A Year of Change

Today’s my Mom’s birthday, 79 I think. That’s quite an accomplishment. She looks at least 10 years younger than that! Tonight we’re all going to dinner at 6 at one of her favorite local hangouts. It was pretty warm yesterday and supposed to be so again today but then light snow comes tomorrow.

The youngest was off to school yesterday but the oldest one stayed home as he was not feeling well. We think he was just tired from the weekend and just needed a rest. They’re both on the couch right now sparring with each other. I’m getting my haircut this morning and the misses will be working away on her ideas for the big event. I can’t even keep up with all the things she has going on. The misses says the sky is full of lots of colors this morning, I haven’t seen it yet as I’m writing away and it was still dark when I went out for the paper.

I don’t have anymore material today so time to go. Breakfast is almost ready and we’re trying to get the boys to go get dressed. It’s only the first of February but we’re already looking forward to Spring. This happens every year, we get a taste of warm weather, get excited for Spring and then, BAM, we get a huge snow storm, never fail.

Well, have a great day, and once again, Happy Birthday Mom!

Yesterday we were in Beaver Creek at our friends home for a wine tasting and what a remarkable home it is. It sleeps 21 easy and can handle more if needed. I could go on for hours about the house but take my word for it, it’s one of a kind.

Both boys were gone by 11am, the youngest to a birthday party and the oldest to a friends for some playtime. Wouldn’t you know it, the one day both boys were gone and the misses and I had to head up the hill for some work. The traffic was jammed packed coming down the hill from the moment we left until we were an hour up into the hills almost to Vail. It was the longest traffic jam we had ever seen anywhere. New York, Los Angeles, nothing compared. In fact, we hit the same traffic jam at 10pm on the way home as the ski traffic still wasn’t cleared out! I’ve never seen anything like it in my life. Imagine if some kind of disaster had happened in Denver or any major metropolitan area, and everyone was trying to get out of the city, you wouldn’t stand a chance. This was a 60 mile traffic jam for over 7 hours and just from skiers, unbelievable.

We (the misses and I) both have a super busy day. Me with lots and lots of work and the misses starts off with physical therapy and then she’s back to working on the Bocelli event. We’re committed to getting in some exercise sometime although I don’t know when.

Both boys are still sleeping and I’ll have to get them up in 10 minutes at 7am. It’s Monday morning and back to the grind. Tomorrow is Grandma (my Mom’s) birthday! Yea! I’m not sure what we’re doing. She said Uncle T asked her and she said, “oh I don’t know, probably nothing” so he said “ok” and just left. The misses pointed out that no one wants to plan their own birthday so I guess it’s up to us. So Grandma, Uncle T and Aunt B, the party is on for tomorrow at our house. We’ll give you details today.

Time to run, sorry for the short post but we kind of slept in. Hope everyone is doing well, give us a call. Hey Grandma Annette, does Aunt Serena read the blog? We were wondering. Take care and God Bless,

I barely had time to breathe yesterday. After the gym we were off to the store for some dress clothes and other assorted wardrobe upgrades that are long overdue. You see, the misses and I have lots of t-shirts and jeans but not a lot of dress clothes. I haven’t bought  a new pair of dress pants for years. Now the misses does have a few real real nice pieces in her closet but there’s always a need for an accessory or two to put some polish on her outfits. This can be as simple as a pair of “spanks” or as important as a pair of shoes. Anyhow, we’re all set to go for our upcoming event.

The rest of the day for me,  was spent working on numbers and organization of company data for 2012. Before I knew it, it was after 6pm. Today will be filled with much of the same as when I travel (like to NY) I get very little office work done and have to make it up on the weekend. Ah the joys of being self employed.

The boys tagged along and did pretty well for being pulled from clothes store to store. Once they arrived home, off they went to play. Later in the day their neighborhood friends came over and all four of them watched a movie which at least gave us 2 hours of peace. Soon it was 10pm and we all rushed off to bed.

Today the misses and I will head up the highway to Beaver Creek which is the exclusive part of Vail. We’ll be hosting a wine tasting for a friend from Houston who has a fabulous 15,000 square foot home in Bachelor Gulch. We do this every few years or so for him when he has a board meeting at his place. He has his own jet and usually flies in some great food like bbq from Texas or shrimp and crawfish from New Orleans. In any case, he’s a great guy and has always been very nice to us. We’ll take off around 3pm and should be home by 10.

