Even though the girls were being totally evil at the stores we went to today, I still got them ice cream. I hope that 5 yr olds have short term memory and forget the 85 times I threatened not to take them today….man I’m such a sucker.
July 27 2008 | Twins | No Comments »
The girls had their first, I’m sure of many, official events. They have been going to ballet classes for weeks in training for the big day. They had their big performance at a High School auditorium in front of a pretty large crowd They had around 20 different classes performing (hence the large crowd).
All of the little kids were cute to see. The girls were closer to the end but it was worth the wait. They performed a frog dance full of hops and twirls. There was also a grand finale with all the classes doing the Under the Sea. The dance instructors were off to the side of the stage behind curtains. It was funny to watch the kids starring at the “curtain” the whole time instead of the audience.
The girls also had the opportunity to get all dolled up with the whole hair and make up bit…It was a little Jean Benoit…but still cute. The Grandparents, couple aunts, uncle, cousin, and friends made it out, and we feasted at Old Chicagos afterwards.
To sum up….it seriously was the cutest damn thing I have ever seen. And we have the $60 DVD memento to prove it!
See the photo set at: http://picasaweb.google.com/ryan.mccutchen/DanceRecital
July 13 2008 | Family and Friends and Twins | No Comments »
Kristen and the girls went to visit Aunt Vickie in Seattle and then headed down to Ryderwood, WA for a 4th of July parade. I don’t have a lot to say about this trip since I didn’t go, so I’ll just get right to the pictures:
The pictures are in a web album on Picasa. I may start using Picasa since other people are allowed to order prints unlike Flickr.
The pictures are here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/ryan.mccutchen/SeattleTrip
July 13 2008 | Family and Friends and Trips | No Comments »
I hate the hype of News Years where you try to figure out which place you want to spend too much money on to spend the night with a bunch of meat heads in leather shirts and cheap cologne grinding up on cheap girls - like the kind you would never take home to the parents. But I suppose when you have kids…you just hope you can make it up till midnight to see the ball drop with Dick Clark. ……..heh heh…….Ball drop with Dick
This year we decided to be unconventional and just have people over for a Guitar Hero tournament. A very non-New Year type party, but a great time none the less. Guitar Hero is a super fun game to play with friends. Dave brought over his righteous axe so we could go head to head. We were ringin in the New Year to the chops of Brett Michaels, and Slash. Definitely sweet. Check out Maddy in the background of this picture…..ROCK ON!
January 20 2008 | Family and Friends | No Comments »
Christmas is always so eventful at our house with both Kristen and my family living in town, that I will try wrap this whirlwind of a holiday into one summation. Christmas Eve this year was at my Sister’s house which was really cool. It was her first year hosting, and she definitely did it up. We celebrated a little later in the evening and made it more of a drinks and appetizers thing as opposed to the big meal…..funny…I still ate too much.
The girls has a ton of presents as usual - some highlights include these huge plastic ponies from my Mom, and these really cool Scottish dolls from my grandma. The big highlight for me 
was finally getting an xbox 360. Mad props to Kristen for that gift. At first, I thought she would regret buying it as it would lead to me zoning out on video games, but she is on her way to becoming a Guitar Hero champion, so I guess you could say that it is becoming more of a family device than I had anticipated. My Mom brought these crab crepes that were insane….mmmmm…..crab crepes. It was also weird that the Broncos were playing on Christmas eve, so we even found time to watch them loose horribly.
Then for Christmas morning we headed to Elizabeth to Kristen’s parents house. This year we had a white Christmas, which is always cool, but it really came down this year. I would of loved it a lot more if I didn’t have to be on the road, but we made it in one piece. We had the more traditional huge feast on Christmas day where we had more crab (I cant get enough) and a roast that was ‘deelish’…(maybe I should eat before I blog…I seem a little too obsessed with food) Then we had round 2 of presents. The girls got cute clothes, and Hannah Montana toys -what else can you ask for. I got Halo 3 - which is the reason I have been running on 4 hours sleep a night since.
Kristen’s grandma was here from Iowa for the holidays which was very cool. I think its awesome when the girls get to see there great grandparents.
So this year was certainly a memorable one. It seemed to come and go so fast….maybe because in the job switch I didn’t have any time off so it was right back to work after the holidays. Even so it is always good to have time to relax with the fam…..and maybe go on a video game bender or two.
