Another Hike to East Inlet

Chris and I hiked in East Inlet again. Where we thought the temps would be in the 60s and 70s, they were toasty warm in the 80s. The hike switches off from open trails to covered trails, so it was mighty warm to be hiking.

There were a lot of people on the trail too. If you only plan to walk in the meadow, it is a pretty family-friendly hike. That lasts for about 2 1/4 miles before the trail begins to climb. 

There is a bit of elevation at the beginning of the hike as you come to Adams Falls, but since it is only 1/3 of mile, lots of kids have the energy to run and jump and climb with ease.

If you continue going once you get to 2 1/4 miles, the climbing and the stairs are pretty consistent.

We stopped around 3.8 miles. It was just too hot for me to want to continue. Plus, we needed to head back home so we could help Misha move.

Saw these cool mushrooms. I thought they looked burgundy, Chris said red. What do you think?

And here was a deer friend right next to the trail as we were almost finished the hike.

Our drive to East Inlet was probably one of the slowest we have encountered in awhile as we had to follow a bunch of large trucks and slow drivers. We had the same luck on the return trip with slow drivers. Some people are great at pulling over into the "slow driver pull outs", but some people have no clue that they are causing traffic to back up. 

So, we didn't get home until 5:30 (we had hoped for 4 pm) and got on the road pretty quickly after that to help Misha move to her new apartment.

Moving Misha

After a long day of hiking and driving, Chris and I arrived home to help Misha move to a new apartment in Denver. She had her car and my car packed and ready to go.

Chris, Misha, and I had worked on loading the trailer the night before with her stuff, bedroom furniture, and a mattress.

The traffic into Denver was bad, and the App Waze rerouted us in some directions. 

We finally arrived at Misha' apartment and were able to start unloading things to her apartment on the second floor. I am not a big fan of moving (at least she doesn't have too much stuff...yet).

Weekend in Utah - Day 4

It was an early morning for 9 am church. Amy and Derek planned to meet us at Brad’s

church. Since they got in so late last night (or this morning) from the concert, they were

both pretty tired.

 

They also had a full schedule for the day, so they left after Sacrament Meeting to spend

time visiting Derek’s family.

Chris and I and Brad spent Sunday afternoon eating breakfast for lunch and then chatting.

Chris and I planned to leave around 2:30 pm to visit some friends who used to live in Colorado—Scott and Nancy Simmons. Scott had been having a lot of health problems lately and was paralyzed after a surgery a couple of months ago.

Scott is up and walking with a walker now but says he spends about 6 hours on physical

therapy every day. 

 

We enjoyed an early dinner with them and then headed to the airport for our 8 pm flight.

Our flight was delayed for half an hour due to weather in Colorado and then we waited for another hour at baggage claim as Southwest couldn't figure out how to get us our bags! That made for a much later night than we had planned!

Weekend in Utah - Day 3

We planned to meet Amy for breakfast in Provo around 10 am on Saturday morning.

After a quick moment saying hi to one of her roommates, we found a place in Orem

called Corner Bakery Cafe. It was okay. Nothing special

 

We sat and talked with Amy for awhile and then decided to drive up past Bridal Veil Falls

in the canyon before meeting up with Derek at an escape room at 12:30.

 

We did a Zombie Apocalypse escape room where a zombie would come in and scare us

every so often. It didn’t help that Christopher joined in yelling at her. He got a

“Christopher!!” out of that.

 

We did have to ask for a few clues along the way and finally made it out of the room with

3 to 4 minutes to spare. Whew.

We had lunch at Zumba with Amy and Derek, stopped for a few groceries for Amy and

then picked up a few specialty cookies at Twisted Sugar. Much cheaper than Crumbl and

just as tasty.

 

After dropping the groceries off at Amy’s apartment, Chris and I said goodbye. They were

off to a concert that evening.

Chris and I drove the Alpine Loop and ended up in Lehi. We planned to meet up for dinner with Shane, Brad and Mitch ordering from R & R BBQ and then adding in a few sides. After dinner we sat and talked for a couple of hours. It was nice just to enjoy some time with my brothers.

