Outdoors

We are packing the sunshine into our days. Just 12 days until Miles is in school. Adele has three more weeks (oh help!) but my semester starts Monday the 22nd! So we're about to become even more domesticated.

Trying to get out as often as possible, given Koopa's needs.

Last week, we gave Koopa his first car ride since we adopted him. To make it a positive experience, we took him to Jon's campus. This was the first time we'd really walked around and looked at other buildings besides the library. It's lovely! But reeeeally different from Virginia Tech.

See the Thunderwolf statue howling in the background?

Then, we tried crating Koopa during the day, to prepare him for the reality that we will come back and let him out.

We fairly ran out of the house to get to the pool and back before Koopa could miss us too badly.

Friday, we went out to Lake Pueblo State Park, a park we've been meaning to visit since we started researching Pueblo. We went to the south side, to a smooth and low-grade trail near the shore. We were officially there for the stargaze that the Southern Colorado Astronomical Society was holding, but as you can see, the sky didn't really cooperate.

It was a perfectly lovely evening, though, and the rain had the grace to wait until after sunset to start. I had really missed water! To gaze at a large(ish) body of water when you've been living in a desert quenches a kind of thirst you didn't really know you had.

I took kind of a lot of pictures.

Koopa dove right in. He proved himself at least half lab with his delight in the water.

Look at these desert bluffs next to a lake! Unreal.

Fabulous sunset. Serene, perfect weather.

...and a tarantula! Right out in the wild!

We live on Mars now.

Saturday we busied ourself with complying with the law which states that dogs need an outdoor shelter.

He's stopped growling and barking at his house, and has even gone in there after treats. But he doesn't really abide in there, yet.

It turned out cute, though, don't you think?

I'm looking at the new semester as a real possibility now. The only thing I could have to wish for, besides that each and every one of you visits me here, is that we could make some friends. We took Koopa and the kids to Jon's all-faculty year start BBQ last night, and despite the stress of fixing plates for the kids while keeping the straining puppy out of everyone's business, and despite that the event ended early when Pueblo came under a flash flood warning and some heavy rain and hail commenced... we were still actually able to talk to some folks! The head of the Chemistry department and his family go to our church, so there is some chance I might be able to remember some names. I even met someone who teaches high school in district 60! This might be useful to my future. More importantly, it's contributed to my sense of optimism about our life in Pueblo. As Peter Pevensie said, "We've fallen on our feet, and no mistake!"