BBBrrrrrr it's been cold!  Last night, as Les was coming in from a New Year's Eve party, it was 1 degree.  


We went to our good friends' house -- Ken and Angela.  The whole gang was there and so was lots of food and drink.  We both went to the party, but I hitched a ride with another friend who had to run into town to get a friend from the train station.  I left shortly before 9:00.  Yes, I know... what a fuddy-duddy.  As much as I love hanging around with friends -- laughing and talking, there's nothing like my own warm and cozy house.

 Les stayed to bring in the new year, though.  He had a lot of fun.

The night before last it snowed during the night.  There was only about 1-1/2 inches of snow, but it was so pretty.  We went up to the mountain and walked the dogs.  I was curious as to what animal tracks we'd see.  Oddly enough, there weren't a lot of tracks.  Just fox, deer and birds.

I was kind-of hoping I'd see bear tracks, but I guess they must be hibernating right now.

There are a lot of foxes up there.  We saw one as he bolted across the road in front of us today.  They are beautiful creatures.

 But the snow.  I didn't think it was possible, but with a fresh new blanket of snow, our mountain-top was even more picturesque and peaceful than usual.  Fresh snow somehow brings silence to the landscape.

As we hiked our property, Mindy harassed Schultz as usual.  The snow doesn't bother her one bit.  Schultz doesn't seem to mind either, but this morning at 2 degrees, he wasn't interested in much of anything except getting back into this cozy, warm house.

It's been a very mild winter so far.  Jacket weather, for sure.  But not much else going on.  It was nice to see the snow.

Crystalline Magic

This morning was breath-taking.

We awoke to a foggy, cold morning here in Trinidad, Colorado.  I let Les sleep in a little longer as  he didn't sleep well the night before.  And as we were preparing for our usual walk with the dogs, I told him that I'd rather go up to the property to walk.  When we go up there, we don't have to worry about one of the dogs choosing to poop right in the middle of the street as we cross.  (Don't laugh... it happens quite often!)  There's nothing worse than holding on to a young dog who hates the leash while trying to open a little plastic bag to pick up poop.  And doing that while you're watching for cars, or.. worse still, having a car wait for you as you scrape poop from the middle of the street is just awful.

That, and Mindy gets to run to her heart's content.  She loves to run!  Schultz has a blast up there, too.  They play and play.

But back to our gorgeous morning... while it was foggy here in town this morning, it was really foggy up the mountain.  And an amazing thing was happening up there.  On the east side of everything was a blanket of crystal.  It wasn't exactly snow and it wasn't exactly ice.  It was just crystal and it was exquisite!  It was on the trees, on the scrub oak, on every blade of grass and every dried flower.

 This is what they call here a "freezing fog."  And it was beautiful.

Just a Blur

Mindy girl is about 8 months old now.  We knew that a blue heeler/border collie mix would be a very active pup.  I just don't think we were aware of how much.

 She and Schultz get along really well together now.  He even allows her to step over him as he sprawls out in the hallway.  Until she got the nerve, she would whine and bark imploring him to move so that she could get by.  Sometimes he'd oblige -- usually he wouldn't.

 Now she playfully hops over him and sometimes even gives him a little nip on her way by.

Taking pictures of her is a real challenge.  I try to have my camera with me whenever we go up to the mountain.  But try as I might, I have yet to get a really good picture of her because she's moving all the time.  I either get her head as a big blur or just the back end of her as she's leaving the frame.

 Schultz is easy to photograph.  He stands there... he does what he's told... he's nice and mellow now.

Mindy... that's another story entirely.

The Boys

We were blessed to have our boys here for Thanksgiving.  Les came home from California by way of Boise Idaho in order to drop Andrew's drums off and to bring him here for Thanksgiving.  We hadn't seen Andy since our official move date of June 10th.  He's been keeping himself busy in Boise... looking for a job... playing with a band.

DJ took a week of leave from the Army and headed down here to Trinidad from Fort Carson near Colorado Springs.  It was so good to have our family together again.

I cooked a near-perfect Thanksgiving dinner with turkey and all of the trimmings.  Our friend, Jim, joined us for a meal.  It turned out that he was making his rounds on Thanksgiving Day as Joelle was out of town.  I know Jim attended at least 3 meals that day -- the boy must have been hungry.  Probably didn't eat for a week afterwards!

 The day after Thanksgiving was the tree and train lighting ceremony near City Hall.  Trinidad has a steam engine and a few old rail cars sitting near the river.  They light it up for Christmas along with a very large fir tree.  Many of the people from town gathered to watch as carols were sung and the tree and train were lit with sparkling white lights.

Andy fresh off the truck from Boise.

 Mindy and Schultz were happy to have the boys here as company.  I took many pictures of them, but then I realized that nearly every single picture I took of Mindy was blurry.  This creature does not stand for pictures.  Pretty much, the only time she's still is when she's sleeping, or if food is just about to hit her bowl.  What a character!

