Random Food Stuffs

Grilled dill salmon with bacon green beans

Panini's made with Eric's grill press he got for his birthday!

Sunday Morning Breakfast- homemade biscuits and gravy!

Cabbage and noodles as a side for brined pork roast

Pictures of (What we hope is!!) Our First House!

So we currently are under contract on a house, and the listing pictures of course are cruddy quality, so we tried to take some of our own when we were there for the inspection so you can see better views of the rooms.

At the end of the hallway is the master bedroom. This is looking into the master bedroom. There's more room to the right side you can't see.

This is the guest room right across the hall from the master. Through the door you can  see the guest bathroom.

Said guest bathroom.

Room that we're making an office w/ the ladder to the attic. 

Kitchen!

Other side of the kitchen where we'll put the dining room table, bar stuff and  someday a buffet/sideboard.

view of the back yard from the kitchen sliding doors. The white thing in the back is the door on the shed.

Camping at Cottonwood Lake

Welcome to Buena Vista!

Right as you go round the curve into Buena Vista Mount Princeton (a 14'er) welcomes you. Our campground was on the back side of this massive mountain.

We camped at Cottonwood Lake, which is near Cottonwood Pass. It was dispersed camping, so we just pulled off the road and picked our spot! Our camp site was actually huge. We parked off the road  and then hiked down the hill to our camp site, which you can see above.

It was a GORGEOUS blue bird day. 

While things got unpacked from the car and brought down the hill Indy kept watch to make sure nothing happened to the grill.

Once everything was unpacked everyone started relaxing and Indy of course was not far from Eric.

After we recovered from unpacking and relaxing it was time to take the kayaks out and the dogs swimming. Matt and Eric are out on the boats in the distance and Indy is swimming to his tennis ball off to the left. 

I LOVE SWIMMING!!

Another lake shot

Indy and Eric

Dogs gone wild in the water- Dayton and Rocky (Joe and Laura's dogs are in the front)

We ALL LOVE SWIMMING!

Sleepy after swimming

Sitting around waiting for the grill to heat up

sunsetting shot

MEAT! Yes, this was our dinner.

Me with the Cottonwood Valley in the background

Us and Cottonwood Valley 

Overall we had a great time camping. The temperature was good, it didn't snow, and it wasn't buggy! I haven't been camping in two summers, so this was a nice low key re-entry to it.

Storm "Damage"

This past week -50% of Colorado was beaten by terrible storms. Even Englewood, where we are, was under a tornado warning, which is extremely rare. We had hail pelting the windows, wind we could hear blowing through the windows and it's amazing we didn't have flooding with how hard the rain was coming down. 

All in all we are fine, no hail damage to the house or our cars, we just had a bunch of downed branches and some very tattered plants! Pictures of the hail that remained the next morning along with our shredded plants are below.

Planting!

So while my guys were away camping I decided since it was Memorial Day weekend the odds of my plants being frosted over at this point was slim, so I went to Lowe's and stocked up to give our yard, patio and porch some color. I planted all sorts of randomness, but it's taken really well and some of it's already larger and fuller a week later! It has to be the Miracle-Gro potting soil because I never have luck with plants surviving!

As you look through the pictures I'm sure you'll notice all of what I planted is in pots. Why you ask? Well, we've started looking at houses and might buy one before the wedding- it's not a guarantee!!!- but the market out here, at least in our price range, isn't bad, so we're giving it a shot. If we do in fact find some luck and buy a house- here's the cheap skate in me showing through- I'm taking all of our plants with us and the only way to do that is if they are in pots. 

Herb pots

Snap Dragons

Coleus

The pots have violas, marigolds and petunias in them. The barrel on the left has jalapeno peppers and the one on the right has squash.

hanging basket

nice summer back yard ready for lots of cook outs!

Eric's hop plants he planted a few weeks ago. They are growing like crazy!

Front porch with mixed flower pots- more petunias  and violas and some salvia

Inaugural Camping Trip of 2012

I feel as though each time I update this I start with an apology because there are weeks between posts. I'm going to stop apologizing since I clearly have a pattern and have set the expectation and assumption I'm not on the ball!

That said, the newest adventure was when Eric and Indy went camping with Matt, Cody, Joey and Joey's dog, Lucy. They went down south off of 285 and did some car camping. It was everyone's first camping trip of 2012. The weather wasn't bad, except it got a little colder at night than the weather predicted and the guys anticipated (32* in May- whoops!). they survived and had a great time. The dogs especially loved it. Lucy got to run around outside like a nut, and Indy found snow. There's no happier moment in Indy's day than when he finds snow or water and can burrow in it and get all stinky. 

Pictures are below. I mentioned that this was Eric and Indy's trip so I'm sure you're wondering what I did. Maybe not, who knows. For the answer check out the next post - yes, I know 2 in one weekend! Admit it, it's impressive :)