Groundhog Day

The rest of the country relies on Punxsutawney Phil to predict the next 6 weeks of winter, but in Colorado they get their advice from Flatiron Freddy - a stuffed, yellow-bellied marmot from Boulder (first cousin to Phil). Since we've had very little snow and 27 days over 60° so far this year, it's no surprise that Freddy is predicting an early spring even though Phil saw his shadow. It definitely works for me, though I'm sure we'll be paying for it (literally) this summer when water prices skyrocket.

I've been a little remiss on my winter bingo challenges, so this morning Charlie and I went out for a walk to watch the sunrise. I tend to watch the sunrise almost every morning with Bruce while he drinks his coffee, because the sunrises are so colorful around here. But watching it from the comfort of my livingroom chair doesn't allow me to check off a box - hence the walk with Charlie. The only trouble with that is he likes to do his business early in the morning, so I have to cart around a bag of dog poop.

I'm also taking an online watercolor class with Courtney. It's called Peaks and Valleys, but mostly it's about painting mountains, a subject that is probably more relevant to me living in Colorado than Courtney living in Chicago. I've been intrigued for a while now to try plein air painting (painting outside), so I went online and bought an easel and tripod. I've been practicing in the house before I venture out into the cold. It's a lot trickier to paint standing up out in the grass than it is sitting down at a table in a coffee shop. We'll see how that works out.

I started another reading challenge sponsored by the library. It's a bingo board game only you don't have to get blackout. Whenever you get a simple bingo (horizontal, vertical, or diagonal), you are automatically enrolled in a drawing for an iPad. I figured 'what the heck.' I read all the time anyway, so I might as well throw my name into the hat. I already checked off the lower left box (create an outdoor winter scene) by submitting one of my mountain paintings. The nice thing about this challenge is that it's got some other activities in addition to reading. One of them is to ask a librarian to make a book recommendation for you. I'll be interested to see what she picks for me.

San Diego

From this...

to this. No, I wasn't on a cruise. I was on my winter snowbird adventure to San Diego. This is a brew pub on San Diego Bay with gorgeous views. On this particular day, a cruise ship pulled into the harbor so all the passengers could disembark for a day of fun before heading on down to Mexico.

I always like to do some sketching in Balboa Park when I go to San Diego. It was a bit chillier than usual this year, so the ducks spent a lot of time sleeping beside the pond instead of swimming in it. I didn't blame them, but at least it was warmer than back home.

Besides the usual Mexican fare, I tried a few new eateries while I was in San Diego. There were about a dozen new coffee shops within a few blocks of my hotel. One of my favorites had a creme Brule latte. The barista literally used a torch on the top to get that burnt sugar effect. There were also several restaurants named Crack Shack. This particular one specialized in chicken; another one near the waterfront had tacos. I don't know if Crack refers to a family or business name, but I sure saw it on a lot of signs. And BTW, the latte and those biscuits were delicious.

When I got back, I headed off to Breckenridge with the Senior Center to see the ice sculptures. Colorado hasn't gotten much snow this year, but it is still cold enough to keep the ice sculptures frozen. My favorite was the corn-on-the-cob man on the left.

Unfortunately, the ice sculpture from Argentina fell down and broke into a million pieces. I'm not sure why it fell, because the original design didn't look top-heavy to me like some of the other sculptures. I would have loved to make a sketch of the debris, but even though it was sunny, it was too cold to stand outside for long (plus, I can't sketch with gloves on).

But today it warmed up enough that I was able to get back on my new eBike and ride around the neighborhood. I think it's pretty impressive to be able to put 100 miles on my bike in January. If this would have been a typical Colorado winter, I would have needed to wait until spring.

Bingo Bucket List - Week 3

Since we're already up to the middle of January, I thought I'd better jump on finishing my vision board. Janet went hi-tech and used Canva to make a digital vision board; I just did it the old-fashioned way with magazine cutouts. The big 50 in the middle represents mine and Bruce's 50th wedding anniversary. The gold medallion in the middle says "learning, adventures, and friendship." Technically, I cut it out of a Road Scholar magazine, which features educational components in their programs. But when Bruce asked me what learning had to do with marriage, I told him it was learning to get along with your wife.

