When Max leaped across from Sydney to join us for three weeks in January, we took lots of pictures. As mums do.

I promised myself I’d get them organised, and create a nice montage. As mums do.

Now we’re halfway through February, and the planned montage didn’t happen because other things got in the way. As they do.

Max enjoying the view.

I decided I was being too much of a perfectionist. I just needed to do it. So this morning I opened the new Windows Movie Maker, and plugged in a series of pictures we took as we hiked the Flatirons.

The pictures included views, close ups of snow, crappy ones of trees, some that were out of focus and even one of Max’s jacket that he’d thrown aside as he climbed the final part of the Flatiron, knowing I was coming up behind. (Even teenagers on hikes think mum will pick up after them.) All of them combined were a memory for us.

For the first time ever I clicked on the Auto Movie feature.

Auto Movie allows you to choose some music to go in the background, from the selection already on your computer.

It then crunches it all, does the transitions for you and so on. You can then watch the result, go in and make a few changes if you would like to, and publish directly to YouTube or DVD, or just save it on your computer.

From the moment I opened Movie Maker to the time I was watching the finished product was within about 40 minutes – much faster than if I’d painstakingly put the whole thing together myself. As I had always done before.

As mums, success is about recognising when you can give a little in order to get things done, rather than be a perfectionist at everything (and let’s face it, rarely are we completely happy with what we produce even after days of working on it). That said, I think Movie Maker did a darned fine job. I like to think I could do better than a automated system, but you know what, just quietly? I think this is probably proof I’m no James Cameron.

Windows Movie Maker has always been a favourite of mine. It’s intuitive, easy (ie obvious) to use for non-techy people, and produces very respectable results that you can easily adjust if you’re unhappy or just want to tweak things.

Windows Movie Maker opens the realm of possibility for my 9 and 12 year olds to make movies without paying for lots of equipment or training. In a world where we want to encourage people to have a voice and create content, ease of use and access for people of all ages and technical abilities is the most important factor. Movie Maker gives that to you. Others don’t.

I hope you enjoy watching the little montage. And I’d love to see your own efforts!

Related posts:

1. Why my family loves Boulder
2. Win family tickets to Disney on Ice in Denver!
3. Things I don’t need to hear from my family

Moving to Denver meant we moved to the heart of Speed Stacking. We’d tried it out back in Australia, because you know, it’s freaky to watch so as soon as we saw the ad on tv we just had to give it a go.

The sport hasn’t taken off in Australia like it has in other some places. But Denver is where it originated, and so here we are, equipped with cups, timers and mats.

This sport is great for kids to build their fine motor skills, concentration and team work. I love the flexibility of it all, and the way kids can move at their own pace, and challenge themselves to beat their own times. It’s competitive without needing to beat other people (although you can of course do that). The equipment (some cups) is easily transportable, and fairly inexpensive to buy if you just want the basic set (around $15). I treated myself to a set of little thimble-like cups at the World event last year ($8).

I’m not telling you my times. It’s embarrassing. Instead, here are the current world records, including different countries. I’ll end with a video of the kids at the World Sport Stacking Championships last year. We have the cups out of the toybox now, and are in training for this year, which will be held at the Denver coliseum from April 10-11. There’s an event for adults too, especially as doubles! Anyone want to join me? I promise you can use the standard size cups…

Related posts:

1. World Championships Speed Stacking
2. Just us Talking: When should kids get to decide for themselves?
3. Skiing on a budget with kids in Colorado

As I predicted right here on Mediamum.net in March 2009 when the Rocky Mountain News folded, Colorado’s the Denver Post is now also in trouble. Its owners are asking for bankruptcy protection.

They’re still not humble.

I’m hearing professional journalists and academics in journalism blame all sorts of things for this situation:

1. Falling ad revenues (you know, that’s a failure of the business model that the traditional media organizations have held onto like a liferaft with a hole in it). The Washington Times reports advertising revenue has fallen 40% since 2005, according to the Newspaper Association. It’s the advertisers’ fault.

2. Reader ADHD. People just aren’t interested in “real” news any more. They’d rather read about Ashton and Demi than Haiti. It’s the reader’s fault.

