Graduation Day!

Graduation Day!
Originally uploaded by LacyLu42.

Bella graduated from beginner puppy training on Sunday, and they had an adorable hat for her to wear! She looks so unhappy, though!

I call this one, "Cone of Shame."

Bella and Brandon Roughhousing

Bella and Brandon Roughhousing
Originally uploaded by LacyLu42.

This, my friends, is the face of puppy love. Look at that sweetness! I'm going to get a print of this and tape it to the fridge to look at when she's busy destroying something.

More photos on flickr!

Meet Bella

Bella's First Day
Originally uploaded by LacyLu42.

Allow me to introduce you to Bella, the newest member of our little family.

Bella is six months old and she's a black lab/border collie mix. We found her today at a PetSmart. She'd been with Every Creature Counts, a no-kill shelter here. The woman from the shelter (named Wendy!) told us that animals come to them when they've got no options left; Bella was slated for euthanasia in Mississippi before she was rescued by Every Creature Counts. So, we named her Bella because she's a southern belle.

She was pretty shy and scared when we got her, but she's warming up to us beautifully. She's been in shelters her whole life, so she doesn't really know what to do with a house and a yard. They told us she wasn't potty trained, but we've only had one accident.

Wendy from the shelter was nearly crying when we said we wanted to take her, because she was so scared, she wouldn't even come out of her crate. We spent more than half an hour, sitting outside the crate, tempting her with treats to get her to come close enough to be petted. Wendy said she was afraid Bella wouldn't get adopted, because no one would take the time to get to know her. But we just fell in love and felt like we could give her a forever home and all the attention she needs.

Cleo is taking this a lot better than we had anticipated. She's not hiding or anything; she's mostly interested and a little wary, though not keen on being approached too quickly! We're really pleased that she's handling it as well as she is.

More photos to follow, I'm sure! Or you can click the picture and go to flickr to see more photos from her first day.

A Preview

Emily's Shower
Originally uploaded by LacyLu42.

This is just a preview of what Baby Richardson will have to look forward to when he meets his Pop.

Home Sweet Home

We've been working on filling up our somewhat empty "formal" living room space so that it echoes a little less, and over Christmas, we added quite a few things!

In the photo, you can see the lovely pillows my mom got me. I love the way the red and taupe colors pick up the colors of the room.

You can also see the bench we bought on a whim while shopping in Dallas! It makes a great coffee table/foot rest/extra seating/extra storage piece! (It opens up so you can store things inside.)

We also got the rice paper lamp in the corner from Ikea. It looks just as good as I hoped it would, and really warms up that corner!

We haven't hung the curtains we bought yet, but I'm excited to see how they look.

And also on the sofa, you'll see my favorite accessory of all: the cuddly miss Cleo in her favorite corner of the sofa.

The Folded Twenties

The Folded Twenties
Originally uploaded by LacyLu42.

The Folded Twenties ROCKED the Fox Theatre Sunday afternoon. ;)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lacylu42/sets/72157622861461610/

New Mexico, Part Tres

This is King, and he was kind enough to carry me around the next morning in Red River. We went horseback riding with the funniest, most polite cowboy I have ever met, up into the mountains, and it was beautiful. I sort of remembered how to ride. A little bit. Enough that I wasn't too sore the next day, at any rate!

After lunch we left Red River and headed for Angel Fire. The town is so-named because of a crazy light phenomenon that happens sometimes at sunset, where the mountains are painted red with light. We checked into our hotel and then went on a drive to visit some local artists.

This man and his wife make pottery in a wood-fired kiln. As you can see, it's bigger than he is! When this thing gets going, they have to continuously feed the fire for 40 hours straight.

That night we had the best meal of the whole trip at a restaurant called the Roasted Clove. Exquisite food cooked up by a chef who used to be the vegetarian chef at the North Pole!

Sunday morning we had some time to ourselves before heading up to the top of the mountain on the longest chair lift in the US. Then they packed us back in the vans and heading to the Buffalo Thunder Casino Resort in Pojaque.

Finally, on Monday morning, we visited el Sanctuario de Chimayo.

