The Hanson Family

Kid's eat Japanese food, who knew.

2008-06-17T16:14:00.001-06:00

Kid's eat Japanese food, who knew.
Originally uploaded by mhanson

Last Friday night we ate dinner with the Dye family in Wash Park at Japon. The kids ate lots of stuff i thought they would turn their noses up at, and even used chopsticks proficiently (thanks i think to Kung Fu Panda's influence). The service was excellent and the food started coming right away. We ate early enough as to not be too much of an embarrassment to the non-kid crowd. I am really loving the idea of being able to take the kids to a sushi restaurant!

Aunt Sonja Graduates from UW.

2008-05-21T12:20:00.001-06:00

Sonja's Graduation
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

The Hanson family made a pilgrimage up to Laramie 2 weekends ago for my little sister Sonja's graduation. We had a great time, and almost made it through the whole graduation ceremony. Lukas spent at least an hour playing 'graduate' by wearing Sonja's mortar-board and sashes (Sonja graduated with high honors - way to go Sonj)...

Go Karting is awsome!

2008-04-24T12:36:00.001-06:00

Micha and Chad looking at the track
Originally uploaded by ktinboulder.

For a company outing yesterday afternoon, our whole team went Go Karting at 'The Track'. A race facility down by Centennial Airport. Everyone really enjoyed the track, and a few of us can't wait to go again.

My buddy Keith Hunniford was by far the fastest driver on the track consistently lap after lap.

Lukas's First Ski Day!

2008-02-11T10:52:00.001-07:00

IMG_0310.JPG
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

This past Saturday, I took Lukas for his first ski lesson at Winter Park. Lukas and his Friend Jordan had a great day at Mary Jane on the Galloping Goose run. Lukas was so excited to go, that he almost jumped out of his skin on the car ride up.

As a parent, i was impressed with the setup at Mary Jane. We skied for free all day as long as we were skiing in the family area. Great setup to get the kids started and interested in skiing, short little lift ride with a nice run they can get down in about 5 minutes. We ate pizza for lunch right at the base of the run (which was also a big hit).

We choose the perfect day to take the boys up as well, it was warm (just about 35) and sunny, so no complaining about being cold. The snow this year has been increadable, as any of you out there who get your Colorado snow reports from powderfone will already know.

2008 Stock Show is a big hit with the Hansons.

2008-02-01T10:59:00.000-07:00

IMG_0267.JPG
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

This year once again, the Hanson family made it to The National Wester Stock Show. We actually made it to two different events this year with the Kids, the "Super Dogs" show, which was a big hit with Olivia, and the 'Pro Rodeo' which Lukas was absolutely enthralled with.

According to Lukas, Bronco riding is now one of his possible careers - to the great dismay of his father who cannot imagine the hospital bills associated with such a sport!

Weekend in Las Vegas

2008-01-25T13:04:00.000-07:00

Bellagio, Carrie
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

Carrie and I spent a weekend in Vegas last month. My parents were kind enough to offer up their timeshare for the weekend & watch the kids, so Carrie and I checked out the sites in Las Vegas.

The Bellagio had a garden display for the Chinese New Year which you can see in the background. We gambled a little, and went to see the Zumanity Cirque du Soleil show.

Sledding at City Park

2007-12-10T12:12:00.001-07:00

IMG_0097.JPG
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

We had a great time this Sunday taking the kids sledding at City Park in Denver. Lukas & Olivia spent a good hour and a half sledding without complaining about the cold!

We hope to get Lukas started with Ski lessons this winter, as his friends have already started skiing.

Kelly does the Ironman Louisville

2007-08-29T14:49:00.000-06:00

My business partner Kelly Taylor just finished the Ironman in Louisville Kentucky over the weekend. Kelly and his brother Mark Taylor both competed in the Ironman, Kelly finishing in 12 hours and 6 minutes (12:06:00), and Mark finished in 12 hours and 15 minutes (12:15:00).

You can check out some pictures of Kelly and Mark during the race over on Kelly's family website.

Kelly seems to have recovered just fine, and even rode his bike into work today. I personally thought he would not be friends with his bike for a few weeks, but he said the ride in was perfect.

Kelly is using the new .mac gallery function that comes with the new iPhoto 08 to publish the pictures from the Ironman. This is a really cool way to publish pictures or movies from an event.

Testing out the really cool looking code...

2007-08-21T23:40:00.000-06:00

Testing out this really cool little flickr flash gallery embed. I have been a huge fan of all the development around flickr for a while, and am always playing with all the little tools that come out using the API. Anyway, interested in adding this component to your site to display your flickr data? here is the link to pictobrowser.

Escaping the heat in Estes Park!

2007-07-22T17:35:00.001-06:00

Escaping the heat in Estes Park!
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

I have been having a lot o fun playing with the camera on my iPhone. Picture quality is not bad, and using the flickr mail upload function allows me to publish images from the camera right to the blog - pretty slick.

Sent from my iPhone ;)

Amsterdam Bicycle Parking Garage

2007-07-13T10:29:00.001-06:00

Amsterdam Bicycle Parking Garage
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

I took this shot from a canal ferry in Amsterdam. This parking structure really blows me away, a multi leveled parking garage at the train station. I have never seen so many bicycles in one place in my entire life. Wouldn't it be great if this started to be a trend in some US cities? 10 bikes for every single parking space needed for a SUV right now....

