Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Is It Really July Already?

On the Way to South Dakota
Cathedral Spire Formations in the Black Hills
Mule Deer at Custer
Sylvan Lake in Custer
Wild Burro Greeting at the Car Window
Beeper Moment at Mount Rushmore
Mountain Meadow in the Rockies
Rocky Mountain Overlook
Elk in the Mountains
Hike to The Loch
The Loch
Hi.  Here I am.  Back again with my fully functioning camera--see?   Is it really already mid-July?  I feel like I fell into a very humid, very hot hole over here in this place we call summer in Minnesota.  I missed you, dear blog and lovely blog-readers, but it has just been curiously difficult to find my way back here.  Want to know what I have been doing all this time?  Well, we painted almost the whole of our downstairs in various shades of slate and heavy-cream, put chalkboard paint all over the ugly half-bathroom door to encourage bathroom-stall style graffiti, framed some prints that have been lurking in their poster tubes for months (years?), planted some veggies (chard, couple kinds of melon, and all the other usual suspects of tomatoes, peppers, zucchini), got real cozy with my iPad, and then headed out for a 10-day summer road trip to The Rocky Mountains via the Black Hills.

I really, really fell hard for Custer State Park--the free-range wild life everywhere (buffalo shuffling through our camp site during the night, burros greeting us at out car window, stopping for pronghorn lazily crossing back into waving prairie grass), swimming in the breath-takingly gigantic boulder strewn lakes, the various resorts that put me in mind of 1950's-style summer camps.  Then we drove onto the larger-than-life Rockies where we hiked, swam, ate homemade ice cream, slept, then did it again the next day.  You can see more photos of the Black Hills, here, and the Rockies, here (including my Instagram photos which I uploaded to my Flickr--I have become very sweet on the immediacy of whipping out your phone to grab a photo out the car window of the passing landscape and the snappy photo editing all right there).

I tell myself that my plan is to ease into blogging this month--sort of like how you slither down into a really hot bath.  But who knows, maybe I will just take a running jump off the dock, right into the deep end....it does feel good to be here again.  Little bit like coming home.

9 comments:

Katie said...

I love these pictures- they look a bit like Viewfinder pics!

Anonymous said...

Sylvan Lake and Custer State Park are a dream - so beautiful. We honeymooned there, and can't wait for our kids to be a bit older so we can head back. Just gorgeous.

Sarah said...

How fun. I've always wanted to visit Mt. Rushmore. Looks like you all had a great time =)

- Sarah
agirlintransit.blogspot.com

Unknown said...

Welcome back!

Christina said...

Hey! I was actually just checking my blog list the other day to make sure blogger hadn't somehow made me unfollow you. You must have been relatively near us--we're in southwestern Montana. : )

Angela said...

Yay! Welcome back. So glad you've enjoyed your break and what looks like the perfect kind of summer trip.

Larissa Holland said...

Hi, wow, you've been so busy! Sounds like you got a boatload done. I often wonder how productive I'd be if I didnt blog. LOL. I'm very curious to see your home improvements.

heather at wordplayhouse® said...

Just discovered your delightful space today!

Anonymous said...

Good to have you back!