The misses has had a headache for over two weeks now. It’s clearly stems from her neck and bad discs. Sometimes she does something that throws it out of whack and it just takes time to heal. I wish it would get better for her. She and the youngest are of course still sleeping.

We were talking last night about how few comments we get although Grandma Annette did chime in yesterday. It’s ok as we’ve resigned ourselves to the fact that we just won’t get a bunch of regular input from you all. Maybe we should have guest writers this year and let some of you write a bit sometime. I’m going to head off to the gym for a quick workout before everyone gets up. It’s 31 degrees and a bit windy this morning as I can hear it howling outside as I write. No musings on the color of the sky as whenever I’m writing it’s just black.

Hard to believe it’s almost February, Spring will be here before you know it. Time to start thinking about our garden.

Take care, have a great day (I think the Pro Bowl is on tv today!) and God Bless. Talk to you all tomorrow,

It’s good to be home but I must say, I have a pretty darn good job. 3 days in New York isn’t a bad way to spend the week. It was hugely successful and a good thing I went. Besides eating at top restaurants, the highlight of my week was reconnecting with a good friend who left the city to go to Westchester County to open his own restaurant a year and a half ago. We first met when he called a cult estate in Italy who referred him to a 70 year old cult winemaker in Napa who then told him how to get to me in Denver, and then I went to New York a couple of 3 years ago to meet with him. At that time Stephen was the wine buyer for the Danny Meyer restaurant group which is the most prestigious group in NY and has probably a dozen or so properties in the area. It was a real coup for us and my distributor to get into this group as one of the lead investors is also an importer so normally they don’t even look at wine from anyone else. Anyhow to cut to the chase, we hit it off and developed a good friendship. A year or so ago he moved upstate a bit (45 minutes out of the city) to one of the most exclusive counties in America, and opened his own place called Restaurant North. He’s killing them and is doing very well. Bill and Hillary were in for diner 3 nights ago, Michael Douglas the night before that, a bunch of NY Yankees are regulars and the list goes on and on. We strolled in (Lorenzo and I) and smiles and man hugs were on like long lost brothers who hadn’t seen each other for years. He had his chef whip out all kinds of delicacies and although we had no time, we caught up fast. I tried to pay but of course, he’d have none of it (he never let me pay for anything when he was at Gramercy Park Hotel in Manhattan either). The cool thing about his place is it’s all farm to table meaning everything is from local farmers. Oh well, enough said but it was great to see him and we agreed I’ll come back for dinner mid February. I think cousin Chris and Julie live close so I’ll have to let them know.

I arrived home around noon and had about 30 minutes before a Bocelli event conference call. Outside of the hotel contract, the misses has pretty much handled everything so I wasn’t really up to speed. I have to say, she has 99% of everything covered and despite navigating through our CFO’s “spend nothing” mentality, she’s put together a great event.

I have a lot of work to do this weekend (when don’t I?) and next week as well. I tend to compartmentalize things or break them down into pieces to get things done, so I’m always thinking in terms of what do I have to do in the next few days, then weeks, then months, etc.

It’s great to be home with the family, the house was sparkling and we were once again all together. Today we have some errands to run around 10am and then we’ll be home for the day. It’s now 5am which is not too bad as I’m still on NY time. I wish I could get my Mom to go with me for a two night trip there as she used to love going to NY and I’m sure she’d love it again. Maybe I can convince her sometime this Spring. I know she doesn’t like to fly (she and John Madden have a lot in common) but I could get her in first class, get her a great room on Park Avenue (all through points) and she’d eat at the finest restaurants through my connections. Maybe she could even take in a show! I’ll have the misses work on her as she seems to be bagging out on Paris in May. I need to get up and see the ageless one this weekend just to check on her.

I’m going to head off to the gym. I sure love the misses posts. She sees the beauty in the World like the colors of the sky that she always mentions. And how about all the 80’s music in her head. This is 100% true, we need to find an 80’s music game show as she’d win for sure! Time to run, I’m on a big cardio kick, trying to run a couple of miles a day (it’s half walk half run as no way I could run two miles non stop if my life depended on it) so I have to “run”. Hope you all are well, have a great weekend and God Bless.

