Fall Family Pictures - Part 2 of 2

This picture has the whole family all together.  My mom, Bob, Uncle Mike, Aunt Jackie and Uncle Karl, Madison and Sarah, and of course our family.  We had some other shots that were under a bridge that were pretty good but the sun was shining in our eyes and most of us were squinting, but I think this one turned out pretty great too.

Here are the cousins together on the railway track in a more straight-laced picture.

Of course they couldn't last too long like that, so we had to let them get in a few silly pictures as well.  Overall, really happy with how these pictures turned out.  If only I could get organized and order some hard copies to put up on the walls now...

Fall Family Pictures - Part 1 of 2

For my mom's birthday, my sister arranged for us to do family pictures with her friend who does amazing photographs.  The same guy had done pictures for us several years back near Red Rocks that we absolutely loved.  For this shoot, he found this awesome park that looked really cool with the green trees and grass in the fall.  We actually put in some effort on coordinating colors this time and found some really nice oranges and blues that went together.  I love this picture of the four of us on this bridge together.

Here is a good solo shot of Gage.  It is hard to believe these guys are getting so big.

Here is one of our favorites of Gavin by himself.  Sometimes its hard to get a real smile in these pictures rather than the cheesy smile, but this one is great.

Here is a great one of Tara and I on the shores of a small stream next to the park.

Lastly, for the shots just of our family, these guys are standing on a small railway track.

Gavin's 9th Birthday!

I can't believe Gavin is turning nine years old!  They always says the years go by so quickly, but that's probably because it always seems that way.  This year we decided to go indoors for a little Battledarts.  Gavin invited his best friends for a chance to shoot at each other with little nerf disks.  I, of course, wasn't going to pass up the opportunity to light some of them up myself!

Gavin is getting ready for his first game.  They provide the nerf dart guns and protective eye wear, though you can also bring your own nerf guns from home if you have them.

I think they had his whole party on one side in green and another birthday party going against them in blue.  Lots of cardboard walls created this little labyrinth with windows that you could pop out of and shoot some people.  If you got hit, you were supposed to go back to the back wall and reset before coming out again.

As you can see, a lot of time was spent picking up more ammo that littered the floor so you could keep firing essentially non-stop the whole time.  We played for about an hour straight in two separate rooms with different mazes and some different lights.

After the games, we headed to a nearby park to have cupcakes and formally sing Happy Birthday to our newly nine year old son.  Gavin is such a fun-loving, creative, inquisitive, active young man.  I am so glad that he is in our lives and we get to help him grow up to be all he wants to be.

Gavin's First Soccer Game

Gavin had a tough jump this year in soccer, as he was supposed to jump up into U9 and potentially what they call Academy Select for the Broomfield Soccer Club.  Unfortunately, USA Soccer changed the guidance on how the age groups are determined and they realigned the age groups with school year rather than calendar year.  This meant that anyone with a September through December birthday had to move up two age groups rather than the normal one in the fall.  Gavin moved up to U10 soccer and had to tryout against kids that had already played a year in Academy Select.  Predictably, the competition was a bit much and so here he is in U10 Academy.  We are proud of him and his efforts in playing.  He still gets to play with a few of the kids he has played with in the past and is having fun.

This is the start of the first game of the season for Fall 2016.  It's still 7 v 7 but next year will go to 9 v 9.  He was starting as a center midfielder.  Gavin didn't score any goals but was aggressive and had a great time.  I love seeing him get out there and try his best.