Calm Among the Storm

Change and growth. Two of the most sought after, yet jolting occurrences in life.

I've experienced a wee bit of both of these in the past few years, and per the usual, I'm heavily into another cycle of it now. With all of the busy I've been dealing with, I jumped on an opportunity to spend a little quiet time in the mountains with the 'rents this weekend. Best decision ever.

I spent most of Saturday just slowly driving through the valleys. Through Summit County, Climax Pass, Leadville, then I stopped in one of my beloved spots: Twin Lakes.

Mt. Elbert from the Town of Twin Lakes

Twin Lakes in the Spring

I spent a little time peering at a few deer by the lake, watching the fishermen, and walking up on a naked lady butt peeing on a rock (oops!).

Next stop, Buena Vista. The river walk area has always been one of my favorites.

Can you see the kayaks up river?

Down river highlights what an absolutely gorgeous day it was.

I left the river walk and perused down the street towards Cottonwood Pass & Cottonwood Lake. After making it almost to the top of the (closed) pass, I stumbled upon the cutest little lake and resort, Rainbow Lake Resort. I might have passed a private property sign (just maybe), but I ran into the cutest couple who owned the place and were terrifically friendly. They teach fly fishing and let you rent row boats to play on the private lake.

Also, I stopped and wandered around a place I've always wanted to check out: Mt. Princeton Hot Springs. One day soon I will relax in a tiny hot pool in Chalk Creek.

After running into the folks and enjoying a delicious dinner with a couple beers at Boathouse Cantina in Salida, Saturday was called to an end.

Waking up Sunday, we set out to St. Elmo the old ghost mining town way up on Mt. Princeton.  Reading the signs on the old buildings labeling them the General Store and the School House along with the year they were built (most around the 1880's) proved interesting. Along the way, the bighorn sheep, deer, pika and chipmunks were out in hoards, giving us a majestic sight around unexpected bends. We turned down a tiny, rocky road noting a direction to "Iron City". After passing a campground we stumbled upon a historic cemetery, The Iron City Cemetery. Majority of the markers dated back to the early 1800's and the entrance included a sign noting the lives of the people buried there (archived here).

The Iron City Cemetery

We spent a couple hours just reading graves and talking about the lives that these people must have led. It boggles my mind to think of the hard lives they lived and the miles they traveled to get to this remote area.

Driving down the bumpy road a few miles brought us upon an old mill. It had a historical marker, but I'm still unable to find any information on it.

Curious Old Mill

A couple more miles brought us to a beautiful ravine view of the river. A perfect perspective to close my day.

Overall, I spent less than two days in the crisp mountain air, but it was all I needed to clear my head.

...and re-awaken my inner adventurer.

Triumph Over the Evil "L"!

So life's been a wee bit crazy and I've neglected my poor little blog, but today's good news elicits me to stop and rejoice!

My sweet cousin Julie is 100% grafted! She is kicking leukemia square in the butt and I am elated for her!

GO JULIE! You are a star, sweetheart!

Read on, friends...

http://butlerblessings.wordpress.com/2011/11/21/blessed-it-just-isnt-big-enough/


Hip, Hip, Hooray!

"Give them hell, honey."

This past Sunday, the world lost the biggest spitfire I've ever had the luck of getting to know. 

Good-bye Great Aunt Syble. You will be immensely missed.

I hope that you keep those boys in line up in heaven and that you continue to be as glamorous and beautiful as I remember. You advised me to give 'em hell and look good doing it. You were the epitome of humor, grace and put-up-with-no-one's-crap.

Syble and the boys

I will always remember what you taught me:

1. Keep my man in line, but make him think he's in charge
2. If you quit doing something you love you won't live longer, it'll just seem longer
3. If you should be doing something but you could be having fun, go with fun
4. Screw what everyone else thinks
5. The answer is always one more drink

     ...her genius goes on and on.

Uncle Cal, Aunt Syble, my beautiful mom and my baby head

I'll never forget the first time she and Uncle Cal picked me up from the Dallas airport in their 1970's olive green Oldsmobile boat of a car. We drove 35 miles an hour down the interstate with Syble randomly yelling "oh hush", "damn heathens" and "let's go Cal" while smoking her cigarettes she kept in a sequined pouch through her foot long cigarette holder. She always wore sunglasses and lipstick, always smelled of perfume. 

She loved that car. It was in mint condition and she told me that she often was asked in the Wal-Mart parking lot if she'd sell it but "no one is making my car into one of those damn low-riders".

