LHC Balloon Fest Mass Ascent (Friday, January 11th, 2019)

We played hooky from the gym this morning to watch the mass ascent of the hot air balloons from the London Bridge.  Most of them took off from Windsor beach, but a few set up in other parts of town.

This balloon flew right over us, then dipped it's basket on the other side of the bridge.

There was an experimental two person balloon this year.  

Do we feel a little  bit guilty for skipping our workout this morning?  Absolutely not!  This was amazing!  It was the perfect morning in Havasu!

Painting Balloons (Tuesday, January 8th, 2019)

Our oldest daughter is in town, so I wanted to do our local Canvas and Cocktails with her.  We invited Sharyn to join us at the London Bridge Resort.  This weeks painting is hot air balloons with a Havasu sunset.  Very fitting since the balloon festival is this weekend.

I love the group photos when the class is over.  Each painting is so unique even though we are all painting the same thing.

Such a fun night with the girls, now we are excited and ready to see the real balloon festival!

A Run and Camera Practice (Saturday, January 5th, 2019)

We're back in Havasu, after being chased across the country by a pretty big storm.  Now we're settling back into life with our oldest daughter and her two cats in tow.  Her husband is deployed, so she will be spending the month with us, working from our house and enjoying time with us in the evenings and on weekends.  

She is training for a half marathon, which she will be doing in May, so our first order of the day was to get her run in.  We took her down to the island where it is nice and flat and dropped her off.  We parked a few miles down the path and waited for her.  She was running strong as she came by us.

When she finished her run, we headed to the cactus garden at Windsor beach to do some photography practice.  She has a new camera that she's trying to learn, so we experimented with some different shots.  I decided to play with some fun textures.  The desert is full of them.  One of my favorite things about photography is that it forces me to slow down and enjoy the views.

 

 

This is one of the most unpleasant looking cactus I have ever seen.

There are some spectacular views from the cactus garden too.

The weather was a bit cool today, so we were glad to not spend the whole day out in it.  Our cactus garden stroll was great, and we were proud of our daughter for getting her run in.

Pheasants and Wine, Stratton, CO (Thursday, December 27th, 2018)

This morning we headed to Stratton, Colorado for a Pheasant hunt, and to see the hunting lodge where our youngest daughter's boyfriend spends a lot of his time in the fall and winter.  The lodge is beautiful, with tons of sleeping space and a huge gathering area and kitchen.  It was so much fun to see it.

Shortly after we arrived, we all headed out on a quick hunt.

We got one rooster.  Arrow (the dog) was very happy to bring it in for us.

When the hunting was over, we did a little bit of clay pigeon practice.  Each time the gun went off, Arrow really wanted to go retrieve the bird.  He had a hard time with the concept that there wasn't one.

Two from this morning, and the one from our short hunt.  Pheasants are such beautiful birds!

When our hunting day was over, we headed across the highway to the Claremont Inn, a winery and bed and breakfast, for a little wine tasting.

They have so many great wines, and a really fun tasting room.

What a beautiful place!

What a great way to spend our day!  We never knew that Stratton had such great things to offer.  We love exploring small towns for this very reason.  We are so grateful that we got to spend our day out here.