A Snowy Tuesday

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It’s been a while since I felt like writing. On January 18th, after some of the most bitter temperatures in a while, I headed to Cheyenne. It had been 39 Very Long Days since I’d seen Dan. I swear that the travel fairies were with me as I literally flew up I-25. It is usually a 4.5 hour trip and I made it in just under 4 hours. 🙂 It was so good to be together again.

We had a computer client in Denver on Saturday. When we got back, we packed up all of Dan’s stuff and came home on Sunday afternoon. He will continue to look for work, but that will be done from here, instead of Cheyenne. Neither one of us liked being apart.

This last week has been hectic. Meetings, rearranging the house once more to accommodate the offices to the front porch where it is warm, and dinner with my parents. In that Dan missed Christmas dinner, he got to pick what he wanted for dinner. We had fried chicken, mashed potatoes and green beans with bacon. Mom made oatmeal cookies with butterscotch chips for dessert.

Friday we had a Spanish Peaks International Celtic Music Festival meeting. We are planning for the 9th Festival. It looks like it will be very good.

 

On Sunday we had a birthday party with a group we are a part of called Mach30. It was fun.  Monday was interesting. Dan got an offer to build some electrical parts for a local WISP. It is exciting and should actually net us some income. We had a school district meeting as well that lasted until nearly 8pm.

Today we were suppose to go visit Morgan in La Junta. It was going to be a quick trip as I had yet another school board meeting tonight. Well, we woke up to about 4 inches of snow with more falling. Right now I think we have had about 6-7 inches. The wind has settled down, but the snow is still falling. We stayed home and I canceled the meeting. My parents didn’t go to Pueblo either. They got about 25 miles up the road and turned back. About 30 minutes ago I took some pictures. We are snugged up in the Guest house keeping warm by the woodstove. 🙂

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Heatwave!!!

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Okay, so it’s only 42 outside, but in comparison to the last week or so, that is nice and toasty warm. We haven’t had any more snow, but it has been cold. Lovely star filled nights with no clouds suck the heat right out of the earth, the house and I swear, my toes. By an hour after sunset, even Brandy, the dog wants in. So, I’m soaking up the heat today.

As for the rest of life… Dan is still in Cheyenne trying to find work. He is frustrated by the fact that there are all these jobs ‘open’, and yet no one is hiring. He’s also applying for jobs out of state in all directions. So, all good wishes for employment will gleefully be appreciated. With the computer business failing, we really must find some sort of income.

And… the sooner that Dan has work, the sooner we will be back together. It’s been 26 days apart at this point. Neither of us are happy about the separation. I know it’s necessary, but that doesn’t mean it’s been fun.

Well, time to go bask in the sun some more!

Before I forget…

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We did have a white Christmas. It was lovely. I spent the day with my parents, Daniel and his SO Angela and Morgan. We had a lovely dinner, but missed Dan. He of course is still in Cheyenne.

A few days later, once the snow had melted, I had a young buck in my front yard eating berries. I stood next to our truck and tried to take pictures, as our tomcat, Redtom, was stalking the deer. I startled the deer, which in turn saw the cat. They startled each other and both ran. A few minutes later, the buck came back to eat berries and Redtom kept his back to the buck with the “That was NOT a mouse!” look on his face.

New Year’s was interesting. I spent most of the time trying to calm down Brandy, our dog, who did not care for the fireworks. She was upset until at least 4am. Yawwwwn… I ate dinner with my parents and Mom sent Brandy a bag full of ham scraps and bones. It helped. 🙂

I am hoping that 2013 will be a good year.

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Of being cold and having colds

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Or how I hacked my way through most of December so far.

I went up to Cheyenne on December 5th. Time with Dan, the grandboys and running around Cheyenne. It was fun. Right up until they shared their cold. First with Dan, who was sick the entire time I was up there, and then with me. I’ll blame Dan as well for my cold. I came back to Walsenburg on the 10th and was miserable. And no, not just because Dan stayed in Cheyenne. I had the cold. Ugh.

I managed the board meeting on Tuesday, and then crawled in bed until yesterday. Ugh.

I came home to 4 inches of snow on the 10th. That was the first moisture since early October. It is still far too dry, and if we are lucky, we are suppose to have snow tonight. In the mean time, the wind is cold. Brrrr!

Life in general has been a bit up in the air. We realized in July that our business was about to expire. No clients. No one wanting their computer repaired. The reason is that the most common computer down here is the smart phone. They don’t repair them, they just toss and replace them. So, we’ve had no work. this has caused a rather radical change in our thinking and plans. We started and  to look around and realized that we would have to move. We began to look around. Colorado Springs, Pueblo, Denver and even Loveland. Nothing. Or, at least nothing that would last. Then my oldest son asked us to come up to Cheyenne for a weekend. We did and were surprised at how much Cheyenne had “grown up. Dan decided that come October, that he’d start looking for work up there. That’s why we’ve been running up and down I-25.

