We’re back in New Jersey as of last night after a whirlwind trip to Colorado. We packed a lot into those few days! After the wide open spaces of Colorado, our corner of the world seems closed-in and secular with the trees fully leafed out. Kind of like being in a green cocoon. A welcoming one, though. In five short days things really filled in. Above is looking out over one of the front yards.

I can’t say we had a great time dealing with issues at our as-yet-still-unsold house in Ft. Collins, but it was fun visiting with old friends. Walking through our empty house was nostalgic and tugged at my heart strings. It really is a beautiful house. The ghosts of past dogs were everywhere I looked: the room where quite a few of them were born; the courtyard patio in front where Indy used to love to lay; just about everywhere I turned I could see them. Funny that I didn’t see myself doing things in the house, mostly the dogs. Would I want to live there again? No, not really.

Our time at the cabin was serene, albeit short. Thanks to our friends Donna and Larry for getting everything ready for us! How nice to have hot water and a cold fridge (not to mention a snow-free driveway)! We enjoyed our visit with you and we’re so glad you have internet now.

Whereas our house didn’t really feel like home anymore, the cabin certainly did. It just enveloped us in its log walls and worked its magic on us. It did feel strange to be there without the dogs to accompany us on walks. It’s the first tme we’ve both stayed at the cabin without them. I’ll be sharing more about the cabin in the next few days. My body may be in New Jersey, but my head is still in Colorado and I’m not really in the mood for writing and creating. Too many other things crowding my mind right now.

Thanks to Linda and Phil for putting us up for the night, the great food, the dog fix, and for just being the wonderful people that you are.

I leave you with a photo of part of our back yard as it looked two weeks ago, and now as it looks today. Are you GREEN with envy?

I won’t be blogging this week as we are off on a vacation of sorts to Colorado. As I type from our motel room in Ft. Collins, CO, we’ve had a hectic day at our house. I spent most of the day pulling weeds—oh, excuse me you poor Dandelions!—dealing with plumbers, heating and air-conditioning guys, turning on our watering system, and interviewing new realtors. Whew. I am due for a good night’s sleep. Right now it doesn’t seem much like a “vacation.” But, we need to make some changes in order to get our house SOLD. Anyone want to buy a high-end house in Ft. Collins with lots of European touches, price recently reduced? It’s all very wearying.

We are off for what we hope is some true relaxation at our mountain cabin tomorrow. After we arrive at the cabin on Thursday we will be out of touch with the rest of the world. No telephone. No television. No internet. Nothing but the sound of the wind through the trees and the hooting of our Great Horned owl.

We do have a radio though, which was a necessary addition to keep in touch with the world. Back in 2001, we were staying at the cabin for the week when the 9-11 disaster happened and we didn’t even know. That’s how much the world used to pass us by up there. Since then we added a television with VCR and DVD capability, a phone with a booster antenna, and finally in the year before our move to New Jersey we added satellite internet and television. On our move we traded in our phone for a different service, took the TV with us, and disconnected our satellite dish. Now the cabin is back to being what it was years ago. A retreat from the outside world.

So, with my best wishes for a great end of the week, I hereby retreat from the world for a few short days. Have a great one. Please check back in with me once I’ve returned to the real world. Until Monday ...

Like I said, there is a reason New Jersey is called the Garden State. Take a look at this house in Wayne as an example! It just takes my breath away. Azaleas of every available hue and dogwood trees cover their yard. We found this house last year as it’s on the way to work for Rick and this year he kept an eye on it for me, letting me know when it was in full bloom. These were taken over the weekend. It inspired us so much we went out and bought four azalea plants!

The photo of above was taken with my little camera’s feature, Stitch Assist, which allows you to take panoramic shots easily. To see the full effect, click here to view a much larger version. This is a series of four photos taken separately, then stitched together in Photoshop Elements. I love this camera feature because it shows your previous photo in the viewfinder so you can line up your next shot perfectly. It also keeps the exposure the same from photo to photo, allowing a seamless transition.

What follows are the four photos, taken from left to right.

I am just a bloggin’ fool today. Too many things to blog about before we leave on Tuesday for Colorado. My trip back to Hyde Park will be only a blur by then more than likely, with my head stuffed full with that trip to my other “home.”

For my Mom—and after all we really did this stroll down Memory Lane for her—no trip back to Poughkeepsie would be complete without eating pizza at Aloy’s Restaurant. We could only hope that this culinary experience would prove all she remembered it to be.

We used to eat there quite a bit when I was a child, but I don’t remember much of it, and I certainly don’t remember eating pizza. I think I usually had spaghetti. My Mom likes to tell the story of me spilling a Coke in my spaghetti and I ate it anyway, Coke and all. I guess I’ve always been an adventurous eater. Anyway, we ordered a plain cheese pizza and waited for it to arrive. It looked and smelled delicious.

Mom said it wasn’t quite like she remembered it being. She told us that it used to come with Parmesan cheese just grated over the top instead of the mozzarella melted into the sauce. We just nodded and thought to ourselves that she must not be remembering right. Who just put cheese on a pizza without melting it? It was very tasty, and I think we were all satisfied. Aloy’s didn’t disappoint our taste buds.

When I went to their website to add a link, imagine my surprise when I read the following quote:

“Founded in 1929 by Joseph & Anna Aloy, our restaurant became famous for having the best pizza in the Hudson Valley. Our square pizza has remained a trademark of the business for it’s delicious taste and thin, crispy crust. A popular alternative among our customers is substituting grated parmesan cheese on top of our pizza, which many consider a “lighter” alternative to the traditional mozzarella. Try any of our pizzas, and join the growing number of people who now cannot go back to eating just any pizza.”

By golly, Mom was right! They did do grated Parmesan on top! How about that? The next time we go back we’ll try it the “original” way.

No trip down Memory Lane would be complete without a stop to the school where I attended Grades 2-6. Staatsburg Elementary School. It now sits alone and deserted. Its halls and classrooms empty of the sound of children. Even the playground swings and jungle gym that were still there seven years ago have now been taken down. Don’t you think it’s a handsome building?

See that room on the basement level on the left side? That’s my fifth grade classroom. I had Mr. Jubar that year. What a stir he made in a school that up until then had employed only older women for teachers! He was fresh, young, exuberant, and we loved him. One of the best teachers I’ve ever had. Here’s our class photo. Can you find me? No, of course you can’t, you don’t know what I look like. Okay, see Mr. Jubar in the middle? Count over two girls to the right and there I am! Second in from the right, second row from the top. My best friend, Debbie Volce is sitting right in front of me. I had a crush on Mark DeLucca (bottom row; first boy on right). I think I pestered that boy silly.

On to sixth grade. My classroom was on the top level, last room on the right. Mrs. Charbonnet’s class. She was a hoot of a teacher. She was convinced that the whole “man landing on the moon” thing was a hoax. She believed that they had filmed the whole thing on a Hollywood film set. No joke, she really did believe that.

There I am again, same spot with my long finger curls. oh boy. There’s that creepy boy (back row, third from left), I think his name was Chris, that rode his bicycle to my house one day. I hid in my room until he went away. There’s Julie Mayer standing next to me on the left. She was glad I left since she got my coveted spot in Ensemble [a special chorus group that got to put on musical revues throughout the year].

I think about them once in a while and wonder how their lives turned out. What they’re doing now, and do any of them remember me? We moved to Florida before the school year was over that year. I didn’t get to perform the HukiLau in my grass skirt. What would my life have been like had we stayed? Would I have finally convinced Mark DeLucca to be my boyfriend?

My life followed a course very different than theirs, and I certainly have no complaints, but it’s only natural to wonder ... what if?