Good morning, the sky is black as coal.  I was awakened by weird sounds coming from the downstairs bathroom..4:22 a.m.  Of course it was nothing to scary or disgusting…like a sewer rat. No, it was our Lab trying her darnedest to get into the trash.  We bought a can with a pop up lid solely for the purpose of keeping her out.  It worked, but she had the can scooting around the floor trying to tip it.  The boys must have put some sort of food in there and with Lacey’s blood hound nose and doggie eating disorder she just couldn’t resist.  It was a bit early, but I couldn’t go to sleep so here I am.

I brought the boys home from school yesterday along with two other kids in hopes that they would all play outside together and I could finish my projects.  No such luck…they wanted me to play this game that resembles one I played as a girl.  I stand 2o feet away and asked the kids if they have chosen their colored egg colors.  After they reply yes, I start calling out colors and when I call out theirs….they try to run past me.  It used to be easy to catch them, but they are quite fast now…or I am quite slow.  Which ever it is I didn’t get to my stuff until after dinner. Oh well, I had fun and got some exercise too. I don’t think they will remember an uncluttered house…hopefully they will remember that I played “Colored Eggs”.

After the other two kids went home the boys played a bit of “Skylanders”.  Rice noodle with soy sauce for dinner…off to bed at 8:30 (Late) and back downstairs for hot dogs and milk.  Finally, I managed to get them to bed and I finished putting the laundry away.

The Mister returns this morning with one of his partners…Lorenzo.  I am heading to the basement to make some space for them to work.  We have a conference call on the Bocelli event at 1:00.  I have some things all buttoned up, but can’t find where the final number of guests is.  I was told 71, but I can’t find that number on an email anywhere….I come up with 31 plus Andrea and his family…there can’t possibly be 40 family members…so…that will be a great way to start.  I am so excited for the event that I can hardly think of anything else.

We..the Mister, Lorenzo and I are going up the mountain to a fabulous house to conduct a wine tasting.  It’s one of my favorite houses to visit.  I’ll try to take a few pictures to post. The house is about 12,000 sq. ft. of rustic splendor with a gigantic stone fireplace that I think burns small trees instead of logs.  Wonderful.

I picked up girl scout cookies for Grandma and Aunti B.  I am putting that in this post so you two can help me remember…mom brain, busy brain, pre-menopause brain…not sure if it is one or all of the above, but if I don’t write it on the chalkboard or a post it….it’s gone.  No worries though….I have all of the useless lyrics to “80”s music imbedded in my brain.  I certainly wish I had been listening to foreign languages on tape instead of big hair bands. Darn.

Grandma’s birthday is Tuesday the 31st….Wouldn’t it be nice to be as ageless as she? Beautiful inside and out.

The dryer just sang to me, so I am off to finish one more load.  Have a wonderful day.

God Bless,

LLF

Thankfully it’s Friday.  I’ve had a headache for about 10 days and I can hopefully kick it this weekend.

Good morning.  The boys and I got up at 6:30 and made our way downstairs to feed the dogs and cook breakfast.  The kiddos ate bacon, eggs, hashbrowns and toast.  They must be growing because they inhaled their food. I think the oldest’t inseam maybe the same as mine…if not I’m sure it will be by tomorrow.  The youngest is growing just as fast.  He is right on pace where his brother was at age 8.  The pants we buy…or that Aunti B and Uncle T. buy have to be 2 years more than the age of the munchkin. The 10 year old needs pants that are 4 to 6 years more, but when he was 8 he wore 10’s as well.  Obviously not so much to write about today.

I asked to leave work about 30 minutes early yesterday and WF was very accommodating, as always.  I picked up the youngest from D.I. where the Destination Imagination teacher had offered to keep him at her house until 4:45. That was quite kind especially since he didn’t want to miss building the prototype for the competition.  The oldest went with his friend Jennifer and they filmed their project for “Skinny Bones” a 4th grade assignment.  They went to dinner and talked Jenn’s Grandma into stopping at a park so they could play some more.  Jenn’s Grandma called to make sure it was okay to keep the oldest a bit longer so they could play….of course it was…but nice of her to check.

The boys did their homework…the youngest sped through his in order to go and play with the kids across the street and the oldest waited to do his reading in bed.

