Update from Nancy: Las Vegas and Longmont

Dear blog readers:  Last weekend I traveled to Las Vegas, NM to visit friends.  I stayed with Phyllis Ludi and we had a lot of time for in depth conversations and dog walks.  On Sunday morning, I visited First Presbyterian, where I saw many friends from our days there before moving to Honduras  (Chad, Judy Long, the Litherlands, Gordy, Carol Linder and Katie, the Manns, etc.).  But the big surprise to me was to find my niece Diane there!   She didn't know I was in LV and I hadn't thought about seeing her either!  She is staying there to keep Bob company while he recuperates from his stroke in April.  Their daughter Lyla has gone back to Texas for school.  On Tuesday, I borrowed Phyllis' car and took Diane and Bob for a ride--up the Mineral Hill road far enough to see Hermit's Peak and then north of town to Storrie Pond  (formerly Storrie Lake).   The drought persists, although (happily) it rained every day I was there!  The city has worked on an improved catchment system to fill up their reservoir whenever they do get rain.  Bob had not been out of the hospital/nursing home since his stroke, so he enjoyed the outing.
      In addition to the aforementioned church friends, I saw Robin, Les, Cordia, Diane and the Martinezes.  Diane is building some marimbas for Janine to use in her music teaching.   Very interesting to see.  Ray Litherland gave me a tour of the new (old, recently remodeled) bank building, introducing me to everyone as "our Honduran loan customer"!  That evening, I watched a video presentation shown outdoors, with various Las Vegas historical characters appearing in the second story windows of the building, each telling a story, then fading away as another character appeared in another window. 

      I rode the Amtrak from LV to Raton on my return to Colo.   From the train we spotted several herds of antelope and several of elk, some of them quite close to the train, with their big antlers and muscular bodies in motion.  Also, some passengers saw wild turkeys and a bear  (I missed those, though I saw the turkeys from the car on the way to LV).

      I spent the night with Larry and Deepa in Colo. Springs and then continued on my bus route to Longmont.   Deepa again served up a feast cooked in their "green egg" with many of the ingredients from their own garden. 

       Back in Longmont, I have had several interesting experiences (not counting the gas leak problems at 609 Bross!).  There is a bagpipe band that practices in the basement of First Presbyterian Church twice a week.   I have been able to sit in on a couple of their rehearsals.  It's quite a thrill, being in a relatively small space with 10 bagpipes and 5 drums playing!  I will ask them for a photo, if possible.

Last night was the annual Festival on Main street fair.  Main Street was closed off for four blocks.  Various business and civic organizations work together to sponsor this multi-faceted family oriented fun evening.  There were several stages, one with a couple of bands performing.   There was a presentation of 10 entries into a competition for kinetic sculptures, or so they are called.  Actually, they are totally crazy vehicles which need to be land mobile as well as water worthy, as the second part is today at a nearby lake.  They were judged on engineering, costumes, etc.   A couple of them were the Nurse Sharks and the Nascargots  (snail costumed folks who walked in slow motion to convey their snail-ness). 

    In addition, there were multi-cultural dancers, my favorite being the Chinese lion dancers (like the oft-pictured dragons, but with only two people in a much shorter but exceedingly beautiful costume).   it took so much energy to do this dance, that the people under the heads (there were 2) had to keep trading places with replacement dancers.  Accompanied by drum and cymbals, they processed for blocks, delighting young and old alike. 
    There was also a big bungee cord area, rock climbing, hula hoops, chalk on street painting, bubble machines, a fantastic juggler, acrobats, fire juggling, cotton candy, snow cones (free), lots of food booths, a 9-foot tall clown, and a display of cars by the ColoRODans that Corita wrote about a month ago. 

    Today I will go with Mary, my sister-in-law, on a tour of an old mansion that is used as senior hous  it has recently been renovated, hence the tours. 

      All for now from  Nancy.

Nancy Back from Las Vegas visit

Dear blog readers. Sorry for the long silence. I am not sure that I am entering this in the correct place, so I will just write this sentence to check it out. Then, hopefully I can fill you in on my most recent experiences. Nancy

Back in contact, Nancy in Longmont

Hi blog readers.   Corita, Raquel and Joel returned to Honduras on August 1 and Nancy went to Ames, Iowa for a week.  I will continue on in first person.  I visited  my good friend Mary Sawyer in Ames, who has been storing boxes of our stuff for nine years now!  I spent the week mostly sorting through this memorabilia, including boxes of old photos.   I through away a lot and pruned down to the amount I thought I could get in suitcases and take with me.  Quite a job.   Mary was a good support person.

Next I returned to Colorado and spent several days with Wally and Mary Finley in Boulder.  We had time for wonderful conversations, a bit of shopping, and some special celebrations as I was with them over my birthday.  They took me out to eat at an Ethiopian restaurant (the food was fantastic!) and then a stroll through Boulder's downtown pedestrian mall--alive with street artists, music, and energy.   I especially was fascinated with some live statues--people who had spray painted themselves and stood motionless for long periods with the visual effect of a statue, until they made a surprise move!   We experienced two different street artists with this act, and it was truly hard to tell if there was a person standing there or not!  Also, we enjoyed a wonderful digerido player (with a fantastic homemade digerido) and an upside down guitar player.  Wandered through a terrific local  independent bookstore  (especially a joy after witnessing the going-out-of -business sale of Borders in Ames, which store had previously driven out of business the best Ames local bookstore).     The next morning, Mary and Wally took me in their little camper up into beautiful Eldorado canyon to cook our breakfast by the river, with towering canyon cliffs as our backdrop.   There were several groups climbing on the rocks, including some elementary-school age children. 

