He's a Keeper!!!

Yup, I think our daughter, Beth, finally got it right! Her beau is a keeper!!!! This morning we met Beth's boyfriend, James; we approve; really, really nice person and we like him a lot. He was personable, up-front about everything, answered all the grueling questions parents ask boyfriends, and passed the test with flying colors. Here we are - one happy family!

They make a cute couple, don't they?

Remember, you are loved!

Daughter Visit

Well, we pulled out of Alamosa Tuesday morning and drove to Santa Fe to have a short visit with our daughters. We met daughter Beth at the Walmart parking lot where Bill and Lesle were waiting for us. We surprised our daughter Christine by walking into the restaurant where she works to have lunch.

That's Christine on the left and Beth on the right. They are really close and see each other about every day. In another 2 weeks Beth will move into the same apartment complex as Christine, so they will be living really close.

We had to have a group photo also.

Bill and Lesle and us will travel together for the next six-seven months. We are like our own little SKP/Boomer family....always having our own mini-rangs (short for Boomerangs). We do get along so well...Jim and Bill becoming best friends and Lesle and I realizing we are so much alike we could be sisters. I think we have unofficially adopted each other.

After lunch we traveled a bit down the road to San Felipe Casino Hollywood, which is pretty close to the Balloon Fiesta launching field. They have a nice RV Park with electric for $10 a night with water and dump site available. We'll stay here for a couple of days and go be a part of the Boomers group on Thursday.

This morning we meet with Beth and her boyfriend for breakfast. We haven't met her James before, so this is a "come meet the parents" event. I think there might be a private meeting with Jim and James for the "ask for your daughter's hand". I'll let you know tomorrow.

Remember, you are loved and missed!

On the Road Again

Tomorrow morning we will finally be on the road again after about five months of being within 75 miles of Alamosa. Yippeeee!!!!! We will stop and see our daughters in Santa Fe for a little bit and then head out for Albuquerque to the Balloon Fiesta. Luckily Albuquerque and Santa Fe are close so we can go up and visit the daughters a couple of times while we are at the Balloon Fiesta. I am so ready to hit the road!!!

Unfortunately our friends, Rich and Terri, won't be coming along with us. Rich's mother isn't doing too well so they feel they need to stay in the area for the winter to care for her. So they won't be doing the Balloon Fiesta or Amazon.com. We are sure disappointed, but understand.

Remember, you are loved!

Organization Freak-Yes, I Alphabetize My Spices Also

Yes, I am pretty much an organization freak! I hate disorder and congestion in the rig. You know, when you live in such a small space anything out of place makes everything look messy. I'm not a clean freak except for the restroom - I don't spend a lot of time dusting and vacuuming - but I do like things in their place.

Once a year Jim and I go through everything in the rig to reevaluate everything we are carrying. It is surprising how much you accumulate in a year. And we have found our taste changes during the year. And for me my hobbies have changed.

I have been a dedicated quilter for some 14 years - always having a quilt project in progress. I brought my sewing machine with me when we went fulltime along with a selected amount of fabric and quilting supplies. But I no long feel the "pull" to quilt and now have the "knitting" bug. Jim was very surprised when I chose to go to a yarn store instead of a quilt shop. Part of the reason is that quilting on the road is difficult if you aren't in an rv park with a club house or something so you can spread out and quilt a top. I have sewn a quilt project in the rig, but all cooking and cleaning has to stop until I finish the project because it takes over the rig. You know, you've seen my photos of when I am making a quilt in the rig. My design wall is a flannel sheet hooked over the door of the freezer; the ironing board is laid onto of the stove and my kitchen island becomes my cutting board. It's a mess for a couple of days until I finish; then you have to put everything away. It's not like when we were in our "sticks and bricks" when I had my own sewing room and I could leave things out and just close the door till the next day.

So today I went through all my fabric- stored under the bed-and brought some of it to our local quilt shop to give to the quilt guild to use for charity quilts. I'll package up most of the rest of the fabric into packets for auction for C.A.R.E. that the Boomers will hold at the Balloon Fiesta.

