Our Girl Turns 3 Months 12.13.2008
Wow! It has flown by…3 months. We were amazed this weekend how her development had made a leap. We enjoyed making videos of her cooing and John playing. The weather was beautiful and we got more snow!!
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The Beautiful Snow 12.07.2008 This is a picture of the b eautiful fog that lay in Boulder Valley after the snow fall. It was early morning. It was moving to the soul. Stunning!
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Our Family 11.06.2008
This picture was taken when I was 5 1/2 months pregnant. We had a great time taking the pictures with Julie Afflerbaugh. We knew it would be the last time for us to take photos with just the three of us. We have had a magical, intense journey to this point. We look forward to all that we create in the future with our family and all the changes children bring to our lives. Our decision to unschool our family influences all of our choices.
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Halloween 10.31.2008 We did our first Halloween this year. We had a great time. Our friends Joe and Lara invited us over to their community event. They live in Nyland which is a co-housing community. They had a great set up. Nyland community members gave out a lot of healthy treats so it made it even more enjoyable for us all. John was able to trick or treat with a bunch of kids in a very fun, safe place. After a parade through the community, we went back to Joe and Lara’s house. The kids dumped out their goodies and started to trade. It was so much fun!!!
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Dennis Meets Lena 10.17.2008
Dennis came to visit in October and meet Lena for the first time. We went to several pumkin patch/corn mazes. In the corn maze, we had to find 10 different punch card stations and, with Dennis leading the way, we found all 10! It was so much fun and it was a beautiful day! The first farm had face painting and John was turned into a Godzilla. John loved chasing Bacon Bit, the pet farm pig. The second farm had bounce houses, pony rides and a playsets. We finished the evening with wine and pasta at home. Yummy! The next day Peggy Dyer joined us for dinner, Wii and hottub fun… Dennis finished out his visit helping us, as he always does, with small projects around the house. The time went fast and we look forward to another visit from our Uncle D!
Granny Pa Visits 09.25.2008
Brad’s mom Wanda (who John calls Granny Pa) came to visit for maybe the last time this year. She met Lena and had a good time with John. We really just nested at home together on this visit. We did go get a pedicure and shopped for material for baby blankets. JoAnn’s Fabrics has a great selection but their store is not well organized - still we did get some cool material.
Our Family Self Portrait 09.24.2008
We took this picture when the evening light was beautiful in our backyard. A photographer was scheduled to take our pictures that evening at our house. At the last minute, she called and canceled due to illness. We were already dressed and ready so we took advantage of us all looking nice and had a lot of fun with the camera. John would run up to the camera and push the button for the timed photo. He then would run back and get next to us.
Our Daughter Has Arrived
Lena Gianna Holcomb was born on September 13, 2008 at 12:50 p.m.
View Our Birth Pictures Here
Labor Day Visit from Dennis 08.2008
We had a great Labor Day Weekend which included a visit from Dennis. We did several things including going to the Farmer’s Market. It is always a show with a festival feel. We enjoyed good food and great music. John had a blast on an inflatable jumping slide. We enjoyed fresh brewed root beer which the ingredients came from the Ozarks only minutes from where we used to live. Kettle Corn was a hit with all of us too! It did rain on us some and my energy level was lower since it was the end of my pregnancy; however that didn’t diminish the fun we all had together! We also witnessed a wonderful double rainbow and saw both ends of both rainbows.
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Kathy Visits 08.2008
We had a great week with Kathy! Kathy’s Thursday flight got canceled so she decided to fly out on Friday. We had a relaxing time in the hot tub and then went out to dinner. We went to Dino Ridge by Red Rocks, and played music with Sierra Samuels on Sunday. We drove up to Nederland and to the Boulder Falls on Monday and then Tuesday we hiked at NCAR and Eldorado Canyon after a quick trip to REI and WholeFoods. On Wednesday morning, we did a quick walk on the Davidson Mesa and saw no prairie dogs!
