Spring Break in the Mountains

Overall, March has been a good month for us, but I’ll go ahead and get the bad news out of the way first. Jessica’s Grandma Sherry passed away at the beginning of the month, which is about 9 months after the passing of her husband Larry. The two of them were married for 67 years and the family always said once one of them goes, the other won’t be far behind. This turned out to be true. 

Obviously, it was very sad news to receive, and the timing was especially difficult because Jessica had already made plans to visit her in Iowa. She knew the time was coming and wanted to get one more special visit in, but unfortunately, Sherry couldn’t hang on long enough. Jessica decided to keep her Iowa plans and will be flying there this Friday. She’s looking forward to spending time with her Dad, as well as driving over to Illinois to spend some time with her friend Laurel. From my perspective, I will always have fond memories of Larry and Sherry spending Christmas 2010 with us in San Diego. It was our first year of marriage, as well as our first Christmas in San Diego, and having them spend a week with us in our tiny beach shack was something I’ll never forget. My condolences go out to Amy and family; she was a great woman and always played a special role in Jessica’s life.

Now that the sad news is out of the way, we’ve got a lot of good things to get into. At the beginning of March, the kids and I attended the NASCAR race at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway. None of us had ever attended anything like this but we had a great time. I never used to be a big NASCAR fan but after seeing it in person I feel like I totally get it. It’s hard to describe the sensation of seeing those cars go thundering by at 160 mph! The sights and sounds are very exciting, and since then I have watched every race on TV. There’s another Las Vegas race in late October and we have already made plans to attend it with Grandma and Grandpa Martin, who will be driving down from Colorado at that time.

Our Colorado Roadtrip

Speaking of Colorado, we had an excellent Spring Break vacation there and are already planning another visit in June. We drove up on a Friday, and without meaning to, ended up stopping at all of the exact same places we stopped at during our first Colorado road trip for Christmas 2022. It was unbelievable and totally unplanned. 

We stopped at the same little gas station in Joseph, Utah with the cleanest bathrooms and an excellent candy selection. Then we stopped at the same rest stop with a scenic view in Central Utah. We even had lunch at Starvin Arvins again, which is a little diner in Fruita, Colorado. The first two-thirds of the drive was perfect and gorgeous. It was a beautiful sunny day and I can never get over how beautiful the scenery in Utah is.

Shortly after lunch, as we were just beginning to ascend the Rocky Mountains from the west side, we started seeing signs saying I-70 was closed at Vail Pass. It sounded like there was a snowstorm up there but we later learned that a pair of semi trucks had jackknifed, causing a massive slowdown on the interstate. Jessica immediately started researching alternate routes and then got on the phone with Grandpa Tom to get his advice. 

We ended up getting off I-70 and took a little two-lane highway for the remainder of the trip. Around 90 minutes before sunset we started noticing a lot of deer out and about. They were eating plants and we ended up seeing hundreds of them. It was an awesome sight to see, but my biggest concern was that one would come onto the highway. A while later we came around a bend and about 150 yards ahead I could see a deer on the highway. It wasn’t in my lane, but this was a two-lane road so I started slowing down.

Beyond the deer, I could see a blue Subaru sedan approaching and it seemed like it had plenty of time to slow down but it didn’t work out that way. They slammed on their brakes but it was too late. Right as we were approaching they hit the deer and all I can say is that it was an awful thing to see. I have never seen something like this before and also never witnessed so much carnage. It all happened so fast but I could see there were two adults in the car and that they were able to safely pull over on the side of the road. 

For a second I thought maybe I should stop but there were multiple factors that caused me to keep going. First, I had no idea where we were so I didn’t think I could be of much help. I knew there were two adults in the car so it wasn’t like someone was dealing with this alone, and their car wasn’t totaled so they were in control after the collision. I also didn’t want to expose my children to that type of carnage, plus we had already been on the road for 11 hours at that point. We were getting tired and I felt like my number 1 priority was to get them safely to Grandma and Grandpa’s house. I felt bad about not stopping but based on all those factors it seemed clear to me that I needed to stay the course. It was hard though, and I can still vividly remember exactly what that collision looked like.

We arrived safely at Amy and Tom’s house about an hour later but it was a little strange because they weren’t there. As soon as they knew Sherry was close to passing they had to get back to Iowa as quickly as possible. This was a Friday and Sherry’s service was scheduled for that Monday. Their plan was to fly home on Monday evening after the service, so we knew we would see them on the back half of our trip, but for this first night, it was just us in their beautiful mountain home.

On Saturday morning we let the kids play in the snow for a bit, then we made the drive down the mountain and into Denver. Although I have been to Colorado several times, those trips have always been up in the mountains, so my only Denver experience before this was related to the airport. We arrived in Denver before our hotel was ready for us to check in, so we ended up hanging out in this really cool little neighborhood on Tennyson St. Our lunch at Vital Root was excellent, and then we enjoyed walking around for a bit.

The hotel was nice because it was right in the heart of Denver and we had a corner suite on the 12th floor. There were two bedrooms so we gave the kids the room with all the windows. It was so cool seeing them lying in bed with an expansive view of Downtown Denver. 