I spent all last week doing the diet square of the bingo card. I didn't follow any published diet; instead, I just gave up sugar and junk food for a week and replaced them with vegetables and other healthy foods. So, it's not surprising that early Monday morning, I was one of the first customers at Fika ordering my favorite drink. It's not very nearly as satisfying to sketch while munching on a celery stick as it is sipping a raspberry mocha.

I've been taking a yoga class at our neighborhood community center. I always think I'm in fairly decent shape until I start some new exercise regime. I felt like I'd been beaten with a ball bat after the first class. 

I'm trying to get Charlie to help me with the walking square. I made up a list of parks and open spaces around my neighborhood (listed in the sidebar), but it's hard to give up biking when we have such nice weather right now. But one day it was cooler, so I took Charlie over to the Harvie Open Space. He loves going over there, because lots of wild animals live in the grass (good smells). It also has really great views of the mountains.

I started a new book challenge this year. Each month you get a prompt on what kind of book to read. For January, you are supposed to read a book with a color in the title. I looked back over my Kindle library (I have lots of books I've downloaded but not read yet) and I found The Chartreuse Clue by William F Love. It turned out to be a really great book - kind of cerebral like a Preston & Child book. It was published in 1990, but except for people always calling each other from pay phones, I didn't really notice much difference from books published more recently. I'd definitely give it 5 stars.

Bucket List Bingo - Week 2

This week has produced some hits and misses regarding the winter bucket list. I tried to make muffins one day, something I could normally do in my sleep (as long as I'm not interrupted), but Bruce started talking to me and I forgot to put in the salt and baking soda. I kept thinking they looked sort of strange when they came out of the oven (very small and dense), and they tasted like those gluten-free cardboard muffins you can buy at the health store. But then I realized what the problem was. I'm not a multi-tasker, especially in the kitchen. So, back to the kitchen tonight to bake Paul Hollywood's ciabatta bread to go with some homemade sweet potato and butternut squash soup. This seemed like an excellent "comfort food" dinner since our temperatures have taken a nosedive.

On Tuesday morning I walked up to the clubhouse to the Scrapbook Club meeting. The moon was really big and round in the sky. Unfortunately, it was probably too late in the morning to capture a picture with my phone (it's there, but not showing up), so I decided I couldn't count it as watching the sunrise (besides, it's SUNrise, not MOONrise). We've had some really colorful sunrises the past few days, but the bingo card says you have to watch them during an early morning walk... brrr. It's too cold around here right now.

But I was able to check off "play a board game." My favorite game is Saloon Tycoon. Brian introduced me to it, but I only get to play it when I go to Seattle or Courtney comes to visit; it's a little too involved to play online with my St Louis friends. So, I partnered with Mr Nobody and played both boards by myself. Saloon Tycoon doesn't exactly lend itself to playing both boards, since there are open cards and secret cards. But even if you're playing with real people, you can usually guess what their secret cards say by the properties or villains they start acquiring. It was a close match with Mr Nobody leading most of the way (pathetic, since I could see his cards), but I squeaked ahead in the last hand.

I also checked off "start a new project," which I also finished. I downloaded a digital journal from Etsy - one of those "print it yourself, cut out a million pieces, and glue it together." I added a few embellishments from my junk journal stash, so the folio ended up being really thick. It was a good indoor project to do right now, because it's too cold to go outside. (I'm a wimp.)

It actually snowed on Thursday - only about an inch or two, but enough to give the trees some much-needed moisture and enough to make Charlie go crazy (he adores the snow).

The crazy thing was the day before (Wednesday) I went on a 26-mile bike ride to Castlewood Canyon State Park with the bike club. It was 60° out with gorgeous blue skies. This was the first time I put my new eBike on the car rack and drove out to a trailhead. No one could believe I lifted it on and off the car by myself, since eBikes are notoriously heavy (mine only weighs 30 pounds). But it rode like a dream. This was one of the rides on last summer's bucket list that I missed when I was out of town, so I was glad I got to finally ride it, though I seriously doubt I could have pulled that last hill on my regular bike. The new eBike makes pedaling uphill so much easier.

