And now for…

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Something completely different. Yesterday we woke to fog, mist and later on rain. All day long was a study in mist and moisture. The plants loved it. My asthma hated it and it was one of those stay warm kinda days.

Dan took us to Wonderful House for dinner. On the drive to Trinidad, we got to watch the fog roll in, the clouds hang low and the rain fall. Lovely. It was like being in England again.

Today, we woke to blue skies and sunshine. Mother Nature, you are one crazy woman at the moment! Hope you stay calm for the next 24 hours. I have to drive up to Cheyenne to pick up Daniel. His sweetie’s sister is getting married on Saturday.

Dust Storm!

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Yesterday got a little windy. In fact, it sounded like it was raining… that tap-tap-tap of raindrops got my attention. I looked out the front door and realized that there were no mountains. (yah… no Spanish Peaks!) Then I realized that the cloud was actually dust. The Cuchara Ridge disappeared as did Ideal Road. That’s when we realized that the dust was really flying.

Dan and I ran to close doors and windows as the dust/sand poured in with the wind. It was nasty! It sounded like rain, but it was dirt and dust hitting the house. I’m sure that the windows on the west side are etched.

About an hour after it started, the wind settled down and we could once more see Ideal Road. It took a bit longer and by sunset, we could see the Spanish Peaks again. Every surface we touched had a fine layer of dust. Ugh!

Flamin’ June!

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Or should I say Windy? Here it is the 3rd of June, and the wind just hasn’t stopped.

Friday we went to Pueblo for some needed shopping and just plain relaxation. We got soil for the raised beds, plumbing bits for the Wendy House, a staple gun (wheee!!!! ) and groceries. When we got home, we could smell smoke and discovered that HWY 160 was closed off. There was a fire in town. The Main Event, also locally known as the Walsenburg Walmart had a fire behind it. We looked at the fire for a bit and then went home.

Saturday, I went to Rock Ledge Ranch, in Colorado Springs. They were having a sheep shearing and spinning event. I was suppose to meet a friend there, but her ride didn’t appear. I still had a great time though. It’s well worth the visit. I loved the houses and walking around the grounds.

Afterwards, I went to Joann’s and got some stuff for Battlemoor. It’s in just over 2 months! I have some sewing to do and I’m going to try and make some more nalbinding needles. 🙂

Sunday was suppose to be a workday around the house. Well… we slept in. While Dan worked on his school work, I did a little gardening, and cleaned house. Next weekend though is all about the plumbing! 🙂 Who’d have thought the idea of running water could make a person so happy? 🙂

May Blizzards…

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Well, nearly. We had snow yesterday and a few flakes today. I know I’ve groused a bit about all the snow, but the weather changes have really caused my parents and Dan pain. The flip flop between the weather cycles plays havoc with their arthritis. Plus, for the first time since we left England nearly 20 years ago, I’ve had pain in my hands. sigh…

The last two days of April were in the 80’s and Dan and I did some major construction work on the back yard. We are getting ready to put a green house in along with a few other bits and pieces. Yes, we are doing more work on the Wendy house. 🙂 I have a ceiling fan to go in for summer breezes and winter heat management. We are going to add a composting toilet to the Wendy house as well.

The weather this year has not been kind to the two houses or the yard either. The winter winds blew down the fence to the point where we had a choice. Trash it or move it. We chose to move it. Now that the stone work is done, it looks like it has always been there. When it warms up, I plan to hit it with some white spray paint and then decorate it. I’m thinking flowers or something sort of art deco. I’m still thinking about it.

As soon as the ground is dry-ish, we will be re-digging the trench and laying water pipes. We are planning to run water for the Wendy house and the green house which will be to the SW of the Wendy house by about ten feet if that. Once the pipes are in place, we will begin to level the ground for the first keyhole garden and green house. We spent half a day playing with various layouts. That of course was after Dan loaded up Visio. 🙂

We have been discussing reusing anything and everything we can in the yard. We have lots of building materials and there is a cabinet that I’m going to turn into a potting bench. It has drawers and shelves. We are going to use one of the old doors for one side, old curtain rods and a shelf for a bench and some corrugated roofing from the shed for a roof. Then I think I am going to apply liberal amounts of paint in loud colours. 🙂

Here are some pictures of how things have changed over the last eight years. Yes, progress has been slow, but the budget has been $0.00. The last pics are of RedTom, our cat and Brandy our dog, irises, etc.

It’s the snow storm that never ends…

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Well once again, Mother Nature played chicken with us and we lost. After horrid winds on Sunday, warmth up to about 70 yesterday, we woke to clouds and damp this morning. I thought it would be rain. Smelled like rain. Looked like rain. Hoped it would be rain.

So, I went off to the County Commissioners meeting to hear the proclamation of Ludlow Centennial Year. This Saturday, April 20th is the 99th anniversary of that horrid day. So, the state has decided to have a year long event. Our three commissioners signed the proclamation and handed it to our local UMW representative. In June there is usually a memorial service out at Ludlow. I’ve written about this event before. Here and here. I will be writing more about it as the year goes on.

