In Chloe's Words

When our friends were in town we spent one evening doing our own version of a TED Talk. We all decided on the topic: Gun violence in schools. We were each given 20 minutes to do research and then present our talk to the rest of the group.

It was fascinating! I thoroughly enjoyed each and every insight presented. I learned something new with each talk as well. What I appreciated the most is how well the "talks" represented each person's personality so perfectly. We have some amazing orators.

But the ONE talk that stood out from the rest was from the person most nervous to give her speech: Chloe. As soon as she finished, the room was perfectly quiet and we all sat there in awe until Priya broke the revere and said, "Chloe, you MUST send that to a local paper. That is THE BEST explanation about gun violence in schools I have ever heard!" This, coming from a teacher.

Here is the essay that astounded us all:

Ever since I have attended school, lockdown drills have been a quarterly occurrence in classes. Growing up, I’d hear little things about students “threatening” to shoot up the school. I’d heard about different shootings going on in high schools.

I never gave it much thought, I was in elementary school, or I was in middle school. Nobody shot up middle schools. It was one of those things that have been normal and I don’t give much thought, even though I should have.

When we moved to Colorado, I was a little uneasy because the first shooting anybody had heard of was Columbine, in Colorado.

But I still never gave it too much thought, except another drill we’d have to practice in school. At the end of eighth grade, the Parkland shooting headlined in the news for a long time, enough to make me scared about the possibility of it happening to me, especially since I would be going to high school that next year.

All of my freshman year, we’d have kids in my own school threatening to shoot up the school, shoot our school officer or our principal. These “threats” would be written in the bathroom stalls, lists of people they’d shoot. I was pulled out of school one day because there were rumors of which day the school shooting would happen.

In May, right before the end of the year, Highlands Ranch, a school just south of Denver got shot up. Just before he graduated, a senior was killed trying to save his peers. This shouldn’t be a thing kids go through their entire school career and think of as normal, or inevitable.

We need to prevent things like this from happening before it becomes too normal to pay attention to. There are several ways to prevent school shootings. One of the main reasons a student shoots their school up is because of their mental state.

Feeling neglect from parents, depression, anxiety from grades, or anger. Teachers can start recognizing these traits, make a personal connection with that student, recommend help, and follow through with it.

People often argue ‘guns don’t kill people — people kill people’. This is true, but what is the main way people kill people? Through guns. Controlling guns, maintaining areas where they're allowed to be used, at a shooting range, for hunting, and that’s all.

It’s simple in theory, but there are too many people who will think it’s either all guns or no guns at all. It’s like during class, one student sticks gum under his desk, so no one gets to chew gum.

It doesn’t have to be like that, people just need to realize it’s not right to stick gum under your desk.

Well said, Chloe! I hope people care and listen to the words of a 15 year old.

Summer Job

This summer Bennett found the exact perfect job for himself.

He is a coach for kids' summer sport camps!

It has been so fun listening to his stories everyday when he comes home. He always connects with a few kids at each camp. He definitely has a way with kids, they all love him. He's great at coming up with games/activities on the spot. He genuinely enjoys playing and being with the kids. He loves it when they look up to him and if one were to start talking about basketball...well, he's in heaven!  It's such a joy watching your kids find their niche. 

Some stories he's related are:

At a golf camp, one 5 year old little girl, Asher, spent most of the days pouring gobs of sunscreen all over herself. On the last day she said she was hot and asked if Bennett would go sit under the shade with her. Then she takes out her unicorn book and asks Bennett if he knows how to read. He answers in the affirmative. She then sits on his lap, leans her head on his shoulder and asks him to read her book. He gladly obliges. She constantly wanted to hold his hand and walk around with him the whole camp.

At a basketball camp, he had two proteges, Duke and Carter. According to Bennett, they both had skills and a love for the game as big as his. He would make sure they were always in his group. He would even cut their break time short so he and the boys could sneak back in the gym without the other kids knowing and do some one-on-one basketball. They spoke his language and brought joy to his heart. 

At a football camp, he met a little kid named Yusef who had zero desire or ability to play a sport but was hilarious and kept Bennett in stitches the whole time. The kid just couldn't catch a ball, but boy was he quick-witted, a skill Bennett values.

