An End of Summer Trip to Denver

This past weekend, Josh and I flew to Denver for a couple of days, while Charly stayed at home and held down the fort here.  My birth-mother lives in the Mile-High City and Josh wanted to meet her, so off we went for a family reunion of sorts.

Josh enjoyed meeting his grandmother and I know she enjoyed meeting him.  We also spent time with my sister.  Josh had met her when he was eight, but had not seen her since then.

We all had a great weekend laughing, talking, getting re-acquainted and catching-up on each other lives.

Sunday morning, Josh and I went to church, then found the Denver Temple.  It was beautiful, as all LDS temples are.

The gardens surrounding the temple were especially lovely.

We enjoyed just sitting for a while and enjoying the peace and serenity of the temple grounds.

After leaving the temple grounds, Josh and I decided to drive out to West Denver and Lakewood and try to find some of the landmarks of my childhood and teen years. This is the house where I lived from the time I was a baby until I was six-years-old.  My dad planted that huge tree that covers up most of the front window and my first bedroom was where the small window on the right is.  The house looks much the same as I remember it, although everything seemed smaller than it did when I was growing up there.  

We then traveled farther west to the Green Mountain area where we found the house we lived in when I was in junior high and high school.  It was brand-new when my parents bought it and I was glad that the neighborhood is still nice and the house looked like its owners were taking care of it.

 Here is the junior high I attended, which has been greatly expanded.  It is now Dunston Middle School. When I went there, it was Dunston Junior High.

The high school I went to during 9th, 10th and part of 11th grade ~ Green Mountain High ~ has also been remodeled and enlarged. It was brand new the year I started high school.  It was fun to share some of my memories of high school with my son.

After our sightseeing, we headed back to my birth mom's home for more visiting, laughter, music, food...

...relaxation and conversation.

It was a nice end of summer family reunion.

Josh and I flew home to Phoenix mid-morning on Monday.  Interestingly, just a short while after we left, a tornado touched down near the airport and the passengers had to take cover in tornado shelter areas (the restrooms at the airport).  This is terminal Josh and I waited at Monday morning, empty of passengers during the tornado warning. 

 Here is a picture of the tornado as it was seen from the airport.

Another picture of the tornado we left behind in Denver.  I should mention that air travel is not my favorite thing and flying during stormy weather is REALLY not my favorite thing. When we came into Denver on Saturday, a storm was brewing to the west and our landing was very bumpy and rough.  When we flew out on Monday, before the storm, we had a particularly calm and smooth flight, for which I was truly grateful.  I am so glad we were well on our way back to Phoenix when this storm hit!

Storms or no storms, our trip to Denver was a great ending to a wonderful summer.  Now, our summer vacation is over.  Charly reported back to work on Tuesday and I start teacher meetings tomorrow ~ our students come back next week.  It was been a summer filled with blessings and good memories ~ one I know we will all remember for many years to come!

Hope you are making good memories and living life to the fullest this summer!