Weekend in Utah - Angie's Wedding

Since the wedding at the Bountiful temple wasn’t until 1 pm, Chris and I had a quiet morning. We had breakfast at the hotel and then worked on finalizing some plans for our anniversary trip at the end of the month.

We made a quick stop at a Kohls in Bountiful and then arrived at the temple around 12:45 for the sealing. Fortunately we didn’t have to wait too long. All of my siblings were at the sealing; it was great to see everybody.

 

After the ceremony, we hung out at the temple for a couple of hours for pictures. It was pretty hot so we were happy to hang out in the shade.

There was a luncheon at a church building about 15 minutes from the temple where we met for a family luncheon at 3:30. Amy and her new guy, Derek, arrived a little late due to traffic but were able to join us for the lunch.

 

This was our first time meeting Derek and both he and Amy were nervous. Apparently meeting the parents is scary. Chris and I were on our best behavior…

 

Seriously though, we both thought Derek was a great guy.

 

Amy and Derek had plans for the evening and Chris and I headed back to the hotel. We found an early showing of the movie “Where the Crawdads Sing”. It was a great movie. I hadn’t read the book or knew anything of the plot of the story. Chris and I both enjoyed it.

 

Just as the movie started a neighbor texted asking if our power was out as well. I replied that I was in Utah and would ask Misha. Yes, ours was out as well.

 

The power finally came back on as the movie ended, unfortunately it set off all of the fire alarms in the house. Chris was on the phone with Misha trying to help her figure out how to turn the alarms off, but had little luck.

 

Misha finally had to start unplugging and removing the batteries in the alarms until she finally found the alarm that was causing the problem. Whew. After an hour, silence.

 

Apparently a huge bull snake got into the transformer across the street from our neighborhood and shorted the transformer. It affected about 900 homes. Bad snake!

Weekend in Utah

Chris and I left for Salt Lake City on Thursday evening for a quick weekend. Dallin’s oldest daughter, Angela, was getting married on Friday and we wanted to share the event with family.

 

Our flight was delayed a bit on arrival so our plan to meet up with Julie and Patrick Ransom had to be improvised. Instead of a sit down restaurant, we chose Cubby’s for a quicker experience. It was pretty tasty but spendy as well.

 

We stayed in a hotel in downtown SLC since it would be close to Bountiful and the temple and all of the festivities for the wedding.

Another Fridge

As we were moving Misha out of her apartment, another student’s dad was helping his son

move out of his apartment. The dad asked if we wanted a small mini-fridge. The

apartments where Misha stayed only had a small fridge in the kitchen. We said sure since

we had the trailer and figured we could take it home, dump it, or sell it.

 

The dad and his son were an odd couple. They asked Chris if they could borrow the hand

truck we brought to bring down some of the kid’s boxes. They did that but left the fridge

sitting upstairs outside his apartment door for Chris and I to retrieve. Some people... Sheesh

After cleaning out the fridge, Chris took it down to his office and now keeps drinks and a few snacks in it.

Misha Moving Out

Misha’s apartment contract expired on July 31st. Chris and I drove down to Denver with our neighbor’s trailer and helped to load Misha’s stuff up. She was mostly packed, but there was still a lot that we had to do to get her stuff loaded onto the trailer.

 

She and her roommate, Sarah, had been looking for a new place to live. It is sooooo expensive. I hope that rent prices start to go down. I’m not sure that Misha can maintain that amount a rent for very long if she isn’t working full-time during the school year.

 

Most of Misha’s stuff is on the trailer still in the garage as well as in my dining room. She signed a contract that allows her to begin moving in on the 13th of August.

While at home, she has been driving back and forth to Denver every day for work and not only is it a lot with traffic and the accidents on the freeway, but she uses up a tank of gas far too quickly for her liking.

She does, incidentally, enjoy coming home to a home-cooked meal each night!

Kristen Working Lots

Once Kristen finished girls’ camp and then FSY (For the Strength of Youth), she has been working pretty consistently at Chick-fil-A. The previous scheduling person was relieved of their duties as they weren’t following people’s requests very closely. 