Les after being gone a month.

There's my Schultzie Boy!

What a Goof!!!!!!!!!!!

Christmas Parade

It seems like this lovely little town will use any excuse to have a parade!  Labor Day -- have a parade!  Homecoming -- have a parade!  I love it!

We went to see the "Parade of Lights" for the Christmas Season.  Main street was closed off and many, many people braved 25 degree weather to see the lights as they made their way down the street.  This was our first Christmas parade here.  It did not disappoint.

I was thrilled to have our whole family together for Thanksgiving.  After a month in California, Les drove home by way of Boise to pick up Andrew and to drop off his drums.  They hit heavy weather on the trek home from Idaho, but arrived safe & sound.

 DJ took a week of leave from the Army.  He and Andy spent quite a lot of time together.  It was so good to have my family around.  Our house is very little, so we could not offer them a bed, but they made the best of it in our recliners and on the floor.  No one complained

This little trailer drove up and down the street offering cookies and cocoa.

Only in Trinidad would you see a porta-potty in a parade and dressed up in Christmas lights! 

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First Snow

The temperatures have been dipping into the low 20's at night time.  Being mid-November, the locals have been commenting about the lack of snow.  Last year, it snowed in September.  This year, nothing so far.

I enthusiastically watch the weather.  I have no idea why, but weather fascinates me.  It's probably because we never really had weather in California.  It was nearly always 78 degrees and sunny.  In the winter, it rained some.  But it never really seemed like "weather" to me.  But I'm always checking www.wunderground.com or www.weather.com.  I know, weird, huh?

Here the weather is really something interesting.  It's changing and diverse.  We get rain in the summer.  It snows in the winter.  Fall is actually a season here!  Can you imagine??

So I watched as the weather websites were calling for snow and/or rain last night and today.  I couldn't help myself but to drive up to the property to see the clouds for myself last night just before dusk.  There was a bright glowing spot where the sun was setting and it was giving off brilliant hues of yellow and gold.  And to the north of that you could clearly see that it was snowing on the Sangre de Cristo range.  Finally, the snow was on its way.

I awoke this morning at 7:00.  Got dressed and opened the door to take the dogs for their walk.  And it was snowing!  Big fluffy flakes falling to the ground.  Schultz didn't pay much attention to it, but Mindy was wondering what the heck was going on!

We walked our usual walk down by the river.  I could feel the snowflakes softly fall upon my face.  There was only a tiny bit of accumulation on the ground, but I didn't care.  It was snowing.  The trees are starting their long winter sleep.  The landscape is changing.

I know that all too soon I'll be longing for spring.  But for now, I want to just enjoy the snow.

Halloween

All Hallows' Eve is a big thing in this quaint little Colorado town.  I think it's just because these people like to party.  It seems like there's always something going on.

This year Halloween landed on a Sunday.  The town, however, celebrated the entire weekend.

Earlier in the week I noticed yellow notices on each of the lamp posts on Main Street and on Commercial Street.  Where these streets intersect is the heart of downtown Trinidad and is the oldest and busiest part of the town.  These yellow notices told of the closure of the streets on Friday in order to celebrate Halloween and have a safe haven for the kids to trick-or-treat downtown.

So on Friday at precisely 2:00 in the afternoon, the two busiest streets in the town were blocked off and the celebration started.  Children and their parents were happily collecting candy and treats from the local merchants. 

But one thing I noticed among all of the smiling faces.  Most of the kids' costumes were home-made.  And these home-made costumes by far outshone the cheesy masks I was used to seeing the kids wear. 

There was a young man wearing a box on his torso and his head.  He wore aluminum ducting on his arms and legs and aluminum foil on his hands and shoes.  He made the perfect little robot.

Another youngster was dressed as a refrigerator.  Her head was in the freezer part of the fridge along with a package of Hot Pockets, Kid Cuisine and a severed hand neatly wrapped in a grocery store meat package.  On the front of the fridge was a child's drawing held by magnets.

Cat Woman made a brief appearance as did Mr. T's youngest protege. 

In the street and every 10 minutes, a group of kids made up like zombies danced to Michael Jackson's "Thriller."  What a huge party!

At 5:00 the bank held the costume contest.  The lobby of the bank was absolutely packed with kids and their parents.  The winners landed on the front page of the local newspaper.

The following night was for the adults.  A costume party benefit was held at one of the local art galleries.  But before that was a "Pre-party party" at a different art gallery.  DJ was here for the weekend and we just decided to stay home and watch a movie, though.  I'm such a fuddy-duddy sometimes!

Halloween night I stayed in.  I did not turn on my front light as our stairs from the street are old and steep.  I didn't want any children to chance going up or down the stairs with their masks on.

All in all, it was a fun weekend.  This is such a lively -- and lovely place.