Heading back to Texas!

After having so much fun with all of our stops on our way to Colorado, Neal spent a little time on our vacation planning stops for the way home.  It really is so nice to break up long drives seeing fun things along the way!

Both of our stops the first day were in Colorado Springs.  First up we headed to the Olympic Training Center for a tour of the facility.  My Olympics-loving girls were super excited!  This facility trains mostly summer athletes and also houses athletes that come and stay for several years as they gear up for whatever Olympics in which they hope to compete.  We even saw some actual Olympic hopefuls working out as well as an Olympic medalist!

This wrestler was in the gym getting ready for an interview before he headed off to a big competition.  He took the time to show us how they use their space to practice.  

We saw several swimmers, but they looked really, really young - but who knows, maybe someday!

Their are these neat pieces all over the grounds - they are silhouettes of actual athletes performing.

This is the actual Olympic medalist we saw

There was a whole group of mens and women's wrestlers in working out in the gym as well.

Go Team USA!

Just a few minutes down the road, we hit up the Money Museum.  We thought we were going to be rushed because we were cutting it close to closing time.  Turns out, our 30 minutes was more than enough!  There was some really cool stuff in there - rare coins, misprinted bills, and coin presses.  There was also a children's section where they girls got to map out all the state quarters.

We headed back to our favorite spot: Raton, New Mexico to stay another night before heading home. Luckily, the AC was working in our room this go round! And the best part was we finally stopped at a DQ for dinner!  Meredith had been waiting all trip for a DQ meal, so we made that happen and we couldn't resist a picture with the DQ ice cream cone outside!

The next day, we stopped just a little while after leaving the hotel at Capulin Volcano National Monument.

We walked down into the middle of the volcano.

The girls, of course, loved finding volcano rocks.

The view overlooking from the top of the volcano.

After leaving Capulin, we made our way back into Texas and finally home sweet home!  Such a fun vacation full of great family memories!

Goodbye Vail!

After our car was packed up and ready to head back to Texas, the girls took a quick dip in the pool and then we all accompanied Daddy to go see the Covered Bridge that he loves so much!

They could have spent all day looking out onto the river!

And Jillian kept doing what she did all vacation - doing spins (or "double pirouettes" as she says since watching the Isabelle movie!)

The view from the bridge

And the pretty little bridge

We split ways at the bridge - Meredith and Daddy went down to the river and Jillian and I went back to Pirate Ship Park for one more time to play!  We ran into Meredith and Daddy at just the right time - Meredith lost her shoe in the river, so we were able to help everyone get back without hurt feet!

And a family photo by the bridge ends this trip to Vail. We all loved our time here - Jillian even asked if we could come back for her birthday!  I am glad we are raising beach and mountain girls!

Vail Day

We finally spent the whole day in Vail on Thursday.  We started off the morning with a walk to the Betty Ford Gardens.  

The girls did a fun scavenger hunt that helped them learn about the plants in the gardens.

They both loved getting to paint, too!

After the gardens, we packed a picnic and took our scooters over to Pirate Ship Park - which was a big playground with a huge pirate ship to play on.  The girls loved it!  Then we continued our walk, did a little shopping and when we got to the river, we decided to get our feet a little wet!

Jillian took the plunge first, Meredith waited to make sure it wasn't SOOOO bad before she joined her.

The girls had fun playing in the super cold water and - guess what? Collecting rocks!

Here is their rock collection - they got one for each person in our family!

Shopping in downtown Vail.

We had a nice dinner that night by the river - it was good food and even better view!

Breckenridge Summer Fun Park

After leaving Estes Park on Tuesday, we arrived in Vail, got settled in our condo, did some grocery shopping and walked around Vail Village before bed.  The next morning we drove back to Breckenridge to go to their Summer Fun Park!

On the Gondola going up to the Summer Fun Park

This was the Gold Runner Coaster - you get to control your own speed on the roller coaster - it was so much fun!

A few in-ride selfies! Don't worry, I wasn't supposed to be controlling the car when I took these! Meredith's favorite part of the rides was when we go to the end, there was the camera - she made up fun poses for us to do each time we passed!

The girls also got to pan for "gems" - this was a fun treat for these two who had been collecting rocks the whole trip!

We did lots of ski lift rides to get us to the top for the Alipine Slide.  Meredith was a little nervous for the first ride.  Jillian was not, which made me a little nervous!  The girl kept leaning forward to see what was below her!  On most of the rides up we would play "I spy a chipmunk" and try to see who found the most.  

See - no hands! Except I kept a firm grip on her on each ride!

When we weren't on the coaster, you could find us on the Alpine Slide.  We are a family that loves to go fast - so it was a blast!

Meredith was old enough for her own, but she had a little trouble being able to push the lever all the way forward (to make it go super fast!) so after one solo ride, she went back to riding with one of us.

She did awesome on the Alpine Slide by herself!  She was faster than a lot of folks, so I was proud of her for taking little chances!  

Next up, we tried the rock climbing wall!  It was super hard, so they didn't get all the way to the top, but they had fun trying.

And then, they got to do the bungee trampoline!  So fun!

We also walked up to "snow hill" which was literally just a pile of snow in an area where there shouldn't have been snow.  Not sure if it was completely "fake" snow, but the girls loved it either way!

There were even snowball fights!

It was fun to go down the snow slides, but then they stayed a little wet and chilly! Oh well, it was worth it!

We had a rain/lightning delay so we took  a minute for pictures on the ski lift.  

After things started opening back up, we got to play a round of miniature golf and the girls did a really big maze!

They worked really hard together to get through the maze - luckily we were up top to help navigate because I think they might still be in there if not!

At the base of the mountain, we spotted a Jelly Belly truck, so we had to get a picture with our Jilly Bean!