When I bought my house nine years ago the yard was sadly neglected.  Colorado had just gone through one of the driest summers on record.  And the house had been empty for months.  The only green thing in the yard were the weeds (of which there was an abundance) and the cactus.  All summer we worked and worked one little piece at a time because as my mom was fond of telling me, "Rome wasn't built in a day ya know." That fall my mom and I planted 150 red tulip bulbs on the south side of the driveway.  There wasn't a lot of room to do planting and we were getting rid of the grass for a more xeric landscape anyway.  There are six rows of 25 red tulips.  That first spring they were spectacular.  Then the next fall we planted yellow and yellow/red tulips in between the red ones.  There are some holes that need to be filled in, but I love pulling into the driveway and seeing this ray of spring!

My brother and his kids are here for a couple of days.  The kids are on spring break this week.  (Their mama is a teacher and is not on spring break this week).  Today we went up to the house we grew up in to take pictures of the kiddos for their mama.  My parents still have the house even though they don't live there full time.  It is more of a summer cabin now.  I think my bro and I had more fun than the kids did.  Lots of memories there.
The House.
The creek in the front yard.  We used to wade here in the summers before the creek dried up as it did in the dry summers.
The tubing hill.  We used to hike up to the power line pole and use that as our starting point.  After a couple of runs, the hill was fast enough that sometimes we could jump the road.  I'm surprised we never broke any bones!
This is basically the view from the mountain behind the house.  (this view was taken a couple of miles away and is more of a panoramic whereas the house view is a little bit more limited- if that makes any sense).

I look back on the time we spend playing outside with fondness.  Every summer day we were outside from after breakfast and would come in for dinner.  Come to think of it, we did that sometimes in the winter too.  Except then we'd come in to warm up and drink hot cocoa.   We used our imagination.  Something I think is lacking in todays kids with some much technology, but it is something I would like Corrine to have.

Did I sign up for the half marathon that I said I was going to sign up for?  No.  Have I been running?  Kind of.  I'll run for a couple of weeks and then something will come up.  Like get sick.  Or work.  Or out of town guests.   Shouldn't really be any excuse, but I totally use it as one.  And then I ended up not running for a couple of weeks and then I'm starting all over.

The Bolder Boulder is coming up on Memorial Day weekend.  I'll run that one.  Because I run it every year.  I even ran it last year after I hadn't run in a year and I had a brand new baby.  That is my goal now.  6.2 miles.  How funny.  I have to train for that!

Books and knitting.  Two of my favorite things.  So I'm joining the weekly Yarn Along.  I'm STILL working on the radiating star blanket.  But I am doing the extended version so it gets bigger every other row.  So each row takes me about 45 minutes to do.  OK.  Maybe not that long, but it sure seems like it.  I counted it last night and I have 20 pattern rows to do and 20 knit rows to do.  Doesn't sound like a lot, but right now I'm feeling like it will take the next forever to finish it.

Books.  I am reading the Lost Wife and The World at Night.  Both books take place during World War II.   It takes place in German occupied Paris in 1940. A film producer is offered the chance to take part in an operation of the British Secret Service.  I just started it so I've only just gotten to the part of the occupation.

The Lost Wife takes place in Prague and is written in two parts.  Josef and Lenka.  They are married on the eve of the German occupation of Czechoslovakia and he has a visa to the United States and she won't leave her family.  They each detail what happened to them in the years since they last saw one another.  A chance encounter in New York starts the story.  I'm only half way through and can't wait to find out what happens to Lenka and Josef.