mile high

our life is not all fun and vacation, but it is summer time and so tonight's post is all about denver.  even though james and i've made trips to kansas, wisconsin, missouri, cali and florida this year, this is truly our first official kehrli family vacation!!  (can you tell i'm excited?)  i love planning, so we have a (flexible) itinerary  with plenty of time for parker's naps (11am-2pm blocked out each day) and full intention to be back in our hotel room by 8:30pm every night for the sake of p's routine.  knowing that it can be a faux paux to talk money, i've gone back and forth about whether to share our budget.  however, there is a big difference between sharing annual incomes (which james and i've vowed not to do on the blog or IRL) and sharing a trip budget (which i think can be semi-helpful for others), so here goes our 5 day/4 night budget:

flights: $320 (parker still flies free!)

hotel for 4 nights: $220

rental car for 2 days: $100

food: $250

entertainment: $75

TOTAL: $975

we've already booked and paid for the flights and hotel, which makes the actual expense in september easier on the wallet.  below are the trip details!

1. denver aquarium.  i've heard great things about this place and since it is right by our hotel, it should make a great activity for a 1 1/2 year old (who is still free to almost everything!)

the rockies have an afternoon game while we are in town, so we are planning on hitting up the $4 rockpile seats!  i went to several rockies games whil living in denver and loved them.

our hotel: the sheraton.  we really wanted to stay downtown because i love the 16th street mall, and we can rely on public transportation the first 3 days (as well as many restaurants within walking distance), so this hotel it is.

the hotel recently recently completed a $70 million renovation including this rooftop pool, which i cannot wait to hit up (and am sure parker will love!)

and last but not least, i'm hoping we have time to go to the denver zoo as well.  the aquarium and zoo might be too many animals for one trip, but i can't decide which one would be best so right now they are both on the agenda (james nixed the water park idea because parker is too young to truly enjoy).

saturday night we are going to my friend jinger's wedding with some of my old intern friends, and hopefully we can meet up with some jbu friends as well!  apparently denver is our favorite city to visit because we've gone there every other year for a while.  here we are in summer of 2007 before going to cirque de soleil (we look so young!)

feb. 2009: out to dinner with jbu friends in denver!  (technically p's first trip to denver as i was 7 months pregnant)

i still think if there was one city i would love to live in it would be denver. if one of our families lived there the decision to move would be easy.  i love love love denver and colorado!  so beautiful, laid back, and tons of  outdoor activities to stay in shape.  maybe one day i'll move back.  until then, sweet dreams and love you all!