3. Too many people don’t respect the value of newsprint. Everyone is too ready to go online for a format of news that suits them. It’s the internet’s fault.

I’ve heard it all. Except for the truth. It’s the newspapers’ fault.

When the Denver Post runs stories that are simply repetitious of ones posted days earlier, like this one on skiing and helmets, it’s not professional.

When the Denver Post lets its reader comments run along with no moderation on the LEAD story yesterday (I’m not kidding) about a Colorado evangelist’s wife who is trying to forgive him over various indescretions, it’s not professional. (That’s right, The Denver Post thinks you should be happy to pay for this crap.)

My point is, that unless newspapers wake up, get humble, and realise they are creating content for an audience that has a discretionary choice across many formats, they will continue to close – and until professional journalists and editors start creating and moderating content worth paying for across these formats, they deserve to close.

The bells have been tolling for a long time. Take your fingers out of your ears.

Related posts:

1. Unmoderated reader comments are a news fail
2. Sydney Morning Herald blames bloggers for incorrect Haiti image
3. More than deputies: A definition of journalism for the 21st Century

The Islam and the Media conference, held by the Center for Media, Religion and Culture at the University of Colorado at Boulder (January 7-10) was a huge success in bringing together leaders in thought and practise on religion and media. But you wouldn’t know it if you’d been watching mainstream media.
At a time in our history that international front pages and lead stories are obsessively dealing with some aspect of Islam, it’s interesting that of all the mainstream media reporters on religion who were invited to attend the conference or interview any of the delegates decided it was not enough of a priority. Surprising when the topic is hot, and when local media simply had to come to campus on any one of three days (including the weekend) to talk with any of the world leading scholars (including Elizabeth Poole)  on Islam and its representation in popular and digital media.
If I were a reporter with a beat, I’d not only be sure to be on top of the content, but the least I’d be doing is reporting on key influencers in my area.
Perhaps if there had been some events at the conference that reinforced the moral panics international media have aligned with Islam, we would have seen a greater presence of professional reporters – but they would have been reporting after the fact, by their own choice.
Should religion reporters have reported on this conference? Attended it to find out how their media is conveying ideas and representations of Islam?

Image courtesy Library of Congress

Unveiling the panic of Islamaphobia? Or does it serve traditional media to maintain and pander to the ignorance of the people who pay for what might or might not be newsworthy?

Related posts:

1. Disrupting the barriers of media in the 21st Century
2. More than deputies: A definition of journalism for the 21st Century
3. Teaching New Media Literacy

If you’re looking for a great deal for skiing, then a little preparation is in order. Think it out early, and you’ll save lots. Leave it to the last minute, and you’ll be paying for it – literally. As a grad student mum with extremely limited funds, I have got hold of some great deals, and I wanted to share some resources with you.

The Colorado Gems Card. For a $10 initial outlay per card, you get a whole range of discounts and free ski days at various resorts across Colorado. The card pays for itself after the first one or two times of use – for example, at Eldora it will get the holder $10 off the price of a child’s lift ticket (normally $39 a day), and $15 off an adult ticket (normally $65 a day). (One per person, per card, per day.) The processing takes a week or two, so get it early to make good use of it.

The Colorado Passport gives your 5th grader three FREE days of skiing at over 20 resorts in Colorado, and four days for 6th graders. It’s a really great way to get some good savings across numerous resorts, from Eldora to Aspen. The Colorado Passport is FREE for 5th graders, and $99 for 6th graders. It’s well worth the investment for the 6th grader – look at how much the lift tickets would cost you at the resort you’re most likely to go to, and you’ll see what an impact having the card makes. You need to have a picture of your child to process, and online is the fastest way of doing the application. The site says it takes about 2-3 weeks for processing, but I did it two days ago, and it’s already on its way. Important: You do not have to be a resident of Colorado to get this passport – if you know your family will ski Colorado at any time this season, it’s a great one to get for your 5th or 6th grader!

The School of Shred gives your 5th and 6th graders four FREE days of skiing at all the    Vail Resort properties. There is no charge for this card at all, for either grade – just take   evidence of enrolment to the pass office at any of the included resorts, and they’ll sort   you out with all of it done on the spot. (You can feasibly do this on the day you arrive  to ski.)