Now, I am back in Longmont at the house where I grew up.  Last evening, I was really homesick for Joel and Raquel.   It seemed so empty there without them.   But I got a good night's sleep and this morning had energy for a little yard work and a walk to the library where I finally (!!!) figured out how to make a blog entry, or so it seems. 

I am back to the previous phone number, as the lost phone was here at the library.  So my phone number is 210-701-7342. 

All for now.   We hope I am able to enter this successfully into the blog!   Nancy

Day 32, July 31, 2011

Raquel's TWELFTH birthday!

After a nice breakfast and a few gifts, we headed off to church.  This Sunday the pastor was in costume, personifying his sermon.

One of the most innovative things about this church was actually its toilets.  The toilets use less or more water to flush according to which button you press.  If anyone is looking for a new toilet, you might look into these toilets by Toto.  I found them fascinating!

After church we packed up everything in the house into the van and headed out for the Ashbaugh family picnic.  There were 48 people invited to this wonderful annual family reunion, complete with organized games for kids and youthful adults.

 It was a great time to meet relatives we had never met before.

We shared our Honduran games as well: enchute (catch the ball on in the cup), honda (slingshot), and trompo (top).  Too bad David wasn't there to really demonstrate the Honduran top game.  It's quite intricate!

This page will be finished later.

Day 31, July 30, 2011

Today, Saturday, was a very unusual mix of activities.  First we went to the local parade, held in honor of the Boulder County Fair.  Unfortunately, the fair was to begin on Monday because it would have been nice to have taken the kids.  We got a nice seat on the edge of the sidewalk where we got lots of candy thrown at us.

There were lots of great floats and other entries, of which Corita took many photos for ideas for the annual Southwest School participation in the Honduran Independence Day parade.  I’m sure we could get more ideas at a 4^th of July parade, but we missed that this year.  One of the groups was a theater group who was passing out announcements for a free Shakespeare performance that very same night.  Boy, were we lucky!

So that evening we took a picnic lunch over to Loveland where we saw Shakespeare's "Love's Labor Lost".  It was quite a performance, even including the audience (us!) in their performance.

It was a little after dark when we pulled into Longmont and we were mystified as to why whole families were sitting out along Main Street in their lawn chairs.  The parade had been that morning, after all!  Well, it turns out we drove into the middle of the annual Hot Rod Cruise down Main Street.  Our rented luxury van did not meet the bill so we pulled over to watch the cars drive by for a while.  It turns out Longmont hosts an annual ColRODan Hot Rod show and competition which was to start the next day, but the previous evening everyone takes their souped-up cars out to show them off, revving their motors while paused at the lights.  Some drive into parking lots and pop their hood to show off their fine work.  It was a dramatic change of activity from the Shakespeare play, but that's what made it so much fun!  We cruised for a while with Joel waving at everyone and shouting, "Nice car!" before calling it a night.

Day 30, July 29, 2011

Today was just an errand day, buying things we need to take home to Honduras and starting to pack.

Day 29, July 28, 2011

Today we went to the Longmont Public Library again.  There was a free outdoor concert, but it was a bit young for our kids.  Joel spent the majority of the time playing at the side of the building with a vent.  He discovered he could make it rain grass!  Bored with the outdoor offerings, Raquel headed inside to check her email.

In the evening, we went to Fort Collins to visit DeAnn and her family.  "DeeDee" is Nancy's brother Alan's daughter, Corita's closest cousin in age.  DeeDee's husband Garth is a pilot and was called to duty, so we only had a few minutes together, just enough time for a group photo.

It didn't take long for Joel and Mason (DeeDee's seven-year-old) to hit it off.  A homemade "zip-line" in their backyard broke the ice.

For the girls (Raquel, Jenna - 12, and Laurel - 15) it took a little more time and a card game to warm up to each other, but then they were full of silliness.

Alan's two other children (Doug and Dan) were also able to make it, as well as Doug's middle child (Tiffany) and Dan's fiance (Anique).  It was great to spend time piecing together how things "really happened" by joining together all our memories.

Day 28, July 27, 2011

ZOO DAY!!

Today we got up early to head over to the Denver Zoo!  What a day!  We saw all sorts of animals the kids had never seen before, plus the hippo training (he wasn't very cooperative), a bird show, the African Wild Dog (similar to a hyena) feeding/training, and the African penguin feeding/training.  We were quite tired by the end of the day, but it was well worth it.  They are adding a new 10 acre section to the zoo which will be wonderful but will make it impossible to visit the whole zoo in one day, we think.

After buying some souvenirs in the zoo gift shop, we went to Ruth Warner (Marcia's sister of yesterday) and her Nicaraguan husband Moises's house where we had a delicious dinner.  Thankfully, Ruth's mother Natalie was able to join us as well.  The kids were delighted to spend the whole evening speaking Spanish, in fact Raquel commented on it two days later!  We had a great time getting to know each other better and catching up on olden days as well.

new phone number for Nancy

Lost our cell phone.  New phone number for Nancy is 970-324-3340.