big 5-0.

yep, yesterday was my 50th birthday.  i honestly don't know how this happened.

my friend leslie and i were talking about how when our parents turned fifty they were really, really old.  and we are just NOT that old.  funny how a teenage mind sees fifty as ancient.  now that we are here we truly feel exactly the same inside, it's just the outside that's a bit different.  

i received some very awesome gifts yesterday.  here are two of my favorites, for obvious reasons (if you know me at all).

vintage wood!  and it's sitting on top of a book on french history, filled with scribbles in graphite from 1908!  love, love, love old wood and old handwriting--especially in pencil.  thanks dad and anita!!

pastel.  new mexico.  plein air frame.  dinah worman.  perfect.

thank you, john.

that's all for today.  what else can i say?  besides, i need to go walk off this menopausal waist line!

taos

i got back from new mexico today.  it is always a constant source of beauty and inspiration.  here are a couple of photos (thanks, tina) to let you see some local color.  the drive is about 4 and-a-half hours from denver, and i always think it's long.  that is, until i get out of pueblo, and the sky opens up my body and soul to another place altogether.

i went to new mexico for the first time about 20 years ago.  and the magic has not faded.  sometimes i feel like this northeastern white girl should feel like a stranger in a place so far removed from my upbringing.  but somehow i feel so at home with the landscape.  so i am selfish, and i soak it in.

here you go:

santuario de chimayo

offerings at santuario de chimayo

rancho de chimayo

san geronimo chapel, taos pueblo

cemetery, taos pueblo