MLK Weekend

On Saturday, we headed to Keystone with our friend Leah and her friends Gretchen and Chad. The weather was gorgeous! Highs in the low 30's and not a cloud in the sky. They hadn't gotten snow recently, so the groomed runs were fast. Matt and Chad were in heaven when we found a run with no one on it and they could go down as fast as they possibly could. We took a break around lunch to have a beer and were able to sit outside and not be cold. It was a great day!

After skiing, we went home, relaxed, and then met our friends Brandon and Ashley at Fire on the Mountain for wings. Wings were probably the only thing that could have gotten Karla off the couch after a day of skiing.

Sunday was the Bronco's game at Matt's friend Brad's house. They live in the suburbs so there was plenty of space for us to throw the football around before the game and during halftime. The game was great -- especially since the Broncos won! It's not hard to jump on the Broncos bandwagon and it's the one football team we can cheer for together.

Since Matt had MLK off, Karla decided to take it off too. Since we went skiing on Saturday, we decided to head up to Rocky Mountain National Park to do some snowshoeing. The weather was amazing again - sunny and not too cold. We hiked from Nymph Lake to Dream Lake to Emerald Lake. Between Dream and Emerald the wind really picked up, but it was still a really fun hike. That's definitely one of our favorite hikes at RMNP - winter or summer!

Fiesta Bowl!

It's the last bowl games of the BCS era, Baylor was Big 12 Championship...we HAD to go to the Fiesta Bowl!

We flew to Phoenix on NYE and spent the night celebrating the new year with Karla's parents, who were nice enough to provide us a place to crash! In the morning, we started our day of football with the Iowa game. Since we wanted to experience all the pre-game festivities at the Fiesta Bowl, we left during at halftime. Luckily we were able to find the game on the radio. The Hawkeyes put up a good fight, but weren't able to pull it out in the end.

Lowell, Matt, and Karla arrived to the Fiesta Bowl and found it filled with Baylor fans! Okay, there were a few UCF fans there too, but we won't mention them. After walking around and soaking in the atmosphere, we headed to a bar to watch the first half of the Rose Bowl. We were able to snag some seats at the bar and made friends with the Baylor fans and had some good-nature trash talking with the UCF fans.

The stadium was a great atmosphere - we were excited to see all of the Baylor fans! We ended up having great seats (after moving since our first seats had a railing in our way) and enjoyed our free chips and salsa (thanks bowl sponsors!). The game was really fun...for the first three quarters. Then the other team started pulling away. Boo. Overall, Baylor had a great season and Matt was a very happy Baylor Bear!!

Iowa for Christmas

Twas the Saturday before Christmas, and a mid morning flight,
brought lines for southwest out the door, quite a horrible sight!
We stood for the skycap, not a moment to spare,
as we debated if we just leave our bag, we didn't care!

A delay of the plane left us some time to rest, as our holiday travel was put to the test!
The flight was uneventful, in Omaha we land,
as Lowell and Judy and Kristin were there, Dr. Pepper in hand.

The weather was cold, and I can't stress it enough
-26 with the windchill was really tough!
Now Henry!  Now Liv!  Now Sadie the dog!
In Iowa there is no shortage of food from the hog.

At Kathy's, we made cookies galore,
And ate them until our stomachs said "No more!"
Christmas Eve was presents, steak dinner, and church with candlelight,
Then a viewing of "Christmas Vacation" that had us laughing with delight.

Plenty of card games and the lack of TV
made for a calming trip inside for the family Lee.

It was a nice trip with the family, good for the soul,
But we will see the parents in Arizona for the BU FIESTA BOWL!!

Holiday tidings and parties

This was pretty much our only holiday weekend before Christmas, so we tried to make the most of it.  On Saturday we went to a performance by the DYAO(Denver Young Artists Orchestra), which Matt sits on the board of.  It was their holiday performance, so they played the Nutcracker Suite, one of our favorite holiday compilations.  It was a very enjoyable concert and a good turnout.

After the concert we drove south to our friend Leah's house for her ugly sweater party.  Since we had just come from a show we didn't have ugly sweaters, but it was nice to see some friends and have some yuletide cheer.

Sunday was a lazy day, as we got ready for our last week of work before we left for Iowa.

Fiesta Bowl Bound!

