Big Love.

We have spent the last few weeks surrounded by some of the really awesome members of our family, we hadn't seen in awhile. We've been enjoying the end of our summer, doing all the summery stuff we didn't have time for earlier in the summer.

It began with a week long visit from Mimi, she came out to watch Charlie for a weekend, while I was working and Nick was celebrating a friend's wedding. During our week with Mimi, we went west, visiting the Bierman's in Aptos. We spent an afternoon at the beach and a day at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Charlie had a lot of fun playing with his cousins, Eli and Luke in their "Lost Boys" backyard, and still has the black eye to prove it.

At the end of the week, we all headed out to Colorado, where Mimi took Charlie and his cousins Aiden and Ellie for a long weekend. While Nick and I joined several other Watts family members and their friends for a 200 mile running relay into the Wild West. With the race motto being "Get Your Ass Over the Pass," you can only imagine the type of pain this race could inflict. The race kicked off for our team, Beer Runners, in Ft. Collins at 8:45am on Friday and finished a little after noon on Saturday in Steamboat Springs. 29 hours, 36 racing legs and 2 rabbit ears (11,000 + feet in elevation) later our team celebrated a 21st place finish overall and 3rd in our mixed division. Congrats Beer Runners and a BIG THANKS to my Mom for watching all those kiddos!

The team kicking off the race and our support van #1 and incredible driver Anna Lisa!

Amanda recording her "road kills" (number of runners she had passed) and me taking off on my longest leg, 2 miles straight up and 8 miles straight down.

Prepping Jenni for her 7 mile night run, she ran so fast, thinking there was a bear keeping pace.

We look rested and energized at our first van transition and Nick finishing his last leg of the race with a 5 mile downhill.

The team celebrating our finish!