We were only in Colorado for a couple days, but we packed those two days full. It was good to see friends we hadn’t seen since we moved. Among our appointments was, of course, the orthodontist. We found out Laurel may get her braces off in early February – a bit earlier than we expected, perhaps due to her diligence with rubber-band wearing. If she does get them off in February, we may rent a place in Boulder then so we can just rent a car for the day that Laurel gets her braces off and again two weeks later when she gets her retainers. I don’t know if we’ll head to Vancouver at that time of year; (We were planning on going in late March or April and staying for two or three months.) I don’t think my psyche can handle two months of rain. I’m trying to be as efficient as possible with our air travel so that we can save money with short(ish), less frequent trips. Although I’d like to go to Savannah and some other southeastern cities, the airfare from Denver puts us over budget. So…we’ll see.
We flew to Phoenix this evening (technically yesterday/Monday) and are staying in a house a couple miles north of downtown. We’re 1.8 miles from a Safeway, the closest grocery store; so I’ll be walking there Tuesday morning to get some breakfast food – and anything else that I can carry that distance. We’ve seen urban sprawl from a plane – Houston comes to mind – but Phoenix doesn’t look far behind. It’s a car culture here. There’s a light rail though, and I think we’ll be able to get to a number of things on foot and by train.

Charlie and his cousin Rachel with the flourless chocolate cake that Aunt Barb & Uncle Ray bought him

That smoothie was good!