Photography by Pearl: October 2011

On our way back to our Arizona home we decided to stop in Cottonwood, Az for a few days to relax, celebrate my birthday and relax one last time. Today we went to the Deadhorse State Park here in Cottonwood for a picnic with friends.

It was a perfect day for a picnic or for fishing - as this little fisherman discovered.

The stream was calm and cool on this 80 degree day.

Blanche, Lucy and their pup friends loved thier hike by the river and around the beautiful cottonwood trees.

We had a great picnic together sharing lots of food and fun.

Blanche, Lucy and their friends Luey and Bailey took this time to rest.

That night we had our last hoorah dinner celebration from our summer vacation.

Heading down to Apache Junction from Cottonwood was an easy 2.5 hour drive. Seeing the Red Rocks and Cactus reminded us we were home for the winter.

When we drove through the security gates of our community - we saw a wonderful welcome home sign... a great sight.


Here's Cheryl and Blanche & Lucy saying bye-bye to summer and hello to fall and winter. It was great to walk into our home - after 5 months in an RV this seems like the Taj Mahal! We'll close the Blog for a little while - but would love to touch base with you all this winter now and then to say hi and let you know what we are up to here in sunny AZ....

We left California and drove through Las Vegas without stopping (darn!). We headed straight for Denver, Colorado to visit with Cheryl's nephew Nick and his wife Melissa as well as my daughter Denise, her hubby Gary and my grandkids - Tyler & Ethan.

It took us a few nights to reach Colorado and one morning as we headed out we noticed a beautiful rainbow in the sky telling us good fortune and good times were awaiting us.

As we crossed through the Aspen and Vail area of Colorado we were delighted to see the land ablaze with fall colors. Even though New England has some pretty vibrant colors in the Fall there is nothing like the beauty of the dark green evergreens and the blaze of gold from the aspen trees.


Needless to say - I wanted to stop often to view the beauty and take photos.

However the snow was starting to fall in Vail as we drove through and reports were that they were expecting over 8" by that night - so we cancelled our original plans to spend some time in the mountains and just kept heading towards Denver since the RV really isn't fun in the snow.

We decided to camp at Chatfield State Park just outside of Littleton, CO - a great spot to spend the next couple of weeks for visiting family.

Our campsite overlooked the water and we had wonderful sunsets each night.

This is Nick and Melissa, Cheryl's nephew and his wife. They live in Cherry Creek Colorado - a Denver suburb. They got married just one year ago and just recently moved to the Denver area.

And this is Nick & Melissa's new little addition - Zoe - she's a Yorkie-poo a Poodle and Yorkie Terrier mix - she's only a few months old and quite the heart-breaker.

Blanche and Lucy loved playing with Zoe - they ran and cavorted all through Nick & Melissa's condo - they were tons of fun to watch.

Nick & Melissa and Zoe took Cheryl and I as well as Blanche and Lucy to the Cherry Creek Farmer's Market to shop and have a yummy brunch.

Another reason for coming to Colorado was to help my grandson Ethan celebrate his 3rd birthday.

The family gathered around as Ethan looked over his Dinosaur decorated cake.

Every year Ethan & I share a birthday celebration since our birthdays are just a week apart.

Ethan decided to take his dinosaurs off the cake to play with them.

Of course as he removed them he would lick off the icing too.

Turns out the dinosaurs make great icing scoops....

After eating most of the icing off the cake - it was gift opening time.

Most of the clothing gifts were not as exciting to Ethan as they were to his mom.

Though for some reason Ethan got very excited over the new briefs / underwear that he got. (Maybe because he's doing a such great job potty training)

One of his favorite gifts was a set of motorcycles that he played with all week.

When he looked down from the kitchen into the living room area he found a couple of big gifts - his first 'big boy' bike with training wheels and a Basketball hoop and balls.

Ethan immediately jumped on the new bike with the 'Cars' motif and rode it around the living room.

From the smile on his face - it looks like he enjoyed his new bike.

The Basketball Hoop stand is an extension pole so that it will grow in height as he grows - or as his ability to get the ball in the hoop gets better.

Ethan may be a little guy - but his hoop tosses were often right in the basket right away.

We were all surprised at how often he made the basket on his own.

Of course sometimes Cheryl had to give him a little boost to help him out.

It didn't take long for the party to work it's way outside so Ethan could take his first ride.

His balance was already very good because he rides the bikes that are at his Preschool.

Not to be outdone - Tyler took her Princess bike out and rode up and down the sidewalk in front of the house too.

Tyler also has a scooter and like most 6yr olds - loves to tool around on that.

Denise immediately went out and bought the kids new helmets to safely ride their bikes.

The next day the kids put on Halloween costumes and we all went to the Pumpkin Festival.

The Chatfield Pumpkin Festival is held right across the street from where we were camping on the State Park grounds.

Ethan put on his best 'Top Gun' outfit and went as Tom Cruise.

And Tyler was the cutest little witch.

The kids went to the Pumpkin Patch to pick out the pumpkins they would bring home.

Tyler couldn't decide which pumpkin she liked best.

Here are my favorite little 'pumpkins' in the pumpkin patch.

We all went on a hay ride around the festival together.

The festival had lots of rides that the kids enjoyed - like this barrel ride....

And this 'dragon ride' that they took Cheryl and Gary on.

Once they got home they decided that their dog 'Charlie' could dress up too.... she's a pumpkin.

We spent our visit doing lots of fun things with the kids - here Cheryl is playing 'Hop-Scotch' with Tyler.

The kids and I baked Halloween cookies one evening.

We watched Ethan create 'art' on the side of their house.

We had great lunches out at Panera Bread restaurant (one of our favorites).

We took Tyler to the Littleton Historical Museum - which is a great place with lots of fun outdoor exhibits on what farm life was like in 1896 in Littleton.

We watched the kids one day so that Denise and Gary could run a 5k race at Red Rock.

When their parents came home the kids were proud that they had completed the run (they looked tired though).

One day we took the kids down to Old Littleton where the town was having a Halloween Decorating Contest.

The businesses around town built elaborate Halloween creations on street corners that we visited. This one is Jokers Wild.

This was one of the kids favortes - The Cat in the Hat.

In the Cat in the Hat sculpture - the kids loved 'Thing 1' and 'Thing 2'...

We couldn't figure out the title of this one - except 'yuky scary'.

The Skeleton Ghost one was scary and pretty at the same time - but we loved them all.

One of the things Lucy loved most about Colorado was rolling in the thick grass.

Blanche love the grassy areas too - so we took the kids (and the dogs) to lots of playgrounds.

Tyler and Ethan loved the campground too - with lots of trails to hike. Here we hiked down to the waterfront to visit the Marina with Blanche and Lucy.