Yesterday I finished up reorganizing all our cabinets. With our rig it works best to have all our canned foods, baking items, etc. put in plastic bins on the shelves. They don't slide and move around so much when we are driving. And since I have been known to buy too much tuna and diced green chiles because I can't remember if I have any, I made a list of each cabinet contents so I can see what I DO have....I'll mark it off as I use it. Here's what it looks like now.

I also went through the kitchen utensils and got rid of about half of what I had. I didn't need two pie pans or three bread pans; or that silicon tart and cake pan I bought with Lesle in Florida last winter. Only used that mini food processor once when Norah gave me her recipe for hummus...I buy it prepared now. But I did keep my yogurt maker because I like fresh yogurt a lot. It felt so good to have room available in the drawers and cabinets again.

Today I defrosted the freezer and cleaned the refrigerator; am taking all the scatter rugs to the laundromat tomorrow while Jim shampoos the carpet. Then we are through with the sorting, discarding, reorganizing and repacking the rig. That will give us a couple of days to just relax and read before we go back to South Fork to help Rich and Terri close down their campground and we all head for Albuquerque.

Oh, and yes, I do alphabetize my spices - sick isn't it?

Remember you are loved.

Car Show

Last Saturday Jim entered his 1964 El Camino in a car show back in Creede. We were so busy at the campground on Labor Day that he was unable to enter this truck in the Early Iron Car Show held in Alamosa every year, so I was happy when he announced he was going to put the El Camino in the Creede show. Oh, you didn't know Jim had a classic car? Oh, he sure does. Isn't it a beauty?
Jim had an El Camino in his youth and he really loved it so we were very happy when he found another one back in 2004. It took B & W Body Shop in Alamosa 15 months to restore it. It is a cherry-apple, gold fleck color that glistens in the sun --- really pretty.

This the first car show for Creede and they had 56 cars crowding the skinny streets of Creede. That's a good amount for their first show.

I stayed home and watched the dogs and continued sorting and cleaning out the rv in preparation for our next year on the road. More about that tomorrow.

Remember, you are loved.

Rally Photos

I finally got the photos from the Chapter 2 rally off the camera and into Picasa for changes. Remember, you can click on any of the collages to enlarge them. So this first collage is of our visit to Creede's Underground Fire Station. Creede didn't have the money to build a fire station, but they had a lot of miners who were working in the silver mines in Creede. So in the miners off hours they donated their talents to dig out a fire station from a mountain just outside of town. They started in 1976 and took six years to complete. The interesting thing is that they didn't just blast out a big room to house the fire trucks. Instead they blasted and dug out individual bays - one for each piece of equipment. Inside it stays a constant 55 degrees, so there is no need to heat or use air conditioning.
I really like the photo of all the bunker gear lined up on pegs! Everyone seemed to enjoy being able to get inside and see the interior.

The South Fork Campground has a double garage that has been fixed up as a club house of sorts. Many of their summer campers come for the entire summer and they have breakfasts and lots of potlucks. So there are two stoves, a refrigerator and a freezer. So we used the garage as our meeting place for all the rally activities from morning coffee, daily happy hours, dinners and evening activities. Judy and Chuck Derington did a fantastic job as rally hosts, especially organizing all the meals. They bought most of the food precooked at Costco in Denver. The heat-and-eat barbeque ribs and hot wings were marvelous as were the frozen cinnamon rolls. As with all Escapee rallies we ate very well and no one left hungry for sure.

One night after dinner we had karaoke provided by MJ and Bill. The guys did the singing and the ladies did the dancing. The group really enjoyed the entertainment. We laughed till we were sick!Another night we all sat outside and had a camp fire provided by a outdoor gas log setup. Can you see it there in one of the photos? It was great! No smoke wafting in your face and in your clothes. The Marvin Eggleston played his guitar and provided us with song sheets and we sang all the old-fashioned songs like "She'll be Coming Round the Mountain" and "Five Foot Two". Wow, we had a great time singing with each other and even harmonizing on some of the songs. It was a great fun evening!

With 21 rigs we had a good turn out. We signed up 11 new members to go along with the 16 new member at the June rally, so we are growing. We had guests from Oklahoma and Kansas who were in the area and heard about the rally. We had some Class of 2007 classmates , Dave and Kathy Bennett, also attending. We even had VCRs in attendance, Ed and Sandy Kruty, which was very special. They were very helpful in explaining things and helping with the business meeting.

