Angel Street Mom

One year’s time.

These cute little guys are growing up too fast.  Can you believe these cousins are running around, talking, playing, destructing, and making us all laugh so hard every day?  They don’t like sitting still very much though, can you tell?

Oh boy.  These days are over for us mommies.  No more sitting quietly in the carseats for us anymore huh boys?

Was this pic really taken only a year ago?!

View from the top.  Beautiful.

My daughter viewing the view.  Beautiful.

So the Shrine of the Sun is something we learned about when we visited the zoo.  The man who founded the zoo (Spencer Penrose) also built this amazing memorial about a mile and a half up the side of the mountain from the zoo.

No expense was spared with the details of this memorial.  It has a chapel inside and a tomb and all kinds of amazing details, murals, and stonework.

The top of the very tall memorial is about 8,000 ft. in elevation. We really enjoyed learning about the famous Coloradan philantropist.  He built this shrine and named it after his friend, Will Rogers. They call it the ‘singing tower’ because it is so high and it sort of whistles and sways in the wind.

Spencer Penrose was an amazing businessman and philanthropist.  He was a miner, and actually started the well-known Kennecott Copper mine in Utah (One of the few man-made structures seen from space).

After climbing 6 flights of stairs at 8,000 feet, I was a little out of breath, but here is the door to the top! 

And here is what it looks like from the top.  Handsome.  Oh, the landscape is pretty good too.

I saw these interesting rock formations and was very curious about what it was.  We quickly learned that that area is called the ‘Garden of the Gods,”  and of course we went to see that the very next weekend. [Post coming soon]  I later learned that Spencer Pinrose’s foundation funds quite a few state parks, including the Garden of the Gods.

There are fun little pathways and lookout points around the shrine and it kinda felt like we were at a castle.

Beautiful.

Beautiful.  OH…wait…I guess it’s time for a beautiful nap.  He slept the whole way home. 

This is my little helper.  About two years ago this scene would have been disastrous.  In fact there were several times that my little independent girl would scoot a chair over to the sink and, when I wasn’t looking, she would want to surprise me by “doing the dishes.”  I lost a few plates that way.  The dishes and the tile floor don’t get along very well.

Now that my ‘Liza is four, she is still nurturing that good helper within.  Fortunately she doesn’t break dishes anymore.  (Granted there is more water on the floor than in the sink sometimes,  but I’m guessing that will improve over time too.  Check back with me in two more years.)

Sledding in the Rockies!

William didn’t go for sledding.  I think it was a little too much for him to handle after his traumatic experience at the park a few weeks earlier.

There are a few things about this beautiful state that really amaze me so far.  One of them is the sky.  It sounds funny to say this, but the sky looks SO huge here.  It is also SO blue.  I find myself looking up all the time whenever I’m driving around.  It’s also very sunny.  When it snows here, it really snows. . . and snows. . . and snows.  Everything closes down during the bigger storms and my kids and I love staying home on snow days.  The amazing thing about the snow is that it snows, but then a few days later the snow will have completely melted!  The snow just sort of comes and goes, and comes and goes.

So this is kind of how it goes with the snow.  We had no snow anywhere in our neighborhood.  A snow storm came and dumped this in a matter of two days!  (Granted, this was a heavier snowstorm than usual, but all the better for the wow effect I’m going for here. . . ) Anyway, it snows like this, then the schools and everything either shuts down or gets officially delayed.

We shovel and shovel snow.  With this storm we had to shovel every few hours.  This was on the second day of the storm and probably the 6th or 7th time shoveling.

By the time the afternoon hit on the second day of the storm, the sun started to come out again.  I was shoveling the end of the driveway when I noticed that the snow I was shoveling started to get really slushy.  I looked up and realized it was already melting.  Gushes of water ran down the streets, and the roads cleared up really fast.  Even though it melts fast, there is still that time when it storms that is really crazy dangerous.  I’ve gotten stuck a few times in the snow and I really need to figure out a better 4-wheel drive situation.  I think I at least need to get some snow tires on my Sienna.  (Or maybe a Seqoia on my tires?) Haha.  A person can wish.  Actually, I really love my mini van.  I wonder if anyone will ever invent an SUV with sliding doors.  That’s what I’d really like.  I love sliding doors.  It would be even better if it was an EV or a hybrid.  Oh, and it would be great if it had a built in vacuum and rear seat drink and snack dispensers. . . and a fold out changing table.  I’d also be willing to pay extra if it came with it’s own shoe-locating elf.  I need a little magical person to retrieve all the shoes that get lost under the seats.  Come on somebody. . . can you start making my dream vehicle please?

This is the first time I’d ever seen a sign like this.  I mean, usually you see school crossing signs or something like that.  I love this sign.  We see a lot more wildlife here than we did before we moved.  There are so many deer all over the place!  They live on the prairie and in the gulches.  There is a family of deer that live by a pond right by our house.  Sometimes they’ll come out and just sit on people’s front lawns.  It’s amazing to me how comfortable they seem to be around the neighborhoods.

We saw a whole herd of deer once while driving to school one morning.  It was a beautiful thing to see about 60 wild deer just roaming across the prairie.

It’s also beautiful to see just one.

Other regular wildlife sightings include this cute little guy (or maybe it’s a girl, I don’t know).  This little rabbit lives under the bush next to our house and we love seeing it’s bunny tracks in the snow every morning.  We also have several squirrels that visit our backyard regularly.  We see flocks of Canadian geese every morning and we once saw a fox.  Our favorite animals right now though are the prairie dogs.  They are sooo cute and it’s fun to watch them in the fields.  I have yet to get a good picture of the prairie dogs, but I’ll keep trying.

We’re new here and haven’t seen everything yet, but apparently there are quite a few coyotes around here and also some black bears.  Hmmm.  I wouldn’t mind too much if I didn’t happen to run into those.  I don’t think they’re around as much though, I mean I haven’t seen a coyote crossing sign or a bear crossing sign, but I’ll keep an eye out.