 

Now that a new person is doing the scheduling, Kristen has been working almost full-time. I think going back to school will be a welcome relief from a 35+ hour work week. 

 

Kristen will continue to work during the Fall and hopes to maintain about 15 hours. We will see how that goes!

Church Missionary Board

As a service project, Kristen updated the missionary board that shows where the missionaries in our building are serving around the world.

She and Chris worked on it together one night after Chris finished work.

Kristen and My Sheet Music

Kristen was bored on a Sunday afternoon and began going through all of my sheet music. The music is stuff I have collected over the years as well as music that my mom gave me from her mom.

 

Kristen even found some of my New Era magazine from the 80s.

She enjoyed going through my grandmother’s music and said that her choir teacher would love this kind of music.

Ministering Group Gathering at the Beach

We extended the invitation to our ministering group (we have groups where 5 or so families all take care of each other) to come and enjoy an afternoon having a picnic and playing on the water at the lake.

Only one family and one brother showed up. We still had a picnic and the kids had a blast being pulled behind the jet ski on “Big Mabel.”

At first they were pretty leery of Chris going fast at all, but after awhile they were giving the thumbs up signal—“go faster”.

Kristen Food Poisoning

Kristen decided not to stay at Misha’s apartment after the Lizzy McAlpine concert. It was probably a good thing. Around 2 am she came into our room, said she wasn’t feeling great and that she had been throwing up for about an hour already.

 

I got up with her for about an hour and helped with a cool cloth on her forehead and some Coke to drink. She threw up one more time while I was up with her and then maybe one more time after I went back to bed.

 

I think she must have had food poisoning as the throwing up came on pretty suddenly and didn’t last more than a few hours. Still, she was able to call in sick the next day and got sick pay for missing that shift.

Kristen's Birthday Concert with Misha

For Kristen’s birthday, Misha gifted her tickets to a Lizzy McAlpine concert.

Kristen drove down to Misha’s house and they enjoyed dinner out (courtesy of Mom) and then a fun concert where Kristen also met up with some of her friends.

Empty Shuttle Bus

Chris and I have been riding the shuttle bus from the Bear Lake Park n' Ride all summer and usually the bus is pretty packed with standing room only.

We were surprised to see that bus was so empty today.

Hiking to Fern Lake

I need to go back and count the number of hikes Chris and I have been on this summer. Certainly it isn’t as many as we went on last year, but we have tried to go on a number of hikes throughout the summer.
 
Chris and I had to clean the church before driving up to Estes Park, and since our

reservation for the park wasn’t until noon, we stopped at the church at 9:30 am. Kristen

met us there and we worked with another family for less than an hour to clean.
 
Kristen drove back home (she had to work later in the day), and Chris and I continued

on to Estes.
 
We stopped at Jimmy John’s for sandwiches and were on our way.

We drove up to the Park n' Ride after entering Rocky Mountain National Park and parked.

The lot was fairly empty, but it was already after noon and most of the “lucky” reservation

holders had come earlier in the morning for cooler hiking times.
 
The Park n' Ride bus dropped us off at the Bierstadt Trailhead. Now, normally, we try to

avoid starting here because the trail is instantly up up and up as the path switches back

and forth until you finally reach the top of the trail. It is about 600 ft of incline in less

than one mile. Whew.

The nice thing about that is that we have hiked enough at this point that we aren’t too

winded by the incline.
 
We passed a family that was clearly unprepared for the trail. As we sat and ate our

sandwiches before beginning our ascent, we watched them prepare to hike.
 
The mom, who was obviously pregnant, was wearing a dress and flip flops with no

support whatsoever. We passed them after a while and she was sitting on a rock resting.

The altitude is crazy even for native Coloradans; if you aren’t used to the altitude,

hiking is even harder.
 
We followed the trail using the AllTrails App. We skirted around Bierstadt Lake and

continue following the trail to Mill Creek Basin. As we moved around the side of the

mountain, we had to hike through a burn scar area. It wasn’t terribly beautiful and there

was very little shade from trees. Fortunately the day was overcast or it would have been

hot!