Additionally, you can get discount lift tickets through local supermarkets such as King   Soopers (you need to go there, not able to buy online). There the tickets this season      will save you around 5-10% off the ticket office price. Not a massive saving, but    everything helps and this is one option for those who find themselves considering  skiing the day prior to heading up the mountain.

Ski rentals are expensive on the mountain. If you plan it well, you can rent in town for  a cheaper rate. Just be prepared to pick up the afternoon of the day prior to your ski  day, and return either the same day, or early the day after you shred. For the front  range, Boulder Ski Deals is my rental location of choice, with rentals from just $10 a  day for kids skis and even better deals for everyone as the season gets older. You can also  try Crystal Ski Shop and the rentskis.com site. All these have deals for group rates, and extended rentals. If you don’t ask, you don’t get.

Food and beverages are expensive (and are kind of like airplane food in quality) on the mountain, so if at all possible, take your own lunch and snacks. The best skiing seems to happen in the mornings, with everyone winding down after lunch, so don’t think you need to take a heap of food with you – a sandwich, some juice/water and snacks is fine. Remember your chapstick and sunscreen (irritating to be so prepared and then have to buy them on the mountain).

And one final note: Please, rent a helmet. You can get helmets for $10 a day anywhere (in town or on the mountain). In fact, some resorts will charge $10 for the first rental and only $8 for the subsequent ones. We’re all about saving money, but medical expenses are far more than $10. It doesn’t matter how fast you go, if you’re learning, if it’s your first time, or if you’re seasoned – if you want to keep your head and what it has in it, protect it. Helmets keep your head warm, look good, and if you don’t wear one, you’ll be the odd one out on the slopes.

Hopefully this will give you a great start to getting out with your kids on the slopes in Colorado – have fun!

Related posts:

1. Our visit to Vail
2. Our day at the Colorado Chocolate Festival 2009
3. Why my family loves Boulder

I am fortunate enough to have been invited to attend IMSI, the Invitational Masters Student Invitational, to be held at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, the weekend of October 16-18. Given Rutgers received over 100 applications, to be one of the 25 students invited to discuss their current research and proposed dissertation topic with Rutgers faculty, existing doctoral candidates, and other invitees is a privelege and real highlight of my academic career.

In my application I had to submit an existing paper to demonstrate my research. The paper I chose to submit was on identity work performed on twitter through the use of language and sentence structure. This paper looked at how people create and present an identity of themselves on Twitter, primarily through the use of @ replies, hashtags and retweets. While it’s a decent paper, for Rutgers I’d like to extend it to look at this identity work, and how the Twitter community sees its need to create an identity of concern in crisis and tragedy. This is where I’m headed.

Online communities and crisis

We’ve all seen media stories of tragic events, and how people are affected by them – and how they’ve gathered together online as a result. While sites exist to create online memorials, sometimes it crosses over and a personal fun page is morphed into a place for others to gather when they’ve passed on. On Twitter, I have personally witnessed multiple occasions where someone has ended up tweeting their own tragic events. The death of a wife. The death of a child. I wonder what would have happened if Twitter had been so commonplace during larger tragedies such as the Virginia Tech shootings.

I have watched the online community gather to provide concern and support to individuals directly affected by tragedy. It is this kind of resonance that led me to undertake a small content analysis on the tweets associated with the Australian bushfires last year. I wanted to find out who was tweeting about it? How were they involved? What were they saying and why?

The paper was a very small, very specific analysis in which I was surprised to discover that two thirds of people who twittered during the high point of the bushfire-related tweets were located nowhere near the tragedy. In fact, they were overseas. None of them knew people directly affected. And what were they saying?

Apart from retweeting basic information, the majority of people wanted to know how could they help?

Seeking triangulation? I’m not quite there yet…

Last week I attended the presentation of Leysia Palen’s to-date work in crisis informatics at CU. And the data appears to be reflected in her unit’s research (in particular, on the American-located Red River floods) as well. Exactly the same percentage – two thirds of people tweeting during a disaster are not directly involved.

So, is this real?

I hear a lot of people who doubt the friendships experienced in online communities. They say “how do you know they’re real?”

