Delightful Heartland Barns

When my husband and I drove 3,700 miles West to Colorado and then back East to Brooklyn, New York on Interstate 80 a couple of weeks ago (see more about the trip on this post), we passed quite a bit of scenic beauty along the way. We went on this trip to bring my daughter's bridal shower gifts out to her, many of which were special order items or one of a kind handcrafted items that we knew would be expensive to mail. Except for two stops along the way to sleep, we did the trip in two and a half days each way.  One of my favorite things I tried to take a photo of, as we passed many farms in the beautiful heartland of America, were barns.  Luckily, my Nikon D 60 camera has a fast shutter, as we were often whizzing by these roadside farms anywhere from 65 to 85 miles per hour!  Some photos were "winners," like this wonderful white Ohio bicentennial design barn above.

Other photos were "losers," like this interesting decaying barn that is partially blocked by a car in the lane next to us.  However, all in all, I captured quite a few amazing barn shots from my passenger side car window that I'd love to share today.

First is this selection of classic red painted barns.   I thought this would be the predominate barn color until.....

.....I saw how they were greatly outnumbered by barns that were painted white!

The most interesting barns were those that were faded or unpainted, bare weathered wood.  I wish I knew how old each one was, and the history behind them.

I even saw a new barn being constructed which made me happy. It was good to see rebirth instead of old abandonment.

Taking photos of as many barns as I could help to make our cross country trip more enjoyable......

.....and certainly broke up the monotony of blank, flat prairie lands and acres and acres and acres of corn fields that we saw in many states.

When driving across country I think everyone would marvel, as we did,  over how the pioneers made this same journey in covered wagons over dirt trails!  The Great Platte River Road Archway Monument that crosses Interstate 80 near the town of Kearney, Nebraska, is a beautiful tribute to these pioneers. Kearney is exactly located 1733 miles from San Francisco and 1733 miles from Boston and during the years of 1843 to 1869, nearly half a million men, women, and children rode and walked the trails to the West Coast. Pioneers going on the Oregon, Mormon or California Trails all converged in Fort Kearny (different spelling) before they headed out into the harsh wilderness ahead of them. The city of Kearney was also proclaimed as the Sandhill Crane Capital of the World. For 6 weeks, in late February to early April, more than 80% of the world's population of Sandhill Cranes converges on Nebraska's Platte River in order to rest and eat before resuming their northward migration.  This event attracts many birdwatchers to the area.

Of course, my husband and I were thrilled to finally arrive in Colorado and see our daughter and son-in law's new home!  We also visited with our son and daughter-in-law and our two grandsons. The week flew by before it was time to make the return car ride home. We wondered if the ride home would seem shorter, but we found 1,850 miles is a long ride both directions!  In my next post I'll show you more of what we did in Colorado and tell you my happy and exciting news...please stay tuned!


 

Rocky Mountain Christmas High

If you are a long time reader of my blog the poinsettia tree above might be a familiar sight that you see this time of the year.  Every December, Denver International Airport is beautifully decorated with poinsettias and they are a happy sight for me as I begin a long holiday visit with my children and grandchildren.

My husband and I love the Rocky Mountain views we see in Colorado, no matter what time of the year we visit, but we agree that they are especially beautiful when the high peaks are snow capped.  The weather was wonderful for our visit, with cool, not cold, crisp air and mainly bright blue skies.

My oldest grandson had a birthday while we were in Colorado and there was a face painter and a balloon artist at his dinosaur themed birthday party. His little brother had lots of fun watching all the party festivities. Look at the stegosaurus birthday cake that is in the upper left corner of the photo mosaic above.  What a special treat!

We all had lots of fun doing many more things together as a family in the past two weeks. In the mosaic above from top left to bottom right is: my daughter's Christmas tree, together for my daughter's first bridal dress fitting, my daughter and her fiance's three cats, my grandson pretending to be a fireman at the Denver Children's Museum, another birthday dinner at the very kitschy "Casa Bonita" theme restaurant in Lakewood, my son and daughter-in-law's dog, a tour of Hammonds Candy Factory, where candy canes are still made by hand, and the Colorado Governor's Residence Christmas tree! 

We had early family Christmas celebrations and saw the beautiful Denver City and County Building all lit up in its annual splendor for Christmas!

The beautiful life size Nativity scene on site.

When my husaband and I returned home this evening we saw an unusual, but quintessential NYC sight as we waited for our luggage in John F. Kennedy International Airport.  Do you see it?

