The Early Bird gets the . . Caterpillar and my Hero to the Rescue

Monna and I were sitting out on the back patio this morning and noticed a bird that was standing absolutely still so we took a second look and spotted a caterpillar crawling towards him. When it got close enough for the bird to get, it pounced on it and started pecking at it. Of course my camera was in the trailer and the bird was between me and the camera. I guess we made it nervous and it flew a short distance, prey in its beak and I went for my camera and got a few shots.

Today wasn't as busy as yesterday, I was so glad for that and didn't spend any time sitting in Alan's chair today. I wore a back brace with an ice pack all morning and it helped my back feel better. It wasn't as hot today and as a storm started coming closer, we got a nice cool breeze.

This afternoon I heard a sort of cheeping sound and tracked it down and found it was a hummingbird trapped in a spider web in our skylight! Who would have thought that a web would hold a bird! John climbed up on a chair and still couldn't reach it, so he hunted up a ladder and rescued the poor thing. He took it outside and freed its feet from the web and it instantly flew away. I tried to get a shot of it in his hand, but it was too quick for me. John was our hero for rescuing him.

Wow, What a Busy Day!

We started our day with a walk on the golf course.


What a busy day, I was exhausted by the end of it! I sold lots of stuff for Alan and Vicki, and spent most of the day in their booth. My back was killing me by the end of the day, I don't know how Alan stands sitting the chair in his booth! Two days and mine is a disaster!

This mushroom was near our trailer, one more slit and it would look like a daisy! There are so many mushrooms right now that you can hardly walk through the forest without stepping on one!

On the Road Again

Hey it's Friday the 13th! Hope it's not my unlucky day!

We had to be in ShowLow by 7:15 this morning to check in at the hospital for the ultrasound, so we got an early start! The earth is so green and beautiful right now, we are loving driving places!

We were done by 9 and stopped at WalMart for a few things, then headed for the barn. Alan and Vicki are gone this weekend meeting their new granddaughter and I am babysitting their booth. I sold quite a few items and luckily all of them were cash so I didn't have to worry about messing up the credit machine! Alan has the most uncomfortable chair in his booth, and I spent most of the day sitting in it. I hooked up my computer and watched Lost in between customers.

After the barn closed we went and picked up the railroad spikes a kind customer gave us. He also gave John several other rusty items. Then we went and put up the signs, picked up a pizza and headed back to the barn. Whew, I was so tired!

Rainy Day

We got a nice rain this morning, the rains are making everything grow like crazy! The field across the street is filled with beautiful yellow flowers that are 2 to 3 feet high!

Mom came up today and we went out to lunch, then visited a lady that makes kits to make baby blankets with crocheted edges. She has a special machine that makes holes around the blanket edges and stitches them.

Summer is Grand!

I'm so loving summer this year and all the beautiful growing things around me. I love sitting under our locust tree and soaking in the oxygen it gives off! I'm wishing summer could last forever!

Horsey Neighbors

Often when I go across the street to take pictures, the horses will come to visit. Santana likes to get up close and personal and see what I am doing. Makes it hard to get pictures! But, they get bored with this silly human with the funny little thing in her hands and soon leave. Here they come. . .

Here's Santana trying to get in my face while I'm backing off so he can't slobber on my camera.

I went with John to the dump today, lots of beautiful green fields on the way!

Rainy Days and Mondays

is one of my favorite Carpenter songs. It's been a rainy day and it's Monday, so the words came to mind today. We got some rain midday, then this afternoon we are having another storm. Everything is so green and beautiful, but in spite of all the rain, the tomatoes in the box under the kitchen window were wilting! I felt the soil and it was dry, the rain isn't making it to them so I had to water them today. I had several red tomatoes today and picked some beans and squash.

Bear Country!

We were reminded this morning that we are on the edge of the forest. John was out early puttering around when he noticed white on the ground. (It was still dark out, so he couldn't see clearly.) When he walked up closer, he noticed the dumpster had been tipped over and the white was trash from the dumpster scattered around. When everyone was up and out, we asked and strangely no one had heard anything. Monna sleeps in her van, so we expected that she would have heard a loud bang as the dumpster hit the ground, but she didn't. The guys decided it had to have been a bear to tip over the heavy dumpster, it took 3 of them to tip it back up! They found the other dumpster in the area had muddy prints on it and there was a bit of trash scattered around it too. It looked like someone had already picked up most of it, not sure if that one had been tipped over and stood back up already, or if it wasn't tipped over.

It was raining this morning when I got up and rained just long enough that we didn't have time to walk on the golf course. I wandered around this morning shooting mushrooms, they are popping up everywhere and there are some really weird ones!

We didn't get any more rain at the barn today, it was cloudy most of the day, but by the time we left, the sun was shining. I ventured out for a walk mid morning down Deep Forest Drive, it was cloudy and I had my camera with me and I didn't want to chance it getting wet so I didn't go far.

I took this shot on the way home this afternoon, it's the drainage that's close to the Green's Peak turnoff.

It must have rained here in town shortly before we got home, there was water on the roads and puddles all over. Guess it was our turn for rain today.

A Cold Day!

John went home early this morning to meet Andy and fix the leak in the shop's water supply pipe. After he left, I went for a walk on the golf course, I love walking there, it's so beautiful! There were 11 geese at the pond and I got several shots of them. They were all out grazing when I first saw them and I was able to walk up fairly close to them before they all headed for the water.

I watched the booth most of the day. When John got back, he framed pictures and left me in the booth. It was a cold day, the temperature dropped dramatically this afternoon, I wouldn't have been surprised to see snow falling, it was so cold! A big cloud of mist rolled by the barn, at first I thought it was smoke and someones house was on fire, it was so big. It felt like we were in a Stephen King story, several people even mentioned that.

