Fall Photography

Ok so I haven't been keeping up with all the events happening in the Valach household, but since I've been taking tons of pictures of it all I figured I'd post some Fall moments. Since I've been learning my new camera and shooting everything that moves me- Josiah isn't the star in all these shots :)... I think Fall is my favorite season in Colorado - it's just soooo Colorful!

marking his lines

showing Papa his masterpiece

Barn near our house that I've been wanting to shoot forever.
The two below are from the same shoot...




our lazy chickens (we're only getting one egg every few days now - and we have 5 chickens!)

looking for the ckicken feed



little hands at the coop

Moments in the yard...

I can't wait to post about my family's trip out to Durango and then our trip to San Diego - I have so many pictures though it's going to take me forever - argh!

Imogene Pass Run

This year my big athletic goal was to do Imogene Pass run. It's a 17 mile run from Ouray to Telluride over a 13,100 foot pass. The plan was to stay in Telluride a night after the run and hang out in Telluride and go hiking. It was a blast! A friend had told me that a good time goal for the run would be 4hours 15 minutes. When I didn't get in the training I wanted (longest run of 15 miles a few times) I figured it would take between 4:15 and 4:30. Having never done this run before I had built it up in my mind to be this impossible feat. That tatctic ended up working really well for me in that it was not as hard as I thought and I ended up finishing in 3:52 - I was very happy. The best part about it was that I had been praying with my prayer partner about this run for several months leading up to it. My knees will usually give me problems on distances over 12 miles. I knew that with God and prayer all things are possible but it was ridiculous- on the way down the mountain (miles 11-17) I just kept feeling better and better - it was a miracle!

This was taken right after I started heading down from the summit. I had told my self to walk this section since it's where most of the falls occur. I started jogging for the picture but you can see my legs aren't going very fast :)

Here's the town of telluride and the condo we stayed at (below)

This is probably the smallest house in all of Telluride (in the middle of the huge 3 story houses) and I joked with Pete that we might actually be able to affrod this one :)

We took Josiah on the Gondola and he loved it - he kept talking about "ride it".

He only wanted Papa to hold him - he might have been a little scared.

The next day we diecided to do a hike with Gab and her mom (who is visiting from Czech) to Bear Creek Waterfall.

I bet this sucker really gets roaring in the Spring - everyone said that is was actually big for this time of year.


So what was Josiah's favorite part of the trip you ask?.....

The heavy machinery of course!

We spent somtime walking downtown and Pete got sick of all the pictures I was taking so here are just a few of them smelling the flowers.

On the drive home I spotted this cool old mine that I thought would be fun to photograph...Pete was excited because he got to explore the inside of the mine while J and I stayed outside.

This face was so cute I had to make it into an Andy Warhol moment

Josiah was so sweet he kept picking flowers for me and putting them on my knee

or should I say petals?

Lake Days

Some friends of ours, Jack and Anand live out in Falls Creek Ranch, a beautiful community of homes out past the National Forest with its own lake. Her son, Emmett is just 5 months older than Josiah and we love to get them together.

Josiah isn't crazy about going in the water yet but he loves boats. There is a collection of community kayaks and life vests available for use out at the Lake and Josiah loves to have me paddle around with him or just stand on the shore and look at the boats. Here are some pics from a recent trip out to the Lake.

Here's Emmett and his dad Jack getting ready to paddle out

J and his buddy Ava who is just 5 weeks younger than he.

Ava and her mom Christine

Unfortunately I didn't get any pics of us when we went out on the lake but here's J in the reeds walking over to look at a beached dingy.

J closely studying the boat

Lots of fun for mom and J!

Scary Sick Fathers Day

I can't believe the flu is going around again - it's June for heavens' sake! This one took a turn for the worse and Josiah refused to eat or drink. I had to resort to forcing liquids through a small medicine dropper every 15 minutes - he would cry the entire time. He is so sweet when he's sick - he just lays in your lap and cuddles (it's the only upside to having a sick baby). It was so hard to see him feeling so awful - it was hard for me to photograph but I knew I would want to remember how he looked when he was sick.cuddling with Papahe was so punk he could barely open his eyes :(doing his best to smile

When we took him to the Doctors the next day she said that he looked pretty good (not dehydrated) but when I explained that he was really malaise and not himself she thought we should run some blood tests just to be sure.

While in the waiting room to have the blood drawn there was another woman in front of us. She had kids, one around our age and she sympathized with us. When her number came up she offered for us to go first. I was so thankful I wanted to cry - she really knew what we were going through - the worry, the anticipation - the anxiety and thin nerves. When we went in Pete and I had to be the ones to hold him down it was horrible - He did really good though- I think it was worse on us than it was on him.

When we finally got the results it showed that his electrolytes were off and his blood calcium was low - they wanted to admit him in order to be on an IV - yay - more sticky pokeys. It proved to be more horrible than we anticipated. They couldn't get his IV in - they tried several times in his arms until finally succeeding on the fourth try. It was in his hand - not a great place for a moving toddler.

At 4 am I woke to Josiah crying - his bed was soaked and his blanket covered in blood - his IV had come out in the night and had leaked everywhere. Thus started the second round of trying to get the IV in. After three more trys and the NICU nurse giving a go - they finally got it in his foot.

the IV fluids made his eyes so puffy. So one night wasn't going to be enough - we had to stay another night. The hospital can be a really depressing place to be when you're surrounded by the same numbing noises of the machinery and the lack of sleep associated with scheduled nurses checks (bless them - we had some really good ones). Not to mention the heaviness that comes with knowing that you're there for a reason - like your baby is really sick!

Fortunately on day two, auntie Ella (as Josiah calls Gabi) came to visit us. She was so sweet - she came in with this humongous fish balloon - Josiah loves balloons. She also brought all his favorite treats that Mommy never buys him. I didn't care a bit - I just wanted him to start eating again. I have to admit it didn't just cheer Josiah up it lifted my and Pete's spirits as well - it was so good to see him smiling again - look at the difference in his countenance!Can you believe how happy he was after she came - he loves her so much -and so do we - thanks for blessing us auntie Ella! (as a side note - I'm always saying that Josiah didn't get any of my features - I may have overlooked one thing - his neck.)When we finally got to leave on day three (Father's Day - Happy Father's day Dad!) they let him ride out in a shiny red Radio Flyer wagon. I was so bummed that this picture came out blurred but I had to put it in - he was just so thrilled to get to ride in this thing, it was great.

We felt blessed this weekend to have so many people praying for us around the clock - I was even able to text my prayer partner at 4 am to tell her to pray they could get the IV in again. My mom also called from Africa to check in and let us know she was praying. We're just glad to have this little adventure behind us. Hopefully this will fufill the quota for hospital stays in Josiah's life (please God? :))