I knew that getting into an event with such national security implications would be an exercise in patience, but it was beyond anything I anticipated. We (Mom, Becca, Jordan and I) left my house about 12:45 and we finally got into the stadium about 7:00. Unbelievable! I won't bore you with the details of the hours and hours of serpentine lines through parking lots, but just imagine a single-file line of about 70,000 people. As my mom said, yesterday's line will be the standard that we judge all lines against for the rest of our lives. Anyways, it was totally worth it!
One of the several parking lots that we serpentined through:
Not exactly a celebrity on my "must see" list, but oh well: 
The view from the nosebleeds. 
A slightly larger venue than the parking lot in Park City that we shook Obama's hand in last August.
Just awesome!
All of us contributed supplies for the diaper cake and Audra and I had an artsy-craftsy afternoon last week putting it together.
And not to leave out the little brother, a picture of Benjamin (and Mason) as well:
The scenery was gorgeous!
Interesting factoid: to build this bridge, they would drop a cable off each side of the gorge, connect them at the bottom, and then pull them taut from the top using oxen and tractors. There are 2100 cables that make up the bridge.
"Hi rafters!" (Yell this while waving wildly.) Maybe when the boys are older we'll see the gorge this way.
The weather was perfect for the open-air car, but the boys really didn't like the sound of the brakes (they were really loud) as we came back down the gorge (which is why they're hiding), so we headed back into the covered cars for most of the ride.
It was a fun little trip, with a beautiful and relaxing train ride. (And I've got to say, camping with paper plates was the deal!)
I don't know how you can really go wrong taking the little ones for ice cream - they even got to make their own ice cream sundaes! Awesome!
one last time before their big move to Oregon for law school. (This is file footage. They weren't running a race this weekend, nor do they always match.) We will miss having them in Colorado, but we're excited for the new things in store for them as they open this new chapter in their lives!
And Karla definitely won a Coolest Dessert Award. She brought this awesome ice cream dessert that looks like a watermelon: 
It tasted delicious too!
This BBQ was also the inaugural get-together for our new chiminea. 
Andrew was soooo excited to get one! 
This is obviously the first summer for us in this house, so everytime a plant or flower blooms, it's like opening a little gift. I'd never seen a daylily this color before, so here's a moment of zen for you:
And the other project was this mound in the backyard. 
It was previously covered entirely with wood-chips, and as is wont to happen on a hill, the wood-chips just kept sliding down the hill into the grass and our neighbor's yard. So I raked the wood-chips up the hill and hauled rocks from other parts of the yard to cover the slopey parts, creating a little mulch-island around the trees and plants. And whoever landscaped the yard totally upsold the homeowners on rocks, they're about 8 inches thick in some places, so I easily found enough rocks in the other beds around the yard to do the project withouth leaving bare spots. The boys had a lot of fun helping with this project - not a lot of things they like better than hauling rocks in their dump-trucks and little John Deere wheelbarrow.
and you know why he's enjoying that cookie? Because today is the first day he has gone all day without having an accident!!
The next day we headed to: 
It's this wildlife park that you drive through and see lots of wild animals up close from the safety of your car. Elk: 
Reindeer and babies: 
Bears, bears, and more bears: 
Bears in places you don't expect, like in a little cave right next to the truck: 
This morning we headed to Mt. Rushmore. 
Max getting sworn in as a Junior Park Ranger at Mt. Rushmore: 
Ben was in tears, ready for lunch, so he didn't participate in the swearing in ceremony, but he got a badge and certificate too.
Sacked out from fun: 
The weather's been great. Last night we got a good ol' thunderstorm in the middle of the night and it rained for a long time (brought back memories of the last time I was in Custer; that was the first time I'd really experienced thunderstorms), and I couldn't believe the boys slept through it. Another camper (from Minnesota) was shocked when we said this was a little more humid and buggy compared to what we're used to :). She couldn't imagine anything drier and more free of bugs...
