Casa Bonita's!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here it is......Casa Bonita's!!!!!!


This was one of my most favorite places to come and eat when we went to Colorado EVERY year for vacation! I haven't been there since I was like 12 or 13 so I begged my brother-in-law to make an exception and let us go (not his favorite place to eat!). It literally has not changed a bit since I was there.....except for one minor thing. The swimmer guy is now a young blond haired kid that wears long board shorts. Very different from the Mexican stallion type guy with long hair that sported a speedo that I remember from my childhood! For those that have never been there, you should put it on your list of things to try at least once! Make sure you request to sit near the water, otherwise you miss the good stuff! There are skits and divers and waterfalls and music and all kinds of things to entertain the kids! Zach did great cuz there was always a distraction. Although he came flying out of his highchair during one skit as it has a gorilla in it! My nephew Dawson also had a little gorilla fear when he came flying over our railing and leaped over him....came very close to landing on him. I think I saw Autumn and Treyton jump too as it was totally unexpected and he landed on the railing right next to Autumn. I don't know about everyone else, but I had a great time. Felt like I was 10 again for a bit.....except for the whole having kids thing....that brought me back really quick!


The famous fountain out front. My dad was always so cranky about us getting wet before we went in for dinner. Guess that must have been passed down generationally cuz I kept getting after Zach for the same thing! He though was literally trying to get IN the fountain area.....I NEVER would've even thought of doing that as a child so I'm sure my dad was just overreacting! :)


Everyone being a good sport while I revert back to my childhood! :)


Treyton creating his own fun during dinner....must have been during a break from one of the exciting skits!


Michelle and I pretending we are kids again posing next to where the skits are done....if you can't tell, it's at a scary part with Bad Bart and the Sheriff! :)


Watching the last skit I didn't get to see during dinner of Bad Bart and the Sheriff. That crazy Bart ends up over the edge and in the water every time I have seen it! :) The big kids were acting like it was all lame, yet look at their concentration!



During dinner, my sister thought it would be funny to tell the waiter that it was Autumn's birthday despite it actually being in November. Towards the end of our meal, the mairachi band came to the table and asked for her and then sang. I didn't think to tape it until about half way through. Plus I was laughing so hard I couldn't think of much else! I thought it was hillarious! Not sure Autumn did though. It was a definate favorite among everyone though cuz the rest of the weekend at random times one of us would break into the Autumn birthday song. I have no idea if I will actually be able to load the video cuz I've never tried to do that before!


Can you see the excitement in Autumn???? She was a bit embarrassed, but a great sport about it! Makes me laugh every time I watch it....and now that dang happy birthday part is stuck in my head again!

Thanks for being a good sport Paul....I had a great time!
The last part of the vacation pics is coming soon. Then on to other things....like Zach's dance video!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Vacation Day 3....for Zach and me anyway...

When we got up Sunday morning, the big kids, Donnie and my brother-in-law Paul were gone already to go skiing/snowboarding. So Zach hung with the next group of big kids (to him anyway).....my 2 nephews Dawson and Dylan. Dawson and Dylan are very into their Ninetindo DS's and Zach joined them by stealing bubba Treyton's (don't tell Treyton!). It was very cute. He sat there and pushed buttons and acted like he knew what was going on.



We lounged around all morning and waited until after Zach took a nap to venture out of the house. My sister and I took the boys to the Denver Children's Museum. There was LOTS of fun there! There were areas for dress up....which my nephews were in to. Zach not so much. Lots of make believe areas. Zach's favorites were probably the 0-4 area, the train room and the grocery store area. Here some pics from our day......








This is the train area.....Zach did really well at first. In the 2nd picture, Zach is hoarding the trains. A little had come in and was trying to play with him. He quickly scrambled around to all the tables and grabbed as many trains as he could and was holding them just staring at her. He then came and dumped them all right in front of me while he ran to get more.....like I would protect his stash or something! Guess we need to work on sharing!









In the evening, we went met up with all the big kids and went to one of my favorite childhood places to eat. I'll do a post all on that next! Then some GREAT pics from the skiing/snowboarding adventure that my brother-in-law took.

Dannon

Vacation Day 2......Mr. Biggs

Saturday afternoon after all the ski/snowboard equipment was rented and naps were taken, we went to a place called Mr. Biggs. It's kindof like an All-Star Sports on a bigger level. There was stuff for the big kids as well as Zach's age so was good entertainment for all of us.

In the kids area, there was a little town like atmosphere where kids could play. There was everything from dress up, to a kitchen, to a sand pit, a tricycle riding area, slides, etc, etc. Zach's favorites were the huge car and helicopter he could climb in......





