2nd week of June

A little less than a month into our garden and not much was happening. At least I had a little helper for the watering.

Although I think he preferred that I not take pictures.

Off to the zoo we went and managed to do a few new things.

To start with, we got to pet the alpaca and llama. I got drooled on by the llama. That was a first for me.

Ok, this isn't new. We always run around these statues at the zoo. It never fails to produce a smile.

Logan made contact with some sea life.

Well, at least I like to think they made a connection.

This was the first time I have ridden the train with Logan. Kyle and Logan have done it before, but it was new for me.

It's great for a few minutes, but then it is a little too long of a ride for a 2 year old.

I spied a baby Siamang Gibbon. Our zoo seems to constantly have new additions, which I am so thankful for. Who doesn't love baby animals?

Here are some photos of our home entertainment that week. First we did some tricycle riding. Logan is getting really good at it.

Then Kyle invented a new game that brought on tons of laughter. We all went bouncing around the house, running into each other and into walls. 

On the 13th, we closed (i.e., sold) on our house in Los Alamos. We had been renting it for years and finally decided it was time to get rid of it. The financial loss was big, but manageable. It was a huge relief to no longer own it. Mom, Keith and Uncle Lee came down to watch Logan for us while we went to the bank. Afterwards we went out to lunch at the Barley Room to celebrate Keith's birthday and our closing. 

I made Keith this cake since he loves to golf. The balls were cake too. 

I think Logan liked the cake

To finish off our day of celebration, we went to see Marc Cohn at the zoo concert. Logan and Kyle even listined to some of it before heading off to see the animals.

The next night we had some friends over and sadly I forgot to take photos. I managed to remember at the very end. We had let Logan stay up till he passed out. It was around 11pm or so. Not sure why he chose to fall asleep in his chair rather than on the floor. I did pay for letting him stay up late though. The next night he couldn't sleep at all. We woke up all night long.

Last day of week 2 saw us at Grandma and Grandpa Neel's house. We went for a walk to see the donkey down the lane. 

Along the way we found Grandpa.

Logan just loved walking with everyone. He would run back to Grandma and Grandpa and then run back to Kyle.

Our neighborhood donkey lost his mule friend a few years ago. He was so happy to see us that he instantly came up to the fence and walked along it with us. Next time we need to remember to bring him carrots.

Back at the house, the golf balls needed washing...

Grandpa needed chasing...

Logan needed guiding...

It was a great week 2, but boy was it busy.

June brought on the heat

To escape the June heat we headed into the foothills for some hiking. Of course that is what everyone else did too. The trail-head we had hoped to park at was full. With the morning hours disappearing, we opted for a ride on the tram, followed by some hiking on the crest. I have to say I was a little concerned that the height might bother Logan, but he seemed fine with it. It wasn't windy on the way up either so the ride was nice and smooth.

There were a lot of people at the top near the tram, but the trails themselves seemed relatively empty.

The weather was wonderful, unless you were peering over the edge of the mountain at Albuquerque. Then the wind was a little rough, but still worth the view.

Logan chose a path that was full of grasshoppers. I wish you could see them all jumping around him as he moved forward. It was definitely the summer of the grasshopper in Albuquerque.

In true Logan fashion, he found a great spot to run.

There they go running again.

I think he might have said "Red Light".

After an ice cream break at the ski lodge, we headed back to the tram. We passed a bunch of squirrels chasing each other. I managed to get one in a photo, but he is pretty hard to see in that green circle below. Logan fell asleep in his carrier on the way back, but only got about a 20 minute nap before we made it back to the tram.

When we got back to the tram the wind had definitely picked up. I was not looking forward to the ride down.

I had a harder time with the swaying tram than Logan did. It was a fantastic hiking day. For those interested, I think it was $20 per adult, and Logan was still free.

Some photos of Uncle Lee hanging out with Logan.

I love capturing Logan on his swing set. We don't use it as much as I thought we would, but I hope that he will use it more some day. We had been debating leaving it here in Albuquerque when we move, but I have decided to take it. I figure I can either put it up next to the playhouse, which is already at the house we are buying, or I can use parts of it (like the slide) on the playhouse. Seems like such a waste to get rid of it after all the work I did on it.

Back in May, I forgot to have Kyle take "Mother's Day" photos for me. So, since I was getting dressed up for my friend, Tina's, baby shower it seemed like a great time to have Kyle get behind the camera. I'm so glad he did. I love these photos.

We all hopped in the car to head up to Santa Fe. The boys dropped me off then headed up to Los Alamos for a day.

The ladies had a fabulous time showering Tina with baby gifts, advice and stories. I'm happy to say that Tina has since had a beautiful baby boy!

Renya (below) and I were in Tina's wedding, and Reyna really helped put together Tina's baby shower. The three of us have been friends since we all worked at Los Alamos National Labs back in 2005. We have had a lot of life changes over the years, but these ladies are very special to me.

Reyna's adorable baby, Lucena.

We finished out the first week of June with another hike. I truly love getting out to hike, but man is it hard for us to get going in the morning. I am not a morning person so that doesn't help. I sure wish I could change that about myself so we could do more outings like this.

On this particular hike we managed to take the wrong trail and ended up climbing boulders and getting into too much brush before we decided to turn around.

On the way back to the car we found another trail and decided we had some hiking left in us.

That green line shows you where we started out hiking.

This was the trail we ended up on.