we're back!

we had a wonderful vacation to colorado! as i mentioned in my previous post, the plane ride was a breeze. ava totally understood the concept of flying and started giggling uncontrollably at take-off. it was so cute. she sat in my lap and read books the entire time, it was wonderful. however, once we landed and settled in at my grandma's, she realized that she was not in familiar surroundings and began to grow wary of everyone. the first night she was okay until my uncle decided that he wanted to mess around with her and scare her. after that she didn't trust anyone! i didn't blame her, but that's just my uncle, he loves to play around. the rest of the trip was very exhausting because she refused to go to anyone and was very crabby! she napped and slept well while we were there, but no matter how much she slept, she still looked and acted very tired. i think the elevation might've gotten to her.

despite, her unusual crabbiness, our vacation was lots of fun! the first day we were there, we had a nice bbq at my grandma's. i visited with all of my family and introduced ava to everyone who hadn't met her yet. the weather was wonderful and i enjoyed the outdoors.

on tuesday, i checked out my all-time favorite thrift store: unique thrift. this is the coolest thrift store ever. fellow thrifters, doesn't it just beckon you?

i blogged about this awesome thrift store last year on my trip to colorado. it's kind of like buffalo exchange but with thrift store prices. i bought bryce a nice pair of brown polyester wranglers for only $2! thrift stores here would probably sell them for about $7. i bought myself some things as well. i bought about 9 or 10 items for about $20. very cool. i love that place. if you're ever in the denver area, definitely hit up this unique thrift store.

that evening we headed over to my aunt's house for a delicious fajita dinner. afterwards, we took a walk around their neighborhood and then enjoyed dessert on their patio as we watched some pre-fourth of july fireworks in the distance.

fireworks are legal in colorado, so after dessert we headed out front and lit a few of them. ava was enjoying them in her little chair until one of the works grew very large and started coming closer to us. i dropped my camera, grabbed ava and got her out of the way! all of us got scared because we weren't expecting it to get so big! ava was very startled because after that she grew wary of them, although she was intrigued by them still, she preferred to view them from my lap instead.

wednesday was the fourth of july.

in the morning we got together with some of my family for breakfast. afterwards, i headed home to lay ava down for a nap, while everyone else took off to see transformers. i didn't mind missing out on the movie, because i wasn't that excited to go see that one, although everyone has told me since then that it's really good, so now my curiousity is piqued. in the afternoon, we went out to eat and then met up with more of my family and headed off to see fireworks. we had the best view of them! we found a grassy area directly across the street from the trailer where they were firing the fireworks from. it was the best view of fireworks i've ever had! we had lots of fun and ava was so entertained. everytime a firework exploded ava would say "oooh!"

thursday, we got together again at my aunt's house for another bbq. by this time, ava started to get warmed up to everyone and was a little more pleasant. unfortunately, we were leaving the next day, perfect timing. we enjoyed delicious steaks, potatoes and spinach and apple salad on their deck outside. it was so nice to be able to enjoy dinner in such wonderful weather! i was dreading returning to the heat.

our flight took off early friday morning. ava was good on the plane, however, she was more antsy on the return flight. she kept wanting to get off my lap. i tried to entertain her and managed to get through the flight without a meltdown. i stepped off the plane to a dry, thick heat. right at that moment i wanted to turn around and go back to colorado. we had a wonderful vacation, i'm so glad we had the opportunity to go.