At a flag-football camp a kid found out he was a Cowboys fan and brought him a Romo football card the next day.

Fun With Friends

These guys have been friends since elementary school. 

Gavin and Pranav were in 5th grade

Vik and Bennett were in 2nd.

It's been a joy to watch their friendships continue to grow and blossom even though we've moved twice. We've done vacations together, college visits, numerous trips back and forth to each other's houses. They are the kind of friends that even though you might not see each other or talk very often, you pick right up where you left off without missing a beat. It's the best gift. So you can imagine how excited we were to find out that they would be coming to hang out with us for a week in Colorado.

We did all the things! We started our exciting week off with visiting a local dairy farm. Not that we take all our visitors to dairy farms, but they just happened to be interested and it was low key.

The adults spent a day visiting Rocky Mountain National Park. (Pranav and Gavin hadn't yet arrived in town and Vik and Bennett would rather go fishing. There was no way Chloe wanted to spend the day with all the adults, so she hung out with her friend instead.)

We were treated to all kinds of wildlife. If you look really close, you can see a large herd of Elk grazing on the alpine hillside. We were at almost 12,000 feet here.

These adorable little creatures come out of hibernation for only 6 weeks a year and we were treated to seeing a whole colony of them. They were active, noisy, scampering, and fighting. 

You never know what you're going to come across.

This bird was one of my favorites. It was as if he were posing. He kept standing on the branch patiently waiting for all of us passersby to snap his lovely profile.

Every night it seemed we were playing spikeball. And boy, did these guys get into it! It was some great competition.

We spent a huge swath of time sitting around visiting about all the subjects there are to talk about. And it was wonderful.

Lucky for us, our favorite hammocking spot is still a secret and we took them there. I'm shocked more people haven't found this little gem. We call it Hammock Valley. I think 5 of the 8 of us fell asleep. It was that peaceful.

We went to an escape room, but didn't escape. It was an incredible challenge though.

On this fine day we went white water rafting. This is the pre-rafting picture. 

This is the, "Oh my goodness, I hope none of us fall out of the raft!" picture.

This is the, "WE'RE HAVING THE TIME OF OUR LIVES ADRENALINE RUSH!!" picture. 

Of course we ate til our hearts and tummies were content. Priya makes THE BEST Indian food. I got to literally sit at her feet for one whole day learning All The Things. She lives to cook for people. It's her love language. What she is currently cooking in this picture is one of my all time favorite foods: Rice Balls or White Balls of Goodness, as I like to call them. Good food makes for a good vacation!

Minnesota Time

This past week, Bennett, Chloe, and I got to visit Minnesota together.

We spent a great deal of time playing. This was the first winning tennis team.

This was the first losing tennis team.

This was the second winning tennis team.

This was the second losing tennis team. The common denominator is I was the loser both times.

However, I prevailed in squash against Bennett.

We tried our luck on indoor courts to no avail. We can't seem to beat a 69 and 71 year old no matter how hard we try. Granted, Bennett was playing with tendonitis in his knee and I was still recuperating from the accident. But we sure gave them a run for their money.

While we were busy playing, Chloe was doing a different sort of playing. She was visiting her favorite little neighbors and playing all the fun imagination games they used to play. She talks about these sweet girls all the time and sure does miss them. I'm so glad they were home and had the time to get together on such short notice.

And life just doesn't get better than getting the chance to visit with your best friend from Minnesota. Chloe and Aspen had a few hours to catch up, which is nowhere near enough for two 15 year olds, but any time together was a gift in itself. They took what they could get and made the most of it.

But this was the real reason for our visit. 

We came to surprise my parents for their 50th wedding anniversary. Sveta carved this amazing watermelon.

As well as made this incredibly delicious cake. All I made was a little video - no food.

We had fun taking lots of pictures on the beautiful grounds of the Falconer Vineyards in Red Wing, Minnesota. 

The grandparents with all the grandkids except for Gavin.

Ryan and Sveta and the girls.

Me and the kids.

A nice stroll through the vineyard. It was a wonderful, memorable time.

