August and September 2024 Activities

 Marissa and Fred planted flowers at the end of June. This is Marissa's map for planting.

Now everything is laid out as the map outlined.

I finally took some photos of her blossoms at the end of September. I was probably about a week late because some of the blossoms were starting to shrivel up. The flowers have really been beautiful.

One evening Fred and I were driving out to Parker for something.....I don't remember. This cloud formation in the sky was something I have never seen before. I thought it was a beautiful sight.

Shannon and Brian went to New York for a few days for a work trip Brian had. We had grandchild duty. It was the best long weekend for me. I had a new purpose to get up each day. I feel like I did a good job at spoiling the kids. I always try to serve food at dinner that they will like. We had spaghetti one night and hot dogs another. Oh and let's not forget Cold Stone. 

On Saturday we took them to Elitch Gardens in Denver.

Your typical amusement park with rides. 

This is the one of the two rides I went on. It was fun. No problems.

The second ride was the Tilt a Whirl. I used to love it as a kid.

I got to scream and had fun, but at the end I realized how jumbled my brain felt. 

I was done after that. Fred and I are very particular when choosing a ride anymore.

His stomach doesn't like it and my neck doesn't like jerking or jarring.

Sad days indeed.

Both of the kids went on this ride. 

Blake is in the top pod in the green tee shirt facing the ground.

We ate at the food court. Blake got pulled pork nachos.

Fred got a pulled pork lunch. Marissa and I shared a chicken strip basket.

The picture I took of us the camera was set on live so it's all wiggly.

I didn't post that. We had a really good time.

The next outing was with Shannon and her family. Brian is always good to drive us all in his 4Runner.

It's nice to have to someone else drive and mess with the parking. 

We all went super early because Marissa's school choir was participating in singing the National Athem at the Rockies Game. I guess she is at the front way over at the right. 

Rockies played against the Dodgers. It wasn't pretty.

13-2 - We left at the 7th inning.

This year we decided it was time to take a roadtrip. We were accomplishing three things at once.

Fred has wanted to go the Rocky Mountain National Park. 

I wanted to go see Estes Park, a cute tourist town right outside the Rocky Mountain National Park 

AND we wanted to go see the fall leaves.

We think we were late this year. Almost all of the tree leaves were yellow. 

I caught a little bit of red here.

We did see some beautiful sights. The weather was perfect. 

We drove around for about an hour. We drove almost to the top.  That was at 11,716 ft. 

I quit looking down at about 9,000. I didn't like it. 

We saw a cluster of cluster of elk along the rode, but I couldn't get my camera out in time. 

We saw this one as we were driving out of Estes Park on our way home.

The drive ended up taking longer than expected. There were several points along the way under construction. We stopped at Smokin' Dave's BBQ. It was really delicious!! 

Of course, my favorite part of the day. 

We hope to go earlier next year and hopefully catch some red and orange leaves too.

A quick trip to Utah

Fred and I made a quick spur of the moment trip to Utah.

His cousin Lynda passed away. These are Tom Daly's four daughters. 

From left to right

Sandra, SuzAnn, Lynda, Ardis

They have each been so friendly and accepting from the moment I met them at the first Daly Family Reunion at Panguitch Lake. I'm just now making the effort to put the name with the person. 

It was a very nice service and felt good to be among the Daly Family.

 At the gravesite, Sharlotte (Fred's sister), Candace (Fred's cousin Jim's wife) and me. Three old ladies.

After the service we met up with Ben and the kids at the Hill Air Force Museum. 

Corinne was out of the country this weekend traveling for work.

The kids have all been to this museum multiple times. Henry and Spencer didn't have a very happy look on their faces. But they were all troopers.

I enjoyed seeing Fred and all the Thornton boys checking things out.

Spencer was happy to entertain Clara. 

He really is sincere about playing with her, but it's usually a very annoying type

 of play that causes lots of screeching from Clara. 

We picked the coolest looking jet for a picture of Fred.

These two were very enthusiastic at the beginning to show us around.

Garrett is a really good big brother.

We should have tried to have someone take a picture of all of us.

It was so stinkin' hot. Ick.

After the museum, we took the family to Costa Vida for dinner and then back to the house for games.

