Our Durango , CO Vacation 2015

Our Durango , CO Vacation 2015

This is the charming B&B we stayed in in Durango. Just a lovely charming country just a few miles north of Durango.It was an incredible friendly relaxing place to stay.

View from the grounds,which cover 5 acres full of beautiful small streams, flowers and walkways.

This is the front porch complete with rocking chairs so yu can rest a while after a busy day.

This is our comfortable bedroom, with a feather bed, ensuite bath and shower and lovely views of the garden and mountains.

On the  grounds are 6 individual cabins, all charming with views of the house and mountains.

There is a small lake on the property and twice a day from the very back line you can see the vintage Silverton railway pass by.
Just incredible flowers are everywhere.

The roses were especially beautiful.

A holiday we will certainly remember!

We highly recommend this B&B for a relaxing and comfortable stay in an outstanding Place.

The Moor"s Account by Laila Lalami

The Moor"s Account  by Laila Lalami

This was a historical novel based on an account of the exploration of the first Spanish explorers Of America. 
The account is written by a black Morrocan slave. It starts with the tale of how Estebanico becomes a slave as a young man . His master is one of the conquistadors of the Narvaiez expeditions to Florida.  The first part of the story concerns the time around 1527 when the Spaniards are trying to settle the new country for the King of Spain and find gold. They become hopelessly lost and gradually are killed by waring tribes of native Indians and by disease until only 4 of the party remain.
 They eventually travel across the southern area of America  encountering various other tribes, almost starving and giving up hope but eventually meeting up with Spaniards at  another Spanish settlement.
This is obviously a well researched book and is interesting historically, but fairly difficult to read. It is not a book for casual reading.
I certainly became aware of history that I had never realized before by reading it. 

Disclaimer by Renee Knight

Disclaimer by Renee Knight

This turned out to be a thriller/suspense novel that I couldn't put down !!

Catherine, the main character in this story, has  a long-time secret that she has kept hidden for years from anyone. 
One day a book is sent to her and she finds on reading the book that it is telling her secret  and that the Book is specifically about her. Who is the author of this book? and why are they doing this? Only one other person knew about her secret and that person is dead.
As she tries to unravel the mystery and why this is happening, both her husband and son become involved and get to read the novel.  Eventually Catherine believes she knows who is at the bottom of this and intends to find out  and do something about it as her life fully unravels.

Much more complicated than some thrillers I have read and  definitely a page turner.

Challenge painting- Easter Bunny Dress-Up

Challenge painting- Easter Bunny Dress-Up

Water color 8"x 10"

I can't say I liked this challenge very much.I just couldn't get interested in the subject. The pose was good, the colors varied , but I found the composition complicated and muddling ( Is that a word?). 
I decided to close in on the subject to paint but even then I wasn't that happy with the result. But I did it .
I think the other artists on http://paintanddrawtogether.blogspot.com/  must have felt the same way as there were only 5 entries this month.See the other entries on the link.

Original challenge photo

Then again, it might be it's summer and there are plenty of other things to do!

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver.

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver.

This is a book I picked up at a book sale and it has been on my bookshelf for months if not years! Flicking through the pages I had picked it up one or two times previously but never got round to reading it. It didn’t look too interesting.

Then one evening I was going to bed and I always read last thing in bed and hadn’t a book that I was reading, so I picked up this older book.( pub. 1998)

Well, what a surprise it was! I got hooked pretty quickly on the plot line and in fact found it a very interesting book. Just one of those books you can’t put down.

Here is a start to get you interested.

In 1958, a very devout, evangelistic, Baptist preacher decides his calling is to be a missionary so he takes his wife and 4 daughters to the Belgian Congo.They are all quite unprepared for this adventure. The girls don’t particularly want to go and even the mother is apprehensive but Father say so and so of course , that's what happens.

They eventually arrive and find the small amount of modern things they have bought with them are not much help in the jungle. They have to learn to adjust to a new land, new food, and a new language. Father knows best  but isn’t learning to adapt as well as his young daughters. Mother quickly resents being placed into this setting and having to work so hard and struggle with day to day living. What follows in the book is the story of their lives in the three following decades  plus the events of historical importance with the split up of the Belgium Congo to become independant and all the political disturbances that occurred. The family eventually all decide to go their own way but the telling of their story is fascinating and well told.

it was well worth reading.

A Plant Unknown.

A Plant Unknown.

Sometime in early Spring, like February or March, I was wandering around my garden checking to see if there were signs of early Spring flowers and I saw this one growing. It was like a spiky green rosette.

There were actually 4 of them growing among the dead leaves.
I asked around, checked various plant photos books and even the internet but couldn't get any conclusive answer to "What is it ?"

IT looked remarkably like the lantanas sprouting up everywhere at the same time but even so -different.
I watched it grow through the following months, and grow and grow and grow and soon it was taller than me.

 It was still green and whispy with delicate fine leaves but at the top blossom was forming.






And then it  popped! 

It produced the most beautiful bright cardinal red colored flowers and now I could really look it up in the plant books.
It is a standing cypress plant that grows wild in Texas. Just lovely.
I just wish I had more planted.Only one has bloomed so far.

Next fall I will look for the seeds and plant many together , even if I have to wait for a couple of years to see them bloom again.

Ipomopsis rubra (L.) Wherry

Standing cypress, Texas plume, Red Texas star, Red gilia

The stiff, unbranched, 2-4 ft. stem of this sparsely leaved biennial can reach 6 ft. Showy, red, tubular flowers, widely flaring at the rim, are marked with orange or yellowish spots inside. Flowers are arranged in a thick spike, opening from the tip of the stem downward.

The Beautiful Larkspurs.

The Beautiful Larkspurs.

 Anyone who has read my blogs will know just how much I love larkspurs. 

I guess I like them because of their lovely colors, all different tones of purple and blue, pink and white. They grow very easily, indeed some would say, too easily, and a few seeds will give a good show in your garden, They are fairly tall especially if they get lots of water in the spring , last a good couple of months in bloom and make it look as if you actually know something about gardening !!

 So they are great for a beginning  gardener, who like to potter around in welly boots and old hat and shirt, try new things to grow and be outside in the sun , listening to the birds and relaxing. ( My kind of thing).

I didn't realize how well larkspur would grow when I threw my first seeds out in the garden a couple of years ago.I also didn't realize the amount of new seeds they would produce each year. I thought when I had pulled up the old plants when they had finished blooming  that  was the end of my beautiful flowers.  But indeed not. As the bloom fades, the seeds form and shoot out all over the area but the plant continues to produce more flowers so little do you realize that you are getting quantities of seeds falling all over the place. 

Where I once had a grassy lawn( that was a joke- more like a weedy patch of assorted green growing stuff) this year I have a vast array of larkspurs.

And guess what ...
I LIKE IT!