Sunday, February 22, 2026

Chinese New Year Party Fun!


We attended a fun Chinese New Year celebration at our friends' home this weekend! 
They have been celebrating this event for many years and have collected quite a few fun decorations.


According to Wikipedia, "Chinese New Year, also known as the Spring Festival, marks the beginning of a new year on the traditional lunisolar Chinese calendar. It is one of the most important holidays in Chinese culture and was placed on the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity list in 2024. Marking the end of winter and the beginning of spring, this festival takes place from Chinese New Year's Eve (the evening preceding the first day of the year) to the Lantern Festival, held on the 15th day of the year. The first day of the Chinese New Year falls on the new moon that appears between 21 January and 20 February.

Click on the photo to enlarge it to view the information

A paper placemat our friends had at each place setting described the Chinese Zodiac signs associated with different years.

This year, the New Year was celebrated on February 17, 2026.

The Chinese Zodiac sign for 2026 is: Year of the Horse


According to Chinese astrology, Horses are confident, agreeable, and responsible, although they also tend to dislike being reined in by others. They’re fit and intelligent, adoring physical and mental exertion; they’re decisive but also easily swayed and impatient.



Our hosts had prepared a Pork and Vegetable Egg Roll filling--see the recipe they used on this link.  We all had fun taking turns to fill and roll the egg rolls to bake. We then had fun eating the hot-from-the-oven egg rolls as appetizers, dipping them in assorted sauces.

 

Our hosts prepared some delicious stir-fried entrees buffet-style, along with Hot and Sour Soup brought by one of the guests.

Dessert was fortune cookies!



My two cookie fortunes told me I was going to have an adventure in August and enjoy some culinary delights on my trip. 

That sounds perfect to me!


Thank you to Bekki and Will for a wonderful party!



Happy Year of the Horse

Good Fortune and Prosperity to all!




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Sunday, February 15, 2026

The Blue Mustang of the Denver International Airport

Denver International Airport (DIA) is located 25 miles (40.234 kilometers) east of Denver on the high plains in Aurora. Colorado. Opened in 1995, it replaced the smaller Stapleton International Airport. 
It is the largest airport in North America by area — 53 square miles (137.269 square kilometers) — and one of the world's busiest, serving over 64 million passengers annually.
The Denver International Airport Jeppesen Terminal's internationally recognized peaked roof, designed by Fentress Bradburn Architects, resembles snow-capped mountains and evokes the early history of Colorado when Native American teepees were located across the Great Plains.


 The airport features some of the longest commercial runways in the world, necessary due to its "hot and high" altitude, which affects aircraft performance.
Downtown Denver is less than 40 minutes away via the A Line Commuter Rail.


On trips to the airport, we witnessed the construction of the Westin Hotel, which opened in 2015 and is adjacent to the airport.

The hotel was designed with this description:
 “Building upon imagery of flight and aviation, the sleek form resembles a bird with wings extended, framing and accenting the acclaimed tent-like roof of Jeppesen Terminal.”





Travelers heading to and from Denver International Airport (DIA) along Peña Boulevard have been greeted for 18 years by a blue horse statue called "Blue Mustang." He recently celebrated his birthday!  There is no parking area near the sculpture, so my photos are all "drive-by" ones. 

Weighing 9,000 lbs. and standing 32 feet tall, Blue Mustang is a fiberglass sculpture by Luis Jiménez. It was one of many public art projects at the airport. 

According to the DIA website: "Jiménez’ characteristic style references the grandeur of the Mexican muralists, the energy of the Southwest, and the bright colors he experienced as a youth in his father’s sign-making company. Jiménez’s vivid paint, unique surface treatments, and method of exaggeration have influenced many young artists who are emerging in the galleries of Los Angeles and New York in the styles that are known as Lowbrow and Urban Art."


Most people tend to affectionately refer to the statue as "Blucifer" due to its piercing red neon eyes, but the eyes are actually a tribute to the artist's father, who owned a neon light shop in Mexico

There is also the sad fact that the statue’s creator was killed when a section of the sculpture's three sections came loose in his New Mexico studio, pinning him and severing an artery in his leg in 2006.
After his death, family and friends made the decision to complete the sculpture. Jiménez’s son took over the project to make sure Blue Mustang was finished.



The Blue Mustang is definitely an eye-catching sight when one drives towards the airport terminal!

 I captured this photo of him in the snow a few years ago


Some fun facts about the Blue Mustang: 

The Mustang's eyes are made out of LED lights, and the maintenance team has changed them just once in the airport's lifetime.

The piece was partly modeled on Jiménez's own Appaloosa stallion, Blackjack, a horse that he bought in fulfillment of a childhood desire after becoming a successful artist

A team of professionals helps to perform maintenance on the Mustang's paint as it becomes weathered. Every year, a local art fabrication and conservation company gives him an exam and a cleaning. They check for any cracks or chips caused by the elements. The sculpture is then washed by hand with distilled water, any holes or cracks are filled, it's repainted with an airbrush, and sunblock is applied.

