Loving Life in Boulder!!

I can't explain how amazing these first two days of round three have been. We left Monday morning ad it was really sad to say goodbye to so many people but we all couldn't wait for our VERY SHORT spike travel to Boulder ad the Ameri-Mansion. We drove right to the office and had an orientation of the organization (Boulder Open Space and Mountain Parks) we are working with ad met out two supervisors (Craig and Kristen) who are amazing. After lunch we went on a beautiful hike and learned about Boulder ad the parks. There are prairie dogs everywhere!! They are soo freaking cute and I can't help but get excited every time I see one and I mean EVERY TIME... my team's going to get sick of that that's for sure :-) After the hike we went back to our wonderful new home and unpacked/showered and got ready for team dinner in down town Boulder (which is about 10 minutes from our house). Then bed time after watching some Planet Earth on one of our three t.v.'s.

Today we woke up ad were at work at 8... we learned a few more rules about the house and orientation of the offices ad getting mail and such. We worked on a water ditch (which is going to be one of our main projects this round)... we worked on clearing the brush from around it to get them ready to be filled with water. The one we worked on was built in the 1870's by horses and humans with maybe some shovels. It was really neat to learn about the water system here in Boulder since they have very little rain and get their water from up in the mountains. Which I ca see from my house might I add... no pictures yet due to camera problems but I'll get some up ASAP. Also we don't have Internet so we are at the Barnes and Noble in Boulder using theirs. So after we have a beautiful workday with a spectacular view and not a cloud in the sky we went on a hike that is just across the road from our house in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. It was beautiful and I can't wait to do it again.

My team is amazing and our project is going to be so amazing I can't even describe. The scenery every where I look is so beautiful and our housing is so wonderful. The only bad thing is going to be the "great" suntans we get from our t-shirts and shorts... ooooeee it's already starting :-) The house is even more than we expected: an amazing kitchen, huge living area with two areas of couches, 5 bedrooms and 3 baths with a creepy basement. There are two little upstairs areas which explains the two sets of stairwells. I live on the side with three bedrooms and a bathroom ad I share a room with Kelly who is on my original team too. Last night I didn't sleep overly well because I kept waking up and creeping myself out since it is such a large house... just getting used to all of the new noises. For dinner Kell and I made tator tot hot dish ad scotchies which were a hit for sure. I served the scotchies before they were hard, so they were still really gewy which is my fave, but all I could think about was when my mom would make them and not let me have one until they got hard. Sorry mama haha

There is so much room in this house for alone time which will be great to just sit and read or listen to music. Also there is a small creek on our massive amount of land that seems really nice to read and relax by... not to mention the foothills right across the street. The organization we are working for buys out houses of people who are unable to pay for their homes, or they allow the homeowner to pay little rent so they are able to stay and farm. So our house is one of their homes they bought and have kept up for us. They just put in a new water system, windows and got new pots/pans/silverware. It's amazing, if I haven't said it enough already. They already know our names and have really showed how much they appreciate us and it's only day two. We got these sweet sunglasses that are also safety goggles which are so cool and way better than the Americorps ones that are all scratched up. Well it's about time for us to head back to our humble abode but I will hopefully post pictures very soon and be able to write again this week.

Much love and missing everyone from home A LOT lately,
Nicole (misses home) Burg

p.s. SO EXCITED about momma mona and papa john's new purchase... a beautiful boat!!!! Can't wait to see it is real life!!!