Start of summer

It has been an extremely busy few weeks in the Larson household, so this will be a random hodge-podge of info on what we've been up to.  Hoping to get more consistant as the summer goes on, but who knows if that will actually happen!

I hosted a baby shower for my best friend from high school a few weekends ago - she's due in late July and will be having her first baby, a son!  I'm so excited for her and her new family, so it was wonderful getting to have her and her family/friends over to celebrate the new little one.  It's always so great getting to see your close friends evolve in life and take on the next step - Kari will be an amazing mom, and I'm glad that I finally live closer to her to be able to share in the fun with her.  Here are a few pics:

Later that weekend, we hung out with some new friends we met in the neighborhood at one of our local bars (Skylark) to play some shuffle board.  It's nice having friends nearby now!  Also that weekend, I hit up the City Park Jazz night with Joe and Keri and some of their friends.  (Unfortunately, Matt couldn't make it cuz he was playing on the worship team at church which basically takes up his entire Sunday.)  We hope to make it to more Sunday nights at City Park - what a fun way to spend a summer evening!

I somehow decided to run for a position on our Baker Historic Neighborhood Association's Board.  Being that it's not a super popular thing to do, my campaign was uncontested, and I now serve as the BHNA Secretary.  Looking back, I probably should have put this off for a year or so, but so it is.  I am now involved in the neighborhood whether I like it or not and have the fun responsibilities of typing up minutes and agendas, going to meetings, hearing from folks in the 'hood.  All very exciting stuff, and I'm sure you're jealous :)

Matt is playing on Medtronic's softball team on Monday nights and has been having fun with that.  Doesn't quite match up to the fun we had playing sports in DC with CAN, but it's at least something!  We do miss the fun times we had playing flag football and softball (and soccer for matt) out there - I don't think we'll ever find anything like that again.  Great memories with great friends out there. :)

Bryan was in town briefly on Thursday night as he was heading out to Sterling for his 10 year high school reunion.  After picking him up from the airport in a crazy storm (and seeing an awesome double rainbow), we got some good catch up time at Atomic Cowboy on Colfax, and Friday morning I drove him to Fort Morgan to meet his mom so we could all grab breakfast together.  It's always great seeing her - she's really taken me in as a member of their family, and I love them! I definitely miss having Bryan around and am not so secretly plotting to have him move to Denver.  :)

World Cup mania started this weekend, so what else did Matt do but wear a US flag (as a cape) throughout our neighborhood.  It was great for many high fives and honks.  We enjoyed the US/England game with Keri and Joe first with breakfast at our place and then beers at Dougherty's.  Who doesn't love when global sporting events bring out the patriots in us all? :)

The last thing I'll mention is that I started my prerequisite classes this past week (3 online), and they've been kicking my butt!  Who knew that online classes were so much work?? I think I'd much prefer to sit in a class, take notes, write a few papers and take an exam. If you've never taken an online course, there's a lot of reading, constant checking-in, discussion posting with the class, papers, quizzes, etc.  It's actually been somewhat tough to keep up with!  Maybe it's just that I've been out of college for 7 years... but in any case, it's been taking up a lot of time.  I'm still working Mondays and Tuesdays this month to help us with some income (I'm still not sure what my student loans will be this Fall, I need to get on that!), so my weeks already feel full.  Thankfully, the other thing taking up much of my time (studying for the social studies PRAXIS test) is now over for the time being - I took the test on Saturday morning and will find out in a month if I'll be "certified" to teach my subject area.  It was a super hard test for anyone wondering - it covered all of world and US history, economics, geography, anthropology, psychology, sociology, and government/politics.  WHEW, I'm tired just thinking about it again.  Here's hoping I don't have to take it again!