Happy Holidays!

I can't believe a month has passed since my last post.  We've been super busy.... 

We had a great Thanksgiving up in Bailey! We went up on Wednesday and had a fun dinner at Anne, Mark, and Emily's house.  Emily was our chauffeur for the evening. :) Thursday was a great day of cooking, laughs, and celebration.   We picked up our Christmas tree (from the bin at Home Depot...how I miss getting trees from the Santa Cruz mountains!!) that weekend and have been enjoying it ever since.  We have docorations from the late 1970s all the way through 2008 (we buy a new ornament for ourselves each year), so it is fun to decorate and have all the memories with us as we trim the tree.  Zack just watches from the stairs and awaits the garland...that we didn't put up this year since he crews it and it just can not be good for him.  He is still looking for it.

At the DCB rehearsal the following Monday I was "recruited" to play with the Lone Tree Symphony Orchestra (percussionists are in high demand in the community band world!), so I rehearsed with them twice that week, followed by a concert on Friday night.  The concert went great and us rowdy percussionists surprised Jacinda, our conductor, with Santa hats for the encore! I went to a cookie exchange at Jenna's house on Saturday which was really fun (and yummy....!).  Sunday we went up to Tarah's house with the other Nellis siblings to help Tarah put up her tree.   We had her famous overnight casserole and french toast. Yummy!! The weather was great that afternoon to get our lights up outside!

This week was busy with a DCB concert, so we had two rehearsals this week.  The Northern Trust holiday party was a bowling party at the Denver Athletic Club on Thursday, and it was fun to "let loose" as this has been quite a year in our industry.  The concert went great yesterday.  I had a challenging part on chimes in one piece and jingled the sleigh bells on a few pieces as well. 

Today we attended a baptismal class at Michael and Carrie's church as we have been given the great honor of becoming Sofia's godparents.  Father Ken (a childhood friend of Suanne's) presented the details beyond the rite and Sofia practiced her cries for the ceremony a bit once the class was all done! :)

It is really cold here in Colorado (well below zero tonight), so we are in the holiday spirit.  We should get some more snow tonight, so I'll watch the commute from the comfort of the light rail.  I have a 7 mile drive to the train, but it is good to ride in for the last 2/3s of the drive!  Cheers!

Cruising into winter!

It has been a busy couple of weeks!! And somehow we are now on the back end of November already. My how time flies. Today marks 9 months of marriage for my wonderful hubby and me. I am so lucky to have the life that I do and the love of such an amazing man.

We toasted the election of President Obama with Kari and Brad on 11/4. Wednesday night I attended my first board meeting for MiCasa - I will be voted on to the board at the next December meeting and I am so excited! I helped host a baby shower for Kari on Sunday, which was so fun!! Baby Anderson is a lucky boy, and I can't wait to meet him in 2 months!!

Chuck and I took Monday and Tuesday off (well, us banker types got Tuesday off) and headed up to Eagle to visit Natanee, Matt, and Talon. We stayed at a small B&B in Eagle and with Grandma Patty's help, went out with Natanee and Matt for their first baby free meal. :) Talon is growing like a weed and has the eat, poop, cry, sleep, repeat (not necessarily in that order) actions down!

Jeremiah, Alex, and Maddie came over for dinner on Tuesday to finally start our once a month tradition! It was nice having a short week at the office. I attended a breakfast for Mercy Housing and a lunch for the Women's Foundation. Joy Behar was the speaker at the foundation event - she was great!

Our first snow of the year was on this Friday - amazing it was so late this year. We got about 3-4 inches, and it is all melted away now. Yesterday was the last tailgate of the year. We really lucked out with the weather at for tailgating this year! Even though it was a night game, both Sofia and Talon were able to come to the tailgate with the good weather in the 50s before the sun went down. My oh my, how our tailgates have changed over the years. :)

We are looking forward to the holidays!

Happy Halloween!!

Happy Halloween!!

It has been a busy few weeks. I had my Fall concert with the DCB and had a great time. Mom, Dick, Tarah, and Chuck joined the audience, along with our friends Mark and Denise, so I had a bit of a cheering section!! :) The Sunday after the concert I joined well over 100,000 others at the Obama rally in downtown Denver. It was an amazing experience.  To see the photos, click--> HERE

Work has been crazy as you can imagine, but we are all hanging in there. I am exploring getting involved with a local non-profit, MiCasa, as a member of the board, so it is nice to find time for the community outside of the financial world!!

Tonight we joined Tarah at Alex (Witch) and Jeremiah's (Darth Vader) to help Maddie (Cinderella) celebrate Halloween!! Minus a scary mask at one house, she did great!! We handed out candy at their house and also looked at Alex's awesome scrap booking handy work that she did this week during Fall break.  A few pictures are --> HERE.  Here's how the family before going trick-or-treating...