Our next rally will be in mid-May with a fall rally again next September or October. We want to have rallies all over the state and are looking at having the May rally in Montrose.

Well, that's all the info on our Fall rally. Hope some of you can join us at future rallies of Chapter 2.

Remember - yes, you are loved!

Chapter 2 Fall Rally Finished

We had a great turn out for the Fall Rally of the Escapees RV Club Colorado Chapter 2!!! We had 21 rigs and only about five rigs were also at the June rally, so there were a lot of new people. We had several guest SKPs who were traveling nearby and also came. We had 11 new members to the chapter, so that brings us to about 27 members of the chapter. That is really good for a rejuvenated chapter.

Chuck and Judy Derington did a wonderful job as rally hosts! They simplified the cooking chores by bringing a lot of foods from Costco that only had to be heated. The Curley ribs were very tender and tasty as were the chicken wings and the cinnamon rolls for Friday morning. The precooked food sure worked well.

We made a fun trip to Creede. Jim had arrangements to tour the underground fire station that was blasted out of the side of a mountain. Everyone seemed to be pleased in that tour and the underground mining museum next door. We checked out the shops along main street and then had lunch. The men gathered at OMI (Old Miner's Inn) and the ladies made it a Red Hats on the Road event and ate at The Old Firehouse Cafe, which is the original Creede fire station.

One of the nights of the rally we had karaoke. It was fun and funny. Bill Latham and Bill Borger shined with their voices. A lot of us sang along from our seats. It made for a very entertaining evening.

On the last night of the rally we had a gas campfire pit set up outside and we all sat around as Marvin Eggleston played his guitar and led an old-fashioned sing-a-long. The night air was cool and crisp and we had song sheets so we were able to sing a lot of songs from our youth. They ranged from "She'll be Coming Around the Mountain" to "Five Foot Two". What a grand time we had trying to harmonize.....great fun!

We voted positively on having two rallies next year - May and September-October. We want to cover both ranges of Colorado and also north and south. If the last two rallies are any indication, we should continue to have good participation.

We are back to Alamosa now staying at "Chapman Campground" by Jim's brother's building outside of town by the airport. We have FHU and it is quiet as there are only two commerical flights a day here. We'll be here till September 30th when we will go back to South Fork Campground and help Rich and Terri close down the campground for the winter. Then it is off to Albuquerque for the Balloon Fiesta.

It is getting cold here, though Folks. This morning it was 38 and next week the nights and mornings are predicted to be 27 - 29 degrees. Burr-r-r-r-r-r way too cold.....time to leave Dodge/Alamosa for sure!!! Another 12 days and we will be gone....guess we can stand it that long. I'm pulling out my long underwear for sure.

Remember, you are loved!

Knitting project completed

I'm knitting our Christmas gifts. So here is the latest project I completed. It is for our daughter, Christine, as she loves bath products.

The upper left item is a hand washer, top right is a soap holder, bottom right is a soap-lather scrubby, and in the middle is the bag to hold it all. I bought this as a kit from KnitPicks.com so I didn't have to figure out the color combinations or anything. It did take a while to knit it all, but it was nice to learn new knitting techniques and try something different. I really enjoy knitting this project. Now on to a belt I'm knitting my teen granddaughter, Alyssa.

Remember, you are loved!

Joe and Marcia Visit

Well, we had a wonderful visit with Joe and Marcia from the Escapees Class of 2007. The night before they were predicting SNOW in the mountains. We didn't get any on the ground, but when we went to meet Joe and Marcia in Ft. Garland we sure saw snow on Mt. Blanca. See that "white stuff" on the tops of the mountain?

We joined Roger and Brenda Cyrus (who came up from Eagle's Nest in New Mexico) in a parking lot waiting for Joe and Marcia, then went to Old West Cafe to eat.

Breakfast was great!

We all had a great time to catch up on all our travels and where we plan to go next.

Jim convinced Joe to come spend the night where we are staying at the South Fork Campground. Of course, Jim offered to grill barbeque ribs if they'd come. That did the trick! When they arrived we settled in for a nice visit with them and Rich and Terri, campground managers and fellow SKPs and friends. But that was BEFORE the storm hit!!!!





