We were tired so we went out to eat this evening at Taco Bell. I love their Chalupa bread! Yumm!

A New Tree

John planted the peach tree Mel gave us this morning. It's a variety that is cold resistant and should do well in our area. I think the variety is China Pearl. Hope it does well! Mel said planting it this time of the year will give it time to get used to the weather and hopefully it won't be as traumatized by the weird spring weather we get here.

Had an uneventful trip to the barn, the gardener's were finishing up placing the sod on the new lawn next to the barn. They ended up with a bunch left over and put sod on one side of the path leading from the street to the barn. Looks good!

We ran down to WalMart to shop this evening and ate at Wendy's. While we were there rain started pouring down. It was raining so hard that water was coming in under the door, through the entry and under another door into the restaurant!

Busy, Busy!

It's been a busy day. John worked last night and got up after only a short nap so he could go with me to the doc in ShowLow this morning. The nurse practitioner here referred me to a specialist for some problems she said I had. Turns out she was wrong. I'm so discouraged with the docs here, seems like they are always telling me I have a problem that it turns out I don't have! Practicing physicians is right, and they need lots more practice!

We picked up a scratchboard at the barn that needs to be rescanned and I spent the afternoon trying to get it to scan and stitch together. I don't know whats going on with it, it refuses to stitch. Things line up in one place and are off a bunch by the bottom of the scan. So something is stretching or shrinking parts as they scan? I'm wondering if something got out of alignment when John stored it on it's end?

Some shots from our trip home. View of the mountains and the roadword near the Greer turnoff. They have almost gotten the cuts widened. Lots of rock had to be removed and busted up!

We got rained on on the way to Show Low this morning and got some thunder and lightning here this evening, not much moisture out of it.

Lost

The last couple days I've been totally lost in Lost! For a long time I have been seeing the ads on TV, but have never checked it out, I'm not sure we even get the channel it's on. I noticed it on Netflix and decided to watch the first season and see what it was about. I've gotten hooked, LOL, I've watched the first 13 episodes so far. It's pretty interesting, can't wait to see how it all ends up.

Some shots from my yard.

Happy Birthday Andy!!

My youngest turned 40 today! How did that happen? Seems like only yesterday he was a baby. Hope you have a great day! I called him at work to wish him Happy Birthday, their Internet and phone is still out from the lightning strike.

I found a funny looking tomato in my garden, two tomatoes grew on one stem and it looked like eyes, so I added a big nose and made a silly face. You have to imagine the mouth.

We got only a few scattered sprinkles today. I love the coloring the earth sometimes gets at sunset and rain seems to make it better.

Rain and Flooding

We got a nice rain today.

Andy called and said they are getting heavy rain at his house and there is a river running through the property below him that's risen up onto his property! Hope it doesn't get to the house! He saw stuff floating by, including a butane tank! The highway near him has water running over it and they will most likely close it if the rain doesn't stop soon. A few years ago, they had a big rain like this and it washed out part of the road. Lightning took out their phone and internet, it hit so hard that the modem and a surge protector were smoking and they thought for a minute the house was on fire! Yikes!

I've been enjoying the Strawberries this summer. It's getting hard to find good ones now, they are often moldy, not sure why, maybe they are saving them too long before shipping?

Our gorgeous sunset.

Rainy Day

A cloudy morning makes a beautiful sunrise!

The rain started this morning and it's rained on and off all day.

Progress Report on the High School

I got John's scratchboard edited, burned to a CD and mailed this morning. On the way home from the post office, I checked out the school, they have torn down the entire wing that was damaged by the plane. I guess the brick walls weren't strong enough to re-use. I'll bet it's going to be hard to have school in session while they are rebuilding! I also stopped and took a picture of the Catholic Church, love the architecture!

We got rain again this afternoon, a nice gentle rain, we did have some thunder and lightning with it, but not too loud.

Storm Damage

I checked my garden this morning and found lots of things tipped over and laying on the ground that shouldn't be, more evidence that was some storm we missed yesterday. The peas that were growing in my corn had pulled the corn stalks down and I was afraid they were going to break, plus they have stunted the growth of the later corn, so I pulled them all out. They came up from seeds from last year and I just let them grow. One of my tomato towers had fallen over and I can't get it to stand up straight, it'll just have to lean. It's cloudy today and looks like more rain. I haven't checked the weather to see if we have more storm warnings going on.

Whopper of a Storm

Here's some photos taken in my garden, it's full of blooms right now! These are flowers on some carrots I left in from last year so I can get more seeds.

My green beans are blooming, it won't be long until I'm picking beans.

We drove over the mountain this afteroon to Pinetop and ran into some heavy rain. I got this cool shot through the window.

We went to The Barn to put up the new light we found at Ace. I remembered to take the picture I forgot the other day of our booth. The new light will light my photos, we put up more pro panels and put them on that and the way we put the pro panel blocks the natural light.

We picked up a pizza and went to Andy's house after we finished at the barn. John will be working on Andy's birthday so we paid him a birthday visit early. Hard to believe my baby is turning 40! Makes me feel old! We visited the animals while there, the ducks are getting so big, they're so pretty. They also have a turkey and some chickens. I love the chickens with feathers on their legs!

On the way home we ran into heavy rain and when we got home we found the kitchen was wet, wet, wet! We left a window open and rain had come in halfway into the room! The window sill was full, the rug in front of the sink, sopping, wow, it must have been a downpour coming in from the east. Wouldn't you know, the one time I forget to close the window, rain comes in!