Tomorrow we babysit Sofia for the first time - wish us luck...let's hope she doesn't figure out we are total rookies!!

Another baby boy!

Natanee and Matt welcomed their son, Talon (middle name tbd) on Friday, 10/17.  We visited the new family in Vail today and he is just adorable!! Take a look for yourself!!  

A few more photos -->  HERE

Last week went quick with a short week for me (Columbus day) and a conference for Chuck here in town.  He presented to the group on Friday (and did GREAT - I am quite the proud wife!!!). 

We had a good weekend before heading up to Vail to visit the Spencers.  We had a CU game on Saturday (and they won!), so we (of course) tailgated!  Michael and Carrie left Sofia under the watchful eyes of Mom and Dick and joined us for the game! 

Homecoming and Sofia's first tailgate!!

Last weekend was great fun! Alumni band was really fun, although my back might disagree! I marched with the band across campus to the alumni tent and through the field house.  I was tired from even doing that much (yep, I felt old!).  I played in the stands and did halftime (us old folks joined the band for the last song and just a few sets of drill).  It was great to be down on the field again! I slept most of Sunday...here is a photo of me down on the field:

Last weekend also marked another milestone for Sofia - she went to her first tailgate! :) Steph and I stopped by for just a few minutes, but it looks like Sofia enjoyed being held by friends and family.  Here she is with Mom and Dick having a good snooze:

I have tomorrow off (Columbus Day), so it will be nice to have a short week after the not so fun times in the financial world.  I have a Business School alumni event at the new building (sure, they had to buy a b-school building after I finished!) on Thursday.  The Bank is working with a new elementary school this year through the Denver Public Schools Foundation School Partners program - I am volunteering at their Fall Festival on Friday evening. :)

We are dogsitting yet again - Indy is staying here until next Saturday.  Poor kitty... 

Two baby boys in two days!!

I am about to head up to Boulder for rehearsal, but I have have baby news to share...(the blue background on our page is so appropriate!)

Jenna, Patrick, and big sister Macie welcomed Brayden James on 10/1 (7 lbs. 3 oz., 19.25 inches)!!

And, Erin and George (and big brothers Anderson and George) have welcomed another Metcalf boy!! The family welcomed Tatom Alexander into the world on Thursday, 10/2 (he weighed in at 8lbs., 2 oz. and 20' long). If you click on the Metcalf Boys page under our friends/family links you can see photos of their newest little one.

Congratulations and welcome to Brayden and Tatom!!

The next baby news will come from two more boys on the way....Natanee in a couple of weeks and Kari in January....Micheal has a lot of boys around to keep from Sofia!! Ha. And yes, it seem that just about everyone I know is/was pregnant in the last year. And to answer your next question, no I'm not (yet).

Last night was so fun up in Boulder. The band has a new tradition of the Pearl Street Stampede where there is a short (about 4 blocks) parade up Pearl Street. There were SO many people and seeing the kids enamored with the band was so cool. Steph and I stopped in for a Rio marg (ok, I had two) before the Stampede and made friends with some Texas fans - it is always great to see fans that travel as CU fans are not big travelers. I am of course hoping for a huge upset!! GO BUFFS!

Ok off I go!! The game is on FSN and kickoff is at 5pm CO time. Maybe I'll get on TV like old times! I'll be the short one in the alumni band with the big drum. :)

Happy Fall!

I can't believe it is October already!! In the financial world, we are pretty happy see September 2008 go...the Bank continues to be very strong (the Bank is very well capitalized, and we were not a part of the subprime lending mess), but no one is left untouched with 1200 pt swings in the market.  Yuck.  I see that the "bailout" passed the Senate tonight...although I am guessing the market will react positively, who knows what this all really means.  The bottom line (in my humble opinion) is that we - the collective tax payers - will be paying for this mess one way or another whether controlled or uncontrolled. 

Anyway, I am looking forward to a great weekend.  It is Homecoming Weekend at CU and my good friend (and college roommate), Steph, will be in town for the festivities.  I am going to march with the alumni band on Saturday during the game so I am looking forward to seeing old friends.  Although my back will disagree, I am excited to march again and carry a bass drum (I think I'll even get to march my "old" drum....3rd bass). 

Sofia will go to her very first tailgate this weekend!! She isn't going to the game (being 13 days old on Saturday and all), but you have to start them young in tailgating! I'll actually miss the tailgate with all the band stuff, and it will be a big one with some UT friends joining in the fun. 

CU plays Texas....To our TX cousins that bleed burnt-crusty-kind of yellow-but a bit brown-orange...HERE COMES RALPHIE!! :) GO BUFFS!! I know the Aggie-faithful TX cousins of ours agree!! :)