Fall

Fall is my favorite time of year. The leaves are changing, the air is crisp (although Mother Nature seems to be trying to hold on to some of the summer heat) and it just makes me want to spend time outside. I've been lucky this fall to go to some of my favorite places.

Over Labor Day, I went back to Kansas City to visit my friends and we spent a day in Lawrence. I hadn't been back there since I moved away five years ago. I enjoyed a black bean quesadilla from Free State Brewery, did some shopping on Mass St and then we went up to campus to wander around and take a trip down memory lane. It was a gorgeous day and it was the first football game of the season so there was a lot of energy on campus.

I love to see the game day flag flying on top of Fraser Hall.



Later in September, Gina and I decided to celebrate her birthday by taking a drive up to Breckenridge. We took 285 and the aspens were glorious.





This past weekend, Mary, Phil (click to see their photos from Taos) and I took our annual trip to Taos for the Taos Wool Festival and we once again stayed with James and Becca. I had been looking forward to this trip all year.

We stayed in their incredible house out on a mesa...



Such an amazing view from the front yard...



We took a hike through the sage...



And toured an Earthship that is under construction...



There are thousands of bottles and cans used to create this home...



and the fence...



Of course we went to the Taos Wool Festival...



And I can't post about Taos without including a photo of Jasper modeling a hat I made...



It's a bit snug, but he was a good sport.

Catching up - The Girls Weekend in Colorado

I haven't had this blog very long, and I'm already starting to get lazy about posting. Bad blogger! I'll try to be better. Time to catch you up on February.

My birthday weekend with the girls was absolutely fabulous. Colorado was as beautiful as I remembered it being...although the fog for the first 2 days I was there made it look suspiciously like Oklahoma. It's amazing how mountains change the landscape. Fortunately, the fog lifted enough for all of us to enjoy the views of the Flatirons, Indian Peaks and Long's Peak. I flew in a day earlier than the rest of the girls, so Gina and I went to one of my favorite places to eat, Chipotle (the other girls actually have Chipotles within driving distance...so not fair)

From there, we went to a enormous yarn store where I bought a skein of purple, orange and hot pink Toasty Toes hand-dyed yarn from Interlacements. They make the most beautiful yarn. I absolutely love it! My new theory, now that I am a sock knitting expert, is that if I'm going to take the time to make a pair of socks, they need to be obnoxious so people notice them. I can buy a boring pair of socks anytime.

Obnoxious socks! Love them. :)

But I digress. After what was probably one of the most exciting shopping excursions Gina has ever experienced, we bundled up and headed to the mountains to go snowshoeing. It was a little cold at first, but once we got moving, we quickly realized we overdressed. It was a really fun experience. I definitely want to try it again when we have a little more time and when I hadn't been up since 4:30 a.m. with only 3 hours of sleep. I was beat!



On Friday, Gina and I headed to her gym (once again, she pointed out the supposed views of the mountains...everything was still covered with fog), and we went to a spin class. The instructor kept warning us not to go anaerobic, but my flatlander lungs were struggling to get enough oxygen. The promise of a smoothie after the class helped me push through.

Friday afternoon, the rest of the girls FINALLY arrived. Sheryl, Allison and Holly came in from Kansas City, and Christy flew in from sunny San Diego. It has been a long time since we've all been in the same place all at once. We had to head to the ski rental shop to pick up our skis, but then the focus quickly turned to food (a common theme when we all got together). Waits are pretty long in Boulder at restaurants on Friday nights, but we ended up eating at a cute little Italian place with yummy food. I think the first time we all stopped talking from the time the rest of the girls arrived was when they delivered our dinner to the table.


Saturday morning (my birthday!) we headed to Breckenridge for some skiing. It was a beautiful day, and the conditions were perfect on the slopes. We don't have any daredevils in the group, so we stuck with mostly greens, but decided toward the end of our day to challenge ourselves with a blue. We all made it safely off the mountain. There were a few leg cramps from the evil ski boots, but no major injuries to report.

Ski bunnies

We left Breckenridge Saturday afternoon to make it back to Gina's to give us time to get cleaned up so we could go out to dinner to celebrate my birthday. I felt so lucky to get to spend my birthday with 5 of the greatest friends a girl could have. Since Mexican food on my birthday is a bit of a tradition, we headed to a restaurant in Boulder called Rio. Not that we have any lushes in the group, but we were a little surprised to hear that the restaurant has a 3 margarita maximum per person. And even more shocked to see that they were small. By our second round of margaritas, we learned that they weren't your average everyday margaritas. They were high octane. It made for a fun night. Many thanks to Arch (Christy's super thoughtful husband) for arranging to buy us our first round of drinks. He got the evening kicked off in the right way.

Looks innocent, doesn't it? HA!

The weekend flew by way too fast. I'm already counting the days until our next girls weekend. I miss having my friends close by, but I marvel at how when we are together, we don't miss a beat. I feel so lucky to have found this group of caring, intelligent, athletic, fun (I could go on and on...these girls are amazing) women.