Camping In Colorado

This past weekend we ended a 4 year self-imposed moratorium on camping. The Mallott Camping Rain Curse has been heavily documented over the years. And if it wasn't raining on our parade, then the bugs, specifically mosquitos, were poised against our enjoyment of the outdoors. Yet, we remained optimistic thinking "this time will be better". Why?! For the love of God, why can't we just admit we suck at camping?! The curse is real people. Even if we go with other avid campers who've never experienced our drama, we somehow suck them into our portal of bad luck instead of the other way around. This time was no exception.

John and Karen invited us camping with them. John is an avid hunter. He knows how to camp, doesn't get all bent out of shape about a little bad weather, and has all the tools and stuff to make a camping adventure easier and rain-proof. We scheduled this trip 6 months ago with the thought that summer camping would be fun, rain free, and warm. How could anything go wrong? The week leading up to our camping date showed an 80% chance of rain with temperatures plummeting into the low 30s at night.

John ensured the rain would stay off our tent by providing us with this fantastic tarp. Sadly, the tarp did nothing to keep the 32 degrees out of our tent.

This is the face of a "not-happy-camper".  Chloe did not sleep all night. Apparently our sleeping bags and quilts were not enough of a defense against the freezing night air. This was our first attempt at sleeping outside in freezing temperatures.

The first bird started its morning song around 4am. I was finally brave enough to make a run for the car by 5:07am. I literally could not feel my toes they were so numb. We all sat in the car with the heater blasting 90 degree air for 2 hours waiting for John and Karen to wake up.

 They enjoyed all the comforts of home in this camper they rented. I am now of the opinion that campers make camping easier. It helps take the primitive out of nature.

However, when we decided to take our kids on their very fist camping adventure in March of 2008, we were going to do it primitive. We didn't have a lot of money to buy all the right gear. We were given a tent for Christmas one year. We all had sleeping bags. We lived in Texas, so rain and/or bad weather wasn't a problem. We had a cooler to put all our food in and we had chairs to set up around a camp fire. What more do you need? This wasn't a costly venture, it was done out of practicality and with great cost efficiency. And the kids loved it! How can they not, the whole outdoors becomes their playground. It feeds their curiosity. They can use their endless amounts of energy running everywhere. It's such a great activity to do with young kids. And therein lies the key phrase: young kids. We are no longer in that phase of life. We actually only took one of our kids on this latest trip and she was having none of it. Except for when she was in the hammock with her young cousins.

That was a happy place.

I had a great time with my little snuggle bug on this trip. I was his horsey and he was the cowboy. 

We were very lucky to get campsites right next to each other which makes hanging out that much more fun.

We couldn't have asked for a more beautiful setting. We were at 10,100 feet above sea level. I think the altitude had a lot to do with how incredibly cold it still was in June. I guess if you can still see snow, it means it's still cold. And as we've learned living in CO the past two years, afternoon thunderstorms are very common. 

When it rained after dinner and throughout the night, we just got cozy in the camper and played a lot of games and stayed dry.

But the moonrise was pretty.

 The next morning we decided to pack up our tent early. It was forecasted to rain the entire day. We would rather put our tent away early and enjoy the rest of the day. We were supposed to stay a second night, but after the first nights' frozen fiasco, we knew there would be no second night. But that didn't stop us from enjoying the second day. We played cornhole (the girls won).

We threw lots of rocks into the lake.

We made fire.

This was such a beautiful setting. It was a fun time together. And we actually ended up with periods of sun and warmish weather believe it or not. But it also cemented our decision to never camp again. We will be happy to accompany any fellow campers who desire our company while staying in a cabin. But that's our minimum requirement from now on. We love nature. We love exploring. We love outdoor adventures. We do not love rain. We do not love cold. We do not love numb toes. We are not primitive and we are not wealthy. We may not be able to afford camping in style in a camper, but we can afford a cabin for a night. A structure that is sure to keep out bugs, rain, and cold. This is the new "us". Goodbye camping. It was funnish (not really) while it lasted. You gave us lots of memories (filled with rain and cold). But life is a cycle and full of change. We are ready to embrace that change with open arms.