Uncle Cal & I

I hope you are up in heaven dancing with Uncle Cal, laughing with Aunt Oneva and still putting my hard-ass papa, Coy, in his place. 

Drink a Colorado Bulldog or three, I'll share one with you from down below.

Pure attitude

I only hope that I can be the woman you represented to me. 

"Give them hell, honey."

Oh, I will. You did it for 90 years, it's my turn now.

Be the Match

Recently my heart was broken.

I reluctantly returned to my home town in July to spend some time with my parents. I have realized as I have gotten older that I enjoy their friendship and it's worth a weekend in Amarillo to get to see them. It just so happened that the same weekend was a 60th anniversary party for some close family members woven into a wedding for a distant cousin. We made the trek down to lovely Hereford, Texas, where the smell of money fills the air, on that Saturday afternoon for the festivities. For those of you not from West Texas, Hereford is a cow town. I assume you can figure out what the smell of money is.

We had a good time - sat through the longest catholic wedding and service imaginable, ate dinner, had a few beers and glasses of wine, ran into the anniversary couple (who, by the way, are still so incredibly in love it's quite endearing) and then unexpectedly I ran into my cousin Julie. Julie is my surprise cousin, you see. I worked at a trust company in Texas and overheard one of my new coworkers talking about his girlfriend and when he mentioned her unique last name, I knew she was related even though I had never met her. I already thought the world of him, so when the two of them got engaged, then married, then had their first child, Luke, I got to know and love both of them.

Julie is the girl who walks into a room and everyone smiles. The girl who is so bubbly that if you are in a bad mood, you can only not smile in her presence for a matter of minutes. Her joy and faith is just simply contagious. She's purely amazing and I love her heart to pieces. When I saw her at the wedding, I was elated. I hadn't seen either of them in quite a while and I even got to meet their new baby Anna. It was definitely the cherry on top of the night to catch up with them and hug their necks.

Then a week later I got the news. Julie is sick. Leukemia. They found it while she was pregnant with Anna. The day I saw her, the day she was so chipper and beautiful and happy, she was told she had 6 weeks to live. I was crushed. My heart broke. She's got a 2 year old and a 4 month old and she has been given such devastating news. And Thomas, such a sweet, stand-up, strong guy. All I wanted to do was help, but I felt so helpless.

I have followed Julie's blog ever since I found out about her illness. She's been documenting her treatments and daily life. Then there it was one day - my opportunity to help. Julie needs a bone marrow match in order for a transplant to take place. She's had trouble finding one, but she wrote about Be the Match a national marrow donor program. It's fairly simple on the front end, fill out the information online then they mail you a kit and you take mouth swabs and mail it back. I read through everything online, thought seriously about it, then sent in for my kit.



Once I got it, the enormity of it hit me. I hate needles. Like pass out hate. I'm not sending this in with the hope that I'm blindly attempting to help, but secretly hope to not get matched, I want to get matched. I had to sit with it for a solid week and prepare myself in knowing that sending this off could mean lots of needles or even surgery. But it also means something else - the possibility to greatly improve someone's life. The chance to truly help someone. I'll take a few needles for that.

So I swabbed my mouth, said a little prayer, and am mailing it off in the morning.

Please say a little prayer, a few words of encouragement, cross your fingers, send good vibes and lend positive karma to Julie. She's doing amazing and still just as cheerful as ever through all of this. I wish my heart was as big as hers.

Also, if you feel the desire, check out Be the Match. Maybe it'll pull your heart strings as it did mine.

July Wrap-up

Yeah, I now. July was over ten days ago and yet I am just now writing my wrap-up. I'm perpetually late SO in Jennifer time, I'm early.

July closed out with a fervor of activity. I wrote my monthly stipend of note cards and read one new book pictured above. I highly recommend this quick, easy read in which I stole my new motto: "Mary Poppins in Silk Stockings".

The day after my awesome, but headache and dehydration inducing birthday party, B and I rode in a sixteen mile, obstacle course laden bike ride. Yeah - that hurt. The New Belgium Urban Assault Race included such things as slip and slides into mud pits, bobbing for beers in a giant pool and adult size tricycles. I hated life for about the first twelve miles, but then we gave up and retorted to the free beers and food trucks allotted to us. I'm hard core. On that note: if you have a chance to try Stick it to Me go for the Korean BBQ. You will thank me. I even met a new friend while waiting for our snacks. Her name is Jeanne, she's a doctor from Wisconsin, and she's totally down to earth and cool!

