bless my birth

July 14th – Tuesday

We pulled out of our spot at Cherry Creek and toward Denver, fairly early. Before parking the motorhome in our cozy day-use lot near the convention center, Sid cruised the town to find a coffee shop within skateboarding distance, since parking our behemoth near a coffee shop would be nearly impossible. He located a Starbucks, parked us and skated off toward it. On his way back, three coffees and a snack bag in hand, he hit a hose and ate it! He was okay (phew), and the guy at Starbucks replaced the drinks, free of charge, very nice. Like Charles Ingalls used to say, “All’s well that ends well.”

Sid went off to the Cuckoo Christian Convention (heh heh) and the kids and I chilled in the motorhome, played Legos (them) and watched Iron Man (me). That movie is so great. It got HOT! The kids decided that they wanted to cool off in the fountain at Civic Center Park again so we headed out on the town once more.

This day at the fountain we spied the “NO WADING” message spray painted on the concrete beside the pool. So much for cooling off. There was an open market going on there in the park so we perused nothing of interest. Seeing that this was no longer Monday, we felt the The Denver Art Museum beckoning us to enter it’s serene, air-conditioned hallways and be inspired and revived. We heeded the call.

What a cool museum, temperature-wise, art-wise and architecturally. I loved it! Too bad I only accounted for 1/4 of my party and the other 3/4 were not as impressed as I. At least not after we got through making our cool Old West style art using stamps and colored pencils in a kids’ area of the Western Art section. One more section, to show Aveline a real Monet, and the 3/4 complaints of fatigue and hunger got the best of me. We headed downstairs to the “fancy” museum restaurant Palettes. We had so much fun talking about what constitutes good manners, what doesn’t, and then practicing! June was especially challenged in the etiquette department, but overall the 3/4 were so good! It went much more smoothly than I had anticipated, when I first noticed it was the kind of restaurant whose tables each were clad in a white tablecloth! My kids managed to charm the staff and get yet one more official declaration of being the cutest kids someone has ever seen, besides her niece and nephew.

We played for a bit inside and then outside and then went back to the motorhome . . . and to all of my missed texts from Sid. Oops, we were supposed to drive down to Colorado Springs with our good pals Ryan and Laura, to their home, but when it was time for them to go, Jen and the kids were MIA! Well we made it down that evening anyway and got to get in some good hanging out and talking time while their cutie-pie Lincoln played with “the kids,” as he called our bunch. Then the girls got a real bath and Miss Aveline tried her fingers at pinball, and she’s a wizard, I tell ya!