A Visit from Michele and Conan 07.2008
We had a fun July visit with Michele and Conan. Conan, Brad, and John rode dirtbikes, we ate good food, went to Boulder Creek, Pearl Street and Lookout Gulch. It was great to see them again and look forward to our next visit together!
My First Squash Harvest 07.2008
This is a picture of my first squash harvest. My plants are doing so well. Sierra has fished them several times and they love it. I am a huge fan of zucchini (which in Italian means little squash)! I am shredding most of it, now, and steaming it for 3 minutes then freezing it in small packages. I am using a Food Saver to vacuum seal all my veggies. I just purchased a dehydrator. I am very excited to start that process. It is so fun to be connected to my food source and have veggies through the winter that came from my garden!
My Beautiful Squash Plants and Garden 07.2008
This is a picture of just one of my zucchini plants. They are huge. I have about 4 of them plus yellow summer squash, pumpkins, patty pans, watermelon (which I planted late) and pie pumpkins. My pictures are on Flickr.
Dennis Visits For The Fourth 07.2008
Dennis came to visit us for the 4th of July. We had a great time together. We took the Ski Train to WinterPark and spent the day. That was the first time I have ridden a train and we all really enjoyed it. Dennis, Brad and John rode the ski lift to get on the alpine slide. Dennis and I took the ski lift up to the mountain top to see the view. Dennis installed our window air unit in our bedroom which has been wonderful!!! He also got Brad motivated to clean up the garage and it made a world of difference. We also got some Wii Tennis time and lots of eating of good food.
A Fun Weekend with Granny Pa Wanda- 06.13.08
Wanda, who John calls Pa, came to visit for the weekend. We had a lot of fun. Friday, we spent the day on Pearl Street and then drove up Flagstaff Mountain. It was a beautiful day to be looking down onto Boulder. That evening we went to dinner at The Melting Pot, a fondue restaurant in Louisville. Saturday, we relaxed at home and played outside. I had put the umbrella up and a swift wind blew it out of the table. It became a missile and launched into on of our front plate glass panes and shattered it. I am so grateful John was inside at the time. Sunday, we packed a picnic lunch and went to Eldorado State Park. We hiked early afternoon and then went to the resort swimming pool. It was a lot of fun and relaxing. I have posted the pictures from the afternoon on Flickr.
Photo Play Date - 06.12.08
At a local photo studio, Mom’s and babies gathered to play and learn about the manual mode of the point and shoot camera. My point and shoot camera is a Canon SD870. We meet at Julie Afflerbaugh’s studio. We learned about the ISO and shooting in manual mode. We worked with indoor and outdoor natural light, shadows, framing the subject and finding the light in the eye. It was a lot of fun. Julie offers a Photo Camp that is in the morning and works only with a digital SLR and I will be joining her to learn more then…
Fixing Up The Basement After The Flood - 06.2008
The property manager for our home has been wonderful to work with and has really taken care of fixing the water the damage. Her name is Karen. Karen’s team is great! They have worked to rebuild the basement bedroom that received most of the damage. The new carpet has been laid and the new walls are up. Sanding, Painting and general clean up is left. The guys that have been working on this project,mostly, are Curly and Phil. John is having lunch with Curly and another worker under our front tree. They are very sweet with John. Phil and Curly are in a band called Mountain Standard Time. We plan on going to some of their gigs.
Big Head Todd at Red Rocks - 06.07.08
Brad and I had a great time going to Red Rocks for the Big Head Todd Concert. It was a wonderful concert! They played from 7:30 pm till 11:00 pm with only a 20 minute break. The venue is so beautiful that it makes the music come live. I absolutely loved the cool breeze, the view of Denver and the music floating by and over me. I was enraptured by the whole experience. The music filled me and took on an essence that was magical. I look forward to our next Red Rocks concert.
Drying Out Books - 05.30.08 Thanks again to Karen’s team who came over and spent about 2 hours hauling stuff out of our basement. We put it on the back deck to dry. Our books on the bottom row of shelves suffered. Calvin and Hobbs may never be the same. John really enjoyed looking through all the books outside. 
