Brother to Brother

Little Samuel was born this afternoon and his brother got to meet him this evening. The photo, sent by Suzanne just resonated with me as little Chas meets his brother for the first time. You can see in Chas's touching the wonder of he has towards this special new person who is going to change his life forever. It is poignant to view and vicariously touches all of us. Welcome to life Sammy! Your brother will show you the ropes!

Wordless Wednesday - Christmas Season

Rain, Rain, Go Away

Can you believe it, we had a little rain yesterday. Yes, even in Las Vegas we get rain - less than 10% of what we got in the midwest, so when we get rain here it's like driving on ice for the locals. They all slow down - well most of them anyway. When we got up yesterday morning we looked out and there was only a low gray cloud cover to see. We thought, "Well that's not so bad. It's nice to have a little cloudy weather and some rain." However, by the time mid-afternoon rolled around the comment from the front room (the alternate quilting room) was, "Where's the sunshine?" It didn't help that we had this little drizzle (or what we like to call a Las Vegas downpour) going on all day and night.

This morning we got up to another day of predicted rain showers. Thank goodness the weather forecasters in Nevada aren't any better than the ones in the midwest. As it started to clear we went out to get the last of those Christmas packages mailed and the sunshine was peaking through. As we looked east to the strip it was shrouded in a low fog that made the hotels and casinos appear as more of a distant mirage. It was sort of cool. As we looked west the mountains behind our home had a light snow covering and those further away in the Red Rock Conservation Area had snow, clouds and the like. It is absolutely beautiful to see the sun, clouds, and snow on the mountains.

By the time I left for work at noon we had beautiful cumulus clouds with breaks of sunshine coming through. Yes, living in Las Vegas with its 300 plus days of sunshine is wonderful and we certainly enjoy it.

I took this a year ago, but this is the view we often see in the winter when we
look west.

Sharing and Rethinking Some Sharing

As JoAnn and I have had children leave home and had more time for each other we have discovered we are share more and more experiences together and enjoying it. We've always enjoyed driving together to see new or old and beautiful country. We more recently have had fun making salads together. We pull all of the vegetables, spinach, condiments, and other things. While one of us builds the salad the other steams the vegetables. Those salads are sooooo goooood! We've made bread and cookies together. We fold clothes together although there are some of her clothes that I can't fold. We put up Christmas decorations together. We garden together and the list goes on. While I don't help sewing, she values my opion, or at least asks when it related to colors. I reciprocate by asking about ties (when I wear them).

However, we have one sharing experience we are having to rethink. For years we have sat next to each other and shared the hymnal during sacrament meeting at Church. If you sit behind us it probably looks comical. The hymnal almost continuously goes forward, backward, up, down with each of us trying to find the right distance and location for our bifocal and trifocal lenses. We laughed about it last Sunday as we realized that our hymnal was constantly in motion. It's a good thing we know most of the songs and only periodically have to look at the words. I can only imagine what it looks like to watch us from the pew behind us. I suspect we will figure out how to make this work so we can continue to share.

Wordless Wednesday

Black Friday

We have never buckled under to "Black Friday" in our house. We find Friday morning a great day to stay away from stores, shops, and other commercial public places. This year, however, we thought we might do something just a little different - after all Krissie & David were visiting and we wanted them to have a Las Vegas experience.

So, with that in mind, we made some decisions. While the rest of you were standing in line, pushing and shoving to get those "bargains" we were sound asleep - at least until about 5:30 am. We roused everyone from bed, bundled up and headed out for "Black Friday!"

We didn't go far, but we don't have to to have our kind of "Las Vegas" experience. We drove out to Red Rock Conservation area and watched the sun rise. In this case it's more of a sun drop since the sun hits the tops of the mountains and works its way down. It is a beautiful site. While it was a little cool for Las Vegas, watching the sun come down the mountain was worth the wait - we all thought so!

This is JoAnn's personal favorite. Those are the Spring Mountains in the background.

We watched the sun come down the mountain and it was a beautiful vista. We weren't alone, but that was fine. We like watching the sun set at the beach, but this is just as awesome. It's a renewal.

Following our sunrise watch we drove about 4 miles down the road to a little area called Calico Basin, named for the rocks that look like a calico material. It is one of our favorite areas to visit. It has a small spring and meadow and is so peaceful and beautiful - especially at 6:45 in the morning. I took the following photos while we were there. There are more photos on my flickr account.

I had fun playing with this one and focusing on colors
as opposed to people. The women were horrified I took
the photo, but as a Grandpa I can get away with it.

David and I came into the meadow from a hill above it. I'd never done that before
and the colors and the light were awesome. We were the only ones there!

It's hard to find the fall colors in this photo, but the colors are about as good
as they get anywhere in southern Nevada right here.