Over the Christmas holidays, we took a trip up to Colorado to visit Oma and Opa. Regine was able to fly up there too, so it was really a treat to get to spend some extended time together.
There wasn’t much snow when we arrived, but Mother Nature didn’t hold back for the next week and a half. We had snow come through several times, usually dropping at least 4″ and sometimes closer to 8.” It was also super cold! We were very glad for the wood burning stove downstairs and the heated floor in the living room. There was one night with the lows around -8* and the high the next day was 4.* Brr! It was beautiful though!
We pretty much stayed home bound, except one short overnight trip to Denver for Keller and myself, but that didn’t stop the kids from having a great time. They played in the snow, went sledding, hiked down the trail with Oma, and puttered around on the four wheelers in the yard and neighborhood. Alas, there was no snowman this trip … the snow was way too dry to stick together and the best you could do was a small snowball or mound.
We tackled several puzzles while huddled inside. Both kids received puzzles for Christmas, so there was nearly always a puzzle or two on the table to work on. Caden’s very comfortable doing 35 and 60 piece puzzles, while Kamy can do 100 pieces solo, and she I worked together on 300 and 500 piece puzzles! Regine and I also broke out a massive 2000 piece puzzle I gave Oma last year and spent all week working on it. We left when it was about 80% complete and Oma and Opa finished it off! Unfortunately, there are two rogue pieces, but it was still an accomplishment!
Our drive up was uneventful and very straightforward. Both kids are such great travelers and we didn’t have any major issues to deal with. We had sunny blue skies and the cross winds weren’t terrible either. It took right about 15 hours including stops for the drive. =) The truck did great. We are hoping this is the last big trip up to the mountains before we buy another (4 wheel drive) truck this year. We’ll see.
Coming home, however, was a different story. A major snow storm went through the Texas panhandle and southern Colorado the night before we would be leaving … promising 4-8″ of snow and possible ice on our route. We couldn’t stay for another day or two either, because a new storm system was coming in from Wyoming and would hit the Denver area around mid-day the day we were planning to drive. So, we opted for the longer route and went due east through Kansas before turning south and driving through Wichita, Kansas and Oklahoma down 35. Unfortunately, that storm that caused issues in the Texas panhandle was heading up to Wichita too. We caught it heading south. The leading edge of the storm was really only 15-20 miles ahead of us, but as we headed due south the storm moved at an angle to the east, so we ended up stuck in the snow storm until we crossed into Oklahoma. Keller did a fabulous job driving us safely through the storm. We still made decent time considering the poor weather in Kansas and made it back to Granpops house for the night after about 17 hours of driving with only one short meal break and the necessary potty stops.
We have really enjoyed going up to Colorado to visit Oma and Opa at Christmas and through the New Year. It is a great chance to spend some extended time with them and the kids love playing outside in the snow.