January 20 2008 | Family and Friends | No Comments »
The end of 2007 saw a big change for me - Changing jobs. After 7 years at Coors it was time to move on. In October, I took a job as Senior Consultant at Statera. I won’t go into details about the job as usually when I try to explain my existence to a non-IT person it gets a little boring ….However, if you must know, you can get an idea at my other blog. I have been very happy with the move as my new job really lets me focus much more on the technologies I am passionate about. Kristen and I had a great time at the company Christmas party this year at Invesco Field. It’s the first work party I have had in a long time (hard to believe a beer company doesn’t have parties, but its true), and it was cool meeting a lot of my coworkers. I have been out at client locations since I started so I haven’t had much of a chance to see other people from the office.
January 20 2008 | Good Times | No Comments »
As someone who has lived in Colorado for the majority of his life, I find myself no longer impressed by the intense beauty outside my window….but occasionally I will bask in it, and say “Why don’t I do that more often” Especially when you consider how easy it is. We took off for Estes Park around 1pm, and I thought for sure that it was a waste of time, and that it would be dark by time we got there, but on the contrary, we were eating lunch in the mountains by 2:30. The nice part about Estes Park is that there are a lot of smaller hikes 
for the kids. We took a nice long walk around a little lake, and the girls made a couple of friends in fellow kid hikers along the way.
After the hiking and hanging around Rocky Mountain National Park, we still had time to hit all my favorite spots in Estes Park. The girls got some rubber horses from Indian Village, the same place I got my rubber bow and arrow set as a kid. We then had a pizza dinner, and an infamous caramel apple (which I will always seek out in Estes). So even if you leave for the mountains in the afternoon, you can still make a full day out of it.
When my family first moved to Colorado from Indiana, we went camping for something like 16 weeks in a row, and It was a big part of my childhood. When you see people who are from out of town at the ski resorts just loving it, it reminds me not to take Colorado for granted. I definitely need to get the kids up there more.
(but I still wish I lived near an ocean)
November 03 2007 | Trips | No Comments »
This is a post of a rather old event, but I feel it has to be noted. A couple months back Kristen, Dave, Kevin, and I went to see Louie C.K at Comedy Works. He has had several specials on Comedy Central and HBO. He also did the HBO series Lucky Louie. Maybe its because he refers to his kids as a-holes, but I think he is the funniest comedian alive today.
If you are unfamiliar with his genius…check him out http://www.louisck.com/
November 03 2007 | Good Times | No Comments »
Unfortunately, we didn’t 
do an over the top big thing for the girls birthday this year. I was out at a conference the week before the party, and wasn’t able to help Kristen plan, but she did a great job of putting something together. The other thing is since the girls are not in school they don’t have any real friends yet (other than their cousin). I have 2 more years (I hope) before I need to drop a few hundo on a party for an entire class of twerps.
So we ended up going to Gunther Toodys out by my parents house in Littleton. It was only family this year with the grandparents and aunts/uncles. My 
sister and her husband got the girls one of those v-tech video game systems for kids. I am sad to say that it is the only video game system in the house. I have already found myself waiting for my turn to play….mainly because the girls are total noobs and I pown them.
We also had a little gift session at the house the day before, which is really what their in it for - the presents. My friend Kevin stopped by the day after their party to drop by a gift and they tore through with with little enthusiasm as they were so used to presents at that point….note to self - next year they get dog poo in a box.
November 03 2007 | Twins | No Comments »
We took a road trip this month to the huge metropolis of Lamont, IA to visit Kristen’s grandma for her 80th birthday. I wasn’t sure how the girls would do on the road trip now that they are older and restless, but they were OK….and when I say OK I mean that they are decent for about 8 hours before I start to lose my mind, and yell crap like “I’ll turn this damn car around. I swear!!”
We got to see a lot of the Scovel side of the family as Kristen’s cousins all live near Lamont. They are a crazy bunch, and we had a great time with them. The church for Easter was crowded with what must have been 20 people or so…the highlight of Easter service was watching the cousins stroll in each more hungover than the next. I was still tasting the eggs, hash browns, and nacho cheese delight known as the Barn special from our early (2am) breakfast.
After church, we had Great Grandma’s birthday party at the Scout house (some sort of facility owned by the Boys Scouts). The kids had an Easter egg hunt in the cold…one thing I noted for the future is that 40 degrees in the Midwest is not the same as 40 degrees in Colorado….yikes thats cold. So the girls had to wear these black beanies, and I couldn’t tell if they were looking for Easter eggs or going to hold up a Liquor store….either way I’m proud.
The drive back was nice as well, but my only regret is that we didn’t get to tour the bridges of Madison County (we drove through them in Nebraska…and yes I am gay)
November 03 2007 | Trips | No Comments »