Colorado...funerals and surprises

I mentioned that Finley and I were going to Colorado for a good friends funeral last week.  A good friend from high school passed away very unexpectedly and it was important for me to be at the funeral.  Of course going to funerals completely suck, but it really was good to see some old friends!

Finley and I flew in last Wednesday, the flight was great, she was an angel.  We even had other passengers comment on what a good traveler she was...probably because she slept most of the time :)

Our first night there we just hung out at my parents house and let Finley explore outside.  Rachel, Cameron and Sydney came over for dinner and the girls had fun playing together.  Of course Cameron's first question when she walked in was, "Where's Cole?" 

"Uncle Ross, go fetch!" :)

Why not bathe in the sink??

Thursday morning was Scott's funeral.  Rachel was nice enough to watch Finley for me while all of us attended the funeral.  I felt bad sticking Rachel with 3 kids but I knew she could handle it...and she did!  Finley actually slept for a lot of it but had fun playing with Cameron and Sydney the rest of the time.  That afternoon, Ross and I spent some time up at the country club with a lot of Scott's family and friends.  It was great fellowship and being able to talk fun stories about him.  He sure will be missed!

Friday morning, we headed to my dad's office.  The office people were putting on a little birthday party for him....yes, Papa Volk turned the big 6-0 while were were visiting! 

Finley was so excited to go see Papa and wish him a Happy Birthday!

 

 

"I love you Papa"

Friday afternoon, I took a drive to the airport and picked up Nick and Cole!!!  Yeah, long story short, the 4 of us were supposed to surprise my dad for his birthday but with the funeral, I changed my flight to come in early.  My dad, however, still had no clue that Nick and Cole were coming into town.  We spent the rest of the afternoon at Ryan and Rachel's house then that evening we drove to a really cool restaurant in the foothills called The Greenbriar.  We arrived about 5 minutes before my mom and dad and they put us in a really cool private room.  We told them we had 4 kids...guess they knew that would be the best room for everyone :)

Cole before Papa got there

Ryan and Sydney

Rachel and Sydney

I had to show the cute outfits that Mimi got Finley and Sydney.  I just think they are so adorable!

 Finally, Mimi and Papa showed up and as my dad was walking into the restaurant, we sent Cole out to greet him and my dad's face was priceless!  It took him awhile to figure out what he was doing there but then Cole gave him the biggest hugs, the type of thing that just brings tears to your eyes.

 

Papa joining the rest of us

 

Mimi and Papa during dinner

I mentioned before that they gave us a private room and it was fantastic because it gave Cole and Cameron room to run around and be wild!

Cole and Cameron helping Papa blow out his birthday candle

  

 We had such a great time at dinner and we were so happy that we got to help my dad celebrate with him!  We love you Papa!!!

The next day we just hung out at my parents 

house.  We had company come over for dinner but we mostly just played outside and relaxed.

Cole even got to play around on Papa's motorcycle.  Of course my dad wanted to take him on a ride but maybe when he's a bit older :)

  

Bad to the Bone

I even got to take some pictures with my girl :)

She loves to give kisses now....sometimes even open mouth :)

That helmet must have weighed about as much as Cole...not sure how he didn't topple over!

  

  

  

  

Our last full day there, again, we had more family over for dinner and Ryan brought over Cameron's Strider bike.  It doesn't have pedals and it's the coolest little thing.  We even tried to get Cole on it, but his legs were a bit long for it.  

  

  

Uncle Ross got in some snuggle time with Finley.  She sat there for the longest time, it was so funny.

 We flew back to Dallas yesterday afternoon and had some yummy spaghetti/meatballs at Granddad and Gigi's house.  We then came home, put the kids to bed and then Nick informed me that my blog had some how deleted about 6 months worth of pictures from my blog.  Of course I was sick to my stomach when he first told me because I have never really kept baby books, this blog was always my form of that.  We looked and it was mostly the first 6 months of Finley's life.  I was MAD!  Again, it was just the pictures that were deleted and none of the content, Thank God!  

We did some investigating and it sounds like when blogger, Google+ and Picasa did some upgrading a couple weeks ago, other people had the same problem.

We figured out how to find the source of the original pictures so that I can just re-import them but if you can imagine, it will take me forever!!!!!

As soon as I am finished getting it all taken care of, I am printing out my blog into books, I don't care how much it costs.  Yes, I'm still mad, and if there was someone over at the blogger world I could talk to, well, they would hear not-so-nice things from me!  Lesson to everyone, figure out a way to back up your blog!