Last weekend, my oldest friend came to stay for a couple of weeks. This is my friend that was there when I met my ex-husband, she was in my wedding. We were both military wives, we have children that are like stair steps, both of us having a boy first, then a girl and while it was not planned, our children have the same first initial, boys Js and girls Ks. She and her husband are Godparents to both my children.

I had my granddaughter with me when I picked her up and the baby was so excited. (Heads up, my granddaughter is 6, she is the only grandchild and I use the term baby quite often for her). You see, my daughter was explaining that Miss Dawn was her Godmother and Sofia decided that she was her Grand Godmother. As the squealing in the car calmed down and we were heading away from DIA, I asked her if she wanted to go home and freshen up and drop of luggage and then go eat….and she said lets go see some stuff and get drive thru. So we hit up Chik-Fil-A and we headed to Boulder, Colorado.

Once we were in Boulder we drove up Flagstaff Mountain. Now, we had just had “Surprise April Snow” the day before and Boulder had more snow than at my house and the clouds were still very low. As we started up the mountain, visiblity was lower than anyone’s liking, but Adventure Awaits, so we drove on.

This is not just a white square, this was the view over Boulder taken from close to the summit. The second picture is from a lower elevation, with some tree tops. This made for a VERY exciting drive up.

Even though I could only see about 2 feet in front of my car, everything was beautiful (this will most likely be the last snow pics for a few months),

We even saw baby elk, my granddaughter was squealing again.

When we were talking about low clouds to the baby, she wanted to “touch” a cloud. So, I opened her backseat window and she stuck her hand out to touch them. She was very disappointed that it was “cold air”. When we got to the summit, she wanted to try again and announced the clouds were stinging her…it was sleet. (Please note, we were going very slow up the mountain, about 10-15 mph, there was no danger for her).

As we were heading to the road to go up Flagstaff, we passed by Chautauqua Park, we saw a couple getting married in the hazy fog, swirling flurries chased around them at the beginning of one of the trails. I did not get a picture. I wish I had, it was like an old travelers take, told at a pub, to get free ale and meat pie.

Coming back down, I pulled into Chautauqua to see what was what. I never really took time to pull in before. This park is a historic little area that is a landmark. There is a store that has been there for about a hundred years as well as a dining hall and cottages for lodging. The Dining Hall has been a favorite of locals for 125 years. I am looking forward to the concerts they are advertising too!

We saw these little baby bear sculptures, so small and precious. They were created by children in an Art in the Park event and the baby bears are available for bear hugs.

I turned up a road that said Dead End, but there is always a place to turn around (even if it has to be a 15 point turn) and there was a wide spot in the road with a beautiful sculpture that immediately fill my heart with love and laughter. Both Boulder and Denver and the smaller townships between have incredible sculptures, mainly metal, but some are carved, like this one.

It was a fun and exciting day. We made our way home and got cleaned up and presentable for dinner with my daughter and son in love.

The goal is 60 new things before I turn 60 and I have 50 more to go and I can’t wait!