Afterwards we hit up Rock & Roll Sunday at one of our favorite brunch places Japoix, whom never fails to impress (more on this in a later post), then on to the worlds shortest concert. Sister Hazel playing at Hudson Gardens for a mere $20 sounded amazing. Little did we know that they would only play for about an hour. It was odd, but I was too exhausted to be disappointed.

After my monthly travel to Oklahoma the next week, yeah, be jealous, I closed out the week with an amazing tweet-up at the Brown Palace Hotel including many drinks, delicious hors d'oeuvres, mini massages and some of my favorite people.

Friday was O.A.R. day at Red Rocks and I was a dancing mess singing at the top of my lungs. That was definitely my favorite concert so far. B had a blast, too!

The month ended with a bang: beer brewing! Denver Craft Ninjas held the event at Beer at Home in Englewood. We labored and sweated (literally) all day over, but not into, our concoctions, drank beer, learned and laughed. My group made the Jasmine IPA shown above, the Belgian Wit another group made is pictured beside it. I even made another new friend, Josh, and I'm joining his soccer team!

Anyone have a clever name for our beer? We are on the hunt...

So as you can see it was a busy couple of weeks. I'm definitely living up to my desire to get out more. August is already looking like it'll blow July out of the water. I hope to see your lovely faces along this journey!

Birthday Bash

This picture is full of awesome. Just like my birthday party.

No kidding, I went to one of the best parties I've been to in years this past Saturday, and it just happened to be my birthday party. I'm one extremely lucky girl, and to that, I owe many thanks:

To Becky, thanks for being my super awesome sister and putting this together for me. I appreciate it very much and am so glad you are in my life! I've said it all along, I've always wanted a sister and am really enjoying finally getting to know you and living in the same city as you. It's kinda fun to know someone who has the same Jerry quirks as me...

To Evan & Archie, thank you for letting us use your spot. I hope that we didn't make too many neighbors angry. Or at least if we did, they have forgiven you. Evan, you are a peach, my favorite hugger and I adore you.

To my sweet B, you rock my world. Thank you for helping put this together & spending the time to plan it out and shop for all the goodies. The food was super yummy and I might be biased, but you were the hottest chef in the pool area. Thank you for putting up with my drunk rear and making me get up, after 14 hours of sleep and still being hungover, to ride in UAR on Sunday. I love the heck out of you.

Louay, thanks for bringing deadly jell-o shots. My mom always told me to beware of boys like you...

Thank you's for coming to celebrate with me, and possible apologies for being pushed in the pool, go to everyone else. You know who you are you sweet thangs and I love you.

CHEERS!

30/30

Today begins my last year in my twenties. I think I'm supposed to mourn them, but I don't. So far my twenties have not been horrible, they were as filled with the darkest, saddest moments of my life as they were with the brightest, most self-realizing ones. I have come out with a solid group of friends and family and the realization that I am strong enough to survive anything. I know that the older I get, the better my life gets. It's true - I look forward to getting older.

So here goes - I'm beginning my 30/30 project. 30 things to do before I turn 30. I can recognize the fact that growth is a continual thing and I know who I want to be, so I'm pushing myself in that direction. This list is in no particular order, I wrote it as my heart identified my personal needs and wants. I've just tried to quantify everything and give myself a measurable goal. I'm holding myself accountable, and hoping you all will help me along this journey.

Here goes nothing:

1. Try vegetarianism for a month
2. Run a 5k &/or half-marathon
3. Paydown school debts by at least 25%
4. Write & mail 5 letters/cards a month
5. Travel! See 3 new places, 1 of them foreign
6. Make a final decision about more school or CPA testing
7. Sew & craft more - make 1 dress
8. Keep the Mini clean
9. Cook & bake more - share & blog about it
10. Learn to knit/crochet & make a pillow
11. Make 12 new friends
12. Get healthier! Lose 15 pounds
13. Grow bookkeeping business & gain 2 new clients
14. Hike a 14'er
15. Get involved in a new sport
16. Blog/photo blog on the regular
17. Get more involved with Morgan Adams Foundation
18. Grow my music library
19. Get out more, cancel plans less
20. Read 1 new book a month
21. Whitewater raft
22. Do 1 good deed a day
23. Spend a day on a real beach
24. Try 3 new ethnic foods
25. Entertain more - have 3 dinners/brunches a month
26. Budget & live by it
27. Do a once-a-month photography excursion
28. Show/create/act with love
29. Keep 1 new plant alive for an entire year
30. Be true to myself in all that I do

There it is.

Who knows, maybe I'll be persistent enough to tell the tale of my triumphs and failures as far as this list goes...