Things I Love Lately

~Fall decorations. I love when my house is decked out for Fall

~Williams Sonoma spiced pecan pumpkin quick bread. Combine it with either pumpkin butter or cream cheese frosting and it's heavenly!

~Football season

~The cooler weather

~Celebrating my birthday

~Fall baking- or just collecting new recipes

~Getting cards in the mail

~Bath and Body works leaves scent. It's my absolute favorite!!

~Lazy weekends

Zac Brown Band

The Zac Brown Band came to town to put on a concert at Red Rocks and we got tickets to go! We had so much fun. We tailgated before hand and met a really fun couple from Ft. Collins that we hung out with the rest of the evening.

Zac Brown puts on a really great concert and they sound just as good live as they do on their albums.

Cycling Challenge

This year Ben really got me into Pro Cycling. He would record everyday of the Tour de France and we would watch it together every night. I picked out a few favorite riders and cheered them on. I was pretty excited when I found out about the US Pro Cycling Challenge that was happening throughout Colorado. I was even more excited when I found out most of the riders I knew from France would be coming, including most of my favorites, as well as the overall winner. The opening day was happening down in the Springs, so i headed down to check out the action. I had an absolute BLAST! I got a perfect spot- right against the boards, 50 meters out from the finish. As the riders were approaching everyone would start banging on the boards and cheering.

Opening day was a time trial where each rider rides the course individually and races against the clock. It was cool because you actually got to see every rider come by.

My view of the course. The riders started in the Garden of the Gods and finished in downtown Colorado Springs

3 riders warming up

Andy Schleck- he's my favorite! He's finished 2nd in France for the last 3 years. He just has a great attitude and you can't help but root for him

This is Cadel Evans, this year's winner in the Tour de France. This is after he finished his time trial and was heading back towards his team bus

The Finish line

Michigan Trip

In August we took a trip to Holland, Michigan with Eric and Erin to visit our friends Nate and Christine. We had a great trip! Our first night there, we had dinner with a bunch of Nate & Christine's friends.

Ben and Eric headed out on the water for a bit.

We went over to the town of Saugatuck for dinner at a place called Wick's Park. Saugatuck is the cutest little town! It's right on the lake and just quiet and quaint. It's full of cute little shops and restaurants.

The next day we went shopping in downtown Holland.

We headed back over to Saugatuck for an evening. We had dinner at Wally's. They're known for their fish and chips

We hit up Kilwin's for dessert. Their line was out the door! But the wait was worth it, as their Saugatuck mud ice cream was delicious!

Erin and Nate hanging out

After dessert we walked around the docks and watched the sunset.

We spent a day out on Lake Michigan. It was my favorite day of the whole trip!

This lighthouse is pretty famous in the area. Erin and I actually got to tour the inside of it one morning during a workout.

Enjoying the boat ride!

We all took a jump into Lake Michigan. If you know me, you know what a big deal this was for me. I can't swim and start to panic when i'm in water.

The water was FREEZING!

We went to "sloopside" which is a little part of the beach owned by a family friend of Nate and Christine. He has an old boat set up that he stocks with all sorts of beverages. There's even little bar stools around the boat.

We played beach games- you set a bottle on a pvc pipe and the opposing team tries to knock the bottle off with a frisbee. You have to try and catch the bottle before it hits the ground. There were some pretty intense games and some great plays!

We then headed over to this giant dune. Pictures don't even do justice to how steep this thing really was! We got one heck of a workout when we climbed to the top.

Nate and Christine's little boy- Clayton. His life jacket was so cute!

Our last night, we bbq'd at Nate and Christine's house. It was a great way to round out the trip.

Ben was master of the corn

Clayton and I

Trip to the Royal Gorge

I've decided that blogging is like exercising- as long as you are consistent at it, it's easy and fun. But when you slack off, it's so hard to get back in the swing of things! I have so many things to update on, so here we go!

Way back in July my sister and I took a trip to the Royal Gorge. We had talked about taking this trip for awhile, and i'm glad we finally made the trip down there. We did the lunch train and I'm glad we decided to do that. We were served a delicious 3 course meal.

We go there early, so we took a walk around the train station

A shot of the train taking us down the canyon

Meliss and i in the dining car

We could see white water rafters going down the river along side the train.

Our delicious dessert!

The view of the bridge. It's amazing how high and how long the bridge is!

I had such a fun day with my sister. We had good talks, sang karaoke in the car, and laughed so hard until we cried!