Cerro Grande

Cheese fondue for our 12-22 Fondue on Saturday night.

And Sunday, we drove up to the Caldera to see about a hike up there. I figured the view would be pretty and snow-covered, and that the snow on the trail would already be pretty worn down from other hikers. Getting to the trailhead, looked like one, maybe two, people and a coyote had been on it since the snow, leaving us about 6" of powder to slog through. None of us were really equipped for that, so we drove on to one of the overlooks to see the Caldera, then turned around and picked a more popular trail on the edges of Bandelier.

The Cerro Grande trail leads to the edge of Frijoles Canyon; last year, when Jorge and I went skiing, we ended our day on the trail.



Set out into the woods. The snow trail was kind of packed, cross-country skiiers, snowshoers, and other hikers had been through, but it was still kind of slow going. Air temperature was around freezing, but it felt warmer in the sun and especially once we got going.



We made it to the overlook, stopped for a bit, and then headed back; out for about two hours total. Definitely earned our stop at Starbucks in Los Alamos.

Merry Christmas!

May you all know the joy of of a wind-up squirrel this holiday season.

Snow, Parents

Probably about 3-4" of snow since last night, enough to cover everything and make it all picturesque for the holidays — as long as it lingers, or that 30% chance of snow showers on Christmas Eve/Day pans out. Looks like that was about 7" up in the ski basin, according to their current conditions.

M+D arrived into Albuqueque Wednesday without too much incident, and into Santa Fe on Thursday. We've met up with them for lunches and dinners, and have sent them off on their own today so we can catch up on our preparations for the next couple days. Tonight will be the traditional 12-22 fondue. There's talk of heading up to the Caldera tomorrow to see that in the snow.

Bob and Claire are due to arrive into town today to meet up with their family, but we've got plans to see them some this week.

Also, our guest appearance on Mouth of Wonder is now posted at PRX.

Decoratin'

The tree thawed, we brought it in, set it up, put lights on, made some Chili Blanco, prepared the traditional Mai Tais, and had a crowd over to decorate.


   

Serena, Poalie, Ryk, Tyrrell, and Danny came over, Jett joined us later in the evening after work.



Serena, Jett, and Poalie got us a little devil ornament.



And Joan, helping move our tree closer to "Joan-ness," sent along a turquoise ornament.



It all turned out pretty well, I think.

Mystery Tree

All the Christmas trees at the Delancey Street Foundation lot had been bundled up and were now frozen in that position from the snow and cold. We picked one that seems about the right height, brought it home and set it up out in the sun. Hopefully, in a couple hours, we'll see what kind of tree we got.