Wrapping it up ...

I thought I'd put some odds and ends together showing how we ended our time in Las Cruces.  Actually, tonight we're in Ponca City OK.  Had a wonderful dinner at Danny's BBQ.  Yummy.  Now it's time to look at my pictures and remember how we spent our last few days in sunny LC.  What wonderful weather we enjoyed this winter!  Wish I could take some of the clear, bright blue sunny-sky days home with me.

One of the things we did was attend a quilt show at the LC Convention Center.  I drug Wendell thru and he did really well.  Actually, he somewhat enjoys looking at quilts; it might be the geometry of the craft.  I surely do!  And I took tons of pictures -- here's three of my favorites ...

I especially like this small wall hanging. It was made with Kaffe Fassett fabrics, my favorite fabric designer right now.  There was another quilt opposite this, identical design but with different Kaffe Fassett fabrics.

I liked these circles appliqued over a pieced quilt.

This was the winner of best appliqued quilt.  Love this bright orange quilt!  You don't see lots of orange quilts ...

While we were living in LC we enjoyed walking on this mile-long paved walkway just back of our rental.  It runs down the middle of the boulevard.  There were several stations to do exercises along the way (which I didn't do but W. tried a few).  But what I enjoyed the most was the view.  It was a cloudy day when I took this picture but sort of awesome looking.

Couple other things I want to mention ... the last week there we found a very special museum on the campus of NMSU.  So glad we went there before we left.  It's called the Zuhl Museum and it's in the visitor's center on campus.  Mr. & Mrs. Zuhl collected petrified wood and fossil rocks.  They had a studio in New York, and cut and polished petrified wood pieces and sold them all over the world.  When they retired he donated his entire remaining collection to NMSU.  It is just awesome.  Like I said, so glad we didn't miss seeing this.  I'll have a problem picking out some pictures to place here!!!

These fossil rocks were fascinating! Some of them are trilobites. Most of the Zuhl's collection was found in the U.S. but some came from Morocco and north Africa.

Here's a closeup of some vegetative material, fossilized.

One of the rarest fossil examples in their collection is this nest of dinosaur eggs.

This is a very large piece of petrified wood made into a large board-room sized table!  Wow!

I just loved the colors in this small piece of petrified wood.

This is one of the largest cross-cut pieces of polished petrified wood in the world.  Pine.

Another day we took a trip on a beautiful back road, Dona Anna Road, from LC to Hatch.  It goes through a large agricultural district.  In Hatch I bought some chiles for Ray & Gloria.  Shopped at several shops and ate at Sparky's.  The weather was just beautiful that day.  I took this picture along the road showing a field where there will be either cotton or chiles in the spring/summer with a pecan grove in the distance.  The three main crops in this area are cotton, chile peppers and pecans.

The last Sunday we were there we went to church as usual.  They were having a farewell carry-in lunch for a fellow going into the Navy.  They surprised us by asking us (during services) to join them to say farewell to us as well.  That was so nice!  And delicious as well.  We'll miss our little church family in LC.  

After we left church, we went down to the convention center and went through the Lion's Club Gun Show.  It was the largest gun show I've ever seen but Wendell said the NRA's show at the Convention in Indy was far bigger; I was impressed with this show!  And outside was a group of protesters.  Of course, I expected that considering what is happening in our country right now.  Got a kick out of the evening news on KVIA -- they were there and did a video close-up of this small group and billed it as a "large group of protesters" in LC.  LOL!  

Closeup of just part of one of three large rooms of goods at the show.  There was more than guns there -- I enjoyed seeing all of the antique cowboy equipment (spurs, ropes, bridles, etc.).  There was also clothing, jewelry, baskets, western art, advertising ephemera, on and on!

... and the "large group of protesters" outside.  

Well, that's it for Las Cruces.  We had a great winter.  Now we're on our way back and hope to find our home in good order.  Hopefully the remainder of our trip will be uneventful.  Plan on stopping in Pawhuska, OK tomorrow to visit Ree Drummond's Pioneer Woman Mercantile on our way to Springfield, MO so we can BOTH enjoy Bass Pro World!  Then on to Sikeston, MO for just one more throwed roll before we get back to the real world.  God is good!