On Mothers' Day (the day we were told that snow is "supposed" to be over in Colorado), I planted some flowers in the back yard. Well 2 months and 2 snows later, they have flourished and are well into blooming. Luckily only one has been nibbled on by the deer.
The public space behind our house is not faring so well. We call it the "Cinderella spot" since it seems the HOA tends to ignore it. They've been seeding and watering all the public spaces on the family side, but haven't done anything on the 55+ side. But today they decided to give it a little attention and came by to mow it. I hope this guy was wearing a mask, because all he mowed down was dirt.
Our days are usually bright and sunny, but around 4 o'clock each afternoon, it clouds up and rains about 10 drops. Then we get a glorious rainbow (sometimes a double). I think I'd rather have a few more drops of rain and skip the rainbow.
I went to the Farmers' Market in Parker last Sunday. You can sure tell that COVID is over, because the street was packed. Even though the fruits and vegetables looked really good, I didn't buy anything, because the vendors were taking cash. I haven't carried cash around with me for 2 years. Even Dollar Tree will only accept credit cards these days.
I went down to sketch in an area called Uptown - not quite downtown, but around 18th Street in Denver. This was a quirky little coffee shop I found - VERY popular with the locals as it had a steady stream of customers the entire time I was there.
Bruce and I went hiking at St Vrain State Park near Longmont, CO. Most of the state parks on the eastern side of the state have water features devoted to fishing or boating. This park had several ponds that you could fish in, but you were only allowed to keep catfish. If you caught a trout, you had to throw it back.
As we were hiking around one of the ponds, we saw these goats called, Mutton Mowers. I guess that's a cheap way of mowing the grass. I don't think they were friendly goats like you might find in a petting zoo, because they were surrounded by an electric fence.
There were also a ton of GIANT ant hills in this park. This ant hill was about 2 ft long and the ants were about half an inch.
Bruce continued walking around the ponds, but I opted out in lieu of doing a little sketching (the giant ant hills were creeping me out).
In Chicago, Courtney went to the Urban Sketchers workshop. We used to go together (pre-COVID), but I decided to skip this year. Luckily, they had extremely good weather (cooler than most of the Midwest) and some great teachers. I may have to think about rejoining them next year.
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