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.

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.

Don’t blink! The weather may change!

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This has been a weird spring. Hot in March. No real snow when it is usually our snowiest month. Now April is being weird. Last week was warm. Then there was the wind. Oh My! I swear that on Saturday my laundry was going to end up in Kansas. Or, at least at my friend Jacque’s house. Geeze!

Sunday started out okay. There was a heavy dusting of snow, but the sun came out and melted it. It was sunny, but not too warm by mid day. I was suppose to go walking with Jacque at 1pm. We didn’t go because it kept getting darker and colder just while we were on the phone. Instead, I went out and worked on the gardens. I picked up trash, dug out trees starts and thistles, and began to work on the front garden. I have this big chunk of rail road tie that I want to use as part of a garden bed frame. The front yard slopes and I want to stop the erosion that is going on there. So, I started digging the trench needed to put the tie in place. Lots of weeds and rocks. Ugh! I realized I couldn’t move the tie by myself, so I weeded the area by the bulls head. There are ants right there and I needed to weed when they weren’t out. Otherwise I’d have been dancing. I even found the irises! Wheeee!!! By this point it had started to rain, so I went inside.

It rained. It snowed. It snained. (both at the same time) It got colder. In fact, it got cold enough for us to have a fire last night. We had one Saturday night too! I hoped for warmer weather today. So far, no luck. At least the clouds have broken up a bit and let enough sunshine in to warm the Wendy House up to about 68. After my walk today, I’d best pick up some kindling to add to the wood pile. Brrrr!

Renovations and Aprils showers.

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Last week it was in the 70’s and 80’s. We moved furniture, oiled floors, figured out where to put the business bits and pieces. We even sorted out and threw a few things away!

Monday was cool. Cloudy. And by 2am this morning, we had 3 inches of snow. By 8am, nearly 8 inches of snow. At 3pm, we have over 11 inches of snow and it is barely 36 degrees! Brrrr!!!! Instead of writing today, I have been busy keeping warm!

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The pictures are of the back yard, the newly reorganized interior of the main house and the front yard.

Busy, Hectic Week

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This week was something else. Monday I spent catching up on all the email from the weekend and met with Sandi Hansen of Edison Learning. She is working with our school district to help bring up our educational scores on the Colorado student assessment tests. (TCAP).

Tuesday was meeting day from hell. Dan and I had a Southeastern Workforce Investment Board meeting in La Junta. This was also the day that Colorado tried to blow all of it’s topsoil to Kansas. We had miles of dirt fog. So much dirt in the air that we couldn’t see. Tumbleweeds were passing us and we were going 65! It took 1 gallon of gas to get to La Junta and 3 to get home due to the wind.

At the meeting, we discussed the workforce/employment issues in our region. The map showing the regions can be found here. We also had a really good presentation on Demographics for regions 6 and 14, which is what we are according to the state. It was very interesting and we actually got to solve a question that the Demographers had. There was a statistical blip that they didn’t understand and I looked at it and knew in an instant what it was. There was a burst of households in the 44 to 65 yr range. They didn’t get it and I explained that it was the grandchildren coming to Huerfano County to occupy their grandparents houses. The reason I knew that was that I’m one of those. I escaped the big city, Littleton, to come down to Walsenburg to raise my family in a low cost, low crime/stress area.

After that meeting, we drove home, grabbed dinner and then headed to the board meeting. This was the first regular board meeting for RE-1 in February. All others had been special meetings and/or workshops. We got a lot accomplished and once again, there is more on that meeting on my other blog.

Wednesday should have been quiet. I got some stuff done around the office and then went to meet with David Benson around 4pm. He and his partner, Iris Williams are working to help our school district with trust issues. We have a situation whereby nearly 100% of the district dislikes/distrusts one person. Not healthy, and it is causing major issues. It was a really good discussion and we talked till nearly 5pm. Afterwards, I went to the library and then went to work to pick up Dan. We had to be to Peakview by 6pm to see a 4th grade play called the Emerald Egg. That was fun.

Thursday we were up early and went with my parents to Colorado Springs. Dad had his cancer checkup. Dan drove us home as Dad was a little loopy from the pain meds. We stopped at Romero’s for lunch. Yummm!

Friday was just as early a start. I had a State Youth Council meeting to be at in Denver. The weather was  bit nasty, so we left early. The meeting was very good. More info on that over on Untapped Potential. We drove home through bands of snow. We were going to stop in Pueblo for dinner, but with the snow, we changed our minds. Good thing we did as there was a huge car pileup accident due to the snow.

Friday was also Daniel’s 22nd birthday. 🙂

Saturday was sort of a stay in bed type day. We slept in, relaxed and did as little as possible. 🙂 Better yet, we went to Wonderful House in Trinidad with my parents. It was my parents way of thanking Dan for driving. They even promised him that he could bring a date if he wanted, or if he didn’t, they have this daughter…. that they’d set up as a blind date for him. ROFLOL!! Needless to say, there were a bunch of blind date jokes all evening.

Today is catch-up day. Dan has gone into work for the day and I’m writing blog posts, reading emails and cleaning house. Wheee!

For more school board adventures, check out my other blog, Untapped Potential

Heatwave!!! (and skunkwave)

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Supposedly. 46 today and 54 tomorrow! Wheeee! This morning, we slid down Jackson, thru the stop sign at Kansas, and the stop sign at Colorado. no choice, as the hill is one huge sheet of ice. Then we slid all over Colorado until we got to Main street. Geeze!

We had to dig our firewood pile out of the melt too. What a mess! Oh, and the skunk came by for a visit. Phewww!!! I actually opened up all the doors I could to let the house air. It was bad. Walking through the house was enough to make my coat smell. Ugh. Have I said how much I detest the damn things? Double it. With prejudice.

For once I am looking forward to the melty part of the storm and Spring. I want to introduce Mr. Skunk to Mr. Trap or Mr. Shotgun.  I think I’ll go snort Listerine to get rid of the smell.

Wrapping up the year

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It is the last week of the year and  we are wrapping up various client work, and all the end of year stuff. blahhhh! Last week we had all of that snow and then a last minute trip to Denver to celebrate Christmas with the family. Maybe next year we can get everyone to meet down here in Walsenburg.

There has been a lot of change this year. Divorce, CEO of the company, new committees and responsibilities, moving family and the business and finally, school board. Some have been good and others, while not bad, could have been better.

Next year will be interesting. More involvement with the school board and all of the various committees that Dan and I are on are a sure thing. Our business hopes to land a couple of big contracts and that would be fantastic. (think good thoughts!) However, after moving out of the house, and having a slow year this year, we may move the business back into the house. It would cut our bills in half. It is something we will be looking into over the next month or so.