Today I have a fun day of….you guess it….cleaning.  I wish I could get a cleaning lady for $50.00.  I have to clean before I can clean.  The legos and a massive assortment of toys adorn the youngest’s floor. The other kiddo has one of each sock he owns and all of his covers from his bed on the floor…plus some dirty clothes.  The guest room has been a storage room for all of the clothes that the mister and I need to go through…keep or donate….and tomorrow we have a guest coming that will actually need to sleep in one of the beds.  Yea me!!!  I will feel great once I have finished…it’s the “Starting that will be tough.

Time to get the youngest in the shower.  Have a great day!!!

God Bless,

LLF

Good morning.  Red sky at night sailors delight, red sky in the morning sailors take warning…Well….the sky was a beautiful crimson, glowing bright, outlined with golden orange that met with the still darkness.  The heavens were sparkling with a million tiny diamonds.  Sailors may need to take warning… but this morning…diamonds are a girls best friend. Stunning.

I went to P.T. for the first time since my hip locked up in November.  The woman was shocked at how tight my back and hips are…she even asked if I have arthritis in my hip.  The nerve…I still can’t believe she asked such a question.   I did laundry the rest of the day….the Physical Therapist gave strict instructions not to vacuum.  Thank you PT lady.

I picked the boys up from school and we headed off to look for the coveted “Stealth Elf” Skylander; it costs $7.99 and the oldest was going to buy it. We only went to one store and the shelves were literally cleaned out.  Empty….not one Skylander to be found.  I then called and sat on hold with three different stores, just to find out that their shelves were also empty.  The trucks get to the stores at 9 a.m. to unload the store open at 10, and the darn things are sold out in 15 minutes.  I’ll call again in the morning…10:01.

We returned home for snacks…rice cakes….turkey jerky….pirates booty….fruit and milk. A bit of homework (they saved some for later) a lot of fighting and screaming (them not me) a couple of punches a couple of kicks….more screaming and chasing each other around the house…all of which was happening while I was on a phone call…of course.  I’m sure you have all been on the listening end of the chaos of 8 and 10 year old boys.  These actions seem to happen on the first night that the Mister is away….like clockwork….hmm…maybe something to that… Whom or who is the Alfa while Dad is away?  I’ll check with my mom on the grammar…pretty sure it is “Whom”.

Everything calmed down in a matter of seconds….the food must have digested at that point…because, the kiddos were apologetic with one another and life was once again bliss. They played upstairs for about 45minutes and then we gathered together on the couch to watch one show.  Looks like “No T.V.” is out while Dad is in New York.

The Mister landed in New York and headed to his hotel.  He worked out at the Hotel gym…showered and primped for meetings and dinner out.  He called after dinner and was going to watch a movie.  He has more meetings today and Thursday and he will be home Friday.  Hurray….we miss him already.

I work this morning from 8:15 to 5.  The boys have an early release day today…out at 12:15.  The oldest is going to Jennifer’s to work on a school project…have fun…go to dinner and her Grandma will drop him here at 5p.m.  The youngest has D.I. until 2:30 and he will stay there until 4:30 when I can hopefully pick him up.  Uncle T. or Aunti B. may  be getting a frantic phone call from me if I can’t leave work early.  WF is really great about family first.

I am off to shower and primp…make breakfast and lunch for all.

Have a great day and God Bless,

LLF

Look out, here it comes, the election season officially kicks off tonight with what is billed as a State of the Union speech by the President. Now I don’t watch these but you can bet that it’ll be more about getting him re-elected than anything to do with the state of our country. After all, how would talking about high unemployment help him get re-elected? Trust me, it’ll be all about how he’s better than them, meaning the republicans. Boy are we in trouble, no matter what you think. We just continue to kick the can down the road. Ok, that felt good, haven’t talked politics for weeks, maybe months. I’ve been resting up for the big run between now and November.

How about the Boston Bruins MVP goalie that didn’t show at the White House yesterday with the rest of his team to protest how big government is and how they’ve trashed the constitution. Good for him, and by the way, he was protesting both parties!

Ok, I’m of to New York this morning so you’ll get the misses thoughts for the next few days. There’s a truck strike in Italy right now which is causing me a few problems. You see when they strike over there, it’s not just not showing up for work, no, they block the highways! Give me a break, hope it ends soon.

