officially...

...a college girl.

She moved out of her room here at home on saturday and after a LENGTHY 'traffic filled' afternoon, she moved into her dorm. She is unpacking, organizing, socializing, meeting, greeting and believe it or not...freezing. The dorm rooms are really cold. On the list of extra things for us to bring today? A hoodie. It is 106 outside but... chiiilllly in the rooms.

She is ready. And we are now down to three of us around the dinner table. How does that happen so quickly? We will miss her spunk for sure. And her green eyes, and her big smile and all that other stuff.

Good luck college girl.

We love you.

this girl

Guess who started the fist day of her senior year this morning?

Guess who made the volleyball team as a starter?

Guess who pointed out to me that after today, she will have gone to high school more days at this Arizona high school then she did at the Colorado high school? I had to think about that one for a minute. That is hard to believe. It is the first time that she did not go to school with her sister by her side. It is also the first time we only had her, out in the yard, for the first day of school picture!

Guess who is going to rock her senior year?

This girl...that's who.

reading

I'm reading this book for the second time and I'm looking forward to the movie. I hope it will be as good as the book. The commercials make me think that it will be.

I might even get some popcorn.

how's the weather?

Oh no, another post about the weather. Well, it seems worth talking about. Weather is a strange thing. It is so conflicting... with changes from day to day, even minute to minute, and so drastically different from one state to the next. Sometimes, it is so hard to believe there is a beautiful blue sky and bright sunshine where you are and a horrible storm brewing somewhere else. Or the fact that it is flooding like crazy in some states, terrible drought in others, and so hot and humid elsewhere that it is causing deaths. This sure has been a hot summer. For just about everyone. I'm sure there are records being set everywhere. The writer of a blog that I follow said, "it's like the earth is having one big hot flash!"

We have had a few good rainstorms in the last couple of weeks. That is always a welcome relief from the heat here. It does bring some humidity, which is something we have not lived with for a long time while in Colorado. I'm not fond of it. And my hair has a mind of its own on humid days. There are days when the clouds blow in and billow up, with what look like it will be a big storm, only to just slowly fade away. And other days, or evenings, when they blow in and the lightening starts cracking, we know we will probably get some rain. It is great to stand outside and watch the clouds and the lightening in the sky.

Rachel has been trying over and over again to capture some lightening. She finally did, with a little patience and the tri-pod to steady the camera.



Amazing.

Whether it be rain that you need or cooler temperatures,

I hope where you are you will get it.

Weather or not, have a great monday!

i can't make this stuff up

I had a different line up of photos on my desk top for today's blog post... but this has to come first. A dang tarantula folks!!!

Leah and I were in the pool last night about 9:00 for a little cool off before bed. We were enjoying the bright stars, the lovely moon and the cool water against the hot night air. We left the pool light off so that we could enjoy the lights in the sky that much more.

Suddenly, Leah grabbed me and said ..."Mommmm?" and while putting her hands on my arms she turned me around..."what is thaaaaat?" Just a few feet away from us, crawling along the edge of the pool deck, silhouetted with the light from inside the house, at eye level to us...we could see big long legs and a giant body crawling along. I, in a voice you can imagine, grabbed her tight as we embraced each other and said..."it must be a tarantula!" And I can positively say it was not like the one we saw last year! (click there to re-fresh your memory). This one was real. And big.
I'm not known to spew expletives but this could have been one of those moments! And then I hollered ..."Rachel!" (The Reptile Wrangler wasn't home so I had to yell for someone, ya know). Through the sliding glass door I could see her jump up, knowing from the sound of my voice something was amiss. She threw open the door and I said, "put the patio lights on". And Leah and I both said..."A tarantula!" She ran over to see it which made it go down around the edge as if it might go in the water. I told her to run and grab the big flashlight. As it crawled back up the edge, she shined the flashlight at it which caused it to stop in its big hairy tracks.

That was our moment to exit the pool. The usual warnings came flying out of our mouths..."stay back", "they're poisonous", "no they're not", "yes they are", "do they jump?", "yes, I think they do", "no they don't", "stay back in case it does", "let me get my camera". I ran into the house, grabbed the camera and Rachel zoomed in on the giant creature.

