Last week, the mountains were very barren and dry.
This week, they're topped with snow. It's very pretty, but it's not even Daylight Savings yet. I'm not ready for cold weather.
Since it was still unseasonably warm last week, we decided to go on a camping trip to Golden Gate Canyon State Park. We started off with a hike to see all the aspen trees (it's a BIG Colorado-thing). The yellow is very pretty, especially when the sun is shining on the leaves, but I prefer the red leaves on maple trees (which you don't tend to see around here). Charlie loves going on hikes, because he gets to share my peanut butter crackers when we take a break.
We decided to tent camp this time rather than rent a cabin. We haven't camped since last year, so it took us about 2 hours to set up the tent. We kept getting things backwards, plus it's not as easy to crawl around on the ground as it used to be. I noticed that most of the families around us had much taller tents than ours and they went together a lot quicker. I think if we do this again next year, we may have to look into upgrading (that or go back to parks with cabins).
I've been trying to squeeze in several bike rides before it gets too cold. I'm wearing our new club jersey. It's got the Colorado "C" symbol on it with a 150. The "150" represents the 150th anniversary of Colorado statehood; but we like to tell people that we've ridden 150 miles. I doubt they believe us.
On one of my rides, I rode the new section of the Platte River bike trail. It's been under construction since we moved here 5 years ago, so it was nice to see what it really looked like beyond the detour signs. One section had a giant dog statue that looked like it was made out of aluminum foil. I'm not sure what the inspiration was for that, but it was definitely unique.
I went down into the city this week to do some sketching. They tend to decorate for Halloween a lot more that they do in my neighborhood - more like they did when we lived in St Louis. Maybe it's a city thing.
Since it was raining on Wednesday, I went to the neighborhood Craft Club meeting. This month's project was "diamond painting." I wasn't sure what that meant, but we used that pink tool to pick up tiny beads and stick them on a card (the pink tool was sticky on one end). You can see how tiny the beads are in that little green tray. The card was only about 6 inches square, but it held a LOT of beads. It was fun to do once, but I don't think this kind of painting will replace my watercolor.
After the meeting, the Travel Club sponsored a Travel Expo with reps from several different companies. We've sort of given up international traveling, but it was interesting to hear about some of the US programs sponsored by the Road Scholar group (the company we went through when we biked the Katy Trail).
Bruce started taking a Tai Chi class over on the family side clubhouse. He said the instructor is good, but a bit of an entertainer always telling jokes. I thought Tai Chi was supposed to be quiet and meditative, but I don't participate in that sport.
And speaking of sports, Melissa posted a picture of Lincoln wearing his Broncos football uniform. Except for being the wrong color, he'd fit right in here, because Colorado people are nuts about the Denver Broncos. On the radio today, they were talking about their 4-2 "winning streak." That doesn't necessarily sound that great to me, especially when compared to the Chiefs 4-0 status so far this season. But I don't dare bring up the Chiefs... Denver people hate them.