The boys had a good day at school. The youngest brought home a bunch of work that was graded 4+. This is the highest mark you can get and is equivalent to our old A+. The afternoon was spent playing games, doing some homework and then having dinner. The misses seems a bit overwhelmed with the house but I told her to just relax. You see, it’ll never get clean until we get rid of some stuff. We just have too much stuff, period.

Time to run, sorry about the short posts the last couple of days, I’m just super busy. We’re still bummed about the football games but at least I did win the fantasy football Super Bowl. I’m so far ahead, no one can catch me now. Too bad it doesn’t come with a big check! Have a great day, stay healthy and God Bless. Give the misses a call in the next few days to say hi in case she’s lonely. See you soon.

We woke up at 6 and were on the road a bit before 8am headed off to the ski slopes. The traffic was so thick, it took us 2 1/2 hours to drive what normally would have taken us 45 minutes! When we finally arrived, the snow was blowing sideways and the temperature was just above zero. We met up with our friend who started teaching the boys the finer points of snow boarding while the misses and I ran inside for a cup of coffee. By the time we made it back outside, we were told the boys had already picked up what normally takes hours to learn. So the misses and I began pulling both boys up the hill. It was so windy, the lifts were on and off. After a few runs the cold became unbearable and the day was done. All in all, it was a great first day and both boys did very well.

We stopped by the grocery store on the way home and arrived just in time for the kickoff of the first game. We made a bunch of food for lunch for the boys and then the oldest and I decided to play some catch. After 5 minutes outside, we quickly came in as the wind was blowing right through our coats. Around 4:30, the game we were waiting for was just starting. I’m sure everyone knows the outcome so no need to belabor the point, but the misses, and I, are both sad San Francisco lost.

Both dogs are in now and it’s a bit after 5:30. I have a ton to do today as I’m off to NY tomorrow and scheduled to return Friday morning. I might be able to get out Thursday night, we’ll see.

Time to grab another cup of coffee and get to the gym. Maybe the misses will chime in this morning. Have a great day and God Bless,

We’re headed up the mountain to Loveland Ski Area for the boys to get their first taste at snow boarding on a real hill. The wind is blowing with gusts of 60 miles an hour right now but we think we’re giving it a try anyhow. We should be headed down the hill by noon to get ready for the football games. Wish us luck.

Yesterday we were at Big Time on and off for most of the day. With two parties, the boys got lots of exercise. Then the youngest and his friend, whose birthday it was, lobbied hard for both boys to come to our house for some more playtime. We gave in, loaded up 3 boys and were off to home. They played hard outside until around 5pm when it began to get dark. Meanwhile the oldest I played some catch with our gloves and a baseball. Now I don’t want to overstate this but the oldest was catching everything I threw at him. Towering pop flies, hard grounders, fast balls, I mean everything. He also now has quite an arm throwing me the ball from down the street after he’d have to chase a missed ball. We’re going to try to get him into baseball this Spring. In a few weeks we decided to go find some batting cages as he seems to have some natural talent.

Mom has been tired for a few days now so we just sent her to bed and had a “boys night”. For dinner, our first course was waffles with warm syrup and then thick pad thai noodles with butter. The youngest commented, “wow dad, you give us a lot more syrup than mom!”. This information of course came too late as they’d already licked their plates clean. The rest of the night was the three of us laying around laughing, making various man sounds (I think there was a contest but I’m not verifying anything) and watching the Nuggets beat the New York Knicks. The game went to double overtime so it was a bit after 8:30 before we headed up to get our rest for the big day. The youngest had taken back a few things from Christmas to Target and received a $70 store credit so he bought himself a couple of new DSI games. He and his brother were consumed with these as well for most of the evening.

It’s now 6:49 and the misses is trying to find our snow pants as she and I will be tugging and towing the kids up and down the hill this morning. I don’t think we have to buy lift tickets after all as our friend, who is an instructor, says the first step will be just hiking up the hill a bit to get comfortable. He’s meeting us up there to give the boys a lesson. His boy started when he was 3 and he has a web site called familyshred.com which is all about family’s and snow boarding.

Wish us luck and go 49ers, have a great day and God Bless