Letter to a First Grade Class

My cousin asked if I would send a note to her son's class talking a little about our life in Colorado.  They live in Pennsylvania and this is a way to make geography a little more relevant for first graders.  So I sent the following note to my little cousin's first grade class last week... with some items changed to protect identities.  ;-)

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Dear Class –

My name is Kathryn and I live on a small farm near Loveland, Colorado with my husband.

We live at the base of the Rocky Mountains between Denver, CO and Cheyenne, WY in an area called The Front Range.   We are close to Rocky Mountain National Park and can see the Continental Divide from our house.

There is a ski area called Loveland also, but that is about 2 hours away.

We raise Huacaya Alpaca and Tibetan Mastiff Dogs.  Our dogs are Livestock Guardian Dogs and protect our alpaca from predators like coyote, mountain lion, black bear and neighborhood dogs.

I shear the alpacas in the spring and spin their fleece into yarn for knitting and weaving.

My husband is a professional wheelchair racer.  He just completed his 6^th Boston Marathon which makes 79 marathons total.  He travels around the US and internationally for races.  He was on the US Paralympic National Team for the ParaPanAmerican Games in Guadalajara, Mexico in 2011.  His fastest time is 1 hour and 36 minutes.

Photo ©Reporter-Herald

I also have a day job managing Information Technology (IT) projects for a company that makes medical devices in Minnesota.  Sometimes I have to travel to Minnesota and Texas for my job, but mostly I work remotely from home which means I am on the computer and telephone all day long.

We like living here because the weather is really nice.  The sun shines almost every day, even in the winter.  We like going to the mountains and walking along the river.

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My cousin said that her son felt special knowing that he has such cool relatives.  ;-)

It was fun to write this letter and take an objective view of our life.