Ski Trip 2010

This past weekend was the Second Annual Richards and Friends Ski Trip! The first one was held at Breckenridge, but this year's was at Winter Park since that's where we have ski passes to this year :). Travis organized the whole thing; renting out a nice big house, getting people in and out of town, and food plans. We had 17 people staying at the house near Winter Park (it was at capacity!). Several of our friends from the Denver area joined us, including Jamie & Neely, Dani & Jerad, Berkeley & Jay, and Dave & Joan. The out-of-towners who made it were Chad, Aaron, Brad, Zack & Victoria, and Lindsey & Clint. It was SO much fun to get to hang out with everyone AND be able to ski the fresh snow without worrying about traffic. After a couple of dry months, we finally got some snow up there!

Dani helped me ski through some trees with lots of powder in them. I did well at first, but then I lost momentum. That was the end. Every time I got myself standing on my skis on top of the snow, I would fall into the powder again. At one point I even left my ski pole about 10 feet out of reach and had to work my way back up to it. It was exhausting! Great workout, though.

Here's me after I managed to get out of the trees:



and a view of where I had come from:



It was fun! Dani was very, very patient. The ski trip was a great success this year. We'll continue to organize it - even when we migrate back to Texas!

Superbowl Sunday

Sorry to post this out of order, but since I forgot to take pictures at our party yesterday, my friend Dani graciously offered to "draw me a representative picture" of the party. I just got it in my inbox, so here it is.



It really is very representative of last night's event. We had a few of our regulars over, including Dani & Jerad, Berkeley & Jay, Neely & Jamie, and our friend Grant from school. Of course there was way too much food (this normally happens at our get-togethers with this group) and way too much beer, but hey, too much is better than not enough! I was glad that our guests brought plenty of beer to share because I was a clutz earlier in the day and all the beer I had just bought spilled out of the car onto the concrete when I opened it up. Needless to say not much of that survived :(.

Travis was indeed cheering for both teams. He would say, "Alright whatcha gonna do on this move", to the defense and then make "ooo that's not good" comments to the offense when the defense did indeed tackle them. It was funny to observe. Very different from the normal frustrated comments made by Travis while watching say, an Aggies game. It was odd to see him calm during a football game. He actually remained seated most of the time!

Overall I guess I'm glad New Orleans won even though I was cheering for the Colts (big fan of Peyton Manning). I don't hate either of those teams, so it was kind of a win-win! Hope you all had great Superbowl Sundays, too!

So it IS still winter!!

Old Man Winter made his return to Denver yesterday morning after about a month long vacation. It was so weird that we got so much snow in October and November and then nothing for the whole month of January. It's been so mild (typical highs in the forties, lows in the upper twenties) and dry. I guess I got spoiled. My run yesterday morning was foiled due to snow and put off until today when the snow was supposed to stop. Of course, the snow hasn't stopped, and the roads are a mess, so I get to do a two hour run on a treadmill this afternoon. Woohoo. Here's a pic taken outside my office building in Golden.

A Visit from Mom and Dad

This past weekend, for my mom's birthday, my parents came out to visit! We had a fantastic time. First, we took them to our favorite Denver restaurant, Osteria Marco. It's a great place that's all about hanging out, sipping on wine, and enjoying small but amazingly tasty plates. On Saturday we woke up early to go skiing at Copper Mountain. The traffic was horrible! I got so carsick and had to trade seats with my dad :/. It was worth it, though, for a great day on the mountain. Here are a few pics of us happy skiers:



I think my parents are cute. We stayed the night in a condo right at the base of the mountain. If the snow had been any good, Travis and I probably would have gotten a run or two in on Sunday morning, but we aren't having a fantastic ski season as far as snow goes. In fact, it's pretty bad; it all keeps going to the south of us! Sunday morning we stopped for breakfast at the Butterhorn Bakery in Frisco (love their whole wheat pancakes!!). A picture of Frisco is below.



My dad slept when we got home as my mom and I were organizing the study. Wyatt monitored our progress from a safe location.





Sunday night a few of our good friends came over for dinner and to hang out with my parents. On Monday I brought them to campus for a tour of my lab and lunch with my advisor. Overall I couldn't have asked for a better few days with my parents!!!

Hooligans

Last Saturday morning, Travis called me shortly after he left to go to a basketball game watch party with the Denver A&M Club. I could tell by his voice that he was not happy, and I was shortly not happy, either. When he closed the garage door after backing the car out, this is what he saw:



Hooligans, I tell you! Isn't that awful?! We've reported it to the police and the city is supposed to remove it by February 12th. I get upset every time I close the garage door :(.