The DNC is halfway over...for those of you that don't know, my office is just 3 blocks away from the Pepsi Center and the Convention Center. So, we are in the thick of things. Most of us are using alternative transportation to get around with the road closures.
That said, to answer your question of "how is it?," I say - GREAT! Denver is so alive and busy! Walking down 16th Street (the pedestrian mall that runs the length of downtown) feels like a bustling city. The police are plentiful...it seems every city in the state has lent officers to downtown. There have been some protests that have gotten a bit our of hand, but fortunately for me, those have been on the other end of the city. Overall it is a feeling of community and excitement. Of course, I may be a bit biased...
We are always aware and are keeping our eyes open when walking around, but I just couldn't stay inside and not experience history in Denver.
I haven't seen any famous faces (political or otherwise), but coworker "sightings" include Joe Biden, Susan Sarandon, Charlize Theron, and Spike Lee.
I have put of my first set of photos --> HERE
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Photo updates...
Busy weekend!
We had a wonderful (but busy!) weekend!! :) Friday night, Natanee, Matt, and super-dog Sydney came down for their weekend stay. Syd stayed home getting to know Zack (who was hiding in the closet) and we finally got the Spencer's to dinner at our favorite Italian place - Armando's. It lived up to the hype, landing in Matt's famous Top 5 (this time, top 5 Italian meals).
Saturday was a busy day with Natanee's baby shower! Fortunately for me, Kandi and Mom came down early to help assemble tea sandwiches and the onesie "station" - we got done just in time! Whew!! In typical Katie and Kan fashion, there was way too much food....we wouldn't want anyone to starve. We celebrated Baby Boy Spencer to be with laughs and some cleverness - instead of games, we crafted custom onesies with iron-ons (Kan showed us all up by using a needle and thread!). Kari once again showed off her baking skills with a yummy checkerboard cake (blue and white, of course!) to top off the meal! Thank you to Kandi, Mom, and Kari for helping with the shower!! :) I so couldn't have done it without you.
Chuck and some of the husbands couldn't get away fast enough to the golf course during the shower. It rained ALL day (so rare for Colorado, especially in August!!), but they were able to hit the links at an executive course just North of us (they got a big soggy!). The boys came back after the girlie fun for a BBQ.
Just to top of living meal to meal (as Natanee's mom noted!). we went to breakfast this morning and said goodbyes to go to our next event - celebrating my birthday and getting together with Chuck's mom and siblings. We cashed in on the rain checks from last year's attempt at miniature golfing and played a round! Maddie had her own ball (purple) and club to keep her entertained, but I think the adults were more into it with our ever so classic "Hole in 2" Dance. We had yet another meal (no need for dinner tonight) at Red Robin and had a great time!! Thank you to Mom, Darby, Jeremiah, Alex, and Maddie for a fun day!!
I'll get photos of the shower and golfing posted soon. :)
So, we are a bit tired and definitely full from a fun weekend. The cat is happy to have his house back! Little does he know we are babysitting Timber (Stacey's yellow lab) next week and Trinity (Michael/Carrie's doggie) when Baby Garioto comes in September! Poor kitty......
Saturday was a busy day with Natanee's baby shower! Fortunately for me, Kandi and Mom came down early to help assemble tea sandwiches and the onesie "station" - we got done just in time! Whew!! In typical Katie and Kan fashion, there was way too much food....we wouldn't want anyone to starve. We celebrated Baby Boy Spencer to be with laughs and some cleverness - instead of games, we crafted custom onesies with iron-ons (Kan showed us all up by using a needle and thread!). Kari once again showed off her baking skills with a yummy checkerboard cake (blue and white, of course!) to top off the meal! Thank you to Kandi, Mom, and Kari for helping with the shower!! :) I so couldn't have done it without you.
Chuck and some of the husbands couldn't get away fast enough to the golf course during the shower. It rained ALL day (so rare for Colorado, especially in August!!), but they were able to hit the links at an executive course just North of us (they got a big soggy!). The boys came back after the girlie fun for a BBQ.
Just to top of living meal to meal (as Natanee's mom noted!). we went to breakfast this morning and said goodbyes to go to our next event - celebrating my birthday and getting together with Chuck's mom and siblings. We cashed in on the rain checks from last year's attempt at miniature golfing and played a round! Maddie had her own ball (purple) and club to keep her entertained, but I think the adults were more into it with our ever so classic "Hole in 2" Dance. We had yet another meal (no need for dinner tonight) at Red Robin and had a great time!! Thank you to Mom, Darby, Jeremiah, Alex, and Maddie for a fun day!!