Now, of course they’re not doubting that the person tweeting is human (sometimes now, however, that presents an entirely different issue), but they are definitely doubting their authenticity. How do you know someone is really concerned about you if you’ve never met them face to face before? And it’s a really good question.

The Karen Walker factor

Karen Walker was a special character who found life, and resonance with many in the hit sitcom, Will and Grace.  While the show has had its day, there are many Walker moments that still hit the nail on the head.It is what is swimming in my head as I plan my paper for the Rutgers Invitational.

One of these is in an episode when Will and Grace are not talking (after a massive argument in which Will tells Grace to move out, which I swear was one of the strongest bits of acting on television I’ve seen). In chatting with Jack about how to get Will and Grace to talk again, she firstly says, “pretend to think, pretend to think.” She then follows it with “Pretend to care, pretend to care.” Of course Karen does care. She’s just conscious of the need to appear to care as well. Plus it’s funny.

So here I am:

* Are people who offer support in online communities ‘pretending to care’?

* Is the expressed concern a demonstration of identity work that gains them favour and positions them as caring individuals you’d want to have as a friend?

* How does the caring from the community affect the person experiencing tragedy?

Do you have any experience of this? Would you be willing to undergo an interview for my research? What do you believe is true?

My sincere thanks goes to the SJMC at CU, without the support of which I wouldn’t be able to conduct any of my research and also in particular to Dean Paul Voakes who saw fit to support my application with a letter of recommendation that I never saw, but am convinced was highly influential in my acceptance.

Related posts:

1. Disrupting the barriers of media in the 21st Century
2. The IKEA effect and online community
3. Mummy’s back in graduate school

There’s something magical about arriving at the airport with all your luggage and just two of your kids for the upcoming 28 hours of travel between countries, and reaching the check-in counter to find out every bag comes in just under the 23kg weight limit. Score.

And there’s something even more special about being handed your boarding passes and passports, turning around and seeing the 11yr old has just decked the 9yr old, and he is laying on the floor groaning loudly, holding one leg to an audience of passengers who are surely thinking ‘Oh My God, I hope they’re not sitting next to us.’

5 minutes in, 27 hours, 55 minutes to go.

How to make a flight a dreaded experience

We flew back to the US yesterday on United Airlines. Apart from the following treasured moments, we arrived safely:

a. Wholly inedible ‘food’ which really was probably the worst I’ve ever had on the long haul part, and food that’s more expensive than eating at Spago for the domestic route. (And far less tasty. Yes, I’ve eaten at Spago. Once. It was wonderful. I’m classy. I am. Stop laughing.)

b. Lack of in-seat entertainment which is very entertaining for my spoilt kids who were expecting personal movies and tv, yet had to watch tv shows like Desperate Housewives on the screens in the aisles instead. (I do remember my own childhood flights to the UK when there was just one movie for the whole flight, and the headphones never worked. I tried telling them that but they didn’t care and then they got more annoyed. They did manage very well in the end. But I digress).

c. Being checked into three seats on the US domestic part of the journey which were single seats in equidistant, very distant seats which I find very difficult to believe was accidental because we checked into the domestic flight, getting boarding passes an entire day before (see earlier part about children punching each other). There is no way there weren’t three seats together when I checked in. Mind you, I was easily trumped by a poor woman with five kids under five, who had all been seated all over the plane. That’s just completely stupid. I was momentarily tempted to tell the attendant not to bother reseating the kids, but just to reseat this other mother and myself somewhere and bring us a bottle of bubbly.

d. The lack of real assistance for a woman with four children travelling alone, whose 3yr old would NOT stop screaming for about 3 hours in the last quarter of the long haul flight. She was forced to stay in her seat with that kid because she couldn’t leave the others. I knew that. I’ve got lots of kids and have usually travelled alone with them. One kid will cry, or take a particular liking to the novelty of the plane’s bathroom and insist they have to go constantly, or need something from the one bag in the overhead bin. It’s a drama. Something simple could have made her journey easier. Such as a flight attendant saying, “what can I do to help?” instead of ignoring her.

