Primarily: Artist Flash mobs, Halloween, and pretending to be statues

It seems that this post is full of all of the strangest things that Santa Fe has to offer. First off, my friend Leah and I went to an event on Canyon Road called "Paint Out/Sculpt-out" where several hundred artists from around the country came to paint and sculpt live outside the galleries. It was pretty incredible. I didn't get too many pictures of the art in progress (artists sometimes get weird about this sort of thing) but I did get some photos of the super secret flash mob that happened at the end of the day:

It was mostly a bunch of middle aged women and men dancing to modern hip hop music and a couple of artists painting to the music:

Definitely an odd experience.

But anyway, Stoops and I saw a DOUBLE RAINBOW!!! Who do you think is more excited?

Also, I'm famous - Sarah, Leah, and I were in the local magazine! (I did warn you that this post was full of oddities)

Last week, Jenny came to visit from Madison! We started her trip by taking her to TuneUp Cafe where Stoops read us children's books to pass the time.

That night was Will and Amy's famous Halloween Party! We had to get all dressed up...

Stoops was BMO from Adventure time (Don't worry if you don't know who we are, no one at the party did either... picture from the TV show to follow)

I'm Finn the Human!

Here's what we were going for - it's pretty good right?

Jenny was the best an out of work mime:

"Farmer" Sarah and "Autumn" Leah (Not pictuered) came over for pre party festivities and picture taking! Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of the party itself, but it was extremely elaborate. Amy, Will and some of their friends had put together a haunted house and scary-themed snacks! 

The next day, Jenny and I treked out to Tent Rocks (see linked post for pictures) which was beautiful as usual.  I found out from my parents later that the only other place on earth where tents like these have formed is in Turkey. Coincidentally, the Turkish tent rocks is also the location for the Turkish balloon festival (Tent Rocks in New Mexico is also very close to the Balloon Fiesta).

On Sunday it rained, so Stoops, Jenny and I visited some thrift shops and ended up finding a copy of the Who Wants to Be a Millionaire board game. We played all afternoon, and actually called our friends and family to help us answer questions when we needed the 'phone a friend' option! It was a fun, rainy afternoon!

On Jenny's last day, I took her to Canyon Road to see the galleries. We had a lot of fun pretending to be the sculptures in one sculpture garden!

It was a great visit! Come back any time :)

Parental Visit #3: Balloon Fiesta

New Mexico is full of all sorts of amazing sights! The natural beauty is great, but sometimes man made beauty can be just a good. The balloon fiesta in Albuquerque is a perfect example.

The balloons start taking off around 6 am, and the crowds are so big, that we had to leave Santa Fe around 5am (although even so, my parents weren't able to make it into the field to see the balloons launch - but don't worry, they still got to see the balloons and were invited to join the chase team to help hunt the balloons down!)

I knew there would be a lot of balloons, but actually seeing them all in the sky is awesome!

We could get up close and personal to the balloons while they were being prepared to launch.

Whoa! Fire!

Stoops is either helping the launch or milking a giant cow, not sure which (maybe both?)

My cousin Alissa and her husband, Lou, came down from Denver to see the balloons with us!

Once the sky started to clear and the sun came out, the balloons started to glow:

Darth Vader!

Here are the four of us together - There are too many balloons to count!

Ok, so I took too many pictures - here are a bunch more:

Stoops and his spirit balloon:

That night, we went out to dinner at Second Street Brewing company. My parents told us how they tried to get directly to the balloon fiesta parking lot (rather than to a park and ride shuttle), but ended up waiting and waiting until finally the police started directing them back onto the highway without any sort of direction on where they should go! They ended up retracing their steps a bit and finding a cliff where they could watch the balloons go overhead and land in a field in front of them. Although we were all very disappointed that they didn't get to see the launches, they got an equally cool (and free) experience watching the balloons land!

Parental Visit #2: Valles Caldera

While my parents were in town (which at this point was several weeks ago) we went to the Valles Caldera. I had never been before but I'd heard it was a beautiful place. The caldera is what was left when the volcano erupted millions of years ago. Throughout time, it has been a mountain, a lake, and now an empty basin where only grass can grow. The day that we went it happened to be overcast, which is unusual for Santa Fe, but that certainly did not detract from the beauty of the place: 

I couldn't help but take panoramic photos, since part of the majesty of the place came from being able to spin in a full circle without seeing any signs of life.  When the caldera was a lake, minerals settled in the soil so that now trees cannot grow - only this tall brown grass.

The bump of land on the left of my mom is actually what used to be an island in the lake.

Here's a closeup of the island - you can see the yellow glow of the aspens which had just started to turn yellow.

I couldn't get over how the weather really made the place look ominous. There was such contrast - the yellow grass, the dark green mountains and the mottled gray sky.

I would love to see this place when the weather is clear, but I think we experienced the Caldera in the height of its beauty.