I'll get photos of the shower and golfing posted soon. :)
So, we are a bit tired and definitely full from a fun weekend. The cat is happy to have his house back! Little does he know we are babysitting Timber (Stacey's yellow lab) next week and Trinity (Michael/Carrie's doggie) when Baby Garioto comes in September! Poor kitty......
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Seeing green!
The weather cooperated (gotta love 300+ days of sunshine in Colorado), and our house has been painted!
Our gray/white house....
And the new and improved green/ivory house (new light fixtures and house numbers, too!):
:)
Our gray/white house....
And the new and improved green/ivory house (new light fixtures and house numbers, too!):
:)
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Concert tour in the mountains!
We had a nice weekend up in Buena Vista and Leadville. The DCB had two concerts (a third in Fairplay was canceled). I will hopefully put up a few photos soon. Chuck was once again the "roadie" for the percussion section. He also doubles as a band photographer. :) We did vary the play list slightly each night, so at least he didn't have to sit through two identical concerts. BV is about 8,000 ft and Leadville is 10,152 ft. Good thing I don't play a wind instrument...not much oxygen up there!
Despite competing with the Opening Ceremony of the Olympics, we had a good turnout at the BV concert! We played in the Orpheum Theater - our concert is held annually to raise funds to renovate the theater.
The Leadville 100 (as in 100 miles and it starts at 10,500 feet and climbs to more than 14,000 feet) was on Saturday, so we had a glimpse of Lance Armstrong (he finished 2nd....the two leaders finished all 100 in about 6 h 45 min!!!). It was exciting to be at the finish line. I missed a picture as I'll never seem to master the timing with digital cameras. :( The concert was also held in another historical venue, the Tabor Opera House, which will begin exterior renovations soon. The venue has a great history including John Phillip Sousa and even Houdini! Of course, the most important is the annual Denver Concert Band concert. :)
BV is about 2.5 hours from us, so it was nice to get away. You can see several 14ers from BV/Leadville....Mt. Princeton, Yale, Harvard, Massive, and Elbert and more (10 in all in the BV area). The drive up had a 30 minute detour on a dirt road (see, my SUV does get "off road" sometimes!) due to an accident, so it was more adventuresome then expected. The drive home was less exciting, but we had lots of fun carpooling with Tricia and Lyndsey. :) Finding decent coffee and breakfast food in BV at 7am on Sunday morning was a challenge (7Eleven was the BEST choice!) for sure.
Next weekend is a shower at our house for Natanee (baby boy on the way) and a belated bday celebration for me with Chuck's family. We haven't seen Chuck's siblings after international travels (Jeremiah, Alex and Maddie to Europe and Darby to the Bahamas), so it will be fun to catch up!
The house is getting painted this week (let's hope the weather cooperates!) - look for before/after photos later this week!
Despite competing with the Opening Ceremony of the Olympics, we had a good turnout at the BV concert! We played in the Orpheum Theater - our concert is held annually to raise funds to renovate the theater.
The Leadville 100 (as in 100 miles and it starts at 10,500 feet and climbs to more than 14,000 feet) was on Saturday, so we had a glimpse of Lance Armstrong (he finished 2nd....the two leaders finished all 100 in about 6 h 45 min!!!). It was exciting to be at the finish line. I missed a picture as I'll never seem to master the timing with digital cameras. :( The concert was also held in another historical venue, the Tabor Opera House, which will begin exterior renovations soon. The venue has a great history including John Phillip Sousa and even Houdini! Of course, the most important is the annual Denver Concert Band concert. :)
BV is about 2.5 hours from us, so it was nice to get away. You can see several 14ers from BV/Leadville....Mt. Princeton, Yale, Harvard, Massive, and Elbert and more (10 in all in the BV area). The drive up had a 30 minute detour on a dirt road (see, my SUV does get "off road" sometimes!) due to an accident, so it was more adventuresome then expected. The drive home was less exciting, but we had lots of fun carpooling with Tricia and Lyndsey. :) Finding decent coffee and breakfast food in BV at 7am on Sunday morning was a challenge (7Eleven was the BEST choice!) for sure.
