nataJane

Chris has been working on making a crokinole board and finally put the finishing stain on it last night. It is a beautiful, regulation board and I can’t believe how much I’ve missed playing! I haven’t played in years, but all of a sudden the days of playing with my grandpa years ago suddenly came flooding back. He was the best player I know and would have been proud of the board Chris made.

Today is Canada Day and and we enjoyed celebrating it with some time spent playing a national game and a family favorite. (more…)

Since we’ve been getting to know people at our new Castleview Baptist, there are some people who have become a very special part of our lives. Bob and Merna are two of those people. The first thing I remember about Bob and Merna was from a Sunday evening fellowship we had almost a year ago. At that time Bob was preparing for a trip to Canada to hunt bear with his son. I remember Merna saying that she had eight children.

The more time we spent with this couple, the more we came to know and love them. They were teenage sweethearts, dated in roller skates, had eight children and have now been married for fifty years (or will be on Thursday).

Their generation is much different than ours. They grew up working hard and making a life for themselves, and they haven’t stopped. They raised their children the best they knew how and instilled faith and morals into their family. Every time Chris and I make the trip to Bob and Merna’s, we hear about their children, what their grandchildren are up to and stories from years ago of houses they’ve built and cars they’ve owned. We feel like we’ve been invited to stand at a window and watch bits and pieces of their lives as they’ve lived. We’ve gotten to know their children and feel a bit of the warmth that they’ve shared. (more…)

A friend of ours is staying with us this weekend and we’re trying to show him a bit of beautiful Colorado. Yesterday we went to Rocky Mountain National Park and here are a few shots from our trip. The boys are driving up Pike’s Peak today, but I opted out.

Chris and I hadn’t been this far into the park before, and it was an incredible day to explore. It rained and we were driving up where there is still snow. I believe the highest point we came to was 12,091 feet above sea level. I really noticed the altitude this time too. By the time we hit 11,000 feet my head was hurting pretty bad. It was freezing cold and the wind was wipping so hard! In many places (like the photo above) the clouds were coming up toward us from between mountains. It had a bit of a dizzying effect, but was incredible to watch.

We had planned to do some hiking while we were there, but we ended up doing more driving and just got out to walk to look-outs. Also, we didn’t realize until we got there that dogs aren’t allowed on the trails… what’s up with that??? Oh well, Potato was fairly content to sit in the warm car while we stepped out to take pictures (or throw snowballs :).

To see the rest of the collection, visit my flickr page.

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We spent an afternoon with our little friends this weekend while their mom and dad went out for a birthday evening. Tucker and Miranda had been working on “hand standing”, so Chris showed them the little trick of using the wall for support.

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Chris and I took John and Kristin’s engagement photos and I had the pleasure of attending her bridal shower last week. It was a great afternoon and I’m looking forward to their wedding next month.

See the rest of this set on my flickr page. (more…)

This is Brady. This is the kid who calls his mom “mamo”, calls shoes “wigglydigglies” (or something close), is convinced that sheep are actually called “migims” and brings me dirt by the handfulls. Cats say “meew” and giraffes say “woah” as they wobble back and forth. How could I not photograph?

Here are a few of my shots from the afternoon, for more, visit my flickr page. (more…)

I was trying to think if I had ever been to a baseball game before, and I think I went to one when I was a kid, but I don’t remember anything about it. Saturday a few from our church went to the Rockies game at the beautiful Coors stadium and here are a few shots from the evening.

See the rest of the collection on my flickr account.

We left the house in a beautiful, sunny day, but we drove through storms and tornado warnings on our way to Denver. At the stadium we got soaked, but when we got to our seats it had stopped and the sun was beginning to peak out. We dried off our seats, took off our jackets and then kicked ourselves for leaving our sunglasses in the car because the sun was shining right into our eyes. It was beautiful though, and we were able to watch the sunset. Only a few minutes after the sun went down, it was freezing and we shivered under our damp jackets and in wet shoes. We payed four dollars for hot dogs, six for cotton candy and my purse and camera had a nice coating of wet peanut shell dust. Chris and I left in the eight inning to beat the traffic and I was very glad we did because on our walk back to the $5 parking, my sandal broke and Chris taped it to my foot with some electrical tape he had in his camera bag.

But the Rockies won, we got some great shots and we were home before the traffic. Overall, it was a great evening!
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We spent Sunday afternoon with friends and I’ve just had the chance to post photos now… It was a beautiful day so we spent it outside.  By the way, you’ve never seen cuter kids on bicycles. Or with a cuter pup ;) (more…)

Chris stumbled upon a new site today and was instantly hooked. It’s called geocaching and is a growing trend all over the world. He has been explaining it to me all afternoon and I’m beginning to understand the draw. Basically, people who enjoy finding stuff, digging for treasure, solving puzzles, or adventures of the outdoor variety, hide stuff for others to find. Sometimes it’s a camera, sometimes it’s a special coin, sometimes it’s simply a log notebook in a pill container wrapped in black tape hidden in a tree. Someone has hidden a cache (anywhere in the world), and recorded it on the official geocache site. Someone else has looked up caches in that area on the website, taken their GPS or Iphone with them on their walk or hike in that area, looks for the cache and logs that they found it both on the notepad and the website.

It’s a simple concept, but has become a complex network of cache seekers. According to the official site, “There are 815,039 active caches worldwide. In the last 7 days, there have been 753,086 new logs written by 89,351 account holders.” Here are some of the recent photos. (more…)

So, this is today’s project. I made this top from a rich, espresso brown, perfectly silky-satiny fabric with enough stretch to fit everywhere perfectly and make you feel oh-so-good-about-life type of fit. Yep, I love it. I had a plan for it too. The plan was to sell it. That was the plan until I put it on to get some photos of it… Now the plan is fuzzy.

I made this shirt with another one in mind. I own a sleeveless top of very similar colour, but the neck is a different shape and I don’t love it. The shape of the top isn’t the most flattering but it is a comfortable summer shirt so I wear it. I made this new top because I like the shape much better. But that’s the problem… I like it much better.

A great business person would finish this post and then list the shirt in a shop and sell it as soon as possible. Unfortunately, I am not a great business person and have grown rather attached to this top. So, I will not list it quite yet… Maybe tomorrow.

02 june 09