Once that was done, I did my usual Wednesday thing. Vacuumed my mom’s house and did laundry. I was just getting ready to leave when I realized that it was SNOWING! Oh My was it snowing. Big Fat Flakes. Instead of heading to the Laundromat to dry my clothes, I picked up Dan. We headed out to George’s and had lunch. We celebrated our 9th anniversary with pie. 🙂

Afterwards we stopped by my parents as they had just returned from Colorado Springs and Pueblo. They brought us fried cinnamon rolls. Yum! We went to the grocery, then to the Laundromat and dried clothes.

Now we are home and curled up next to the wood stove keeping warm and working on our computers. Oh, and watching snow fall on top of the 5-6 inches we have from this storm already.

Colorado, the Menopausal State

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Last Tuesday, we went from warm to freezing snow storm. Probably 2 inches of the stuff. Then it got warm. 70’s. We had a couple of cool nights, but nothing dire. I even packed away most of the winter clothes. And before you laugh and tell me it’s all my fault for packing away the clothes, keep in mind it has been Hot! Warm! Sunny! In fact, today it has been as high as 74F. (9% humidity and 20-25mph gusts)

However, wait… hold on… Tonight the temps are due to drop to the mid 30’s and we are suppose to have snow again by 5am.  (humidity 45%) If we are lucky, we might have as much as 4 to 8 inches of snow accompanied by 50 mph winds. Yes, a blizzard. Akkkk!

So, I am hauling wood into the house. The stove is ready to lite and we will be going over to my parents to chop wood. Such fun. I am wondering if this year will be like the one we had in 1993, where May 1st was greeted with 5 inches of snow. Brr….

Tomorrow’s school board meeting will be fun. Ugh.

Maybe by June the weather will be nice.

Blizzard!

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If I had waited just a bit, I could have written about yesterday. I woke up early thinking it was a little cold. Just a tad. Brandy was curled up deep in her blankets and when I looked outside it was snowing. Between the winds and the size of the flakes, it looked like I was in the middle of a snow globe. I went back to bed.

A few hours later, we all got up. I made breakfast and we ate it in the dining room. Out the windows, we were able to watch the wind slew the snow sideways, and the cars not cope well with the icy roads. Once breakfast was done, we moved into the guest house and fired up the wood stove. While the temperatures dropped to as low as 14, we were toasty warm. Morgan reigned from the bed while Dan used a tv tray. I had my desk, which faces the windows and let me watch the storm. That snow globe weather didn’t stop until nearly 6pm.

Rather than cook, we splurged. Yeah Taco Bell! 🙂 It’s funny when we go there, because one of the staff is a friend and she knows what I want before I speak most days. Okay, I’m not very adventurous, but at least it isn’t difficult to take the cheese out of what I want to eat. Dan and Morgan pigged out on chicken tenders while I had tacos. Then we came home, fed the wood stove and chatted, played on the computers until midnight and in general had a good time.

Today the sun is shining and the temps so far have hit 40F. That’s good, as we have to take Morgan back to college today. sigh… I’m just happy we had her for a week. She gets to take home transport this time. Her half brother Matt finished her bicycle at long last. Her commute has just dropped to 5 minutes. We head to La Junta later this afternoon. March Blizzard3

Yet Another Blizzard

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Yes, it is snowing again. We’ve had a lot of snow since I wrote last. Probably 18 inches all total. Life in it’s own way has been crazy. We took my dad up to Colorado Springs for cancer testing. His bladder cancer is back and they will begin chemo in about two weeks. While we were at the hospital, Dan got some sort of stomach bug which has kicked his ass. Ugh.

He was nearly over it by the time we went up to the Colorado Association of School Board’s Winter Conference over Valentine’s Day. CASB’s conference was good and a fellow board member, David Tesitor went with me this year. Things in general with the school board are settling down. We just finished the superintendent’s evaluation. We work on her contract on Tuesday. I had been writing a separate blog about school board stuff, but simply couldn’t keep up with it. I’m working on writing more on my NaNoWriMo story which is a little more involved that I thought it would be.

On our way home, we stopped at IKEA. 🙂 We got new dishes, a kettle, a BIG cup for Morgan and some little bits and pieces. It was a good but tiring day.

Since we came home, it’s been running errands, general housekeeping stuff, electrical work at The Cowboy Connection for  Marianne Smithey and stacking a ton of wood. We bought a cord and I think we got closer to a cord and a half. 🙂

About that snow… I could just recycle the pictures. You’d never really know. However, here are the latest out our window.

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As predicted, it began to snow around 11am. My son Bryan and the two grandboys, Gavin and Talon were due to visit around 1pm. They made it just before it started to snow heavily. We had a good visit and I gave them some things that Dan and I just don’t use anymore. It saved me a trip to Dorcas Circle, and them a trip to the store. 🙂 Plus, he brought me an armload of firewood. Wheee!

I gave the boys two books I’ve had for them which they were so excited about. 🙂 Who knew that Peter Rabbit and Goodnight Moon would bring such smiles. They devoured two apples and half a dozen gingersnaps while I made potato soup for dinner. When they said goodbye, Talon told me “I love you to the Moon and back.” Pretty good for a three year old. 🙂

 

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.

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!