Garrett had just returned from a trip to Disneyland with a bunch of his friends.

He was giving us a rundown on his fancy lightsabar. His prize souvineer.It was very cool.

Henry and Clara introduced me to Dinasaur Monopoly.

I actually enjoyed playing it with them.

All the men played the real Monopoly game in the kitchen.

It was a fast trip, but we did enjoy our time with family. We did meet up with my brother Craig and his wife Lynette. I really need to get a picture of us the next time we are together. 

Rambler Ranch July 2024

Fred and I drove out to Elizabeth CO. We had never been out there or even on the backroads that took us there. It was a lovely drive. We found the Rambler Ranch back in the woods. A beautiful location. In the showrooms there weren't only cars, but lots of nostalgic nick nacks. This clock is one of the first things that caught Fred's eye. So apropos for Fred.

I found this interesting. Really?

There was a smaller warehouse that housed these really older cars. Several were in the midst of renovation. I think it was a sample of the kind of shape they get these cars and then renovate them into masterpieces.

The following cars were in the first building called the Nash Building. Look at the size of that steering wheel!

1957 - my birth year. Most of the engines in the cars here at Rambler Ranch were V8s, very powerful cars.

Look at the fabulous colors of the different cars.

I don't how they were able to squeeze so many cars into this space with each parked perfectly.

Most of the cars in this wearhouse had signs in the front window with make, engine size, mileage and sometimes the color. The names were very entertaining.

This was the closest Rambler stationwagon we could find that was like the Rambler Fred's Grandpa Howes owned. Fred's parents gave it to us when we got married. When Fred picked me up for our first date in this car, I was a little taken back......but when I sat inside it was pristine. 

Taking a picture of Fred taking a picture.

Look at this fold down bed. Pretty inventive I would say.

So many cars and so many colors.

This is the interior of a 1965 Rambler. It looked a lot like the one my parents owned that I remember. I don't remember if ours was this fancy, but isn't it a beautiful interior?

 I love this pearl rose color that was prevalent on a lot of cars from ealier years. 

This looked just like the Chrysler New Yorker our family owned when we lived in Canoga Park in the late 1960s. It was a beast of a car. Very luxurious!

This AMC Eagle wagon was new in 1988 when Scott was born.

This is a new AMC Eagle on the market when Shannon was born in 1983.

This also is an AMC Eagle that came out the year Corinne was born in 1981.

I don't know what this is. There were no signs, but the showroom was basically Nash, AMC inventory.

Some wierd car with only three wheels.

These two cars reminded of the cars in Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters at California Adventure.

This one is just darling.

When Fred and I started dating, he said he would love to own a Black BMW. Well this guy is an predecessor of the BMW Fred had in mind. 

To get inside the car, you lift the front of the car, like a reverse trunk.

One of the building displays is basically a home from probably the 60s. The rooms reminded so much of the homes my grandparents lived in. 

Very impressive hair dryer going on here. 

This dresser reminds me a lot of Grandma Daly's bedroom set. The furniture from these earlier time periods were so much more decorative in the trim work. Works of art rather than totally just style of today.

I can't imagine an orange kitchen. Even the wall phone is orange. It is cheery and bright.

A very modern appliance of the day. Water faucet, blender and an early form of the Kitchen Aid.

This was the jute box in the living room. I don't imagine too many people actually had one in their living room, but it certainly represents music from earlier times.

One speaker on the wall was their stereo system.

How is this for luxury. A small black and white tv and box fan. It does look familiar.

I find this really so lovely. Simple. 

This dresser again reminds me of Delna's bedroom furnture. I just love the decor.

We never had a big console tv like this growing up. Very fancy.

This color scheme is pretty wild, but it definitely followed the orange theme of the kitchen.

I fell in love with this retro Pink Kitchen. I felt like I was in a life size Barbie Dream Home. 

I do love pink. This kitchen looks nothing like what we see today, but holding it's own on being pretty 

luxurious. 

                    

The Rambler Ranch is open only seasonally May through October from 10 am to 2 PM. If you are into old cars at all, you can spend the full four hours there. There is a $20 donation fee. We had such a good time reminiscing about our early lives. Seeing the marvelous inventive and beautiful cars through the ages. What wondorous machines and so beautifully detailed.