The city ultimately paid $650,000 for the sculpture. A 2007 appraisal valued the work at $2,000,000, and the city has insured it at that value.


Denver International Airport is a busy one, and the Blue Mustang is certainly an iconic sight when one is beginning or ending a travel adventure!


 
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Sunday, February 8, 2026

Our No Snow Winter!

The photo above was taken on an early morning drive to the Denver International Airport late last month. As you can see, there is no snow on the high plains or in the foothills, and there has been very little snow accumulation in the Colorado Rocky Mountains this winter!


Denver didn’t get its first snow until Nov. 29, the second latest first snow on record, and it was only 0.2 inches. 
Temperatures around the Colorado Front Range have also been downright balmy, drawing close to, or even setting, record highs. 
It was 70 F degrees (21.11 C) in Denver on Christmas Day!


A persistent pattern of high pressure over the western U.S. has been the main driver behind both the warmth and the lack of snow, effectively blocking Pacific storms that typically help build Colorado's snowpack.
Natural climate patterns from the Pacific, such as "La Niña, " are also contributing factors. 

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA), during La Niña events, trade winds are even stronger than usual, pushing more warm water toward Asia. Off the west coast of the Americas, upwelling increases, bringing cold, nutrient-rich water to the surface. These cold waters in the Pacific push the jet stream northward. This tends to lead to drought in the southern U.S. and heavy rains and flooding in the Pacific Northwest and Canada. During a La Niña year, winter temperatures are warmer than normal in the South and cooler than normal in the North. La Niña can also lead to a more severe hurricane season.

 

My front lawn is usually covered with deep snow by this time of the year.
Instead, this winter, it is full of deer enjoying the cool shade!


The few snowfalls we have had so far are light and melt quickly as the ground is warm and dry. The Rockies are at 50% of the snowpack they need, and I heard today that they will need five to eight feet of snow (2.4M) just to catch up to normal!

If we, and the other Western states, end up with really low snowpack numbers, water supplies will be greatly compromized and that could eventually lead to water restrictions, increased wildfire risk, and challenges for agriculture later this year.



Colorado’s snowpack typically peaks in early April, as March and April are historically the snowiest months in our region. Weather patterns may shift as La Niña weakens toward neutral conditions in the coming weeks.


(A pillow on display in a nearby new construction model home)


We can only hope this will happen!












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Sunday, February 1, 2026

Geothermal Heat and Cooling in New Home Construction



 My husband and I volunteer for our community's historical society. We joined the society soon after moving to Colorado from New York, as we knew it would be a nice way to meet people and also learn about the history in our county and community.
 We enjoyed volunteering for many years at a National Historic Cemetery, established in 1838 in Brooklyn, NY, called GreenWood Cemetery, where, along with other volunteers, we helped a historian research the Civil War Project. That project wanted to record the burial sites of veterans of the US Civil War buried in the cemetery. We knew of a few famous soldiers from their grand monuments, and expected to find a few hundred more veterans' graves. Instead, we discovered over 5,200 graves of both Union and Confederate soldiers, many with interesting stories. You can see my posts about this cemetery on this label - there are 19 posts in all!

I know you are thinking: "How nice, but what does this have to do with geothermal heat and cooling?"

Please read on...

As part of our duties in our historical society, we help to maintain a large archival collection that began with the first resident volunteers in our community who formed our historical society in the 1980s. They collected brochures of the home construction in progress at that time, when our area was being converted from a cattle ranch to a residential community. 

Since new homes were now being built in our area, I went to collect the new homes' brochures to save for our archives. That is when I learned that one of the builders was installing geothermal heating and cooling in the homes. I was surprised to learn this fact, and very interested to learn more!


The Lennar company announced a partnership that will integrate Dandelion’s geothermal heat pump systems into over 1,500 newly-built homes across 14 Lennar communities in Colorado over the next two years, and the new homes going up in our community are the first!


Please click this photo to enlarge it for easier viewing of the information. 

Geothermal technology taps into the natural heat found below Earth’s surface to provide heating, cooling, and electricity. Geothermal use generally falls into one of three categories: (1) heat pumps, which are shallow geothermal systems that provide heating and cooling; (2) direct use, where natural hot water is applied to tasks that require heat, such as warming buildings or pasteurizing food; and (3) electricity generation. The homes being built in our area will have the first option of heat pumps.


Please click on the photo to enlarge it


The rocks and soils below a building or community act as a heat sink—absorbing excess heat during summer, when surface temperatures are relatively higher—and as a heat source during the winter, when surface temperatures are lower.
Geothermal Heat Pumps (GHP) use the constant temperature of the shallow earth (40–70°F) to provide heating and cooling solutions to buildings wherever the ground can be cost-effectively accessed to depths below seasonal temperature variations.
GHPs increase the efficiency and reduce the energy consumption of heating and cooling systems in residential and commercial buildings. They are currently deployed across all 50 states, and the market is growing as their value becomes better understood.

Learn more about geothermal heat pumps and their potential to reduce the need for new grid transmission infrastructure.