In one final piece of news, my neighbors hired a contractor to build a pergola in their backyard. I wondered how in the world the contractor was going to dig holes in the frozen clay for the support posts (if it were Bruce and I, we'd probably be out there with a handheld post hole digger). But the contractor showed up with a machine with a mammoth screw on one end. I don't think he's going to have a problem getting the holes dug.

Bingo Bucket List - Week 1

I came up with a color-coded way to distinguish mine and Janet's progress on the Bingo Bucket List. Of course, as you'd expect, Janet surged ahead the first week. She's also way ahead of me on steps.

BUT... in my defense, my new bike came in this week and I'm absolutely in love with it. It's a carbon fiber eBike (extremely lightweight) with a torque sensor. My other eBike has a cadence sensor meaning all you have to do it turn the pedals and it zooms up the hill (kind of like a scooter). A torque sensor feels more like riding a real bike. It makes it easier to pedal, but you still have to do the work - just like when you downshift to a lower gear. Since our weather has been staying unseasonably warm, I've taken it out every day. So, this counts as my bingo "day in the sun."

I went out with the bike club on Friday, but it was cloudy and a little brisk, so we didn't get many riders. It was still warm enough to sit outside the coffee shop for our break (the guy in the orange coat is even wearing shorts). And like usual in Colorado, the minute we got home, the sun came out.

I get free books every week from Joffe Books - a UK publishing company that specializes in English mysteries. I thought I'd try to start posting reviews in my sidebar of what I like/dislike about the books. The most recent book I read was The Twin Sister. I don't normally read psychological thrillers, but Yvette Davies was voted Best New Author by the Joffe editors. She wasn't a bad writer, but the story was just a little too weird for me. A lot of psychological thrillers seem to equate to dysfunctional families. I prefer to stick with traditional crime-based mysteries.

The Senior Center has a whole roomful of puzzles that members can check out. When Courtney was here, we put together a 500-piece puzzle (or rather, Courtney did most of the work). I thought I'd picked a picture with a lot of variety, but when the pieces are really small, it's hard to see any detail. So, I went back to the Senior Center and checked out a couple 300-piece puzzles. The pieces are about twice as large making it easier to put the puzzle together quickly. I'm not one of those people who wants to spend a couple weeks working on this.

I tend to watch a lot of movies on Tubi, mostly because they're free and they tend to be more entertaining than the movies on Amazon (in my opinion, Amazon should get out of the movie production business and stick to shopping). I thought it was funny that on New Year's Day, most of the Christmas movies disappeared and the Valentine movies showed up (Tubi didn't waste any time). I watched a movie called A Valentine Carol, which imitated A Christmas Carol with a ghost who tried to get a radio host to clean up her act by taking her to her past, present, and future dating life (the lady in red is the ghost). Good grief, can no one come up with an original theme? I just saw a trailer for the new Bridgerton series on Netflix, and season 4 is based on a Cinderella theme. I'm not quite sure why they didn't just stick with the theme from the book.

Courtney and I are taking another online painting class on mountains. It's definitely appropriate for me, since I live near the mountains. Knowing Courtney, she'll probably get inspired to head off to some place like the Swiss Alps on her next Thanksgiving adventure.

Bucket List Bingo

Every winter, Janet and I have been coming up with some kind of challenge to get us through the cold, gray days of winter. This year I put together a bingo card of activities - some involve exercise, others relate to crafts. There are no cleaning tasks on this year's card (been there, done that). But there should be lots of nice options to get through the winter. And like always, the first person to reach blackout gets to pick her choice of dinner menus when I go to KC. Hopefully Janet will stay healthy and not fall apart this year like she did last.

My other goal is to walk 100 miles a month. That's really only about 6,666 steps per day, but I'm also planning to stick with biking. I made a list of all the open spaces in Douglas County. They aren't necessarily long, nor picturesque hikes, but it's a chance to do some walking on a trail rather than a concrete sidewalk.

