New arrivals and deck work begins...

Well the last couple of weekends were busy and marked with a few notable events.  

Last weekend Scott's folks came over and we took the trek up to Pikes Peak via the cog railroad - quite the experience and definitely something everyone sh

ould do a

t least once.  Some beautiful scenary but also a good foreshadowing to the days ahead with a chilly wind.  The peaks in the distance on the right are the San Juans and on the left is Mt. Wheeler (the highest point in NM).

We started decking the deck and are about 3/4 done with the

 decking for the front stairs with a lot of help from some friends.  One of whom is rather goal oriented... and didn't want to stop in spite of darkness.  :-D

The last (but more notable) event was the arrival of a couple of new furry friends.  We adopted a dog (Rocky) and a cat (Harley) this weekend - they're pretty much responding as expected.  The dog won't leave Jauna's side and appears to want to get back in the car and go home and the cat hasn't left (at least that we've seen) the underside of our bed.  

Decking the halls...

Had to throw in a few pictures from our trip over Boreas Pass between Breckenridge and Como (just north of 285 west of Bailey).  Beautiful trip over the pass and a great time in Breck.  We made it up a few weeks later for a good (albeit rainy) time catching some bluegrass at Yarmony Grass held at Copper Mtn Aug 16th (Railroad Earth was the headliner).

The old deck is now completely down and the new one is mostly up - probably 80% done.  The contractor still has to finish framing the stair platform and 

all of the stair stringers and then it will be turned over to your's truly to finish the decking and the railings.   One pretty shocking picture of the dry rot on one of the triples that was supporting it.

Here's another (much nicer) pic of the landscaping where the old stairs were - you can see a similar (minus all the color) picture from earlier in the year down a few blog entries.