Another view

Yes, it was a rather plump and totally content pigeon sitting next to the luggage carousel belt!  What a funny "welcome home" sight to see.  It cheered me up a little as leaving my family in Colorado is always bittersweet. I already miss them so much, but I'm grateful we were able to celebrate an early Christmas together. I hope you are also enjoying a wonderful holiday season!

I'm linking thsi post to Mosaic Monday, Our World Tuesday, Ruby Tuesday, and the Rednesday and Skywatch Friday blog events.  Thanks to all the blog hosts!

Solvang -- Danish Capital of California

Snuggled in the Santa Ynez Valley in Santa Barbara County, is the charming town of Solvang, which translates a "Sunny Meadows," and is known as the 'Danish Capital of California."  One of my husband's co-workers told us to make an effort to take a detour east from Santa Barbara to visit this town on our trip north to San Francisco along the Pacific Coast Highway. She knew that we'd enjoy its friendly, fairy tale appearance.

Solvang was founded in 1911 on almost 9,000 acres of the Rancho San Carlos de Jonata Mexican land grant, by a group of Danes who traveled west to establish a Danish colony far from the Midwestern winters. There is still a significant Danish population in Solvang, and a number of bakeries, restaurants, and merchants offering a taste of Denmark. The architecture of many of the facades and buildings reflects traditional Danish style.

 
There was so much to see and do there that I'm sorry we could only spend one afternoon walking around town.

On the top floor of this charming little book store called The Book Loft, located at 1680 Mission Drive, was the Hans Christian Anderson Museum.  Hans Christian Anderson was Denmark's most famous writer.  Although Andersen wrote travel journals, plays, novels, and poetry he is best know for his endearing children's Fairy Tales, which have been translated into more than 100 languages.

The Book Loft also contained a large collection of books about all the Scandinavian countries,  books in the various Scandinavian languages, as well as book in English, and a large selection of children's books.

The museum is devoted to presenting the author's life and works. Displays include models of Andersen's childhood home and of his The Princess and the Pea fairy tale.. The museum also contains hundreds of volumes of Andersen's works, including many illustrated first editions.

We also took some time to visit the Mission of Santa Ines located at 1760 Mission Drive in Solvang.  Santa Ines is the nineteenth of 21 missions established by Franciscan priests from 1769 to 1823.  It was founded on September 17, 1804 by Father Estévan Tapís. Santa Ines is the Spanish version of the name "Saint Agnes." Early English settlers changed the spelling to "Santa Inez" when naming the mountains surrounding the area. Saint Agnes was a Christian who was martyred for her faith in Rome in 304 AD. 

The interior of the church is beautiful and very decoratively painted. The statue of St. Agnes, dating from the 18th Century, is located in a niche above the main altar, and almost appeared to glow, as the soft afternoon light shone upon it.  The mission is still an active parish.

The historical museum at Santa Inés is one of the best in the mission chain. It contains an extensive display of Latin missals and handmade parchment music books, some far older than the mission and many magnificent works of art work, vestments, statuary, documents and mission  artifacts.

As with all the missions we visited on this trip, the gardens and cemetery of Santa Ines were lush and peaceful. We really enjoyed visiting this "Hidden Gem of the Missions," as it is also known.

Before we departed Solvang the next morning we stopped at Olsen's Danish Bakery for a Danish pastry and coffee.  There were so many delicious pastries to chose from that of course we had to have more than one!

We went back on the road, headed towards San Luis Obsipo.   I had to visit a fun location there that I read Susan Branch blog about ... I love Susan's cheerful  blog! I'll be sharing more about that in my blog post for Pink Saturday .. you won't want to miss it!

I'm linking this post to:

Mosaic Monday
Blue Monday
Ruby Tuesday
Our World Tuesday
Rednesday

Many thanks to all the blog hosts!

The 85th Feast of San Gennaro, Little Italy

The Annual Feast of San Gennaro is New York City’s longest-running, biggest and most revered religious outdoor festival in the United States. This is the 85th anniversary of the festival, which will be held Thursday, September 15, through Sunday, September 25, 2011, on the streets of the historic Little Italy neighborhood in lower Manhattan. This neighborhood served as the first home in America for hundreds of thousands of Italian immigrants who came here seeking to improve their lives, beginning in the early part of the 20th century.