We stopped for snacks after a couple of hours hiking and then followed the trail down the

side of the mountain until we reach the Fern Lake Trail. At this point we had already

walk 5ish miles. We could have gone on to Fern Lake and a waterfall, but chose instead to

walk to the trailhead.

Since the shuttle bus stopped a half mile from the trailhead, we had to continue walking.

Unfortunately, when we reached the pick up area, another family had been waiting there

for over an hour.

Instead of sitting and waiting, we decided to keep on walking and hoped to come across the shuttle on our way out to the road. The shuttle came after we had been walking for about 5 minutes. We jumped on and had to make a bunch of extra stops just to get back to the Park n' Ride where we had left the car, but we were happy we didn’t have to walk the whole way.

New Deck Cushions

Our deck cushions have disintegrated over the past few summers with the hot sunshine

beating down on them. We found some new (hopefully sturdier) covers.

They don’t fit quite so snugly as the originals, but they are a little more colorful and cheery.

Misha Apartment Hunting

Misha and her roommate, Sarah, have been looking for a new apartment for Fall. They don’t wish to stay at The Assembly any longer and their contract expires at the end of July.

Sadly, though there are a number of options available, so many of them are way beyond their budget. It is unfortunate the rent prices have sky rocketed in Colorado as much as housing prices. 
 
They did find a few cheaper places, but most of them were located on Colfax Ave. which is one of the most dangerous places they could choose to live. I wouldn’t say that I am exactly thrilled with any of the choices that Misha has in Denver. It is getting more sketch all of the time.
 
Mostly, we just pray that Misha is safe everyday as she rides local transit and then walks the rest of the way to school.

DIY Deck Curtains

Chris and I installed deck curtains on the deck off our bedroom. We had been looking at some outdoor curtains; they just so happened to be on sale with an added coupon for Amazon Prime Days. Perfect.

Chris found an inexpensive way to hang the curtains that would allow us to easily remove them from the rod and store them in the house for the winter (ahhh, who's thinking about winter already?).

The curtains are only on two sides of the deck, leaving the front view open still.

We get some pretty interesting views and wild life. Apparently a mountain lion tried to take down a deer across the river this morning. 

Chris' head blended right in with the wood color and shadows.

Nice to be married to such a handy guy!

I tied the curtains back with bungee cords for now.

We might even like to find a screen that rolls down for the front of the deck to keep out bugs on summer evenings.

Logic Monitor Anniversary

Chris celebrated his one year anniversary at Logic Monitor—or LM. It has been a great year for him in managing a team, hiring, and working with the leadership at LM.

Chris is a great asset wherever he works.

She Can Sleep Text?

I received a crazy text from Kristen.

"I'm present and life btw now."

I texted back, "What does that mean?"

She responded a couple of hours later, 

"Ya know, I don't really know."

It must have been a pretty interesting Sunday afternoon nap!

Niwot Ridge Spur Trail

Chris and I set off on another hiking adventure. Surprise, neither Misha nor Kristen wanted to join us.

Granted, it was a lot further than we planned on.

We started from the main parking lot at Brainard Lake. We hiked Lake Isabelle in this area last summer. 

Niwot Ridge Spur Trail or the Niwot Cutoff Trailhead  in the Indian Peaks Wilderness of the Roosevelt National Forest follows a trail up the side of the mountain until you finally reach timber line. From there, the trail winds around the side of the mountain toward a Mountain Research Station where they have the Niwot Ridge Biosphere Reserve.

It was fairly breezy and windy above the tree line. We had thought we would get rained on as we set out, but the dark clouds dissipated for a nice sunny morning.

Those white legs of mine got fairly sunburned!

We stopped at one of the research stations—complete with a chair—and had a picnic lunch.

We could have stopped there at about 4.5 miles in and been great. But we decided to continue another two miles UP the side of the mountain to the top of the peak. It was not as picturesque as we might have hoped.

So, we looked around for a bit and then started back down. The clouds started to pour on us and we pulled out rain jackets for the 20-minute rain storm.

Somehow we made great time heading down the mountain.

And yeah, we were tired and sore once we were done. I love that Chris and I get to explore so much of Colorado together and have the physical capabilities to climb mountains!