Santa Fe!

Santa Fe is a city of architecture, food, fashion, art, and shopping. The lovely old city is celebrating its 400th anniversary this year. The mix of Spanish, Indian, and Mexican culture makes it unique. Santa Fe is only about 72,000 people, but thousands of tourists crawl the streets every day while shopping: even Harry got into the swing of it.

There are many, many museums in the little city: Indian art, folk art, modern art. We went to the Georgia O'Keeffe museum and I was a little disappointed. It was smaller than I expected and at the present time, they are not showing any of her famous flower paintings that I love so much. I became a fan of Georgia many years ago when Alexis and I went to an exhibition of her flower paintings at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. I didn't know anything about her, but as I stood in front of one of her flower paintings, I found myself crying. Alexis came over to me and said, "Mom what's wrong?" I said, "It's just so beautiful."

If you come with a few thousand dollars to buy art you could have a marvelous time here. The world-famous art district, Canyon Road, is within walking distance of the town square and cathedral. Adobe houses on this road, dating back to the 1740s, are now art galleries. All new construction in the central city of Santa Fe has to be in the adobe style. Original adobe construction of even a small building took thousands of hand-made bricks. Today, they make the new buildings look like adobe construction while using easier methods.

We did not buy any art, as we were out of our league, but we did eat like royalty. The restaurants are amazing in Santa Fe. We picked two after reading the restaurant guides (plus a little Vietnamese in a shopping mall) and hit it right. We ate antelope burger and tamales for my birthday lunch, and the following evening went to a tapas restaurant. It was like being back in Madrid! The food was excellent in this small New York-style restaurant with all the people crammed in like sardines. Sitting next to us were a very interesting couple from Austin who were doing an encore evening at the restaurant. They had made reservations elsewhere for that evening, but after eating one night at La Boca, had to come back. We chatted with them about Mexico, Texas, and food. I think Santa Fe is a great tourist destination.

We are now in St Louis after another 1,000-mile drive. We had perfect driving weather, although the winds were up in the 50 mile an hour range for much of the way. We stopped in northern New Mexico for gas and felt like the doors could have been blown off the car as we got out. I found I enjoyed driving across Oklahoma and Missouri with the country music radio station blaring and my coke and chocolate candy bar nearby. Harry had to keep reminding me I was well over the speed limit.

Eva fit into her Oaxaca dress perfectly and the whole family is off this morning to the OB/GYN to find out if Eva will have a new brother or sister come March! Stay tuned ....