Sidebar: I’ll never forget the Qantas flight Jed and I took while I was still nursing Charlie, about 6 years ago. The dinner came, and there was no way I could cut it up – my arm was indisposed with nursing child. I said to leave it with Jed and I’d get to it later. The Qantas attendant decided that was okay and she’d do it if I preferred, but how about if she cut the dinner up, and just left the dinner and a fork (rather than the whole tray), and then I could manage it while it was still hot? She was awesome. I remember that still. Six years later. I even remember what the flight attendant looked like. That’s good branding.

Market your flights to mums

This is a trip that costs about $US1000 a seat return – minimum. There are a couple of hundred people on the plane, who’ve all paid at least that amount. This is not a bus. People are tired, stressed and emotional. Being an attendant on these flights is hard work. But it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a flight attendant go beyond the most basic of service effort and everyone’s flight would have been better if that kid had stopped screaming.

On our trip over another woman was left standing in the queue with her three kids. The flight had been delayed. It was 2am. The smallest kid was asleep. She had carry-on luggage. She was really struggling. And the attendants all ignored her.

Yes, I helped her as I could, and Charlie even offered too. If an 9yr old gets it, why don’t the airlines?

When we finally boarded that flight, the ground staff said the standard “how are you?” I said “good, and you?” His reply was “tired.”

Well stuff you.

My reply? “At least you’re getting paid.” I should have added ‘and don’t have to sit on the plane for the next 16 hours with kids, and haven’t just had a 3 hours flight to get here, and then waited 9 hours for this delayed one.’

Sheesh. I wonder who’s more precious? My kids completely expecting video on demand in their seats, or these airline staff who seem to think we owe them something more than the price of a ticket.

Instead of focusing on leg room, loyalty programs and discount prices, it would be great to see an airline focus on really going beyond the call of duty to make your flight the best you’ve ever had. If an airline marketed to mothers, they’d see these women are the decision makers, who travel with their families (more ticket sales), and to be honest, it’s the simple things like offering a pair of hands when needed that will make a mother like you more.

Or maybe that’s just too hard. Too much to ask.

Related posts:

1. Why my family loves Boulder
2. Mums and moms all hate laundry, even though we tweet about it
3. The Startup Kid

I’m writing for the online news site, Examiner.com as the Boulder Startup Examiner.

Why? Am I insane? Don’t I have enough to do?

I felt compelled to do it. Boulder is a wonderful town, with a fantastic tech community of people. It’s a really big community, for a small town. It’s exciting, vibrant and smart. It’s full of incredible people. And they’re all doing their own thing.

We’re all working with a similar environment. We see lots of familiar people every week, and there are lots of tech events focused on the community. But we have different lives, experiences and industries. There are lots of people here I’ve never met – and when many of those people are ones I’ve heard of and I know have heard of me in our ‘small’ community, that’s disappointing. We have a wealth of things to draw on that don’t get any focus, simply because there’s no professional journalism covering it.

So that’s what I’m trying to do with my Examiner role. I’m treating it as I would a professional journalistic venture. It’s not personal (that’s what my blog’s for). It’s actual journalism. The way I used to do it. It’s amazing how you never forget. And I’m really enjoying it.

I’m putting together a plan of writing one article a week on five different topic areas. (Let’s see how my time management works with that!) Today’s topic area was Women in Tech. I’ll be writing on that once a week. And today’s story relates to how women who work in Boulder startups simply don’t seem to have the same networking opportunities the men of Boulder do. A pretty self-evident post, I thought. I got to interview some wonderful women (another bonus of working on Examiner is chatting with local startups I’ve never run across, or have only met briefly!). I said to Tara and Grace I wanted to focus on women in Boulder startups. It wasn’t their idea, it was mine. And they came to the party. We had a lovely chat over coffee last week. I recorded the chat, and I wrote the piece.

It seems to have hit a bit of a nerve with some people in various elements of social media, and I couldn’t be happier. I believe the article is respectful of Boulder, the community and both men and women. If you read beyond the headline (as any journalism school will explain, the headline is just the foothold into the story) you get a balanced view of women in startups here in Boulder.

I invite you to read the article yourself, and leave a comment. I now know I’ll definitely be covering women in startups in Boulder every week. Because it’s a great topic, obviously close to my heart. And nobody else covers it.