Since 1996, the festival has been run by the "Figli di San Gennaro, Inc."(Children of San Gennaro), a not-for-profit community organization dedicated to keeping alive the spirit and faith of the early Italian immigrants.  San Gennaro is the Patron Saint of Naples, Italy. When newly arrived immigrants from Naples settled along Mulberry Street, in what would become the "Little Italy" section of New York City, they decided to continue a tradition they had followed in their hometown in Italy. That was to celebrate the day in 305 A.D. when Saint Gennaro was martyred for the faith.  Each year on September 19th,  a religious procession of the Statue of San Gennaro, winds along the length of Mulberry and Mott Streets, between Canal and Houston Streets. The procession begins after a celebratory Mass held at the Most Precious Blood Church on Mulberry Street, which is also the National Shrine of San Gennaro.

My husband and I went to the feast on Friday evening, and strolled the many blocks looking at all the food, rides, games, live music and local sights along with the rest of the large crowd. The feast is quite popular and attracts up to a million visitors of all ethnic groups over its eleven days.

The predominantly Italian food was in abundance and it was all very tempting!

There were all kinds of gelato, pastries, calzones, pizzas, pastas, stuffed clams, seafood salad, fried calamari, rice balls, sausage and peppers and onions, roasted pork, beef and chicken, sauteed broccoli rabe, biscotti, a nougat candy called torrone, and Zeppoles, which are fried dough sweetened with powdered sugar.

 More than 35 of Little Italy's most famous Italian restaurants provide outdoor dining facilities for the event. We decided to dine al fresco at one of my husband's many favorite restaurants in Little Italy.  I had linguine with a light tomato sauce yopped with shrimp and clams, and my husband had Veal Sorrentino, which is basically veal cutlets cooked with prosciutto, eggplant and mozzarella cheese.  Delicious!

 We stayed well into the late evening, enjoying all the festivities. 

According to the Feast of San Gennaro web site : "The continued growth of the Feast over the past ten years has enabled Figli di San Gennaro, Inc. to donate more than $1.6-million to worthy causes providing valuable services for children and education in the Little Italy community and beyond. At the conclusion of each annual Feast, sizeable donations are distributed to scores of worthy organizations in all five boroughs and the tri-state area to help the needy and the young. No other public festival donates more money to charity than does the Feast of San Gennaro."


  Below is a short video I took of one of the vendors at the feast, you can also watch it at this link.



The Feast of San Gennaro is a wonderful way to enjoy one of the old time ethnic neighborhoods of New York City and enjoy some delicious food and support a good cause.  We wouldn't miss it!

I'm adding this post to "Mosaic Monday" event on Mary's blog Little Red House, the new Our World Tuesday,  and "Rednesday" on Sue's blog It's A Very Cherry World. Thanks to the hosts!

Seeing Red in Denver

As I strolled around Denver, Colorado, last week, I saw quite a bit of the color red. In my last post I showed all the beautiful red flowers I saw in Alamo Placita Park.  I liked the idea of the red rentable bicycles you see in the photo above, that are called Denver B Cycles. Denver B-cycle is the first large-scale municipal bike sharing system in the United States. They are located in dozens of special bike stations (B-stations) in the downtown neighborhood, as well as the Cherry Creek and Denver University neighborhoods. For a modest charge, Denver B-cycle members can pick up one of the red bikes at any B-station and when finished riding they can drop it off at any B-station. It is a very healthy and environmentally friendly way to travel.

This beautiful red brick Capital Hill Mansion Bed and Breakfast is a national historically registered 1891 Romanesque Mansion located in the Capitol Hill Historic neighborhood of downtown Denver.  Built by Jeffery and Mary Keating, the Keating Mansion was one of the last Historic Homes of Denver built before the silver crash of 1893.

This former red brick church is now turned into a 2.3 million dollar luxury home. You can see a slide show of the house interior on this link.

 A bright red tartan kilt on a man I spied walking around the annual Taste of Colorado festival.

A red sculpture entitled "National Velvet" by John McEnroe, installed during a 2008 public arts program

Fred, one of my daughter's cats, in front of a red wall in her home.

My favorite reds of all were my two grandsons who were wearing red!

It was so much fun to see the boys again so soon, and I gave them lots of hugs, kisses and cuddles!

And now for the winner of the Bertolli sponsored give away from this post of set which consists of a coupon for a free Bertolli sauce product, a cavatelli maker, a cheese grater, a gnocchi board and a La Crueset Gratin dish.There were 93 comments--thank you to all who entered!  Random.org picked comment number 15. The winner is Ginny of the blog "Let Your Light Shine"!  Congratulations Ginny! 

I'm linking this post to the  weekly"Rednesday" event on Sue's blog It's A Very Cherry World. Thanks Sue! If you love the color red be sure to visit Sue's blog and see the links of all the participating blogs.