I held the flashlight with the beam directly on it while she snapped a couple of pictures. That is all. Two pictures and into the house we went.( I enlarged and cropped those two pictures for the close up shots here.) Too much darkness out there for us to hang out any longer. As we went in the house, Leah said..."I don't think I'm sleeping outside anymore."

And I said, "see that is why I said...why would you want to sleep out there anyway?"

In the spring, when the nights were cool, she slept out on the lounge chair with just a blanket and her pillow. At that time I said , "but if the blanket falls down on the ground something could crawl up and get you." She said, "nothing will crawl up and get me."

Now she knows...

note: as a reference, I just went out and measured the tile on the edge of the pool. Six inches from line to line. I'm just sayin'.

wander with us

Because we enjoyed the day so much and because everyone needs a break from the heat...

please enjoy some more photos from our mountain hike.

Chuck carried a back pack with our water bottles and a few other essentials (my camera when it was raining). He whistled a lot, which he likes to do, and he wore his cap backwards, "so he could look up with a full view and not miss out on anything" (because the brim of the hat impairs the view). Rachel had her new camera and was seeing things through a photographers eye. Leah was scaling rocks and trees like a happy little wanderer. And I was just enjoying it all.

Yay! It was a great day. We will think of that cool, rainy day and remember how much we enjoyed ourselves. As I was uploading all of the pictures to post on the blog this morning, I kept hearing a little tune in my head and singing the lyrics to a song I can remember learning in grade school music class. I googled "lyrics to the song valderee, valderah" wondering if I would find anything.

Sure enough, the first link brought me the lyrics to the song I was remembering. How much of this song do you remember? Do you remember it at all?

Happy Wanderer I love to go a wandering Along the mountain track And as I go, I love to sing My knapsack on my back. CHORUS: Valderee, valdera, valderee Valder-ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha, Valderee, Valdera, my knapsack on my back. I love to wander by the stream That dances in the sun. So joyfully it calls to me Come join my happy song. High overhead the skylarks wing They never rest at home But just like me, they love to sing As o’er the world we roam. I wave my hat to all I meet, And they wave back to me And blackbirds call so loud and sweet From ev’ry greenwood tree. Oh, may I go a wandering Until the day I die. And may I always laugh and sing Beneath God’s clear blue sky.

twenty-nine on the thirty-first

Yesterday was our anniversary.

To celebrate we took our two favorite girls to Flagstaff for a day of hiking.

We went to the Kachina Peaks Wilderness area. It was beautiful. And cool. Meaning 'cool' as in the temperature was a wonderful 70 degrees. Ahhhh. A welcome relief from the one hundred and who knows what temperatures that have been goin' on lately. It was a tad balmy, as the sky was looking like a little rain might happen.

Shhh. Do you smell that? The lovely smell of pine trees. And grass. And forest sap. and mushrooms. And wildflowers. And moss. And dirt. Okay. You get the idea. The great smell that a wooded area has to offer.

And all these lush fern.
It was like a rain forest with pine trees and aspen all in one. The paths were pretty steep in areas and flat open in others. We had to climb over rocks and tree roots. The views were great. And did I mention the cool air? It was a pretty good hike for these two creaky knees of mine.

So I had a little help.
Just kidding. The piggy back ride was just for the picture. I made it on my own two feet, thank-you very much.
We enjoyed the aspen trees. We miss seeing them as often as we did in Colorado.

And someone found a perfect spot for a pine cone.
Leah, little miss adventure girl, took every opportunity to scale a boulder, climb a tree, or jump off a rock.
Pine cones. Love.
Butterfly. Love.
The hubs and I. Love.
Heart. Love

The clouds did open up and shower us with a nice rain for a little while. It reminded us of that evening, 29 years ago, when torrential rain delayed our wedding just a wee bit.

It was a happy anniversary.

Love.

post afterthought: we did not carve the heart in the aspen tree. There were a lot of initials and dates and hearts carved into many of the trees already.