2025 in Review

This year, my goal was to ride as many new bike trails as possible (a somewhat short window when you’re trying to avoid winter snow and ice).  I managed to put 1,286 miles on my bike while checking out 21 new trails (that's a round-trip ride to Kansas City and back). Most of the trails were in or around Denver, but a few were out-of-state. 

My favorite ride is always the annual trip our bike club takes to the mountains. We usually start in Frisco and ride to Breckenridge, but this year I stayed an extra day and rode the trail in the opposite direction to Copper Mountain. Both trails are kind of grueling on the way to the top, but easy coasts on the way down. If I were more into mountain biking, I'd just take the chair lift to the top. But mountain bike trails are pretty rugged with loose dirt, tree roots, and rocks; I prefer a nice concrete trail.

I went on a bikepacking trip in September. The group started in Ottawa, Kansas and rode the Flint Hills Trail to Pomona State Park. Most people camped out at the park, but I managed to snag a cabin for the overnight stay (I wanted a real bed and shower). A few weeks later, Bruce and I went to Custer, South Dakota and I rode a piece of the Mickelson Trail. That was really cool, because I rode right past the foot of the Crazy Horse memorial. It was a great summer, but my body keeps telling me it’s probably time to switch to an eBike. 

We went on a few camping trips this summer – some in a cabin and others in a tent. We went to Gunnison to hike in the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park (this was before they had that horrible fire). It was a beautiful place, but we discovered that most national parks do not allow dogs on the trails (we had Charlie, our goldendoodle, with us). Dogs are allowed in the parking lots of the Visitor Centers, but that’s about it. So instead, we went over to the Curecanti Recreation Area where we’d rented a cabin and hiked their trails. 

We went tent camping in a few Colorado State Parks – the state parks are much more dog-friendly. The first time we went out camping, we literally slept in our 1980’s Walmart sleeping bags on the ground (we didn’t realize how long it had been since we’d been camping, nor how old we’d gotten). We were up by 5am and headed home. On our next camping trip, we got a lot smarter and bought camping cots to go inside the tent with insulated sleeping pads, blowup pillows, and 3-season sleeping bags. It was a significantly more enjoyable experience. 

I joined the local Senior Center this year, which is ironic given that I always used to make fun of those places when I was younger. They offer all kinds of activities like line dancing, painting, jigsaw puzzles, etc, but I mostly joined for the trips. They have their own little bus and each month they offer about 10 different trips to local events – theater shows, museums, restaurants, etc. It’s great, because I don’t have to drive (I didn’t think anywhere could beat St Louis, but Denver traffic is horrendous). Last year, I took trips to the state Capitol building, a cannabis factory, and the Breckenridge ice sculpture festival, among others. Bruce thought I’d be the last person to go on a cannabis tour, but truthfully, the science of how they grow the plants and extract the oils to make medical marijuana was fascinating.

We worked on a couple house projects this year - resurfacing the front porch and replacing the wood mulch with decorative rock. I know it looks like Bruce does all the work around the house, but I usually help out at least a little bit.

The sad part about this year was losing so many great actors, especially the ones I grew up with. Two of my favorites were Diane Keaton and Robert Redford. I remember wearing khaki pants all through my 30's like Diane Keaton wore in Annie Hall (I also had the vest, but not the tie or hat). I actually enjoyed her Book Club and Poms movies better than Annie Hall, even though that's where she got her Academy Award for Best Actress. When I was a freshman in college, I painted a 10' x 10' mural of Robert Redford on the ceiling of my dorm room. Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid was the popular movie at the time. Our hall monitor cringed when she saw it, but let it stay through the semester. However, when summer vacation rolled around, I had to paint over it before going home. I think they should have kept it up for future students to enjoy, especially since they ended up tearing the dorm down anyway years later.

I took my annual trips to KC and St Louis to see my sisters and my teacher friends (notice I seem to have an ice cream theme going on here). I also went to Seattle to see Brian and Amber, and Chicago to paint with Courtney at one of their Urban Sketch outings. The sketch outing in May turned out to be really cold, so I think I'll stick with going to Chicago in July - much warmer.

So that's the highlights from 2025. In 2026, Bruce and I will celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary, so it will be interesting to see what new adventures we can come up with.

