Visiting the Aurora Memorial

It's been a week since the Aurora Movie Theater Shooting here in Colorado - Cheryl & I decided to visit the makeshift Memorial that was set up at the Movie Theater location to pay our respects and say a little prayer for the victims.

The first thing we saw when we arrived at the Century16 Movie Theater was lots of yellow crime scene tape.

Most of the yellow tape surrounded the movie theater and the parking lot.

Across the street were all the News stations - CNN - Fox - Channel 7, 4 and 9 as well as all the local stations.

Most of the newscasters were across the street from the memorial and did their interviews and broadcasting from this location.

This is the view from the News area of the memorial that was set up for the victims that lost their lives as well as those injured.

As you can see, behind the crosses that were set up - some of the photographers and newscasters made their way down to the memorial to interview some that were visiting the site.

Here a news photographer is filming a lady that had just laid flowers onto the site of one of the victims.

Many parents had brought their children like these 2 who brought stuffed animals to place on the makeshift graves of one of the victims (note the newcaster and cameraman by the road pointing to the kids.

This memorial is set up for Victoria, the little 6yr old girl that lost her life in the shooting.  As you can see a little boy lays a little stuffed dog on her memorial.

This banner was created and set up by children from a nearby school - with lots of heartfelt thoughts that were written on it.

There were mountains of flowers, balloons and candles everywhere on this site

There were 12 crosses set up for the 12 victims that lost their lives in the shooting that terrible day.

Each cross had the name and story of each victim and who they left behind.

This one was for a your girl named Micaya. Her family and friends placed a few of her personal belongings on the cross and wrote sentiments on the cross itself.

The victims ranged in age from 6yr old to 51 yr old.

Victoria, the youngest of the slain victims, had the highest mountain of gifts laid upon her memorial.  She captured the heart of many and broke the heart of all.

This big white board with hanging markers was loaded with many messages - and many more were written while we were there.

There were many signs that people had made to voice their feelings - like this one.

The Memorial site was a difficult visit for us - we both cried and were deeply affected by the sadness and somberness of the site and the people who also came to give their respect.

Blanche & Lucy visiting friends in Colorado

Between visiting with the grandkids and looking for property here in Colorado - Blanche & Lucy have been having fun visiting with some of our friends who live in Az. in the winter and in the Denver area in the summer.

Most of the photos here were taken with our cell phones so we appologize ahead of time for any grain or fuzziness....Our friends Barb & Dory cooked us a great meal  when we visited them in Loveland, CO (north of Denver)

Barb's house is in a great little neighborhood which Blanche and Lucy loved on their after dinner walk.

The back patio was very comfortably shaded on this very hot day.

The girls loved the cool green grass on their tummies.

We visited our friend Annie's house twice already.  Here we met her friend Barbie and enjoyed a delish shrimp salad lunch together.

Annie's house is very pretty located in Pine Junction - a little north west of Denver - in the mountains.

Her house is at 9000ft so it was wonderfully cool this day at her mountain retreat.

This is the view from her deck while we ate - very relaxing and peaceful.

Annie's living room - a great place for company visits.

You can even see those mountain ranges from the dining room.

From inside the house we could watch Cheryl and Barbie chatting and see the weather come in over the mountains.

The next time we visited Annie - we also saw Ann, Lila and their new addition Maxwell - Ann & Lila live south west of Annie not too far from Buena Vista.  Blanche & Lucy loved visiting with Maxwell this day...

Blanche & Lucy's adventures in Colorado.

The Denver Post is reporting on the wildfires in the Denver area - As you can see  President Obama was here giving Federal help to the state announcing Colorado a Disaster Area.   We are not hearing daily reports on the fires recently - they are slowly getting them under control.

Last week Denise & Tyler flew back home to New England to attend Denise's High School friend's wedding.  While there they visited the ocean.

Before the wedding Tyler & mommy get a manicure and pedicure.

Tyler visited a fun water park while visiting her Pepere (grandfather) in N.E. 

So while the girls are in Massachusetts, Ethan spends time with Grammy,  Cheryl and Blanche & Lucy.

One of the fun things we did was go to Chuck-E Cheese for pizza and games... here we are going in for the adventure.

Ethan met Chuck-E Cheese in person.

Ethan even got to take a ride with Chuck-E in this great car.

One of his favorite rides was a wild horse ride.

Chuck-E sang a special song for Ethan.

The next day Ethan, his daddy, Gary & I went to visit the Denver Zoo - one of Ethan's favorite things to do - here we are visiting the newest addition - the Elephant village.

This is a miniature deer - and this is the biggest it will get.

One of Ethan's favorite animals is the Giraffe.  Here a mom and her baby walked right towards us.

Here the mommy giraffe looked right down on us - very close.

Ethan loves joking around with his dad.

And sometimes he's a serious little boy.

On another day Ethan found a new friend in the Garden - so we put it in a bowl to keep it safe.

And we named her 'Greta the Grasshopper'.

Ethan was fascinated with the grasshopper.

And not a bit afraid.

After a busy morning playing Ethan & Lucy took a little nap.

And Blanche joined them in nap time.

After his nap - Ethan was right back outside playing water games.

We filled all the pails with water and toys and stayed busy filling and emptying containers all afternoon.

And Lucy decided that her favorite place is in the grassy shade under the slide.