That night the five of us walked to the Summit Music Hall for the Moon Taxi concert. We arrived right when the doors opened, which was an hour before the opening band was scheduled to go on, and immediately made our way to the front of the stage. Enzo and Elise were right on the rail at the very front, while Ava, Jessica, and I were directly behind them. We held our ground and kept that spot for the entire show, even when it started getting crowded. Small venues like this are the absolute best way to see a concert and the kids had never experienced anything like it, so we had a lot of fun.

Moon Taxi played all of our favorite songs and also did some unexpected covers. At one point the drummer had to replace the head on his bass drum so the singer started playing “What’s Up” by 4 Non Blondes. Immediately the whole crowd joined in and we all sang together. It was such a fun show that we will never forget, but my favorite part was when the singer reached down to Enzo near the end of the show to give him his guitar pick and a fist bump. It was amazing. Enzo was afraid he would lose it so he gave it to me to hold onto. Every few hours for the next two days he would say “Dad, do you still have my guitar pick?”

The walk back to our hotel was a little chilly but we stopped at a pizza food truck for a few slices, and then made our way back to the room to talk about our favorite parts of the show.

On Sunday, we had a free day to explore Denver. We lucked out with beautiful sunny weather in the mid-60s and bounced around to a few places. We visited a little art walk, then took the kids to play at a park. You could tell the locals were loving the weather because everyone was out walking a dog in shorts and t-shirts. 

Denver is a really cool city with an interesting mix of old west history and modern eclectics. They have a great food scene and it seems like everyone has a dog. For our Sunday afternoon, Elise and Jessica went to Meow Wolf while Ava, Enzo, and I decided to take advantage of the nice weather by playing 36 holes of mini golf at an outdoor course. 

That evening we enjoyed some of the best pizza of our lives at Red Tops Rendezvous. It’s Detroit-style pizza and was easily the best deep-dish pizza we have ever had. We have already decided that any time we return to Denver we will have to eat there again.

On Monday morning we drove back up to Grandma and Grandpa’s house. The kids spent the day playing in the snow, and then later that night Amy and Tom arrived from Iowa. We then spent the entire day on Tuesday outside in the snow. The kids did a bunch of sledding and built two snowmen, plus we got to ride four-wheelers. It was a perfect way to end the trip and we’re looking forward to getting back up there in June.

We drove home on Wednesday and ran into every type of weather imaginable. A big storm was coming in and we’re lucky we left when we did because parts of Colorado got up to 3 feet of snow! It was their biggest storm in 3 years and we barely made it out in time. We made our way through the beginnings of the snowstorm as we were heading down the mountain on Wednesday morning, which then turned into a heavy rainstorm once we got to a lower elevation. 

Shortly after making it into Utah, we found ourselves in a big hailstorm, then as the day progressed there were two strong windstorms. Despite all this crazy weather we still made it home in 10.5 hours, which was record time. We opted not to stop for lunch and just eat in the car, which saved time but still managed to once again stop in all of the exact same places for gas and bathrooms as we did on the previous trip. It was unbelievable.

Since getting home from Colorado things have been great. Ava is busy with softball and I’ve been an assistant on the team, while Elise has been doing choir, running club, and acting classes. She is also interested in playing softball and is currently planning on joining a team for the Fall season. I’m going to work with her between now and then to get as prepared as possible. We’re still looking for some new activities for Enzo to engage in so hopefully that happens sometime soon.

This week Jessica and I will celebrate our 14th anniversary, although we’re holding off on the actual celebration until she returns from Iowa. She leaves this Friday and comes back on Monday, so my Mom will be coming to the house to hang out with us for the weekend. Another exciting thing for Jessica is the fact that she was nominated for Support Professional of the Year for the Clark County School District! I’m so proud of her and it goes to show that she found the perfect thing after moving down here. We will be attending the awards ceremony in April, and regardless of how it turns out, she has a lot to be proud of.

Easter Morning

Today is Easter so we did our annual egg hunt. Normally we would do it in our backyard but it was rainy yesterday so we decided to do it indoors this year. Jessica did a little homage to her Grandma this year by including a scavenger hunt for the kids. Sherry used to do this for the grandkids back in the day and our kids loved it! The rest of our day will be pretty chill but Jessica and the kids had Friday off school, and they have tomorrow off as well, so it’s a nice 4 day weekend for them. Here are a few photos from this morning.

Upcoming Plans

As I have already mentioned, we will be going back up to Colorado to stay with Grandma and Grandpa in June. We’re still figuring out the dates but I’m excited because it’s a nice getaway for us and we can drive there in a day. All of my Colorado trips have been during the winter so I’m excited to see it during the nicer weather.

Our other big plan for this summer is that we will be spending a weekend in Phoenix for Elise’s birthday. Once again, we’re traveling to see one of our favorite bands perform. We love a band called AJR and had a great time seeing them in Vegas at SEMA Fest, which was a big part of Ava’s 12th birthday last November. We were looking at AJR’s tour schedule and saw they were playing a show in Phoenix two days before Elise’s birthday this July, so we decided to go. It’s only about 4.5 hours to drive down there and we’ve never spent time there, so it should be a lot of fun.

That’s about it for now. Here’s a little video collage I made from our Spring Break trip to Colorado.