Next weekend is a shower at our house for Natanee (baby boy on the way) and a belated bday celebration for me with Chuck's family. We haven't seen Chuck's siblings after international travels (Jeremiah, Alex and Maddie to Europe and Darby to the Bahamas), so it will be fun to catch up!
The house is getting painted this week (let's hope the weather cooperates!) - look for before/after photos later this week!
Thursday, July 31, 2008
July is almost gone!
With the end of my birthday month, I finally have gotten around to uploading some photos. :)
Photos from working on the Fireworks shows on July 4th and 5th in Mammoth --> HERE
Photos from the rest of our trip to CA --> HERE
I have started a new venture of biking home from downtown to the park-n-ride/Cherry Creek Lake Dam...about 16 miles or so. If Denver hasn't had record breaking heat (19 days over 90 and counting), I would do it more...just 2 days so far, but I love it! I drive to the train from home, take my bike on the train with me (helmet hair isn't so appropriate at the Bank), and then ride home. This is mostly practice for riding home all week during the DNC which is here in just a few weeks.
What else? I had another concert last Saturday, and again was sight reading quite a bit. So far, no major bang, crash, or woodblock blatantly in the wrong place, so that's good! I do get lost (counting is hard apparently) on occasion, but it works out. We have a 3 concert mountain "tour" the 2nd weekend of August.
I had a great birthday last Sunday! I was awoken by breakfast in bed (awwwww!) and card that alluded to my gift...ROCK BAND! Woo hoo!! I am so very spoiled! Rock Band is a lot like Guitar Hero, but you can have 4 bandmates at once - signer, bass, guitar, and drums! A band geek's (like me) dream! We had a few people over for a birthday BBQ (and some Rock Band) and had a great time! Here we are rocking out!!
Happy August to everyone!!
Photos from working on the Fireworks shows on July 4th and 5th in Mammoth --> HERE
Photos from the rest of our trip to CA --> HERE
I have started a new venture of biking home from downtown to the park-n-ride/Cherry Creek Lake Dam...about 16 miles or so. If Denver hasn't had record breaking heat (19 days over 90 and counting), I would do it more...just 2 days so far, but I love it! I drive to the train from home, take my bike on the train with me (helmet hair isn't so appropriate at the Bank), and then ride home. This is mostly practice for riding home all week during the DNC which is here in just a few weeks.
What else? I had another concert last Saturday, and again was sight reading quite a bit. So far, no major bang, crash, or woodblock blatantly in the wrong place, so that's good! I do get lost (counting is hard apparently) on occasion, but it works out. We have a 3 concert mountain "tour" the 2nd weekend of August.
I had a great birthday last Sunday! I was awoken by breakfast in bed (awwwww!) and card that alluded to my gift...ROCK BAND! Woo hoo!! I am so very spoiled! Rock Band is a lot like Guitar Hero, but you can have 4 bandmates at once - signer, bass, guitar, and drums! A band geek's (like me) dream! We had a few people over for a birthday BBQ (and some Rock Band) and had a great time! Here we are rocking out!!
Happy August to everyone!!
Sunday, July 20, 2008
More work on the house!
Chuck is waking up sore from a long day of rebuilding the front steps (I helped in the morning a bit, but he gets all the credit). We are getting the house painted a a few weeks (yeah!), so this project was on the list before the painting. We still need to stain, but it looks great!
We had a good week - it was hard going back to work after vacation of course, but we made it! One of my college roommates, Steph, was in town, so we went to the Rio for margs with her and her hubby on Thursday (they celebrate there 10th anniversary this week - how did we get so old??? Congrats Steph and Matt!).
Last night was my first concert with the Denver Concert Band! I was on bass drum for the whole set and my boom booms were in the right place most of the time! Woo hoo! The weather held out (no rain and it cooled off from the high 90s of the day). We have another concert next week at a church in Aurora.
Tonight Tarah (Chuck's mom) is coming over for dinner so I'm off to do chores! :)
We had a good week - it was hard going back to work after vacation of course, but we made it! One of my college roommates, Steph, was in town, so we went to the Rio for margs with her and her hubby on Thursday (they celebrate there 10th anniversary this week - how did we get so old??? Congrats Steph and Matt!).
Last night was my first concert with the Denver Concert Band! I was on bass drum for the whole set and my boom booms were in the right place most of the time! Woo hoo! The weather held out (no rain and it cooled off from the high 90s of the day). We have another concert next week at a church in Aurora.
Tonight Tarah (Chuck's mom) is coming over for dinner so I'm off to do chores! :)
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