Look at this mess! It thundered, we had lightning and then the HAIL started to fall, and fall, and fall.

Look at Jim's disgusted look




























and Joe had to make a "hail ball"

Rich said he was going to charge us extra for the "water front property".

Jim did a great job with the ribs.




I made coleslaw and bought some wonderful Olathe sweet corn, doctored up a loaf of garlic bread and Marcia provided a tasty peanut butter pie









It was a full, happy day with great food and even better friends and conversation. Remember, you are very much loved!!!

Fall is coming to Colorado

Yes, siree, fall is coming to Colorado. The aspen trees are turning yellow fast. Haven't seen any of the reds show up yet, but the temperature is dropping, with the sun not coming up until 6:30 am....sure sign of a change in the seasons.

Took this photo yesterday when we were parking the company truck for the winter. Looks like a picture postcard, doesn't it?

We did take a drive up to our campground to see if there were any progress on their tree cutting job. Boy, had they!!! In two and a half days there was a lot of trees down. They have one of those de-limber machines that strip off the limbs real quick. Then they are stacking the stripped lumber where we had our dumpsters. They place is all closed off and they weren't working on Saturdays, so Jim got out and walked through some of the campsites down by the reservoir and he said it looked like a bomb had exploded inside the campground with trees cut down all over waiting to be hauled out to the delimber.

Got a surprising phone call last night that some SKP friends are driving through near by and so we will drive down to Alamosa to meet Joe and Marcia before they drive down to meet other friends in New Mexico. That will be really fun.

Remember, you are loved!

Last Day of Work

Well, today was our last official day of work. I faxed in the time sheets and reports; tomorrow I'll mail in a box of used fee envelopes and monthly reports and we are done!!! Jim will put Stabil into the truck, disconnect the battery and will store the battery here at Rich and Terri's. Take the keys to the Forest Service and we are finished for seven months, when we'll do this all over again.

So we went out to dinner with Rich and Terri to my favorite restaurant, Baldo's Mexican Restaurant. It was delicious!!! Then back to Rich and Terri's for bananna splits.....I know, bad for us, but oh so good!!!

We are getting ready for the rally which starts Tuesday.....should be fun! Remember, you are loved!

Out of the Mountains

Well, we left Big Meadows Campground around 9:30 am yesterday and drove a whole 15 miles to the South Fork Campground where our friends, Rich and Terri Deacon, are managers. We will roost here for 9 days till after the Chapter 2 rally Sept 18th. There are 19 rigs signed up for the rally, which I think is a very impressive number!!! The weather is warmer here as it is about 1,200 feet lower than up at Big Meadows.

The trees seemed to start turning colors all in one day. Jim drove to Alamosa one morning and everything was green and when he came back that afternoon there was yellow leaves everywhere! Hopefully by next week it will be prime time for viewing the fall colors for the rally attendees.

Here are some photos of the animals at Big Meadows that we saw. Jim is very partial to the ground squirrels and likes to feed them. They will eat right out of your hand. One of our campers had a ground squirrel trained to run up his leg and go head first into his shirt pocket and get peanuts in the shell. It looked so funny to see this bushy tail sticking out of his shirt pocket!

After we pulled in yesterday Jim barbequed some chicken and we were able to join in on happy hour.....oh, did we join in! It was our "end of the season" celebration. Terri and I had three Manhattans each with Jim also joining the party with bourbon and coke and Rich with beer. We all got pretty blotto!

We are having a new fresh water tank installed in our rig today. It has a pretty good crack in the bottom. Luckily it happened here where we know where to take it to be repaired. Jim's going to take a photo of the old tank and I'll post it tomorrow.

Well, remember you are loved.

Time to leave!

I guess it is time to leave when your Polident is so cold you can't squeeze it out of the tube to put your dentures in your mouth!!!

Well, that happened to me this morning. I had to put the Polident onto of the heater floor vent to warm up so I could use it.....ridiculous. But, hay, we leave tomorrow morning so it's OK. Yippe-e-e-e we'll be on the road by 9:00 a.m. Yea, I know we're only going 15 miles down the road, but it is out of here and parking with SKP friends, Rich and Terri Deacon. And we can have a drink because we won't be in uniform or in the campground.

