attractions in southern Colorado

Welcoming Spring to the Colorado Foothills

/ Laura Lee Carter / 1 Comment

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Spring can be subtle here at 7,000 feet, especially when we have had so much heat and so little moisture this past winter. Talk about mild, we have had only two decent snowstorms since October and very little measurable precipitation. But there are some much welcomed changes to observe.

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First of all the type of birds appearing at our bird feeders are changing. Not that I’m able to identify many, but I do know when a new one flies up.

Rocky Mtn. BluebirdAnd we see the Rocky Mountain Bluebird coming by more and more. Such a beauty! Mike built a bird house for these. Sure hope they make use of their new accommodations! And there are a few other newcomers to our feeders. So nice to see…

 

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In spite of the very dry conditions, I am beginning to see little patches of green along the county roads and subtle suggestions of future wildflowers.  These lands are used to drought. Mike recently carved an abstract piece of art out of the base of a Pinon tree that we had to cut down to create our new home. The base is only a little over five inches wide and yet Mike was able to count 196 rings! This short tree was almost 200 years old, but most of the rings were impossible to see without extreme magnification.

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Oh, and here’s a photo of his new piece. He calls it Rabbit-Hawk… 

Life in the Colorado outback…

/ Laura Lee Carter / 8 Comments

AMAZING sunrise over the Spanish Peaks January 2018

As the sun rises each day over the Spanish Peaks…

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the birds gather out on our feeder to have a quick bird seed meal and a drink, if the water isn’t frozen.

Did you ever notice?

“The world is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.”                     -YEATS

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“There’s something beautiful about quiet and peace. There’s something beautiful about not trying to do anything, but simply, in some way, your heart joining the whole world. There’s a time in life when we should be running around doing things. We should go out dancing; there’s a time in life for that. There’s a time in life for building something up in this world, a family, an institution, a business, a creative life; there’s a time for that.

There’s also a time for becoming quiet, a time for slow conversations with people that we love, and a time for reflecting on all the things that we’ve seen in many years of living. When the time for those things comes, it’s beautiful. It’s not a terrible thing, it’s sweet. There’s also a time for letting go of our life, not “Damn, somebody’s snatching this away from me,” but “Yes, it’s beautiful to exhale after you inhale.” At the right time, when the chest is full, breathe out and let go.”     – Norman Fischer, “Suffering Opens the Real Path”

Robert Mirabal and the power of intention

/ Laura Lee Carter / 2 Comments

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“You never know what the spirit of intention can do.”  –Robert Mirabal

We spent a marvelous morning on Saturday at the Native American Celebration at Fort Francisco in La Veta.

First of all the Fort is a beautiful example of 1800s adobe construction. Their exhibits are also a wonderful collection of memorabilia from the past century, like a a walk through the homes of the early 1900s. Old furniture, clothes, and my favorite, photos of people from our past.

Then we enjoyed a dance performance by three girls from the Jicarilla Apache Nation. The highlight was a performance by Robert Mirabal of Taos Pueblo. Yes, his music is magic, and I also found great wisdom in his words.

Robert MirabalRobert shared with this mostly European-American crowd the history of this area and what it meant to Native Americans. He explained why his ancestors came up here from the south and kept the trails alive and fresh for others. He spoke of intention in our daily life.

When Robert plays his flutes and sings, it sounds like he is channeling the life and  stories of his ancestors, bringing up vivid imagery of our Native American past.

And in a way, isn’t that what we all do each day, channel our ancestors? So much of who we are is determined by choices made by our parents and grandparents.

I am honored to be now living on this land where the buffalo roamed, the place where my grandfather hoped to retire.  I feel closer to the land than I have in decades, and I intent to protect this land and its heritage.

Excerpted from my new book: A Memoir of Retirement: From Suburbia to Solar in Southern Colorado.

My New Book – Kindle Edition!

/ Laura Lee Carter / 2 Comments

memoir-of-retirement-2016Hey! It’s Small Business Saturday and you cannot find a smaller one than mine! Please consider my new memoir as a great gift for boomers thinking about retirement alternatives. We did something completely different and we’re glad we did, but there were times we weren’t so sure. Some of you have asked when I might have an e-book edition of my new book available for purchase. I just loaded it!