Hiking and More

I haven’t posted much this month (sorry), so here is a quick little update with plenty of photos. We all love photos right? For those of you on Facebook, some of these are repeats.

We’ve been hiking and biking a lot. Dude is a puppy and without his old neighbor girlfriend Cairo coming over every day to play, we’ve had to keep him entertained. Luckily he sleeps and lounges around all day, but that means evenings are spent out exploring. But it’s good- for him and us- so no complaints. He is a really good motivator.

He also likes sleeping on the floor

On the trail just behind our house

A bit further up the trail – beautiful meadow of wildflowers

Dude loves running in the meadow

Beautiful

Mushrooms are out in full force – must be all the moisture we’ve had

Love this color

Sunset

Fox on the road near our house

A foggy drive home one afternoon

 

And here’s a video of Dude and Erik frolicking in the meadow.

It’s been raining a lot and Dude is suddenly afraid of storms, he looks for the nearest thing to hide under or behind. Lately it’s been my desk, with me sitting at it, but then he decided this was an awesome place to hang out – storm or not. I have a space heater, a blanket, it’s carpeted…all great and cozy in his mind.

And sleeping under my desk- his new favorite spot

He also gets to go with us pretty much wherever we go. I can’t decide if he likes the wind or not. But we know he likes the dog park!

Dude kind of likes riding in cars – with the wind in his ears

Dude chasing another dog at the dog park – he’s not very fast

My beautiful bike

Dude drinks from water bottles like a champ

Erik riding and Dude following

We had a nice anniversary on the 13th. We went for a ride behind our house, grilled some yummy food and just had a nice night at home.

One weekend my sister and Erik attempted what I consider an epic ride, to the top of the road we live on. I knew I would never make it so didn’t even suit up. Erik struggled and Mel is amazing. I drove up and took Dude for a hike up there, and got to see first-hand how rough the road is, even driving. I can’t imagine riding it but Dude and I had a nice time.

Snow

Gotta love the views

And peacefulness

Dude was just chilling, waiting for me to take photos

Finally, we discovered a new trail by our house and have been hiking and riding it. And I love full moons.

family photo

A lovely little creek

The creek again

Dude and Erik up on a big rock

Full moon shot from our bedroom – blue moon night i think

 

So now you know exactly what we’ve been up to, right?! This is actually quite representative. What I don’t have are photos from our outings with Mel and Barry. It seems Mel always takes photos on those days for some reason. Recently we’ve done a lot of mountain biking, some Sunday morning hikes, cheering at their mountain bike races, hot springs, the Pro Challenge in Denver, and probably a bunch of other stuff too. Until next time!

 

 

 

New residence in Photos

If you’ve been following, you know that we recently moved. It was a process since we first painted, then moved and then, of course, figured out where everything was to go. Here is the finished product.

Bedroom with a lovely sounding creek below the window

Other side of the bedroom

bathroom 2

bathroom

my boys

bike corner

erik’s office

kitchen

cozy dining room

main floor

main floor

living room

main floor from loft view

from loft down steps

loft outside of the bedroom – aka my office

Moving

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned it, but we had to move. The landlords at our old place were planning to move back into that house so we were left looking for something new. The rental market around here is not fun to deal with. Boulder and surrounding is crazy expensive and the mountains lack many viable options. We both work from home so we had a few requirements, like at least two bedrooms. Ideally three, but at least two and must accept dogs and ideally we wanted the best bang for the buck. Our old place was more than we were wanting to spend, so we wanted to spend less. That meant probably making some concessions. Price or niceness and size – we had to figure out what was important. Luckily we didn’t have to settle too much. We found a two bedroom plus loft for several hundred less than we were paying. No fenced yard and a little shabby, but it would have to do. Except for one other, it was the only actual option we could find. We started the moving process nearly two weeks ago. The place was a little rundown so we decided to do a bunch of painting. Our landlord was cool with us doing it for rent credit and she bought all the paint and supplies for us. It took some major time, especially with the high ceilings in the living room, but Mel and Barry came and did some great work, making it more do-able. Actual move-in day was Thursday night. We borrowed a truck from our neighbor and other neighbors came to help, along with Mel. We got almost everything moved, except the bed and last-minute stuff like cleaning supplies and bathroom stuff that just never got packed. Friday morning we did all the cleaning at the old place and packed up the rest of the stuff. At noonish we checked out and drove away for the last time. I won’t miss driving Magnolia but it was bittersweet because that was our first house in CO.

So onto the new. We went from living on a ridge (think dry, pine forest, not many plants) to wetland (yes, CO does have water). We have a creek running through the front year that can be heard from anywhere in the house. The backyard is solid plants and tall grasses with trails that lead to national forest.  I should add, we are still near the same town, just on the other side of it and a little closer to town.

So, time for photos. This is how the place looked when we first started painting.

Second bedroom/Erik’s office

Kitchen/Dining area

Living Room

Living Room toward loft (upstairs) and kitchen toward office (downstairs)

Loft/My Office

Bedroom

And here’s some outdoor views.

View from the house toward the yard/driveway

The creek

The creek from the other side of the bridge – you have to cross the bridge to get to the driveway

Today, the house looks like chaos – boxes everywhere. So consider this your before and soon, we’ll do the after so you can see how nice the paint looks and with everything put away.

Right now I can hear the creek running, I can hear and see the fluttering of aspen leaves and the wind. The sun is coming in the windows and although I’m exhausted from moving and doing the craziest mountain bike ride of my life last night, things are good.