We have an appointment to install the new water tank on Thursday morning, so tomorrow is a free day to gather all the uniforms, pack office supplies into totes and finish up reports. We will work through Friday... have a leisurely weekend and then the rally early arrival is Monday.

We are tired and ready to be finished with our area manager responsibilities and be back to our normal fulltimers selves.

Remember, you are loved!

Sunday in the Mountains

I am currently following my Sunday ritual. I love Sunday mornings as I have a bunch of my favorite tv shows to watch. First up is CBS News Sunday Morning, then Meet the Press and then Chris Matthews Show. Molly, I guess that makes me "one of your liberal friends" :)

One of our friends asked a couple questions in their comments to our blog, so here are a couple of answers.

(1) Yes, it is getting cold up here in the mountains at 9,300 feet elevation. We run the heater in the mornings and evening. Nights are 35-45 degrees and days in high 60s. Time to get moving out before it begins to snow - which is very possible in mid-September up here!

(2) We will have our Escapees Chapter 2 Fall rally here in South Fork Sept. 15-18 and then beginning of October we will attend the Balloon Festival in Albuquerque Oct. 3-11th.

(3) yes, we are returning to work at Amazon.com the end of October. We'll drive through Amarillo and visit friends for one day, then through Oklahoma City to visit camper friends for a couple of days, then to Branson and stay at the SKP park and relax for a few days, then over to Coffeyville, Kansas to be Santa's Helpers and ship out all the Christmas order people purchase online through amazon.com. The work is very hard, but the pay is very good and amazon.com personnel treat us very, very good. The temp agency we work for per se, Express Employment Pro, are wonderful to us, really care, and they pay for FHU at the many campgrounds it takes to house the 500 workampers they are employing this year.

(4) Yes, Jim and I and Leslie and Bill are co-hosting Boomerville at Quartzsite this year. There are over 100 Boomer rigs attending and we figure it was the best way to meet others. Our friends, Molly and Norah, told us that you get the best experience at a rally by volunteering, so that is what we are going to do.

(5) After the RV Show at the Big Tent in Quartzsite we will travel around Arizona, Southern California and a few trips to Laughlin, NV until it is time to come back to Colorado in April.

Well, that is our itinerary for the next nine months. As all fulltimers, all plans are set in Jello, as plans can change on a whim when you live in your rv.

Remember, my dear friends, you are all loved!

Camphost special dinner

We like to thank our camphost for a job well done by having special dinners. As we come to the end of the season we wanted to say "thank you" so Jim cooked a prime rib on the grill.

Oh, yea, before a morsel was eaten it began to rain so we all scrambled into the rv - all 13 of us to serve ourselves and then cram under the awning to eat.

Luckily the rain stopped for a while and we were able to sit around the fire pit and have a camp fire. We have wonderful camphosts and they have worked so very hard this summer and we appreciate the heck out of them.

One week to go - actually a week ago from today we will be pulling out of here. We have a leak in our fresh water tank that will be repaired and then we pull into town to the South Fork Campground to attend the Escapees Colorado Chapter #2 Fall Rally. We have 17 rigs signed up so we will have a good showing and a grand time. Jim's even made arrangements for a tour of the underground firehouse in Creede - blasted out of the side of a mountain - very unique.

Off to bed, Folks, so remember you are loved!

Anniversary Dinner Photos

Here are some photos from our anniversary dinner. The restaurant have these huge hanging baskets out front with purple and red flowers - my favorite colors. Start of a great evening. We dined on the outside patio situated along the San Juan River. Great setting!

This is a pretty upscale restaurant with great ratings and reviews so it was perfect for a special occasion. I ordered a Caesar's salad ($6) which came with homemade dressing and shavings of real Parmesan Reggiano - it was great! Main entree for me was shrimp and scallops on linguine with a lemon, butter, white wine sauce ($18). Jim got the daily special of prime rib with a salad and baked potato-all for $9.95. Both meals were terrific. I even splurged and had a Manhattan to drink - I'm only allowed one drink a week, so Dr. Kristina, I was good and made that my drink of the week.

It was a wonderful evening with great food and wonderful talks of how we met and remembering memorable moments throughout our 28 years together.

Here is the happy couple!!!
Remember - you are loved!