Related posts:

1. More than deputies: A definition of journalism for the 21st Century
2. Disrupting the barriers of media in the 21st Century
3. I'll pay for content when there's Twitter with penguins

I never dreamed I’d live anywhere other than Sydney, Australia.

When you’ve got a good job, a house you’re constantly doing ‘something’ to, kids, dogs, routine… the last thing you think of is moving. Anywhere. Least of all to a country you’ve never been to before. But then I came home from work one day and Jed told me his start-up dreams weren’t done with itechne. He had a bigger one. To go to the US and launch what was to become scribetribe.us.

And I said okay, we’ll Skype and email.

But he had a different plan. He convinced me to take (another) chance.

We packed up and moved to Boulder, Colorado in August 2008.

Now, lots of people have written about the great things Boulder has to offer in terms of nightlife, culture, the outdoors and the tech scene. And it’s all true and fantastic. I am loving being a part of all of those things. But above everything else, I’m a *proud* mum. And Boulder is an amazing place to raise kids.

Harry and Charlie are aged 8 and 11 and have come to Boulder with us. They have swapped their Sydney private school blazers and ties, frenetic life-by-the-clock, mum out teaching three nights a week, no friends within walking distance, and a home where they weren’t allowed to play out the front due to the traffic – for this:

A lifestyle that is similar to that I remember as a kid. One I thought you couldn’t give your kids any more, because “times have changed.”

They’d never seen snow before we moved to Boulder. Here they love it.

On top of all that, the (public) school they go to has the best educators I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting. They have been wonderful in helping my kids move to not only a new home, but a place where feet and inches, and American history are completely different for them. They’ve made the transtition incredibly smoothly – and it’s largely due to the school. (I’ve already celebrated Bear Creek Elementary in an earlier post.)

For me? The start-up widow? I’ve swapped a lifestyle where the drive to work each day took an hour of fume-laden highways, teaching in this college at Granville:

For being a part of the University of Colorado, which is slightly more attractive.

And on top of everything else, my husband is throwing himself into his life’s dream. He’s happily working on seemingly endless adrenaline, at all hours. But he tries to take a run each day and instead of it being beside a road where it’s simply not safe after a certain hour, it’s up around NCAR where deer graze.

So I guess the thing is, when you think you’re settled and couldn’t think of moving, think again. A bit of unsettling could be the best thing you do for your family. Especially if Boulder is where you end up. If you’re in tech and thinking about moving to Boulder, get in touch with the guys at Boulder.me.

Related posts:

1. How to make a quick family video with Windows Movie Maker
2. Our visit to Vail
3. Win family tickets to Disney on Ice in Denver!

Taking the family out can be tough when the economy is having a downturn and there’s more month than money.

That’s why I’m really excited to give you the chance to win a great prize in my blog’s very first competition! And if you don’t win, I have a code which will give you the opportunity to buy your family of four or more tickets for just $11 each!

If you live in Colorado, the lucky winner will receive a family pack of four tickets to Disney on Ice, being held at the Denver Coliseum from March 12. The family four-pack prize is good for either the first or second night’s show.

There are a few ways to win. You can do as few or as many as you like:

1. Comment on this post with your email/twitter ID (1 entry).

2. Tweet a link to this competition and let me know about it by putting @mediamum AT THE END of the tweet (1 entry).

3. Post a picture of glorious Colorado ice/winter/snow (tweet the link, or add link to your comment, or BrightKite or TwitPic it). Again, if you tweet the link you need to let me know abou tit by putting @mediamum AT THE END of the tweet (1 entry).

So, there are ultimately 3 entries you can choose to have! Go for it! I’ll be announcing the winner on the evening of Sunday 1st March here on my blog and on Twitter too. Good luck!

If you miss out, here’s the code – and you can share this with everyone, including your school so everyone can benefit! Go to www.Ticketmaster.com, go to the Mom Central box and insert the code: MOM to get four tickets to any of the Denver shows for just $44! That’s less than you’d pay for a movie!