Please click on the photo to enlarge it for easier viewing of the information.

GeoThermal Heat pumps can be used anywhere and come in many sizes, including small heat pumps that can be used to heat and cool homes instead of furnaces and air conditioning units. Heat pumps provide an outstanding opportunity to improve air quality and reduce contributions to climate change. They offer no danger of carbon monoxide, have zero emissions, and add no indoor air pollution.
The drawback is that Geothermal heating and cooling are very efficient but expensive — unless the systems are built into new homes from the start. However, recent state, federal, and local incentives have made geothermal more cost-effective than ever. Some of the incentives are covering up to 50% of installation costs, depending on location.

 
Because of all the pros and despite some of the cons, Geothermal Heating and Cooling looked very attractive to me, and I hope more builders incorporate it into new construction. 


Meanwhile, in life around here, we are still having unusually warm weather for winter and hardly any snow.  What little snow we get melts within hours as daytime temperatures rise.


I recently saw this pretty Mountain Bluebird in my backyard.  
It was intently searching for something under and around the fallen leaves for quite some time. 
I hope he was looking for insects to eat, and not nest-building material, thinking it was spring! 



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Sunday, January 25, 2026

The Madden Gallery at the Museum of Outdoor Arts in Colorado




Our daughter works in an office building in the Greenwood Village area of Colorado and wanted to view an exhibit in a new gallery, part of the Museum of Outdoor Arts (MOA), which opened in the fall of 2025. We had a prior visit to the Marjorie Park Sculpture Park in July of last year, and we were also interested to see the indoor gallery.  We met our daughter at her office during her lunch hour to walk over to the Palazzo Verdi, a 15-story office building located at 66363 Fiddlers Green Circle. 



The Palazzo Verdi's building lobby space was recently renovated to include the 10,000 sq foot Madden Gallery, which will host three to four temporary art exhibitions each year.
Formerly known as The Madden Museum of Art, the gallery space was founded by MOA Co-Founders John and Marjorie Madden and first opened in October 2008 alongside the debut of the Palazzo Verdi office building. The Madden Gallery now offers regular hours, is open to the public, and is currently free of charge.



The first exhibit was "Metaphorming TIME" by Todd Siler.

Exhibition Dates: October 21st 2025 – February 13, 2026


According to the Madden Gallery's web site: 

This exhibition showcases a selection of Todd Siler’s paintings, sculptures, drawings, monotypes, and artist’s books—works he calls “Metaphorms.” Rooted in the creative processes of the human brain, Siler’s art fuses symbolic language, metaphor, and invention to explore time as the universal connector linking all aspects of life.

Through neural-inspired textures and thought-provoking imagery, Siler examines humanity’s past, present, and future: how we confront urgent global challenges, how civilizations rise and fall, and how creativity can shape a more sustainable future. His practice, grounded in the principles of ArtScience and STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics), invites viewers to engage as “Metaphormers”—lifelong learners, creators, and problem-solvers.

Metaphorming TIME is both a reflection on human ingenuity and a call to collective action, inspiring audiences to imagine and build a better world together.



Siler explains his predominantly mixed media art on his website:

"I’m a Cerebralist! I meld abstract and representational forms with sensual and conceptual elements, using all media and means of communicating. For the past three decades, I’ve explored the nature of the human mind and creative process: how we think, create, learn, invent, innovate, and communicate. My art shows how the mind is connected to all of its creations: from the words we use to describe our thoughts & feelings to the technologies we build to see everything in the world that words cannot fully describe...




...Cerebralism encompasses all forms and expressions of art. Through art, we can connect and transform everything (information, knowledge, ideas, experiences) to create new meanings and purposes for everything. Art makes life meaningful. It inspires wonder, while challenging the limits of our vision and imagination."



Please click on the photo above to read more about the exhibit and the artist's descriptions.





We all enjoyed getting a close-up look at all the elements incorporated in his artwork.



A small section of the Madden Gallery still had some of the former exhibits when the space was called the Madden Museum of Art before the renovation.



John W. Jr and Marjorie Madden were avid art collectors and together amassed an impressive and diverse collection. The Maddens' collecting philosophy centered around the places they were inspired by in their travels and the relationships they developed with artists.

In January 2016, the University of Denver was pleased to accept the Madden Collection as a permanent addition to the University’s holdings. John W. Madden, Jr., developer of the Fiddler's Green campus in Greenwood Village, CO., donated a collection of 133 artworks valued at $10 million to the University of Denver.




Please click on the photo above to enlarge it to read more about John Madden.



There was also a wonderful tribute to his wife, Marjorie Madden, and their family history.


There was some "rare to us this winter" snow on the ground when we left the Madden Gallery this past December...


...but our spirits were warm with the 
Joy of all the beauty we just saw inside!


The pretty snowy mountain view from our daughter's office's outdoor parking lot.

We enjoyed our visit to the Madden Gallery and agreed that their mission to "make art a part of everyday life" has certainly been accomplished through their generosity!

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