Denver Babysitting

 Jessi and Gary headed to Mt. Princeton for their anniversary and I drove to Denver to babysit the kids!  The weather was perfect when I drove up and Gary and I walked to Gwyn's school so I would know right where to pick her up and take her the next morning!

Jessi had made chili to eat that evening so I didn't even have to cook!!  HOORAY!!  Mid-afternoon I walked to Gwyn's school and found a seat on a bench - I was plenty early which is fine by me - and soon all the kids started walking out with their teachers and all stood in a line until they see their parent and then she lets them go.  So I'm searching and searching trying to find her amidst all the masks!!  And then this girl waves at me and I pull my mask down and say "Is that you Gwyn?"  And of course she shakes her head yes!!!  OMG - I can't believe I didn't recognize her with her mask on!!!!

Thursday morning was red, white and blue day!!  She wanted to wear her 4th of July dress but it looked cold out so I said no and we found this outfit!!  Gwyn was so excited to wear it since it had "love" on the front and that was one of her "power" words the night before!!  We about FROZE walking to school - should have taken the car!!  BRRRRRR

Evan and Kenzie decided my phone case was FILTHY!!  Could they clean it??  Of course - I didn't care - so that's what they did!!!  We played some cards that evening!

Gwyn had fun putting stickers in the "amazon" book that came in the mail and circling everything she wanted for Christmas which was basically everything!!  Gotta love being a kid!

After walking Gwyn to school on Thursday morning, I took the kids out for coffee!  They wanted Starbucks frappes - of course there could only be 2 people at a table so we just brought them home!  I am not a fan of Starbucks but ordered a pumpkin mocha and it was great!!  It was WONDERFUL to see the colors in Denver as all of our leaves are gone - taken by the wind!

Jessi and Gary got home early evening - they had a wonderful time at the hot springs and we enjoyed catching up till we couldn't keep our eyes open!!  Gary took Gwyn to school the next morning so we snuck out for coffee - again to Starbucks since there is nothing else close and Jessi had to go to work but since we were 2 people, we did get to sit and enjoy our coffee together!

It was a wonderful time babysitting the kids - I LOVE being Nana and getting to do this!

Fires and Snow

 The fires in Colorado have been horrible this year - we are blessed that none of them have been even remotely close to us, even though the smoke smell was around many of the days late summer and fall.

It's hard to imagine that Colorado's beauty is being destroyed by fires - there are thousands upon thousands of dead trees in the forests due to the pine beetle kill and I guess this is nature's way of getting rid of them and starting new growth - but it's a tough pill to swallow!

As of last night, here were the current fires:

East Troublesome Fire - 192,560 acres burned - 10% contained - Grand County

Cameron Peak Fire - 208,663 acres burned - 64% contained - Larimer County

Middle Fork Fire - 20,433 acres burned - 12% contained - Routt County

Williams Fork Fire - 14,749 acres burned - 30% contained - Grand County

Calwood Fire - 10,105 acres burned - 76% contained - Boulder County

Ice Fire - 596 acres burned - 90% contained - Silverton

But look what happened yesterday and last night!!!

I'm not sure ANYONE has been so excited to see a winter storm come in!!  We ended up with about 8" of snow and Jill up in Ft Collins (who is close to the Cameron Peak Fire) said they got around 10" of snow!  WHAT A BLESSING!!!  I know it's not enough to actually put the fires out but it will sure help smother a lot of the flames and hopefully the firefighters can take care of the rest!

It's COLD though..... zero when we got up and it's only climbed a degree since then!  But this is Colorado and as usual, the sun is already trying to peek out every now and then!

All of the grand kids are excited as they have a snow day - even the remote learners!!  That's a little strange if you ask me but who am I to wonder!!

It's a beautiful day to drink my coffee in front of the fireplace!

Li'l Red Rodeo

 Remember that song by Collin Raye?  Well I do because I used to really enjoy listening to Collin Raye - I even saw him in concert at Cripple Creek if you can believe that!!

Anyway, Glenn purchased a RED vehicle from a friend of ours - and no, it wasn't a rodeo, it was an Isuzu Amigo!  But every time I looked at it, I thought of that song!

Glenn bought it with the thought that we MAY take it to Mexico and leave it - we've tossed that idea around instead of driving every year.  He prefers to leave a car down there and fly - I prefer to drive as I enjoy the drive AND this next year we have no need to take the truck since we left the boat and the ATV down there, therefore we could take the car which rides pretty darn nice and gets better gas mileage and doesn't use diesel which is more expensive down in Mexico!

I actually did a cost comparison and it IS much cheaper to actually drive down than to fly and pay the storage for a car down there!

Glenn worked on the car - cheap labor - ha ha!!  He put a new windshield in it, did some painting on it and put a black cover on the hood and it did look pretty good!  Then he took me for a drive!  It was loud which I could handle BUT the exhaust fumes seemed to be coming right back in the vehicle and after a couple minutes I was coughing!  Also, there's NO BACK SEAT!!  How are we supposed to pick up people at the airport?  Anyway, a couple of days later Glenn asked me to take pics so he could sell it!!

