We went to Colorado! Thank you to Grandma and Grandpa Merrill that gave us a week of their timeshare. We spent the week in Pagosa Springs in a condo bigger than our apartment. We hiked...
...saw lots of wildflowers (it wouldn't be a real Katie post if there wasn't a picture of wildflowers)...
...summited Pagosa Peak to get a view of the southern Rockies...
...brushed up on our fly-fishing skills...
...checked out a bunch of antique stores...
...went to a quilt museum (this was super neat and Keith is a super good sport)...
...went to the local farmers market and county fair...
...where I ate a foot-long corndog (oh my)...
...spent two days touring Mesa Verde Nat. Park (I love that place)...
...and saw a wildfire. It was a quick, but still relaxing, wonderful trip.
Over Labor Day we took Keith's younger brother and parents backpacking up to Betsy Lake in the Uintas. It was his parent's first backpacking trip and after much preparation and worry it turned out wonderful. Gorgeous, peaceful, fun.
It was the last backpacking trip of the season and I enjoyed every moment.
Along with the summer my hummingbirds have left as well. I already miss them.
My garden is slowly shrinking as well. But my tomato plants are now HUGE!
With summer over the real work began. The major goal of this semester is to successfully put in my master's research study. I have two plots, one in the west desert and one in Washington near Spokane. We put in the west desert one Friday. The last 5 months have been spent getting ready for this so it is exciting to be getting it in the ground.
By the way, I love being co-workers with my hubby.
This is Susan, our boss, helping to plant the seeds into the study plots. The seeds (about 10,000 total) were individually glued onto toothpicks over the course of the last few months. This took forever but it will allow us to track the fate of each individual seed, making the study stronger.
Toothpicks in the ground!
Part of the study is a water/no-water comparison. Because we can't make it rain when we want we water with "water pillows." Just gallon zip-lock bags that we pock holes in and put on racks over the plots to make it "rain."