The foam factory was neat....was only for kids under 5 foot. Zach was a little young for a lot of it, but still liked it. It was a 3 story structure that had a billion foam balls you could shoot, throw, stick into structures, etc. They also had a slide from one story to another, a cargo net climbing thing that went up all 3 levels. I might add this is NOT meant for adults to climb through and being the mother I am I crawle through it with Zach. Lets just say it wasn't my best look.....no photos of that though! Most of the pics came out blurry but you'll get the idea....




Zach's daddy did manage to leave the big kids and their fun stuff to come play with us for awhile. Yet he was still one of the kids. As you can see from this photo, we had a hard time getting daddy to stay with us. Here he is shooting other children with one of the guns that shoots balls across the entire place.....this photo isn't very good and he'll probably try to argue that it isn't him. But trust me it is and I had to include just cuz I kept hollering at him to come play with us and he got all absorbed with shooting random children!


Donnie managed to tear himself away from the gun to catch Zach at the bottom of the slide so I captured a pic of them. I was up on the 2nd story next to the slide. I did manage to shoot them with a ball or two prior to joining them though!


I was surprised Zach could walk through this area as well as he did. It was a cargo net type material with swinging foam sticks (like my expert terminology)...he ran right through it pushing those things out of the way.



The big kids (which includes Donnie!) did other things while Zach and I were in the little kid zone. They had go-karts, laser tag, mini golf, some 3-D simulator thing, a big twisty ride that none of them would ride, etc, etc. I only got pics of the go-karts as that's all Zach and I watched them do.

Pre-race photos.....



All ready to race......
Donnie.....

Justin....

Autumn.....

Treyton.....


The far away pics didn't turn out very well......Treyton ended up beating everyone, but he was also the first one out the gate! Donnie tried REALLY hard to pass him sevearl times but was unable to do so. Autumn and Justin battled it out for 3rd and 4th. Autumn kept spinning all the way around, otherwise she would've been up with Treyton as they started out together. Poor Justin was last out the gate and had a hard time catching up!


Have a couple more days to post pics of......so those will be coming soon.
Dannon

Vacation Day 1

I didn't get a chance to post while at my sister's....she didn't share very well! :) Just kidding, when I did get on her computer I was obsessed with her facebook page looking up all my old high school friends to see what they look like now! Goodness people have changed......I may have to start my own page just so I can reconnect with everyone!

Here we are leaving our street to head to my sister's house in Colorado for vacation....I might add we are in our new minivan which I haven't done a post about yet! I was a bit on edge about trash, food and general mess in my new vehicle!


Zach did pretty good for about half of the trip. It's about a 9 hour drive to my sister's and he was not all that thrilled about spending that much time in his carseat. He did great while napping! :) Did watch a couple of videos and played with some toys. Ate ok....then as evening approached he became a bear! We traveled for awhile with him hollering and with about 2 hours to go in our trip, we decided that we were tired and he needed to be out so we stopped in a teeny tiny town and stayed in the only motel they had! They didn't have a room that would fit all of us, so we ended with the big kids in one room and us in the other.

This would be the bed that slept Donnie, myself AND Zach.....not much space! Full size beds aren't as big as they used to be! Our room also was like 90 degrees so we were hot as all get out.....Was a VERY long night for us.


The big kids had this lovely spaceous room and would've slept fine had they not watched Texas Chainsaw Masacre on TV before trying to sleep. Then they decided this little motel would be perfect for something like that to happen thus their sleep was a bit disrupted....although for far different reasons than Donnie and I's was! I took this pic just after I woke them up.....don't they look excited!


While waiting on the big kids to get around so we could get back on the road, Zach raided the snack box in the car looking for some breakfast!


Zach was NOT happy about getting back into the car to finish the remaining 2 hours of our trip to Aunt Michelle's! He screamed for the first 15 minutes or so and then we bribed him with a video and powdered donut! Powdered donuts are not typically something I would allow in the car with a toddler, but we were willing to try anything! Needless to say he was a mess......




This isn't necessarily from our first day of our trip....but including it anyway....
Eating at Aunt Michelle's house was interesting. We forgot to take our travel highchair so Michelle dug out one of her's from when her boys were little. Her's hangs out there in space which was new to Zach....and a bit scary for his mom! He looked like he could fall at any minute! He enjoyed being up so high and felt like he was in on the action and conversation though......




Aunt Michelle's floor suffered just a bit from Zachary's lovely eating habits! This pic was early in the meal....I should've snapped a pic at the end. Eventually he thought it was fun to throw food over the side and then peer down at it from his high perch. I eventually had to put a towel under him as some of the food was a little harder to get off the floor than others!


I'll have a few more posts from the fun things we did in the next few days to come....maybe I'll be crazy and post again later today! :)