The Three Amigos

2007-07-11T15:04:00.000-06:00

Well, the day has arrived when our good friends & neighbors the Moss-Kings have moved to California. We are happy for all the new adventures they will have, and will try to visit them this fall, but Lukas will miss Gus, who he has played with almost every weekend for the last two years.

European Vacation!

2007-07-11T12:31:00.001-06:00

Bittburger
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

The Hanson family took a trip to Germany and Holland for 16 days this summer. We traveled with the kids, which went much better than I expected, and stayed one week in southern Germany and one week in Holland.

We traveled with Opa & Oma which was great. We flew Denver to New York then on to Dusseldorf on LTU airlines which was great and pretty cheap. If you want to check out the pictures they are up on flickr.

The May fire red eye

2007-05-30T13:15:00.001-06:00

Our main developer here at work is starting to get some nice press for his band 'The May Fire'. They just had an interview on MTV3...

Mayor Klaus fights global warming.

2007-05-11T16:50:00.000-06:00

My dad was elected Mayor of Laramie last year, and is doing his part to help with global warming at the 'city' level. He recently passed me this article in Casper Star Tribune.

Carrie and I have been talking a lot lately about our own carbon footprint (as is everyone I guess since it is in every magazine i pick up). so I thought this was pretty neat timing.

"LARAMIE - Mayor Klaus Hanson hopes Laramie will soon become the second Wyoming ciy -- after Jackson -- to subscribe to the Mayors’ Climate Protection Agreement, a voluntary program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions." Read More.

Steffi & Jared's Flick Page.

2007-05-11T15:19:00.001-06:00

steph strikes back
Originally uploaded by jaredlong9.

My sister Steph & and her husband Jared have been teaching in Japan for the last two years. It has been really interesting to watch their day to day life via flickr. It's just a little window into the culture they are experiencing.

Their flickr gallery really has a nice time line narative to it, you can tell that they become more and more comfortable with their new surroundings as the images progress.

We have been using Skype to communicate as well (and pulled in my Dad and Step mom as well to using Skype). It really is our own little family experiment of new media. Steffi and Jared have watched Olivia & Lukas grow up via Flickr, Skype & Blogger, we have not once picked up a traditional 'phone' in to years.

You can check out there first YouTube post from there trip to Tokyo here.

Lukas's First Baseball Game!

2007-05-11T14:58:00.000-06:00

I took Lukas to his first major league baseball game last night! We went to go see the Rockies play the Giants last night. We did not get to watch much of the game, Lukas liked getting food at the ballpark more than anything else. He actually consumed the following: one foot-long hotdog, a bottled water, a bag of pop-corn, and a 'helmet' ice cream Sunday (without getting sick I may add). After consuming all this food, he promptly informed me he was ready to head home.

Halloween!

2006-12-01T08:13:00.000-07:00

At the Hanson household - Halloween was a big deal this year. We bought Lukas his Batman costume about a month ahead of time, and I think he put it on just about every day. Instead of his sidekick being Robin, it was Duck-Girl.

Carrie's Triathalon This Summer

2006-10-27T16:35:00.000-06:00

DSCN1188.JPG
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

Carrie participated in the TRI-for the cure this summer at the Cherry Creek Reservoir here in Denver. We had babysitting for the morning, so I wass able to go out and cheer her on. This is Carrie's second triathalon, and she improved here time by quite a bit over her first race.

Messy Birthday Party.

2006-06-07T09:57:00.000-06:00

IMG_2936.JPG
Originally uploaded by mossking.

Lukas and his friend Gus attended the second annual 'George's Messy Birthday Party' yesterday. As you can see, it took a lot of effort to get them clean afterwards. The boys painted themselves blue from head to toe with washable paint. You can see all the pictures here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mossking/

Olivia's first driving experience.

2006-05-01T10:12:00.000-06:00

DSCN0951.JPG
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

Does my look in this picture express the fellings that I will really have in about 15 years when Olivia wants the keys!

This little car is our neighbor Gus's car, which both Olivia and Lukas are very interested in.

iPod vending machine

2006-03-03T10:57:00.000-07:00

iPod vending machine
Originally uploaded by sbisson.

This is the coolest thing. Great marketing program, someone was on their game putting this program together. iPod Nano and shuffles and all the accessories in a vending machine in high traffic airports & train stations. Karen (who I work with) just bought a shuffle in New York in the train station. Talk about instant gratification!

Addition: I just found out Safeway here in Denver has these same machines. Here is an article in the Denver Post.

Stockshow 2006

2006-03-01T14:16:00.000-07:00

Stockshow 2006
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

Carrie and I took the kids to the Colorado Stock show this year. Needless to say it was expensive, and kind of a flop. Not much for Lukas to get really engaged with.

Lukas shows an interest in swimming.

2006-03-01T14:12:00.000-07:00

DSCN0821.JPG
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

Well, it looks like my son may end up being a swimmer. He is showing great intrest in the "gear", as well as the waterslide at the pool we go to. He actually went down the 2 story slide alone last weekend!

The Burley'

2006-03-01T14:11:00.000-07:00

DSCN0806.JPG
Originally uploaded by mhanson.

Weather in Denver for the last week or two has been unreal. We have had some days in the 70's. Needless to say, we are enjoying the weather and walking in our neighborhood. Lukas & Olivia seem to enjoy our burley buggy, and ride together often.