we had our fill of looking at the falls, we decided to walk a bit further onto a smaller trail where we found our first mounds of snow. Andrew was leading the crew and I was at the back making sure we didn't lose anyone when I got the novel little idea to send one of our sweet children up to their Daddy with a hand full of snow to put down his shirt. His surprised little yelp kinda shattered the peacefulness of the morning, but I think it was worth it :).

Did you know that the tallest Sand Dunes in North America are in Colorado?? Nestled in between 2 mountain ranges are the Great Sand Dunes. Our kids really enjoyed playing in Medano Creek - you have to cross this creek to get to the dunes and the water is FREEZING. After a while, you get used to it and it's a lot of fun. Because the snow melt water is rushing so quickly from the nearby mountain range, there is a very strong current. After crossing the creek, all you see is this -
Those dunes might not look big, but they are 750 feet tall! They only look small because they're standing in front of a 13 thousand foot tall mountain. Looking at them was incredible and climbing them was exhausting! We definitely didn't make it up the highest peak, but the kids had a ball climbing up and running/rolling down. I'm pretty sure we brought a couple feet of those dunes into the van with us.

For the next 5 days, our family stayed in Manitou Springs - a rugged little town just outside Colorado Springs that probably saw its heyday in the 50/60's - I kid you not, on our way in, Andrew and I saw a hotel sign that read "Air Conditioning & Color TV." Nonetheless, we really enjoyed our stay there. We had a nice 2 bedroom cabin where we could stretch out a little more and a full kitchen so I could cook again. I know it may sound crazy that I was excited about cooking again, but after 1 1/2 wks of eating out, I was really ready to cook some nutritious meals for my family. Plus, Manitou Springs is a fantastic location for so many of the things we wanted to do and see.