PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/29/2008

Here are a few pictures taken from the train...

In many places, the track follows the Colorado River.

What a beautiful place to live!

Lovely though these pictures are, they cannot even begin to capture the beauty we saw!

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/28/2008

Barry and I are safely home, and we had a wonderful trip!

Going by train is very relaxing, because no one has to stress about who is keeping his eyes on the road. (Translation --Barry could look out the window all he wanted without me stressing about whether or not he was looking at the road!) There is lots of room for each passenger, probably three times the space you get on an airplane, and you can go down to the restrooms or get sandwiches, snacks, and cold or hot drinks in the snack car. There are booths where you can sit and look out the big windows while you sip a steaming coffee and snuggle up against your hubby!

If time is not a limiting factor, I would highly recommend a train trip. There is no better way to see our beautiful country.

Union Station in Denver

We started out by parking our truck for two days outside Union Station, which is a beautiful old building that has been preserved very well.
You almost feel like you have gone way back in time when you sit in the huge waiting area on the long high-backed wooden benches with lights all along the top. Barry was pointing out to me the beautiful workmanship in those benches. Someone took a great deal of time to match the grain in the wood so that it creates a very even pattern on the back of each bench.

Here is the train we rode on, the California Zephyr. We only rode a very short piece of its total route, Denver to Glenwood Springs and back again. The trip takes about 5 hours going, 6 hours coming back.
The car we rode in looked like this. The passenger seats are in the upper section, and below there are washrooms, the snack area, baggage, etc. The observation and dining areas are also on the upper level.

The scenery was beautiful with mountains, the Colorado River, evergreens, and the changing colors of fall. I will show you a few of those pictures next time. I was a little disappointed in them, though. I had to take them through the train windows which adds a different quality somehow and creates reflection problems and so forth. (I also wanted to ask the conductor if we could stop the train so that I could get a ladder and wash the outside of the windows!)

More next time!

I'm off again!

Hi friends!

Just a quick note to say I'll be away for a couple of days. Tomorrow Barry and I are going to ride the Amtrak train to Glenwood Springs, stay overnight there, and ride it back on Thursday. I'm sticking my camera in. Who knows? I might get a good shot to share with you!

See you in a couple of days!

.

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/23/2008

Trent, Barry, Jeanette, and Coral
(Long, long ago!)

I hope you don't mind...
I am so short of time these days that I am posting random pictures I already have on my computer. I hope you like them!

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/20/2008

This morning I was working at my computer when a low, steady hum pulled me out of the patient records and into the real world! I grabbed my camera and hurried out the front door... Just as I thought! There is the top of the tractor just coming up out of the valley in the middle of the field...

Hmmm...I wonder who is in the tractor?

Look at that freshly-turned earth? Isn't it the most beautiful thing?

There! He has turned around and is going back the other way! How I love the sound of a tractor going up and down the field! It is a steady constant reassuring presence, humming up and down outside our house...

Look how the driver has to sit facing forward but has to keep his head turned back to watch where the implement is going? That would turn me into an absolute corkscrew!

Who can that driver be??It's my Trent!

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/19/2008

Since we were talking about Coral's hair the other day, I took a couple of pictures of her braid for you to see...

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/16/2008

Barry & me
Another trip into the past!

This was taken a few months after we were married.

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/15/2008

Ptarmigan
It does not take too much trouble to hide if you are a ptarmigan!

On Saturday, Trent went with a group to hike on Quandry, one of Colorado's "fourteeners," which is a mountain with a peak that exceeds 14,000 feet above sea level. He came back with lots of pictures, and I plan to post some of them from time to time, maybe even change my header picture again!

Several of the hikers nearly stepped on these birds because they looked so much like the rocks and did not move until the last minute! When Trent was describing the birds, Gord knew without even seeing the picture exactly what they were.

(I had to ask Gord how to spell "ptarmigan" and was all set ready to type a "T" as the first letter! That 'P" is silent!)

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/12/2008

Coral and L.C.

Here's what I saw last evening when I went to the living room. Coral was sitting in her wheelchair, and L.C. jumped up on the back of the recliner to be close to her.

When it is bedtime, Coral starts calling, "L-Seeee! L-Seee!" He comes running and jumps up on her knee for the ride to the bathroom where he gets a good session of petting and ear-rubbing before he has to get down.
He hardly fits on Coral's petite lap, but they both love this little ritual!

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/10/2008

Coral and me sitting on the couch

On her next birthday, she will be pretty close to the age I was when this picture was taken!
Just what I needed tonight, a good dose of the unbelievable!
But believe it I must!

That sweet little spirit of hers still shines out, just like it did way back then...

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/08/2008

Our Liberian necklaces

Like girls everywhere, we loved to dress up, and these were the necklaces we wore. We used to wear them in several strands, or in one long strand tied in a knot. They are made from gray, brown, and white seeds threaded on a strong slender thread, sometimes using wooden spacers made from the hollow stem of a plant.

The necklaces are glossy and smooth, and I still love to hold them!

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/07/2008

I'm certainly missing some days on these daily pictures, and it is not because I am reading my favorite books, either! Oh, how I would love to go back in time to the days when I could fill every spare moment with reading and rereading all my favorite books! As has been mentioned on this blog before, I learned to read when I was very little and read everything in sight, even using a flashlight under the covers at night to read that last chapter after I was supposed to be asleep!

Like these...And these...I was totally lost in these stories, completely gone into other fascinating worlds.
And, even now, when I am reading I cannot hear what others say to me. It is just as if they never even said anything at all!
(How frustrating that must be for everyone who has to live with me!)

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/04/2008

Trent and I were standing by the side of the road on Saturday, and I heard a rustling in the dry weeds. They were moving, so I went over to get a closer look and saw only...dry weeds.

Then they rustled again, and I saw him...

Sneaky little fella!

(Picture by Trent)

PICTURE OF THE DAY -- 09/01/2008

In Eldorado Canyon

On Saturday Trent, Barry, and I went for another hike in the mountains. We did a fairly easy trail (that I felt up to!), and then Barry and Trent went on to do a much more difficult one. I had brought an easy-reading book for just such a time, and so they left me happily sitting on a bench looking across the canyon at this cliff. How peaceful it was sitting there in the gentle breeze! And how amazing what people aspire to do...


Look more closely...

Get out those binoculars...
I kept hearing shouts of "Wooo-hooo!" that came ringing across the valley as one of the climbers rejoiced in another few feet gained!

How small I am in the middle of God's glorious and amazing creation! And what I can see is a minuscule reflection of what He can do...

(Pictures by Trent)