More of Deadwood-April 29, 2018

As mentioned in the last post it did snow in Deadwood on Tuesday. It was not a blizzard. The rain before it snowed made the roads deep in heavy slush. We elected to stay another day.

Eeny, meeny, which one is ours? The hearty soul who left was

from Wyoming. All others stayed put including us.

 

It was not cold at all so we put on jackets and walked the entire length of main street. It was wonderful to breath the clean fresh air.

 

It looks cold and dreary but it really wasn't either.

 

Jerry thought she was underdressed for the weather.

I thought she was a dummy!

 

By the time we finished our walk things were really

starting to clear up. While the picture is dark it is still possible

to see to the extreme opposite end of the city. I guess the flag shows

it's windier than we realized.

 

We really enjoy Deadwood. It is an interesting town full of history and very nice people. And to make matters better we found a bakery that makes fresh homemade donuts daily. They were delicious. We will add it to our agenda on future trips.

 

 

 

Deadwood, South Dakota-April 24, 2018

We were able to get away to Deadwood on Sunday. The drive here is one of the prettiest we ever make no matter what time of year.

This is at the Wyoming/South Dakota border. It is so peaceful.

 

We noticed that much of Wyoming has red highways including the interstate. I finally took the time to find out why.

 Some are redder than others because they do fade with use.

Wyoming uses iron ore in the road to make it stronger. It appears to us

that it works. Why don't other states do the same?

 

So then I questioned if iron ore is mined in Wyoming? Not at the current time though it was in the past. Now that we know this we can see huge deposits of the ore as we get to the extreme eastern part of the state. It must not be cost effective to mine it now.

 

And while speaking of Wyoming I did get one nice picture of the state as we were nearing South Dakota.

 

 

 

The weather was unbelievably beautiful on Sunday and Monday. Then it snowed on Tuesday. We can't get away from the stuff. Those pictures will be in my next blog post.

 

 

Girls-April 20, 2018

One of the most difficult tasks I have is to try to get pictures of the girls especially Zoey. Either I can't get them to pose or the lighting is bad. Most of all, Zoey almost always refuses to smile. She's a happy little girl but when I take a picture of her she looks miserable. Bless her heart. Today I made another attempt to take pictures and got a couple that are merely acceptable.

At least in this picture Zoey looks pleasantly happy. Daisy looks

like she needs a haircut.

 

Can you tell what this is? Or who it is? It's Daisy digging in the

tub of Legos for more to put on the table which has a Lego top.

We don't know how she kept from falling in. I can only say this

little creature does everything with great gusto. Good or bad,

she gives it her all.

 

I'll try to get a picture of Daisy with her huge grin on her face next time.

 

In spite of nasty weather beginning tonight we are still thinking about heading for the Black Hills of South Dakota, our home state, this weekend.

 

Sign of Spring-April 16, 2018

Time is completely getting away from me. I am not current on emails. I am not current on reading a book I have had for a year. And obviously I am not current on posting this blog. So sorry. We are working very hard at going through tubs and boxes we have had in the garage for a year since we emptied our storage unit. First step was to go through and put a label on everything. Then we started going through every container one by one. What I want to keep must fit in somewhere. That involves cleaning out closets, too. This is much more work than we anticipated but oh how good it will feel when it is done and we are down to just things we need or use currently. In between we are still babysitting. We had all three girls on Saturday night. Two of them were sick. Oh my goodness how terrible that night was. They are starting to get well. We are trying not to give in and get sick.

Today before we went for our walk I looked in the backyard much to the unhappiness of the dog next door and look what I found.

Our first sign of Spring! They are hearty little tulips and easily survive

the freezing nights. The grass is trying to green up also.

 

While we were walking we saw a Robin. So Spring must be on the way, finally. Last weekend was like winter with wind chill temps way below freezing. It is predicted to snow this Saturday. But today was nice enough to get outside. That's Springtime in the Rockies and it is what makes people sick.

 

Hannah's soccer game has been cancelled the past two Saturdays and will probably be cancelled this weekend also. It will be a trifecta of nasty Saturdays. Bless her heart.

 

The one good thing about cleaning out the garage is that it does not matter what the weather is outside. At least I think that's a good thing! Ok, back to work.

 

Seashells-April 7, 2018

While sorting through boxes to help clean out "junque" (junk) I found something I had forgotten about. But when I saw this I remembered in detail what this find meant to us.

These appear to be seashells, right?, just like what you would

find at the beach, any beach. Due to the color these probably would not

have come from the Gulf of Mexico but from an ocean somewhere else.

 

Simply put these are small scallops.

 

But the unique part of these shells is that they came out of the Rio Grande River in 2013.

 

The story: While RVing we stopped more than once at Las Cruces, New Mexico. We always enjoyed it there. We especially loved nearby Mesilla Valley where you not only find history and fabulous food, but also the world's best pistachio grower/distributor called Heart of the Desert. The pistachios you find in stores cannot hold a candle to Heart of the Desert. On one of our trips to Las Cruces we drove to a park that was along side the Rio Grande River. However, there was no river. It was completely dried up. We walked way out to the middle which should have been impossible. Perhaps the river water was being taken out upstream for irrigation purposes and then being put back in way south of where we were. Whatever the reason there simply was no Rio Grande River at that point. So while we are walking we found the above seashells. I don't think they are called river shells. They definitely appear to be seashells. What a treasure! What does that say to you? My inquisitive mind ran wild. We all know that the earth was once covered with oceans. Could these be remains from those oceans? What could possibly lie deep underneath the dried up river bed? These did not appear to be dropped there by someone playing a practical joke. There were too many of them. Obviously they were not sun bleached as those found on the beach some of the time. Would you care to guess where they came from? Whatever the reason this is just one of the many small wonders we found while traveling. I am so glad I found these again. They will be put in a place of safe keeping now.

 

 

Return trip-March 29, 2018

When we left WinStar it was gloomy but not storming. The forecast was for storms in Oklahoma City, but thankfully they did not materialize. We reached a front moving in from the north in Hays, Kansas. As you know we stop there so we can eat at Gella's restaurant. It gets better every time we eat there. When we hit the Colorado far eastern border we found out what the front was all about. Snow.

 

 

It was really pretty for a couple of reasons. First, the antelope had not made

tracks in it yet. And secondly, it did not stick to the interstate so the

driving was not hazardous. This is the kind of snow we'd love to have all

the time. It was still cold unfortunately.

 

We had a skiff of snow on Easter morning, too. Winter is not ready to let go yet.

 

In other news, we survived dyeing eggs with three girls. And we survived the noise of Easter dinner. We have much to be thankful for!