Features

A basketball game unfolded Dec. 19 at the Dakota Ridge High School gym, but thoughts of winning or losing were eclipsed by concern for a graduate facing a devastating disease.

Some players wore black. Some wore white. But they all were part of the same team: Team Tessa.

Two brothers who grew up in Jefferson County and a former resident of Brooklyn, N.Y., have opened an auto-repair shop and car wash that is striving to be friendly — to customers, employees and the environment.

Chris and Mark Shamis and Mike Torres are the owners of Dakota Ridge Complete Automotive. The auto-repair business, at West Bowles Avenue and C-470, opened Oct. 27, and the car wash opened Nov. 23.

Torres, an animated man who moved to Colorado when he was 18, is co-owner and operations manager. He described the shop as “high end.”

Two brothers who grew up in Jefferson County and a former resident of Brooklyn, N.Y., have opened an auto-repair shop and car wash that is striving to be friendly — to customers, employees and the environment.

Chris and Mark Shamis and Mike Torres are the owners of Dakota Ridge Complete Automotive. The auto-repair business, at West Bowles Avenue and C-470, opened Oct. 27, and the car wash opened Nov. 23.

Torres, an animated man who moved to Colorado when he was 18, is co-owner and operations manager. He described the shop as “high end.”

Ten-year-old Dylan Finnegan is a big Broncos fan. Really big.

So big, in fact, that his parents, Crystal and Kevin Finnegan, recently let him paint his bedroom with a Broncos theme: one wall blue, one wall orange, and orange and blue stripes running across the middle of the ceiling.

Ames Rau called us last Sunday to say that he had been down at Bear Creek Lake Park, where he had witnessed a red-tailed hawk refurbishing its nest. It may seem odd that any birds are preparing to nest when we are experiencing well below freezing temperatures and several inches of snow cover the ground, but it is a common practice for the large resident hawks and owls to do so.

Winter seems to have settled in with a fairly stable blanket of white. However, it is not too deep for walking in most of our area, and all but the back roads are fairly passable. This makes it possible for most anyone to get out to see what winter has in store.

The mule deer that wander through our yard are exceedingly handsome right now. They are sporting their new winter coats and are sleek and fat. It has been a good year for them, with plenty of browse — to which my lilac bushes bear mute testimony. They also had a prolific crop of young, with many of the does bearing twins — and one beautiful large doe crossed our driveway one evening with triplets frolicking around her in the dusk.