Courtney Visit

Courtney came to visit the week before Christmas. She got off the plane wearing a long, heavy coat, because the temperatures were in the teens in Chicago. Little did she know that Denver was experiencing record highs in the 70s. The skiers weren't happy, because most of the lifts were closed (even in Vail and Aspen). But we took advantage of the warm weather and did a lot of outdoor activities, including going on a bike ride down the Piney Creek Trail.

The next day, we went to the park to sketch. We were sitting in the grass when Santa rode up on a motorcycle. The park was packed with kids, who all ran over to tell Santa one last time what they wanted for Christmas.

We walked over to the library to sketch some of the Christmas trees on display. Each tree had a different theme based on a book. Normally, the trees are really cute, but this year a lot of the trees were somewhat dark and sinister. The tree on the left is based on a book about a flesh-eating virus that is out to destroy the human race - not your usual Hallmark Christmas moment. The one behind it is from Lord of the Flies where a group of schoolboys get stranded on a desert island and then start killing each other... ho, ho, ho. The Addams Family tree was clever, but I'm not sure I'd feel very festive with a black Christmas tree sporting an amputated hand.

We opened our presents on Christmas Eve-Eve, so that Courtney and I could have a little time to use our new art supplies. Charlie got a stuffed bear that I paid a fortune for, because it was supposed to be indestructible. It took him about 30 minutes to bite off the pompom on the end of the bear's hat. I should send him to the toy manufacturer as one of their testers; he could find the weak spots in their toys.

A few days after Courtney left, we finally got a "white" Christmas with a light dusting of snow. The temperature dropped down so far that Bruce was able to just broom it off. That's the weird thing about Colorado - the temperature can swing 50 or 60 degrees in just a few hours. Since the wind chill said it felt like 4°, Charlie had to watch from the window.

When the temperature got back up above 40° I went out for one last trip to sketch the library trees. I managed to find a nice one representing the Joy of Cooking - lots of pots and pans for decoration. I also stopped off at Black Rock Coffee for one of their holiday drinks - a Mexican mocha chilla. Yum!

Check-ups

This was one of those weeks you just want to forget.

Happy Birthday, Janet & Jamie

Two people in the family have back-to-back December birthdays. Janet turned 71 on the 5th and Jamie turned 43 on the 6th (goodness, everybody is getting old!). Janet and Jamie celebrated together at Thanksgiving, because Jamie and family had to go to a wedding in Kentucky on his birthday.

We finally got our first snow, which in Colorado, is a big deal, especially if you are a skier. Since I'm a biker, I'm not as happy as the others. It was so cold after the first snow, that Bruce just used a broom to brush it away. But it was much warmer during the second round of snow, so Bruce got to use his new electric snow shovel. An "electric" shovel sounds weird, but it works really well, especially on skinny parts like the sidewalks, plus you don't have to pick up heavy shovelfuls of snow. The shovel just scoops them away.

I went on a field trip with the Senior Center to old Colorado City (the old part of Colorado Springs). First, we stopped at a German bakery. There were so many delicious things to choose from, but I picked a chocolate croissant and a poppy seed pretzel. The croissant was huge and loaded with chocolate bits inside - much better than the French version.

Then we had lunch at a German restaurant. I ordered the Weissbier and Käsespätzle (spätzle with Swiss cheese sauce). Delicious! We were getting ready to pay the check when the man next to me ordered a slice of Black Forest torte. It looked so good that I had to get one, too. Only I was so stuffed, I got it to-go. You can't go to a German restaurant if you are on a diet.

We had our neighborhood Santa Jamboree this weekend. My job was running the Elf Scavenger Hunt. Kids had to find the elf hidden in the Christmas tree, take a selfie, and then show it to me for a prize. Needless to say, I had one of the popular jobs. We also had tables set up for kids to write letter to Santa, eat cookies, drink cocoa, and take a photo with Santa and Mrs Claus. 

That part only lasted an hour, and then Santa and Mrs Claus headed out in a horse-drawn carriage to ride around the neighborhood. Luckily, my duties were over, because it was cold outside. I need to go back to that German restaurant a few more times so I'll have padding like Santa.