PICS FROM THE BEST STATE EVER.

colorado.

geesh, this state is beautiful. the weather was crisp and amazing. we slept with the WINDOWS OPEN, people. i mean, really. i could live there.

i could easily live next door to my brother. easily. the pack of kids in that neighborhood are awesome and they run together from sunup to sundown. barefoot, but that's another story.

meanwhile, henry did a lot of this:

and hallie did this:

and we hung out with these peeps:

and this little boy was an angel:

and it was wonderful.

LITTLE MAN'S BEST FRIEND.

henry loves dogs. loooooooves dogs.

so when he got to share his love (and food) with jake in the ozarks, he was a happy boy.

it seems like any picture i took of henry had jake in it. i wonder why?

oh wait - here's some video evidence:

ack, he is so cute!

LET'S BACK THIS TRAIN UP.

time to move in reverse a bit. go back in time, if you will.

i moved forward with the birthday activities before finishing up my summer vacay posts/pictures.

we left papapa's farm on wednesday morning (fourth of july!) and drove the rest of the way to lake of the ozarks.

it was so hot. like, crayons melted in my car hot. as in, crayons melted on the parking hot. i mean, so hot. (can you tell we dropped crayons everywhere? i thought we got them all picked up to avoid the melting - guess not).

we stayed at mom's place and had the time of our lives. tubing, swimming, swimming, tubing, dogpatch, celebrating hallie's birthday, shopping, swimming, skiing (me! what?!), more tubing, more swimming and YOU GET THE IDEA.

the kids stayed up late and slept in every morning. we ate a ridiculous amount of food and managed to pop a giant tube. surely that's not related.

in a word: PERFECT.

A QUICK STOP AT THE FARM.

we started off the vacation with an overnight to papapa's farm. hallie had high expectations of horseback riding and i am happy to say they were fulfilled.

and she looked adorable.

and henry had a wonderful time opening and closing cabinet doors and playing with annie the dog.

we got to spend some time with columbia family that evening, which was lovely.

THE BEGINNING AND THE END.

this is how our trip started:

(no, i did not run out, thank goodness. but i have never been so close in all my life)

and ended:

luckily, everything in between was super fun. we had a great week, but boy oh boy there is

NO PLACE LIKE HOME.

WEEKENDING IN STL.

we spent the weekend in st.louis with aunt kath, uncle phil and dad. it was an awesome weekend.

i really have no words this morning, so i'm just going to stick with pictures.

related: i am just now drinking my first cup of coffee of the day and it's almost 11am.

i will say that it was SMOKIN' hot in st.louis. we went to faust park and it was amazing. perfect playground for hallie/henry, had a BUTTERFLY house and an antique merry-go-round to ride. fantastic.

the butterfly house was phenomenal. like, butterflies everywhere when you walk into the conservatory. you can't touch them, but they do land on you! it was sooo hot in the actual conservatory, hence the miserable pictures of hallie and henry. but i was in heaven! it was seriously one of the coolest things i've seen/been in a long time.

and the whole reason we went to st. louis was to pick up dave from the airport. so it was great to be reunited with him and then visit some good friends at the end of the visit.

it was a fabulous weekend.

PS: i forgot to mention...i got to make another trip to Trader Joe's. seriously, i love that place. i stocked up on my almond butter and tons of other goodies that cost one million dollars here in j'ville. i also tried some new products. sour cream pirates booty = amazing. seaweed snacks = gagworthy. morgan, i blame you.