Show Dates
Thursday March 12 at 7:30pm
Friday March 13 at 11:00am, 7:30pm
Saturday March 14 at 11:30am, 3:30pm, 7:30pm
Sunday March 15 at 11:30am, 3:30pm, 7:30pm* *Spanish Performance
Get 4 tickets for just $44 offer is good on all performances, minimum purchase of 4 tickets required; additional tickets above 4 can be purchased at $11 each. Not valid on Front Row or VIP seats or combinable with other offers.

Related posts:

1. Why my family loves Boulder
2. Disney on Ice, Worlds of Fantasy
3. Why save the Denver Post?

Yesterday we took a road trip to Vail. It’s just two hours away. I found a great sledding area in Vail courtesy of a website which lets you locate good sledding runs (free) in your neighbourhood. We entered the address in the GPS, and off we went!

The day cost us nothing apart from the car’s petrol and wonderful pizza we ate for dinner. We’ve discovered the following:

a. I need snow pants. Now. Because when I have a frozen wet bum I get grumpy.

b. Charlie is a daredevil on the flexi-sled. He’s worked out that he needs to keep his whole body off the ground and entirely on the sled for the best run and for speed. He flies and cares little about danger… or direction.

c. Harry seems to be a natural snowboarder. He doesn’t even own a skateboard, but managed to stay upright for a long way on his new snowboard. His balance is amazing and he just loves it.

d. Vail is spectacular. We are definitely going back, and will probably make it at least an overnight trip. The whole place is like a gingerbread storybook land. You can see a little in my video![youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BbvpgLfHMuY]

Related posts:

1. Hiking with Harry
2. Skiing on a budget with kids in Colorado
3. Why my family loves Boulder

Harry loves to hike through the Rocky Mountains. There are more trails around here than you can poke a … hiking staff at. (Sorry.)

Harry’s decided to do a series of Hiking with Harry videos, which will show everyone a little bit of what new things he’s experiencing in hiking in a completely different environment. This is his first one, where he is seeing his first ever frozen lake. The quality of the video and editing limits this talented young man because it’s done by his mum! But I’ll get better, I promise!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoXjCFYMt-I]

Related posts:

1. Climbing with Harry
2. Our visit to Vail
3. The Startup Kid

Colorado is not just about snow (the lack of which in 2008 is duly noted). Colorado has some absolutely incredible dinosaur excavations, including stuff that’s still being dug up to this day. That’s something I didn’t know until we went on a day-long excursion/adventure this week.

First stop was one of the sites about half an hour from where we are living, at Dinosaur Ridge. The dino footprints have been preserved and you can walk up and see them! While the Ridge is on the side of a roadway, the road has now been blocked off (except for the little tour bus), so you can safely walk up.

Looking at Dino tracksThe tracks have been coloured black and go right up the side of the cliff

  The RMDRC has interactive kid activities, free hourly tours of the centre, two movies running all the time, and full displays of how they create the casts, and preserve the remains. Everything is presented in such a great way, it kept every one of us enthralled. There was no whingeing at this one! This was a day trip well worth taking!

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Living here couldn’t be more different than what we’ve been used to. And it’s pretty much all good. It’s a 1 minute walk to the bus stop, and the bus comes every 10 minutes. And this is the view I have while I wait:

We have at least one squirrel in the tree which overhangs our condo’s back patio. Of course there are squirrels everywhere here. But this one is in our tree.

I’m sure he’s a ninja. As are all squirrels here in Boulder. (You heard it here first.) Why? Nothing that moves that fast is all good.

In any case, this little guy is very cool. I see him every day. Mostly in the  morning or evening, when I’m actually sitting still long enough for him to whip past. I took a pic of him this morning and the flash made him stop and look at me as if to say “paparazzi.”

Additionally, we have a gorgeous family of deer who also hang out in the backyard. (We call it the backyard. It’s actually open space and a park). The mum has a radio collar on her neck, the dad has only been seen a couple of times (he must work a lot), and the kids bounce around like the Disney Bambi. They like the grass and don’t mind it when people bike past or walk down the path. Sorry I don’t have a pic of them at the moment, but will add it when I do.

All these guys could do with names. Suggestions most welcome.

Click your heels together three times. We’re not in Mulletville any more, Toto!

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