Run the Earth and Watch the Sky: Where I've been

I'm inspired to write here again. I've gotten right out of the habit, and I miss this little aerie. For starters I should tell you what I've been up to. Or perhaps show you, since I have a whole bunch of pictures.

It was brilliant to see mountains and hills again. Not to mention the sky. The depth of open sky, wisps of clouds and twitter of birdsong was a welcome rush to my winter-logged brain.

The magpies were a delight to watch, with their sharp black and white coloring, and their enormously long tail, their swooping flight. I also saw a golden eagle, and lot of ducks, including a hooded merganser.

So... I flew to Denver, Colorado to visit old friends, help out around the house, and babysit. There was great conversation as well, and plenty of adventures--they took me for excellent gluten-free pizza...

(at Beau Jo's, Idaho Springs)

and out to Red Rock

Red Rock Amphitheater

with an incredible view, including downtown Denver, and bits of Kansas; magnificent rock formations and miles of sky; sunshine pouring on my skin and wind tugging at my hair and buffeting playfully.

We popped into the museum as well, to see the list of everyone who's sung here, from Ella Fitzgerald, to the Beatles, and dozens--hundreds of others.

And we visited the Nature and Science Museum...

The section on Egyptian mummies was particularly intriguing to me since I recently started reading the Kane Chronicles. It was solely because of these fun books that I was able to recognize the names of the ancient Egyptian mythological gods and creatures, symbols and stories. If I had learned these things elsewhere, I'd forgotten, and a great deal of the excitement of this sort of exhibit is the fact that you're seeing with your eyes things you know all about, but don't generally get to see first hand. So that was fascinating.

dinosaurs, whales,

(I was having way too much fun)

........*........

Sunshine, tea, cozy house days...

ginger rooibos at a teashop

Did you know that the Celestial Seasonings tea factory is in Boulder, Colorado? I didn't either until a couple of weeks ago. But now I've been there! We were able to tour the factory and try all sorts of teas, breathe in a roomful of peppermint (clears your sinuses) and see the machine put plastic on the tea-boxes in less than a second (yes, the plastic that takes so long to pull off ;)