The road home

We lingered in St. Louis for a day to spend time with our good friends, the McCrory-Hatchers. It's a joy to me that we maintain our friendship, despite the years and the miles. It's been nine years since Jon and I met Melissa, and then her husband, Josh, when we were all working in Annapolis. And despite their move to Memphis and now to St. Louis, and our move to Blacksburg and now to Pueblo, we continue to email, text, and visit, because some friends are meant to stay with you. We got to see their new St. Louis home, and see how their children have grown. They took us to one of their favorite new St. Louis places: Grant's Farm, just down the street from their house. It's a peculiar mix of park, zoo, and beer garden that exists on Ulysses S. Grant's former farm. Fun for all ages!

We saw an animal show and pet goats and rode the carousel and drank beer outside while strolling among Zoo animals. I want to go back. 

You can feed goats with baby bottles!

There is a shortage of pictures of this visit. I resolve to do better next time. 

Melissa was so kind as to make this one happen for us. We have very few whole-family pictures.

I just had to include this selfie Adele took when I was upstairs.  She's not supposed to play with my phone without permission. I can't stay mad though.

On the way back to Colorado, we took Koopa to a dog park in Kansas City. 

Loved this statue of Lewis & Clark & Sacajewea. 

And then we were back, at the Colorado state line. The landscape changed rapidly into the dry scrubby stuff I remembered, and the skies seem to grow. 

I love how much of the country you can see. These rainstorms were miles away.
 

Much sooner than we expected we were pulling into the driveway of our own house, returning home to it from out of town for the first time. This garden was little seedlings when we left, and there was only a little grass in the yard. But Jon's automatic watering regimen has had great effect!

We returned just in time for our neighborhood's traditionally raucous (and dangerous) celebration of the 4th of July. Once again, all we felt like doing was going up the hill to watch from a safe distance. 

It was a gorgeous view, despite the total inability of my iphone6s to capture it.

 

A friend hailed us on the way home and before I knew what was happening my kids had sparklers and snappers and whatever other pyrotechnics. It was a new experience for them! Miles has come a long way from his terror of 2 years ago. 
It's odd to come home to this place, but it is home right now. These different homes seem to mark different color-coded eras of our family's life in my mind. Annapolis was blue, Blacksburg was green, Pueblo is orange. And orange is warm and cheerful, and so are we right now.