It sold in 3 days - with an $1100 profit!!!!  I was impressed!  So no Amigo going to Mexico!  

September Photo Dump

 Boy it's not much of a photo dump - does that mean I didn't do anything interesting during the month or just that I blogged about EVERYTHING I did - ha!!

After looking at the calendar, I realized we had company 3 of the 4 weekends!!  So I guess I blogged about all of those - and then we had the 2 fall trips!  There really wasn't much in between!

So here are my lone 2 pics that didn't make the blog!

This guy has been hanging around a lot - he's not the biggest one but he seems to like us!

And this picture is of the aspens on OUR property!!  We have a nice stand of them at the bottom of our property and they are gorgeous too!

Glenn is getting ready to go hunting up at Walden this Friday!  It's always nice to have a little break from each other for a while - he's staying in a cabin with our neighbor and 3 others!

I've started Christmas shopping!!  Ours sneaks up way too fast since we celebrate the 2nd weekend in December so I always start early!  As the grand kids get older, it's harder to buy for them!  I've also spent many hours already starting their "photo" books - and that I truly enjoy doing!

It's been WAY TOO WARM here lately - it's October - time for some moisture!!  It is SO DRY out and many days are smoky - the peak is generally covered in smoke and I think 2 or 3 inches of rain are in order to saturate the ground and get rid of the smoke!  Of course we can't complain because we don't have any fires close to us and we pray the current fires will get put out soon!

I believe we are ALL tired of the pandemic - tired of the fires - tired of the masks - tired of life in general as it is.....We have plenty to be thankful for - it's just that "change" is hard and we're all dealing with it!!  

Winding Through The Aspens

 Since Kebler Pass was on the docket for today's aspens and it's the road out of Crested Butte, I checked online and found a great place to eat breakfast - McGill's!  Since it was pretty darn cold out, we opted NOT to eat outside but enjoyed our breakfast inside at this cute place - breakfast was delicious!

And then it was on to the aspens!!

The traffic wasn't too bad but did get heavier as the day went on!  Glenn was the designated driver and I would say STOP when I wanted to take a picture!

This pass is one of the prettiest for aspens and I can why it's always in the top 10 places in Colorado to see color!

After Kebler Pass, we turned off onto Ohio Pass - it was just as beautiful!

We headed back to the lodge mid-afternoon and rested and then headed back out late afternoon to do Cement Creek Road - a couple years ago when we had done this road, we had seen 4 moose!  Unfortunately we didn't get to go all the way on it - since we were in the car and the time before we were on the ATV, the rocky road turned us back as we sure didn't need a flat tire!

We ate dinner that evening across the street at the other resort since the restaurant was closed where we were staying!  I had a cup of delicious french onion soup and since I still had room, I had dessert - banana cheesecake with all the trimmings!!  YUM!

We headed home the next morning and even saw a bull moose on Cottonwood Pass - a perfect way to end our fall trip!

Fall Trip #2

 I had really wanted to head to Rocky Mtn. Nat'l Park up in Estes Park for our regular fall trip where we stay in a cabin - but the smoke and fire are so thick up there that I didn't think we would even enjoy it so postpone that trip for another time and let's head to Almont for a couple of nights and do Kebler Pass, one of the BEST places to see color!

We stopped in Johnson Village at the coffee place which really does make great coffee - it was nice and crisp outside but the sun was shining so we sat outside and enjoyed talking to a couple and their 2 kids who were traveling and had just came down Cottonwood Pass - they said the colors were amazing and they had seen a moose!  I had wanted to go up Monarch Pass but changed my mind after hearing that!

The bottom part of the canyon for Cottonwood Pass was beautiful but as soon as you start to climb, there are no aspen trees!!  But as we were rounding one of the sharp corners, Glenn spotted a bull moose right by the road!!  I tried to grab the camera but didn't succeed in getting a photo of him - but it was cool to see!!

We drove through Taylor Park and out on one of the roads that took us up to Lake Irwin - a pretty lake where we walked up to the closed campground and had lunch!

Our neighbors were supposed to be staying at the "open" campground but we drove through it and couldn't find them - about 1/2 hour later we met them on the road!

We didn't see a lot of great color on our travels that first day but that was OK!!  What we did see was beautiful!

I had made reservations at 3 Rivers Resort to stay in the lodge this time, instead of in a cabin!  It was more like a hotel room but did have a kitchenette which was nice!  Glenn wanted to take a quick nap before our friends picked us up - after I got all unpacked I realized that Glenn had left the key in the door - I tried and tried to get it out but couldn't - Glenn got up and tried and tried - so went down to get the manager and he tried and couldn't get it!  Finally he called the maintenance man who came pretty quickly and he ended up getting it out and spraying the lock - it really didn't work great the 2 nights we stayed there but at least we could get in and out!

Jan and Jan picked us up at 3:30 and we headed towards Crested Butte - oh my gosh - that's where all the color is - WOW - it was amazing!!

They took us to Secret Stash in Crested Butte for pizza - awesome margaritas and the best pizza we've ever eaten!  It was fun to catch up with them (they are the friends that stayed in our house while we were in Mexico and then moved to Gunnison)

Day one was a success - now on to day two!!