Snapshot

It has been a relatively slow last month or so for our family. Slow meaning not a lot of blog worthy material. That is going to be changing the next couple of weeks as school winds down and we begin the end of the year routine: field trips, concerts, last day party, spring break, Easter, award ceremonies, school presentations, ect.

The other night I decided to take some pictured of the family and what they were all doing at one moment in time. Here are the results. They are typical of a night at the Roth family's house: homework, games, making dinner, bedtime routine and Legos.

Colorado Springs

Last weekend, Noah and Sarabeth had the chance to travel to Colorado Springs with Grandma and Grandpa Gonzales. Sarabeth attended the princess party of her friend Hannah. Noah visited Garden of the Gods and then the entire group went bowling. It was kinds weird only having the "middles" at home with Jennifer and I all weekend.

Wimpy Kid

A couple of weeks ago, I let it slip that Jeff Kinney, the author of the New York Times bestselling series "Diary of A Wimpy Kid" was going to be at the Tattered Cover in Denver. Noah latched onto the idea that we would be going to meet him and get a booked signed. Well, the big day came and neither Jen nor I waned to battle rush hour traffic in and out of Denver. So we decided we weren't going to go. Then Jen went to pick up the kids from school.

Evidently Noah had spent his entire lunch hour walking from classroom to classroom asking the kids if they had any of the Wimpy Kid books they wanted him to get signed. He showed up at the car with 2 grocery bags full of books. Off to Denver!!

As expected, it was a long drive for Jennifer, and a long wait in line. But it was well worth it. Kinney had brought along his two brothers that the kids also got to meet. When they finally reached the front of the line, Kinney signed all the books the kids brought! Amazing. The boys were thrilled to meet him, and Noah was a very popular kid the next day at school.

Party!

After the afternoon of snowshoeing and walking around downtown Estes, it was time for the party! Sarabeth and Nathanael were more than happy to help me open my presents. We had a great take out dinner of pizza, KFC, Raspberry Wheat from the Brewery, and the last cake that was available from Safeway. The family blessed me with many wonderful gifts, including an i-pod touch!

Snowshoeing

Sorry once again to my two faithful readers out there in cyber space. I feel bad it has been quite some time since I updated the blog. So, to finish the posts from the wonderful birthday weekend/snowshoeing trip in Estes Park, here are a few more pics from Winter Trails Day in Rocky Mountain National Park. Grandma Roth very graciously stayed at the hotel with the littles and Andrew, who was having a horrible case of the flu. So Grandpa, Wesley, Kim, Jennifer, Noah, Laura and I hit the trails. It was wonderful! Hopefully we will be able to do more snowshoeing as a family in the future.

Back in town, we stopped at the Estes Park Brewery for a burger and beer for the birthday boy!

Birthday Weekend

It was a wonderful birthday weekend in beautiful Estes Park, Colorado. Our family of 7 was joined by mom and dad and Wesley and his girlfriend Kim. We spent two nights at the Holiday Inn while the days were very busy with swimming, Winter Trails day in Rocky Mountain National Park, shopping in downtown Estes, and of course a birthday party on Saturday night. Here are some of the pictures from Winter Trails Day. I will post the birthday pics when Wesley sends them.

Winter Trails Day was sponsored by REI and included several "stations" dedicated to winter sports, nutrition, and dressing appropriately in the outdoors. The highlight was the snowshoe demo and hike. It was a beautiful sunny day with no wind and warm temps. After the hike, we were greeted with hot choc late and a certificate of accomplishment.

Rock Band

Is there anything funnier than a bunch of adults trying to play Rock Band? I almost couldn't get the game set up and had to wake Noah up to try and help us. Our band didn't do so well, and only finished one song, Radiohead's "Creep." Our band featured Andrew on drums, me on guitar, and our beautiful wives singing lead. What a blast!

Super Bowl Party!

It was great to have everyone over on Sunday for the big party. Andrew, Rebecca, Jim, Janet, and Mark joined our family for some food and fun. Mark had a great night as his Steelers won their 6th Super Bowl championship.

Swimming!

The entire family has been enjoying a family pass to the Greeley Family Funplex we received for Christmas (gee, could I use the word family one more time in that sentence?). I took the littles last week for a couple hour swim while the bigs were at school and Jennifer was at work. The pool was nearly empty, which was nice. I was the only dad at the pool, which was a little uncomfortable. We are hoping to make a trip a week to swim and be active this year.

Dino Park

Hello again to my two faithful readers. Sorry for the lack of posts the last several weeks. It has been crazy at work with the Super Bowl, market tours, a couple of very busy weekends, and very few days off. So, there is kind of a long jam of blog posts today. I hope you enjoy them. Please leave comments if you have the time!

These are a few more of the kids with grandma and grandpa at the dino park in Ft. Collins several weeks ago. We are still having a very warm, windy winter here. In fact it will be almost 70 today here in Greeley.

1,167,078

That is a very large number. Is it the cost to each family of the United States for the banking bailout? The number of unsold Ford's, Chevy's, and Dodge's on the car lots? Some goofy number connected to the "fact" of global warming? How about the number of times Obama uses the word "uh" in a press conference? Nope to all of the above. The number 1,167,078 in the total number of words the Noah has read so far this school year. WOW. That number will rise to almost 1.4 million when he finishes the book he is currently working on.
Here are some pics of Noah taking a break from all that reading last weekend at the dino park in Ft. Collins. Grandma and Grandpa Roth joined us for the day. It was a little windy, but otherwise a beautiful day in Colorado. And, no. The pink shirt he has on isn't a laundry mistake I made. It says "Real men wear pink."