We Only Come Out at Night

Hey Family, I thought I needed to get in on the pumpkin race. So I finally got mine carved with a day to spare. I took two angles because he has a wide face. One side has a bullet hole which I like. He is bleeding from where I cut the top off his head. Oh so scary. Happy halloween.
-Reuben

White Rabbit

Man it is hard to find the perfect song for every occasion. Thought I'd end the find-the-rabbit contest. I'll admit it was rather difficult. Probably why we never saw a Jack Rabbit on our travels before.
If you look at the bottom third of the photo, in the center, you can see a darker triangle. That's him! Works better if you enlarge the photo and check it out. Not really the caliber of Uncle Steve's contests. All you really see is his head and ears, but he's there...
MOM
P.S. if Dad and I are the only ones posting song titles, how can we win the contest? Guess our own artists? ;-)

Long and Winding Road

This first image speaks of the way I felt this morning. Locked out! I was supposed to go on that special tour for photography with the Navajo guide. I was there where he told me to be...early!...and no one was there. Our wires got crossed somehow. Wasn't meant to be. Saved us some money;-) So we decided to visit Mesa Verde again instead.
Had a great day in spite of the rocky start....





Our theme for the day was road shots. They are best when taken from the center of the road. My job was to get the shot while Dad kept watch for traffic.


.... But he wasn't always paying as close attention to cars as he should have been. ;-)





Hey kids remember this? If you look closely you will see the ladder you had to climb to get to Balcony House 13 years ago. This is the view from across the way. Balcony House was closed this time. The only one we could visit was Cliff Palace which was fine because we didn't go thru that one last time.




... and another first. Our first Tarantula in the wild!! People said he was just a baby, but he was big enough for us...

We went for a short hike today. Here are more pictures of the kids.





I also took a picture of something that isn't my children. It's been awhile.

Dancin in the Moonlight

I couldn't resist one more blog entry.
We had a so-so guide for our night hike into the canyon, but what fun photographing under a full moon! I have a few things to learn about photographing at night with that camera, but I had fun trying.
This morning we ha a VERY cool jeep ride with a Navajo guide. He took us to the farm he grew up on in the Canyon. He talked about climbing the canyon wall every day to go to school. We've been invited to a ceremony in the canyon tomorrow night with full dress and dancing and stuff,(right next to that tall formation I posted yesterday, but we are supposed to be in Monument Valley. We just may have to drive back down.... Can't photograph it, but would be an experience if we could swing it. Anyway, maybe not. We'll see.
Ben and Ashley: thanks so much for posting the movie of your cutie taking steps. I love the internet!
Hope everyone is having a good week!

Cherokee People

... Maybe Cherokee ancestors....
Hello again family! Do you know how to read the language of the ancient ones?




We did a little more hiking at Painted Desert early this morning...



...and then we moved on to Canyon De Chelly. Took a hike into the canyon. People are living and farming down there.
Tomorrow we have a jeep tour in the morning and a moonlight hike scheduled at night. Hoping for more cool shots.

Get Your Kicks on Route 66

Hey Kids,
Our little adventure has begun. We have internet tonight and we wanted to let you know we are alive and kicking.
Our plane landed late last night (early this morning) in Albuquerque. This was the only car the rental place had left for us. Dad was sooo disappointed. He really wanted to drive a white Neon again!


Borrowing from Uncle Steve's bag of tricks...
We and I saw our first Jack Rabbit today. He's in this grass. Can you find him?


We spent the afternoon in the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest. This is a close-up of a petrified tree. The colors are cool.....


And some random desert shots....



The moon was so cool today. Came up about an hour before sunset. I'm hoping to be able to incorporate it in some shots later in the week.