Colorado Trip Part 1-Colorado Springs

I'm back with the first installment of our journey. We spent the first two nights of our trip in Colorado Springs. We spent the first afternoon mostly just hanging out and resting after our 14 hour drive to get there. We couldn't sleep the night before so we just decided to leave at 2 am and we arrived in Colorado Springs around 3:30.

The next day after a nice breakfast at our hotel, we set off to explore Garden of the Gods park. The park is full of beautiful rock formations and there are trails and roads running all around the formations. We spent a couple hours wondering around and marveling at many varied formations. It's a really neat place and a must see if you are in the area.

After we were done at Garden of the Gods, we decided to take a trip up Mt. Baldy. We had taken my husband's Jeep, so we were prepared for travel on rough roads where 4-wheel drive is neccessary. It was a long 2 hour journey to the top. The route followed an old stage coach road and railroad bed. There were some great views of Colorado Springs along the way.

The road was rough and rocky with many narrow shelf roads. If you are afraid of heights, this is not the route for you.

Finally we made it to the top and were rewarded with a wonderful overlook of the city below. There was also an old water resevoir at the top that we were told is from the 1800s. It seemed like a long, rough way to go for water!

We headed back to our hotel for a nap before dinner. It was raining that evening and when we left the restaurant after dinner there was a gorgeous double rainbow to greet us.

Overall, I fell in love with Colorado Springs. The town is beautiful with the mountains all around and there is a lot of green space all about the town. It never felt crowded and traffic was pretty light. I'll be back with more stories and photos, so stay tuned.

Colorado, what a glorious state.

If my blog has seemed a little empty lately it's because we just returned this past weekend from spending a week in beautiful Colorado. While I thought Alaska was amazing, Colorado also blew me away.

The mountains and the views are just awesome. I also fell in love with fresh air and low humidity. Even at the higher elevations I felt like I could breathe so much better without all the allergies that seem to plague me at home.

Unfortunately, I picked up a nasty cold on our last day of vacation and I've been trying to mostly rest every since, so little time for blogging. I will be back soon with lots of photos to share of this gorgeous state! We are also in the middle of a big home office overhaul so there will be more DIY and before and after fun to come.

Now if only Colorado wasn't 14 hours away and didn't involve driving across Kansas. That state is soooooo long. It feels like you never get through. While the Flint Hills area is pretty, the stretch of Kansas along I-70 is not that exciting. (No offense to any Kansas residents, I'm sure the state has plenty of pretty areas, just not where the interstate runs through.)

Are we there yet? How about now? Can you see the mountains yet? There were common phrases from our trip. We covered at least 2200 miles in 7 days according to our GPS and we didn't even have it on all the time.


Stay tuned for TONS more photos!

Browned Butter Veggies with Almonds

Yummm. Anything that starts with browned butter is going to be good, right? And hubby ate his veggies without complaint so that's a plus also. This is another recipe from Allrecipes. I was looking for a new way to cook frozen veggies and I came across this one. With some slight modifications, it turned out as a pretty good way to dress up any assortment of fresh or frozen vegetables.

1/4 cup butter (I cut down the original 1/3 cup the recipe called for to less than 1/4 cup)
3/4 teaspoon garlic salt
3/4 teaspoon garlic pepper
(Or use 2-3 cloves minced garlic instead. We love garlic so I use it pretty heavily)
1 tablespoon sliced almonds (or pecans or walnuts. I had walnuts on hand so that's what I used)
1 tablespoon white wine (or chicken broth which is what I used)
2/3 medium onion, chopped (or 2 tablespoons minced onion which is what I used)
1 medium red bell pepper, chopped
1-1/2 cups chopped broccoli
1-1/2 cups chopped cauliflower
(Or just use whatever vegetables you have on hand. This recipe is sized for 4-6 servings so toss in whatever you have. I used frozen broccoli and cauliflower. You can use fresh also.)

1. If using frozen veggies, pop them in the microwave for half the required cooking time as specified on the package. Or you can use thawed frozen veggies. If using fresh, skip this step.

2. Melt butter in a skillet over medium-low heat. Season with garlic salt and garlic pepper(or minced garlic). Mix in nuts and cook until golden brown. (Be sure to cook long enough for the butter to really turn brown and carmelized.)

3. Stir in wine, onion, and veggies. Cook 5 minutes, or until vegetables are tender.

4. Enjoy!

Sprucing Up a Plain Bathroom Shelf

I've had this bathroom shelf cabinet for a long time. I use it do display different accessories, usually beachy themed ones. A bonus is the fact that they don't get dusty since they are enclosed. However, when I was finishing up our bathroom makeover, I decided this simple wall cabinet needed a little oomph.

So I decided to visit my massive scrapbook paper collection to look for some matching paper to use as a background. I measured the inside of the cabinet and cut two pieces to fit. I cut them so that the seam of the two papers was located in the middle. That way, the edges of the doors covers up the seam when you look at it from the front.

It fits in nicely with the wall color of the rest of the room and since I already had the paper it was a free and easy project!

Kitchen Wall Art

I've had some bare kitchen walls since I painted the room several weeks ago. While I was waiting for the paint to dry on those curtain rods I painted, I decided to add some simple artwork to the walls. I had bought these decorative tin tiles at Old Time Pottery 2 years ago. I had one hanging in our bedroom at one time, but never had used all three. I figured they would look nice on one of the kitchen walls. Here they are posing with my new curtains.

And a close up so you can see the detail on the tiles. They were only $3.75 a piece, so the total set only cost $11.25. I went back there recently, and they have these large ones as well as some smaller ones that I think were $1.99. I might have to pick up some more to hang in another room because they are so cheap and pretty.

Going Green

I'm not really a greenie, but I do love plants. They are supposed to be good for indoor air quality and all that fun stuff, but I mostly like how fresh and pretty they look as accents in a room. I used to have a bad record with plants and usually forgot to ever water them. I decided to go for a fresh start and bring in a few plants to liven things up.

I don't even remember the names of the plants I ended up buying, but they were all pretty cheap at Home Depot. As a Garden Club member, I even had a coupon they e-mailed me. If you aren't a Garden Club member, be sure to visit Home Depot's webite to join and get coupons, growing tips, and other fun stuff. The pots were half off at Garden Ridge.

So far my plants seem to striving. I even remember to water them on a regular basis.

Mantle Makeover

Another quick and easy project I completed recently was a little switcheroo on my mantle. Here's what it looks like before:

I wasn't crazy about the picture anymore although I will probably use the frame for another project. The rest of the arrangement was just getting a little boring. So I decide to switch things around.

The two sailboat photos are pictures I took last year in South Haven, Michigan. I changed them to sepia in photoshop and frame them in picture frames I bought at Garden Ridge. I belive the frames were $5.99 and $9.99. The framed key is a $2 Hobby Lobby clearance find. Everything else is stuff I already had. I'm still doing some tinkering with the arrangement. I might ditch the vase and move the globe to somewhere else. I think another framed photo might balace out the arrangement some more. But I like it much better than how it was before. Simple changes like this can help spruce up your home and keep it looking fresh for little or no money.

I'm linking this post up with the Thursday parties of DIY day and Transformation Thursday.