Just a quick blog tonight, as I've been really busy with work. Dave's best friend, Dan, was in town last weekend, and they drove down to San Diego for some weekend fun and I started organinzing for our move and hung out with my friend, Denise. Today, on my way into work I saw Sarah Silverman and one of the actors on Young and the Restless at the Dry Cleaners. Here is a pic of both of them:
Eyal Podell (Adrian Korbel) on Y&R

Sarah Silverman

This weekend Dave and I will be going back to San Jose and coming back on the 4th of July. We are looking forward to catching up with ol' friends and family :) Especially my niece, Emily.

Following up on my previous blog regarding my trip to Colorado last week...

On Wednesday my mom and I met up with a couple of ol' friends of my parents that worked at United Airlines with my dad. We had a nice lunch!

Then on Wednesday evening, we met up with my Aunt Donni in Downtown Denver and she gave us a brief tour of the downtown area and we caught up. We were both really happy to see Aunt Donni, because we hadn't seen each other in almost 20 years. Here's a few pics of our visit:

Inside and Outside Union Station

Then on Thursday we had another great day. My mom and I met our entire new family. My mom's 1/2 brother, John Erickson, his wife, Denise, their oldest daughter, Alicea, and her husband, Josh. We also met my 1/2 cousins, Sara, Lizzie, John, Mark and Luke. From their house in Colorado Springs, we all drove over to my cousin Kevin's house (also in Colorado Springs) for a BBQ to see Kevin, his wife, Debbie, and their two daughters, Amy and Rachel. This was the first time I have ever had so much family in one place. Here's a few pics from our day:

Alicea, Sara and Lizzie******Erickson & Lloyd cousins

(from left to right) Amy, Kevin, Debbie and Rachel

Me, mom, Uncle John and cousin Kevin

Then on Friday, we met up with the Erickson family and drove down to Canon City to meet Great Aunt Geneva, Uncle Carl and Jennifer, my mom's cousin. My mom had not seen Aunt Geneva since she was 16 yrs. old and I had never met her before. Aunt Geneva sounded and acted just like my Grandma, so right away I was very happy to meet her. We all had lunch, then drove over to the park to catch up and shoot some pictures. Here are some more pics:

(from left to right and then above) Sara, Luke, Lizzie, Mark, John and Alicea and Josh.

Aunt Geneva and Mom

The entire Lloyd/Lenquist family

There are more pics on Flickr, so be sure and check out the Flickr icon on the left hand side of the page.

I was shocked to learn how much my Aunt Geneva reminded me of my Grandma. Her mannerisms and voice were very similar, so I decided to video tape her to "hopefully" get a feel of her personality and similarity to my grandma, but she was a bit scared to find out I was so close to her with the camera. Here's a short video of the moment:

Then on Saturday, my mom and I woke up really early, so I could drop her off at the airport. After I dropped my mom off, I decided to venture over to Littleton, CO to see Columbine High School. I have this weird fascination with school shootings, as I am going to base my documentary on these, so called "bad" kids, who I feel had a troubled home life in their formative years. I was surprised to see other photographers/tourists there too. Here are a couple of pics:

Whew, this must be the world's longest blog ;). In closing, upon arriving home, my mom sent me a picture of my grandma when she graduated and I found these two family members to look very similar:

Alicea, do you see any similarities?

On another note, Dave and I picked a date to move back to the Bay Area...August 5th, 2007.

Last week, I traveled to Colorado with my mom to meet my 1/2 Uncle and his family. Over the past year, I learned my Grandma put up her 3rd child (a son) for adoption, when she was 43. His oldest daughter, Alicea (25), contacted a few of my mom's aunts and uncles a couple of years back and long story short...my mom and I started speaking and writing to Alicea over the last few months and we then planned a trip out to meet our new family this month.
My mom arrived in Denver, CO last Monday and I arrived Tuesday afternoon. Our first visitor was Alicea and her husband, Josh. They picked us up at the hotel, then we drove in to North Denver for dinner to meet my mom's brother, John Erickson, and his wife, Denise. Alicea had been looking for her dad's mother since she was 12 yrs. old and we were all really looking forward to this initial meeting. Our nerves settled within a few minutes and we had great conversation the rest of the evening and compared family notes.
Here is a picture from our initial meeting:
Cheri, Denise, John, Karen (mom), Alicea and Josh

Changing the subject, because I have a ton more to write and need to go to bed, as I have quite a bit of work to catch up on tomorrow. In the meantime, I saw a celebrity at the grocery store today. Nikki Taylor (Ali Larter) from "Heroes" was in front of me in the checkout line with her boyfriend. Here's a pic of her:

More to come...

I'm learning many new tricks with my blog site and have added some new features.
Check out some of the features on the left hand side of this page. Please note, all links on the left-hand side column will pull up a separate window, which links to the websites.
I also redirected my other (2) domains to this site. You can now reach this site be going to www.cherihughes.com or www.cheridreams.com.

Dave and I had a great day at Pixelodeon today at the American Film Institute! Pixelodeon is an annual independent video festival recognizing innovation, inspiration, and community in global online video. This is their inaugural year! Be sure and check out their website for more details by clicking on this link:

As we all know, the Video Blogging revolution has just begun...

Another week down, on our way back to San Jose...
On Tuesday, Trisha and I were in the audience for On The Lot, and we were right up in front, sitting directly behind the contestants. The thing about this show is that they don't show the audience as much as American Idol did, so unless I pointed us out, you would not see us. But on the bright side, I think we were probably the most televised audience members. We had a great time!

On Thursday night, I met up with an ex-worker and now good friend, Sanjana, from ROO in NY. She was visiting LA for training on her new job. It was great to meet her live (and complain about our last employer), as we knew each other well by phone and Instant Messenger. Here's a pic of Sanjana and me in Manhattan Beach:

This week I'm off to Colorado with my mom. I'm really looking forward to meeting this part of my family for the first time. I have 6 new cousins and an Aunt and Uncle too! A family reunion of sorts. Plenty of pics to come!

The more I see of LA, the happier I am to move back to the Bay Area. One good thing about my move back, is that I'm seeing more of my friends and family, who live down here. Last Wednesday I hung out with my cousin, Kristina. We had great conversation and it was nice to catch up. Check out her website at Kristina Lloyd .

Last night, I hung out with my friend, Trisha, from Cinequest and we had a wonderful night at The Avalon (dancing and drinking). Here's a pic from the night:

Trisha and I will also be in the audience for The Lot on Tuesday night. I'll let ya'll know when it's televised .

Today, Dave and I went to see the movie Knocked Up. We went into the movie with some trepidation, but the movie turned out to be really good. We laughed (alot) and cried too.

I'm really looking forward to my trip to Colorado next week to meet my new family and visit with ol' family members too with my mom and flying to Virginia next month to see my co-workers and my friend from San Jose, Elise and her family.