The Land of Enchantment

What is wrong with this picture??? You think you've figured it out? We are at the Balloon Fiesta in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in a basket even, but where are the balloons? That's right, we drove all the way to New Mexico and didn't even get to see any hot air balloons. We had been pretty excited about this trip for a while, so needless to say, we were pretty disappointed. The trip was no where near a bust though. We had such a fun weekend trip to the Land of Enchantment!

 We left the winter wonderland of Denver for the High Deserts of New Mexico. That's right, we woke up to a light dusting of snow the day we headed out of town.

We couldn't pass through Colorado Springs without stopping at Rudy's! Even if it was 10:30 in the morning. Apparently it's never too early for some southern BBQ. (They open at 7!! Haha) We convinced the Van-Foulger's to meet us there :) 

Calum was so excited to see his friend Aimsley!

Calum was such a good traveler. Well most of the time... Notice the chocolate all over his screaming face!

We spent our first night checking out Santa Fe and eating some ridiculously good New Mexican food with lots of green chiles! Our friends Kylie and Ryan were great hosts as well as tour guides of the city! Let me just say, that I fell in love with Santa Fe. I wish I had taken more pictures! It is so cute, old, and has so much history! I love places like this. I could spend days checking out all the quaint shops, museums, galleries and wandering the nooks and crannies. Kevin is not convinced. Haha.

Calum's bringing in the wagon train! He was so excited up there. We need to get him on a real horse! 

Calum checking out some of the merchandise from the street vendors :)

This is the oldest house in the United States!! Crazy! 

 The next morning we woke up at 4:30 am to go wait in a ridiculously long line to get on the shuttle that took us to the balloon festival. Once on the shuttle we received the horrible news that it was too windy for the balloons to go up :( 

We still had fun at the festival of course.

Calum got to check out some helicopters with his stand in Grandpa :) This is our friends dad. Haha.

We also got to get in a for real hot air balloon basket!

Calum passed out on the car ride back to our friends house! Haha.

We visited the Albuquerque Temple. 

Ate at the famous Dion's Pizza. Thanks for the tip Laura, it was scrumptious!

And checked out the Sandia Crest.Winding roads and crazy wind were all worth the amazing view of Albuquerque!

After our fabulous time in Albuquerque visiting our friend Kylie and Ryan, we ventured up to Taos to spend some quality time with our long lost friends Jake and Dana. They also were fabulous hosts spoiling us with ice cream, banana bread, popcorn and pancakes. What?!! Then they took us to the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge. Which was awesome and ridiculously high!! Cool info and pictures of the bridge here!

On our way home, Colorado Springs again lured us in, and we took another unplanned stop to check out the Garden of the Gods, a mini Moab if you will. Really pretty red rock formations, but if you've been to Moab it may not live up to all the hype some Coloradans like to give it :) 

Losin his drawers.

 More in the week. We made that applesauce that I was telling you we were going to. We borrowed this contraption from one of Kevin's coworkers and it worked like a charm. Calum had fun watching and helping us cook and mash the apples.

Dad decided to put Calum in this stool and push him around. He loved it! But now whenever he sees the stool he tries to flip it over and climb in it! Such a daredevil! He also went down this HUGE slide at the park all by himself and seriously considered repelling down the climbing wall that is equally as high. Along with being a daredevil he is kind of a brute. He head-butted me hard enough to give me the first bloody nose of my life and didn't even bat an eye.

Still saying lots of words, our favorite this week was when he said "zipper" clear as day. He said it with such gusto that me and Kevin busted up. Such a fun character. We love him so much and he made our visit to Land of Enchantment that much more enchanting :)