This past weekend included a lot of football watching...but came with a (sort of) surprising result! With Oklahoma State losing in the morning, which we didn't think would happen, Baylor's game against Texas ended up being a de facto Big 12 championship game. Baylor's win got them a Big 12 title and a trip to a BCS bowl game - the Fiesta Bowl in Arizona. Woo hoo!! We were wondering what we'd get each other for Christmas so we booked our flights, bought our tickets to the game, and say "Merry Christmas" to each other. :) We're staying with Karla's parents in AZ and Lowell is going to the game with us...so our next task is to convince him to wear green and gold!

On Sunday, Karla co-hosted a baby shower for her friend Naomi. It was really fun! Matt went with Ryan to the bar - they wanted to stay as far away as possible from all the shower activities. :)

November Catch-Up

We've been delinquent in writing in our blog during November! So here's our November catch-up entry...

Karla was able to make it to the Hyman Christmas this year, which was awesome because we didn't make it last year. It was a blast! She played cards with Grandma Hyman, had some amazing meat that John brought, got an awesome Iowa Hawkeyes cap in the gift exchange, and got to spend time with some cousins she hasn't seen in a few years. She snapped a picture of Grandma and her to post on Facebook since Grandma is on there now!

After Christmas, Karla rode back to Chicago with Kristin where they made dinner at the Ronald McDonald House with friends. It was Karla's first time making dinner at the new House so she was pretty excited about that!

She stayed in Chicago for 4 days since she had a work meeting there, then headed back to Denver to put an end to Matt's week of bachelordom.

We went to see Book of Morman with Naomi and Ryan. It was hilarious and quite inappropriate at the same time. After the show, we kept our tradition of post-show hot chocolates from Starbucks.

We were in Texas with Matt's family for Thanksgiving. Apparently our nephew Caleb really, really wanted to go fishing with Uncle Matt and Aunt Karla, so we had to do that as soon as we got there. We didn't catch anything (as per usual), but we had a blast.

We went to the Parade of Lights in Fort Worth the day after Thanksgiving (after watching Iowa put down a beating on Nebraska). It was almost more fun to watch Caleb and Avery than it was watching the parade. Caleb was really into it and loved the lights, firetrucks, and horses.

Matt's highlight (over than seeing family and stuffing himself on Thanksgiving) was probably going to the Baylor vs. TCU game. We met up with some college friends of his before the game and he got to see some people he hadn't seen in years. The game was probably a little more stressful than we would have liked, but Baylor pulled it out in the end.

Pumpkin carving and Broncos football

This weekend started like any other. A party with friends!  Our friends Brandon and Ashley were having their annual pumpkin carving party, and they also had just brewed some pumpkin ale that we were to drink.  Costumes were optional, but Matt decided to dress up like a banana thanks to a friends costume they weren't using.  He should have won for best costume, but there wasn't a contest.  

The Pumpkin Ale was not very pumpkin-y, so it was actually really good.  Pumpkin carving was successful, and Matt was proud of his Chicago Bears logo pumpkin, especially in light of the fact that Brandon and Ashley are staunch Packers fans.  It was left on their front doorstep, likely never to be seen or heard from again.  Karla made a really cool ghost pumpkin, but given it was a party with alot of architects, our design skills didn't match up.

Saturday we went down to Parker to watch the Iowa - Northwestern game with Doug & Jamie.  They appreciated the company, and we had some good tailgating food.  Plus Iowa won!  one more and they are bowl eligible, which Karla didn't think would happen early in the season.  Since our friends Clint and Stacy moved down to Parker recently, we decided to stop and see them on the way home.  Granted they moved halfway to Mexico, so just getting home took 50 minutes.  Don't envy that commute during rush hour!

Since Baylor played Kansas, Matt watched the game at the bar for a bit but it wasn't a game.  Go Bears!

Sunday was funday as Matt and Karla got to go to their first Broncos game!  tickets provided by Matt's parent's for his birthday, and since we didn't own any Broncos gear, a stop by sports authority to get some shirts was in order.  We biked to REI and then walked to the stadium.  It was gorgeous weather, if anything on the warm side at close to 70 degrees.  We got to the stadium in time to walk around.  If there's one thing you can say about denver sports stadiums, its that they have really good beer.

Matt had a conundrum this game, since the  Broncos were playing the Washington Redskins & RGIII, who while is a Baylor alum, is also on Matt's fantasy team, along with Washington's running back.  So basically he was rooting for both offenses.  

Our seats were facing west, so we got great views of the field and the mountains.  Very cool.  RG3 didn't have his best game, but the Broncos won and so did Matt's fantasy team.  Karla's favorite was when the opposing team missed a pass, the whole stadium yells "IN-COM-PLETE!"

A great day!