Everybody seems to be enjoying their summer. Good thing, because it is really flying by. Melissa and family went to Florida for a week. In addition to hanging out at Santa Rosa Beach, they also took a quick road trip to Disney World.
With the record-breaking heat that is enveloping the country, Courtney's been hanging out at Chicago's Lake Michigan beach. She also goes out sketching every weekend with the Urban Sketchers. In this picture, they met at the zoo.
Me, I've been riding my bike as much as possible. Sometimes I go with friends, like the day we rode over to the Fika Coffee House.
And sometimes I go by myself, especially when I want to explore a new place. On this day, I drove over to Morrison, CO and rode the Bear Creek Trail. Our bike club has it on their calendar for a September ride, but I wanted to check out the potential coffee stops at our halfway point. Bear Creek Park is in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, so I got some really great views, but the trail wasn't as flat as I'd have liked.
On another day, I rode downtown to Confluence Park where several creeks drain into the Platte River. It's been record-breaking hot here, too, so the river was full of sunbathers. Too bad there wasn't a similar cooling-off spot by my car, because I was burning up by the time I finished my ride.
On another day, I rode the Highline Canal trail, but only got a couple miles down before I got stopped by construction (unfortunately, a common occurrence in Denver this summer). This is actually a much-needed improvement to this section of the trail, because it's usually rutted after each rain. The rocks in the background will eventually become a waterfall directing the rain straight to the creek and away from the trail. Luckily, I found a short detour around the construction, so was able to continue my ride.
One day, I rode the Cherry Creek Trail south (I usually go north). There aren't nearly as many people on the southern part of the trail, but there are a ton of prairie dogs. They seem to be getting a lot braver, because they dash back and forth across the trail chattering all the while. I wonder if that's a prairie dog's form of cussing you out for disturbing them.
One day I rode to Hidden Mesa Open Space and did a little sketching. This place has a really nice demonstration garden for desert plants. Someday soon, I hope our garden looks as lush as this, but right now our plants are still very small. I really shouldn't be surprised, because I purposefully bought plants that were classified as "slow growing," so our small yard wouldn't start looking like a jungle.
This is a photo from Bike-to-Work Day. We had 21 people from our club join us on this ride. We didn't start until 7:30am, which seems early, but the younger bikers who were actually heading to work started at 6:30am and ate up most of the free breakfast burritos. I managed to snag a Nutella banana waffle on a stick before they were all gone.
And where was Bruce when all this was going on... home cleaning up after the neighborhood work crew stained our fence. For whatever reason, the HOA only stains the outside of the fence; the homeowner has to stain the inside (which Bruce did last year). But the workers didn't even cut down the grass before pulling out their spray guns, so all that tall prairie grass was covered in black stain. Good grief.
I finished June's Something Old, Something New project, which was supposed to be about which watercolor paints work well together. I made a ton of color charts going through almost every variation of the paints on my palette. Mixing 2 colors together makes some really nice shades, but I still think it's easier to just use green paint and not have to mix blue and yellow together.
So, for my July Something Old, Something New project I'm starting a new fitness challenge. I've been following a nutritionist named, Autumn Bates, who is sponsoring a 6-week body recomposition challenge. The emphasis is on healthy eating and exercise with a goal of increasing your energy (something I could always use more of). She's got some interesting recipes in her meal plan, like this cookie dough "ice cream" made from cottage cheese, almond flour, and protein powder. Sounds weird, but it's actually not that bad. Though in my opinion, anything with chocolate in it tastes good, so I'm anxious to see what the rest of the month holds.