This church is a pilgrimage destination because it is said to have holy, healing dirt. It's also a photographer's dream.

That night, I got to have dinner with Larry and Zana, and then flew back the next day. It was an amazing trip and an amazing experience, only cementing my love for Northern New Mexico.

Dinner Party at Steph's House

Dinner Party at Steph's House
Originally uploaded by LacyLu42.

We had a dinner party at Stephanie's house for an article/photo shoot, and this is one of the photos from our awesome photographer, Julie.

New Mexico, Part Dos

We last left New Mexico on the gorgeous expanses of Ghost Ranch. In the above photo, you can see Georgia O'Keefe's beloved Peternale (the mesa).

From there, we got lost (only briefly) and then went to Tierra Wools which is a shop just outside Chama trying to keep the old traditions alive by ranching traditional Churro sheep that the Native Americans used to keep here, and then dying and weaving their wool in traditional ways. This shop keeps 25 local weavers employed full time.

That night, we were hosted at a reception by the Jicarilla Apache nation, and they sang and danced for us — and then we all joined in! It was very cool, and they were extremely friendly and willing to tell us all about their customs.

The weather was bitterly (and unseasonably) cold, so most of us hadn't packed appropriately. On the way to the train the next morning, our PR host let us stop at a Dollar General, where we cleaned them out of gloves, hats and scarves. It made us all a LOT happier on the train!

Because of the cold, we got a really unusual treat: snow and changing aspens at the same time! The ride through the mountains on the Chama railroad was absolutely breathtaking. The train stops at the top, half way, where you have your choice of turkey dinner, meatloaf dinner, or soup and salad for lunch. It was actually very, very good!

That isn't everyone who was on the trip, but all of us who rode the train. Carol (second from the left) turned 65 that day! So we celebrated with Little Debbie cupcakes I bought at the Dollar General! ;)

That night we were treated to a cowboy dinner, complete with entertainment, which was when I decided that I needed me a set of cowboy children. They were all so cute and polite and helpful… when they weren't trying to lasso one another.

That's it for now! More to come!

Northern New Mexico Trip

Last month, I had the amazing opportunity to go on a press trip to Northern New Mexico for work. It was an eight-day trip of epic proportions that I will be writing about for our annual travel issue in 2010.

We started in Santa Fe, which I'm sure many of you know, is one of my favorite cities in the world. There's something about Santa Fe that simply defies explanation: is it the light? The air? The people? The food? What makes this place so magical that even common doorways and mailboxes are photo opportunities?

I can't say that I know, but I do know that I was taking full advantage of every history walk, every restaurant stop, every moment — and full advantage of our new camera.

One of my favorite parts of the trip was a restaurant tour we took through the Santa Fe Cooking School. They take the group around town on foot, visiting four or five different fine restaurants, where you get to meet the chef and then sample some of his food, sometimes even right in the kitchen!

After Santa Fe, we trucked up to Los Alamos and Bandolier National Monument. It was a gorgeous day, if a little chilly, and our guided tour of the dwellings with the ranger was fantastic. (We also got a lecture on proper terminology. The people who lived here are no longer called Anasazi [which is the Navajo word for "strangers"], they are the Ancestral Puebloans. And, because in native beliefs, everything is always as it should be, they are not ruins, because there's nothing ruined about them! They are dwellings.)

We also got some of the history of Los Alamos when we went back to the city, which was fascinating. Because the city didn't actually "exist" during the war, the 150 children who were born there at that time all have "P.O. Box 1667, Santa Fe, NM" as their place of birth on their birth certificates. We stayed in a hotel directly across the street from Brandon's apartment, and ate at a restaurant where he and I used to eat!

After Los Alamos we headed to Abiquiu to visit Georgia O'keefe's home. (They don't allow any photos of her home, but it was lovely: very minimalist and modern.) Then we went on to Ghost Ranch where she had a second home and where she painted much of the scenery. We took a great tour where the guide pointed out the scenery and then showed the painting of it, which was fascinating. Beautiful country, too. It's now owned by the Presbyterian church, which uses the facilities as a wellness retreat center.

That's all for now! More when I upload more photos. To see the whole set that I've uploaded so far, click here.