Today Britton and I celebrated 5 years of marriage! Together with the amount of time we dated before we got married, we’ve been together 10 years! It’s amazing how time flies. I remember our wedding day so vividly. It was nice and warm and sunny. We were worried about the weather since we were having an outdoor reception at my parents’ house in Nunn. But everything turned out great! We had great live music, good food and drink and lots of lovely family and friends turned out.
I like how you can see the Nunn Tower in this picture and how happy we are
Out in front of my parents’ old house -the house I grew up in!
So to celebrate our five year anniversary…well, we worked on our new rental property. Or I could just say Britton bought me a house for our anniversary, lol. But seriously, we did work almost all day on the property painting and Britton put in a shower faucet fixture for the bathroom. But we DID do something just for fun, and that was to go out to Bisetti’s our favorite little Italian restaurant in Fort Collins. It’s also where we had our first date. We got all spruced up and took the Corvette over there. The food was great and it was fun to reminisce about our time together and to think about what the future could hold. We also walked around downtown and heard a live drum band. Overall a great day moving us into the future and remembering our past.
We’ve been extremely busy these last few days. For one thing, we bought another rental which means lots of work. It is very similar to our last one, and at a great price. We’ve been doing a lot of work to it, and I will show the before and after pictures like I did with the last one when we are all done. But for now, here’s a preview:
Newest Rental Property
In addition to this huge demo/remodel project (mostly in the kitchen and bathroom), we are also coordinating the finishing of another rental’s basement. We have been working on that off and on now for about 3 years, so we figured it was about time to finish. We also have a paint job scheduled for the exterior of another one too! Really expensive to do this all at once, but it needs to get done sometime, so we figured while we have the time off, we might as well pull the trigger on them.
So Britton took the whole week off and I took off three days to do this. Some of it is hands on work, others it’s just calling and arranging for bids and quotes and meeting with contractors. In addition to these planned and expected projects, we also had a water heater we needed to replace in one rental and then our air conditioner at our house pooped out on us so we (Britton) had to fix that as well!
Overall, we have fun with these projects and I enjoy being busy. Usually with our rentals we hardly have to lift a finger, but I think it is because we are pretty pro-active property mangers and we treat each of them and the tenants the way we would want to be treated. If I could work doing stuff like this all the time without working for someone else I think it would be great! And it’s so rewarding to see the results of your efforts in tangible form. Plus we’ve had a chance to spend more time with our friends and family as a result.
Today’s Spanish tip is about colors: los colores. (Lohs Coh-lor- res)
We use colors to describe many things. Here are the colors in Spanish and English. Many of them are gender specific when describing an object. For example, to say: ‘the black dog’ it is ‘el perro negro’, for ‘the black chair’, it is ‘la silla negra’. Rosa and Naranja are exceptions because they are also objects in and of themselves (rose and orange). So for a masculine pink object (is that an oxymoron?), it would be rosado. For example: the pink telephone: el teléfono rosado. The orange shirt is ‘la camisa naranja’ but the orange hat is ‘el sombrero anaranjado‘. The ones that don’t end in “a” or “o” like verde, azul, café, you don’t have to change, unless it is plural. The blue tables: ‘las mesas azules’, the green knives?: ‘los cuchillos verdes’.
Rojo=red Gris =grey Azul =blue Negro =black Café =brown (actually means coffee) Rosa =pink (or rosado) Verde =green Blanco =white Naranja =orange (or anaranjado) naranja is also the name for the orange fruit, just like in English. Except in Puerto Rico (and maybe elsewhere), where the fruits are called chinas. Morado -purple (I’ve also heard púrpura and violeta) Amarillo -yellow (Now you know the meaning of the Texas city!)
(For some reason, in this image the colors of the words do NOT correspond)
There is also a very famous song sung in most Spanish-speaking countries called ‘De Colores’. It’s a very pretty song. Plus it sings about chickens! How great is that?! The commonly sung lyrics are here for you to enjoy. The translation to English is not great (I’m not sure who did it), but you get the idea at least.
Spanish Version
De colores, de colores Se visten los campos en la primavera. De colores, de colores Son los pajarillos que vienen de afuera. De colores, de colores Es el arco iris que vemos lucir.
Y por eso los grandes amores De muchos colores me gustan a mí. Y por eso los grandes amores De muchos colores me gustan a mí.
Canta el gallo, canta el gallo Con el quiri, quiri, quiri, quiri, quiri. La gallina, la gallina Con el cara, cara, cara, cara, cara. Los pollitos/polluelos, los pollitos/polluelos Con el pío, pío, pío, pío, pí.
Y por eso los grandes amores De muchos colores me gustan a mí. Y por eso los grandes amores De muchos colores me gustan a mí.
De colores, de colores Brillantes y finos se viste la aurora. De colores, de colores Son los mil reflejos que el sol atesora. De colores, de colores Se viste el diamante que vemos lucir.
Y por eso los grandes amores De muchos colores me gustan a mí. Y por eso los grandes amores De muchos colores me gustan a mí.
English Version
In colors, in colors The fields are dressed in the spring. In colors, in colors Are the little birds that come from outside. In colors, in colors Is the rainbow that we see shining.
And that is why I love The great loves of many colors And that is why I love The great loves of many colors.
The rooster sings, the rooster sings With a cock-a-doodle, cock-a-doodle-doo. The hen, the hen With a cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck. The chicks, the chicks With a cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep, cheep.
And that is why I love The great loves of many colors. And that is why I love The great loves of many colors.
In colors, in colors Brilliant and delicate is dressed the dawn. In colors, in colors Are the thousand gleams the sun treasures. In colors, in colors Is dressed the diamond we see shining.
And that is why I love The great loves of many colors. And that is why I love The great loves of many colors.
Now you can ask for “De Colores” when you go to a Mexican restaurant and there is a Mariachi band.
Last night we went out with our friends Leslie and Al to the Little Theatre of the Rockies, UNC’s performing arts theatre, where we saw “Chicago”. It was performed by students from the University of Northern Colorado, Greeley’s university, and my alma mater. It was great! The props, costumes, singing, dancing, everything was well-done. There were two who really stood out from the rest and that was the actress who played Velma, McKayla Marso and the actor who played Mary Sunshine -Joseph Young. Both were graduates of UNC and came back as guest artists. We had a lot of fun. Leslie was able to get the tickets for free from a customer she knew, so that was cool too! Thanks guys for inviting us!