Anything outside is of interest to him especially since he spends about 6-8 hours out doors. The sun was warm but not hot and the wind was blowing nicely. I ended up napping on the other side of the hot tub after reading to John.
A Big Thanks To Derek - 05.29.08
Derek, the owner of Colorado Landscapes, was so great when we called him Wednesday night about the water in the basement. He literally was at our house in 10 minutes and stayed with us till 1 am. He really stayed longer for moral support and that was so great! Having Derek present just seemed to make it all OK! Derek is the first person we meet the week we moved into our house. He is genuine and kind. He is getting married in June! Congrats Derek!!! 
Water, Water, Everywhere - 05.28.08
When we got home from the airport on Wednesday, we discovered our basement had 5 inches of water! Thank goodness we have an excellent property manager named Karen. She and her crew have been very responsive. They have been very sensitive to our needs. I really appreciate all they done so far!!!
Life Is Good Conference - 5.21.08 through 5.26.08
We are in Vancouver, WA at a fantastic unschooling conference. It is through Memorial Day weekend on the Columbia River. I want to thank my wonderful husband for putting it all together for our family and doing the research on unschooling that has lead us to this place with our family. I will post more about the conference later and I will be adding post to my blog about what I learned. In addition, I will be updating our “Sites We Like” page with unschooling and the Life Is Good Conference information.
My Mother’s Day Gift - 5.11.08
My son and husband gave me a Wii for my 3rd Mother’s Day!! I love it!!! I have been wanting but I only mentioned it briefly once last year.
A Fondu Tale - 5.09.08
Last night we want to a really cool restaurant. It was called the Melting Pot and it is a fondu restaurant. It started out with a salad then everything else was a form of fondu including: a cheese, a main course and a dessert. We had so much fun. The only down side was Brad had a piece of blue glass in his salad!!! We couldn’t believe it!!
It Has Been 5 Years - 05.05.08
We celebrated our 5th Anniversary on Friday. We had a wonderful time together. We went to dinner at Flagstaff Restaurant which is in the mountains. The views were beautiful from every angle. We enjoyed being pampered the whole night. Flagstaff caters in every way to their guest. We had complementary tapas before we ordered, sorbet to cleanse the palette, clotted cream before dessert, and a wonderful sugar/cream selection for coffee. At the end of the evening , they presented us with a nice sugar wish that is in the picture. The last 5 years have been a very happy time for our family!
Earth Day 04.19.08
We are excited to celebrate our first Earth Day in Boulder on Saturday. Wow! Earth Day was a blast! This is a picture of a solar oven. They baked large batches of cookies for the demo and they were tasty. The vendors included Patagonia doing a short race and fly casting for kids, Cliff Bar with lots of samples, Wholefoods, a rock climbing gym with a rock wall for the kids, face painting, live insects and spiders, hola hoops, live music that was wonderful, a seed planting station and much more inside. It was held at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), which in and of itself ,is a fascinating place to visit. There were tons of dogs, families and bikers. On one side of the building, huge remote controlled model airplanes where flying around and we watched them for awhile too. The views were beautiful too.
We Have A Garden
Our garden is going to be beautiful!!! We have the fence up and the beds made. It looks wonderful. We begin planting lettuce, potatoes and squash. Our next plant day is May 19 on the Full Flower Moon. We will have enough produce that we will be able to can for the winter and we will be eating it through the winter. I am so excited because our veggies will have more nutrients and energy then anything we could buy through the season.
Sierra, The Gardener
Sierra Samuals is our organic gardener. She is high energy and a lot of fun. Here she is planning the beds and the layout of the garden.
Tilling The GardenThis is Tom. He tilled the garden space of 30 by 20 for us. This helped a great deal because it cut down our time in preparing the soil for the beds. It took him about an hour.
Working HardThank you to my wonderful husband who worked his ass off!
Even John Worked
John got his little rake out and helped moved the mineral rich compost.