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!! :) 

Welcome Sofia!!

Announcing Sofia Angelina Garioto!!

It has been awhile since my last post, but the most exciting thing happened just yesterday, Michael (my brother) and Carrie welcomed our new niece, Sofia Angelina Garioto (think we're Italian?) into the world!! She was born on 9/20 at 5:30ish and weighed in at 7lbs 15 oz and 20 1/2 inches!! Her middle name of Angelina is after Michael's and my Nonnie (our Dad's mother).  Carrie is doing well recovering from her c-section, and Michael is quite busy caring for his two special girls.  We are so happy for the new family!!  

A link to some photos of us with Sofia --> HERE

Any other news from the past few weeks seems pretty silly compared to Sofia's arrival, but here you go....I took Thursday and Friday off this week, mostly to have ample time to rest up for the Thursday night CU game!! We played West Virgina (ranked 21/22) at home on National TV.  It was a "blackout" game where the team wears black on black jerseys and the fans all wear black.  It was easy to see the WVA fans in bright yellow! The game went into Overtime and CU won 17-14.  It was great fun, but a late night.  We got home at 12:30am.   Chuck went into work Friday morning, but luckily had just 5 or so hours to put in for the week, so he came home for a nap!! We went on a date Friday night to Maggianos (YUM!!). 

Prior to heading up to meet Sofia, we went to a bbq at Kari and Brad's which was fun! Literally everyone on their street is pregnant, so there were cute baby bellies all around.  Kari and Brad's son to be is due in January.  We made a hasty exit to be in time for Sofia's arrival with burgers in hand!

We've been up to visit Sofia two times so far, and are babysitting (or I guess dogsitting) their 2nd born (first is the cat), Trinity.  Trin is a lab mix and has lots of energy, so we took her to the dog park today to run it out of her. :) The cat is doing a bit better than with Timber and ventures out a bit.  The cat is just not a fan of doggies! 

That's all to report from here!! 

Aunt Katie (and Uncle Chuck)