While Dan has been in Cheyenne, I’ve been slowly sorting and packing up the house. Dan is still looking for work. He’s had a few good interviews and we are hoping that the last one he had will be “the one’. We hope in the new year to be up in Cheyenne. I’ll keep you posted.

A Dry and Warm December

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So far, the weather has been dry. Oh so dry. In fact, I think the last time we had any moisture was in the first part of October. By now, we’ve usually had at least two or three snowstorms and a few flurries. The peaks have only had a dusting as well.

Well, the month of November was crowded to say the least. After the quiet weekend after my birthday we were up and down the road to Cheyenne twice. Then my Dad hurt his back and we did a trip to Las Cruces with my parents. We did have a good time in spite of Dad being in pain. It was very good to see Toni, Karl  and their son Kristopher. Karl took us on a few short tours around Las Cruces and we visited the Farm and Ranch Museum where my Aunt Toni is the curator. 🙂 It is a very nice museum. Of course, we ate too much, drank a bit much and had a really good visit.

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When we got home, it was time to take Dan back up to Cheyenne. I visited for a few days and then came home to catch up on laundry, housework and all that kind of thing. I’m heading back up on Wednesday. It should be an interesting week.

November ???

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I swear that this month has flown. Don’t know if it has anything to do with the fact that I’ve been driving up and down I-25 between here and Cheyenne, but damn!

We recovered from all the company, meetings, odd ball jobs and then we started going up to Wyoming to visit Erin. We also sat up all night watching the elections. That was very interesting. It will be interesting too, to see how things work out in the next few months.

We had a WorkForce conference in Canon City. I got to visit my friend Jude and her little farm full of geese, ducks, chickens, and goats. She had two of the cutest baby goats. One was angora and so soft! The last day of the conference was also my 53rd birthday. I had lunch with my friend Jacque at this neat bakery in Florence. It had macaroons to die for. Omg! Then we drove home and pretended we didn’t exist for the whole weekend. It was lovely.

My parents are going to Las Cruces for Thanksgiving at my Aunty Tony’s house. We get to watch the cat, Zoe. Wheee… Otherwise, I’m making Green Chile for dinner. I hate turkey. Morgan is going to her mom’s for Tday, so it will be just Dan and I.

I’m doing NaNoWriMo. I’m a bit behind. Tonight I plan to see how many words I can write between 6 and 10pm. Hopefully a few thousand. I’m writing a story about colonizing Mars.

 

Quiet at last

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… for at least a little while. Erin came by to visit with Natalie on Thursday. We had pizza and chatted until he had to get back to his truck around 9pm. Friday we went to Pueblo. We took Natalie to Bingo Burger for dinner and then we looked around in various shops for a light coat for me. No luck. Finally around 9:30pm, we took Natalie to the bus station and saw her off to Austin Texas. After a quick stop for a drink, we drove to La Junta and picked up Morgan. She had a meeting in Colorado Springs the next morning. We got in late, up early and headed out.

The meeting was a People to People meeting about a trip to Australia. Morgan was really excited about this, but as the meeting wore on, it was apparent to us that Morgan had ‘out grown’ what People to People could offer. That jump in maturity has sent her straight out of PtP’s league. So, it was a rather sad trio that drove home. We are now thinking of just raising the money for Morgan to go visit Natalie in Oxford.

To take the edge off, we went to the Citadel Mall and got Greek gyros for lunch. Yum! Then we did the great coat hunt for me again. In the end, we gave up and I bought a pattern and material for a coat. I’ll be making that this week. (hopefully). We drove home and after a bit of dinner, headed to bed.

We slept in for the first time in nearly 8 weeks! It was glorious!!! We got up, pottered about and then after watching the Space x launch, had a bit of dinner and then drove Morgan back to La Junta. It was a nice ride home, as we watched rabbits zip across the highway. We also talked a bit about my project for NaNoWriMo. (National Novel Writing Month) I’ve decided to give it a try again. Last time my computer died. We talked about the plot, some characters and where I’d like things to go. We discussed just how much I was going to have to pick his brain too. 🙂

Today, it was back to the grind. A much quieter house now that the girls are gone, but good to be back to a more ‘normal’ (?) schedule.

Natalie’s Visit

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Natalie, my oldest daughter has been visiting. We haven’t seen her in six years. So, on her way down from Canada, she stopped here. We’ve been out to see Morgan, had dinner with my parents, visited with some of the boys on the phone, drove up to see the aspens and have visited until the wee hours of the morning. Here are some of the pics so far.

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