The Sweet Escape

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Flagstaff walk through the woods

We’re not much for spur of the moment trips these days. When my husband and I were first married, we’d throw a tent and sleeping bags in the car and head to the beach with an hour’s notice. Or head for the ski slopes in Big Bear.

Friday, my husband suggested we escape the heat of the Phoenix area for a quick trip to Flagstaff which is two hours north at an elevation of 7,000 feet. I looked at the temperatures. Low of 44, high of 69. That’s after a week of blistering high 90s and 100 degrees at home.

My favorite hotel chain has a Little America in Flagstaff. Nice rooms. Delicious food. Hiking trails. Pool, jacuzzi, gym. I was sold!

We drove up to the ski resort called Arizona Snowbowl to check it out. People were skiing and snow boarding!

The Little America was my home away from home in Salt Lake City when my daughter was a student athlete at the University of Utah. We visited lots, because we liked to go to swim meets and watch her swim. I also love Salt Lake City, plus the aforementioned Little America. In Salt Lake City they have the fancier Grand America, but I prefer the lowkey atmosphere of the Little America and the lower prices.

Did I mention that the Covey family founded Little America? Britain Covey played football while my daughter swam at the U. Now Britain plays for the Philidelphia Eagles. Besides being a great athlete at only 5’8″ tall as a football player, he is a kind and authentic person. His grandfather, Stephen Covey, is famous for writing “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” and owning Franklin Daytimer, which we used in the olden days to keep track of our appointments and schedules.

I wrote about driving to Flagstaff for our anniversary in 2021 and running into a hail storm that damaged our car from bumper to bumper HERE.

Pool at the Little America

This trip was was quiet. Peaceful. We had fabulous meals and took walks in the 500 acres of forest that are part of the hotel property. It was a well needed break from the heat and a great escape for the weekend. The beautiful pool was closed for the season, until it gets warmer, but the jacuzzi was going strong.

Here’s to a spur of the moment trip for an escape from the heat!

Here’s a video of Gwen Stefani. She pops up from time to time on my Hallow App where she has been sharing personal stories of her faith. When my kids were in high school the word “Sweet” was used all the time like “Cool” from my earlier days.

Do you take spur of the moment trips? Where do you like to take quick getaways?

Mulies All Around

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If it wasn’t for Amazon, I wouldn’t have seen the Mulies in our front yard. Mulies is a nickname for Mule Deer, which are the most common species of deer in Arizona.

I was walking by our front windows, when I spotted a package outside our front gate. I opened the front door and walked outside. That’s when I saw three mule deer. I went back inside to grab my camera. But I had the wrong lens, my macro lens, on the camera body. I watched as the deer left the front yard and meandered along the side of our house, outside the fence. They reached the backyard, and were munching away on jojoba. I realized they were content and not going anywhere, so I had time to change lenses.

They were also snacking on Palo Verde trees, which are in full bloom now with yellow flowers.

At first, I didn’t get any good shots of the Mulies, because of brush and bushes blocking my view. I watched as seven deer crossed our backyard behind our fence to the side yard. That’s when I started taking more photos.

Eventually they made it to the front yard and were walking across our driveway.

One Mulie thought the Bottlebrush bush looked tasty.

The deer didn’t do too much damage to the Bottlebrush.

Here are several deer in our front yard.

Eventually they all crossed the street to continue their neighborhood stroll. I watched as they disappeared in the brush.

Do you have a favorite Mule Deer photo?

What are your weekend plans?

My Bird Buddies

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A quail took over the Bird Buddy feeder to enjoy the birdseed.

A quail looking for birdseed that fell to the ground.

A quail walking among the backyard plants.

Mourning doves cooling off at the birdbath. I find it funny they often stand with their tails in water.

A Curved-Bill Thrasher on a bench. He’s the bully bird of the backyard.

This video shows the Curved-billed thrasher in action!

How is your week going so far?

Spring is Busting Out All Over

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The bottlebrush bush that I posted Friday has many more blooms a few days later.

The bees sure enjoy bottlebrush blooms.

This is a vine growing up and over our front gate. I got an app to identify plants and discovered this is Pyracantha koidzumi, also called Formosan Firethorn.

Formosan Firethorn growing over our front gate.

This will be a beautiful flower soon, but will only last a day. I don’t remember the name of this cactus and the app gave me five choices that don’t fit. It looks like Hedgehog Cactus but the images on google have massive spikes.

Lantana. We had this plant in Palm Springs and it wanted to take over our backyard. I found out that Lantana is considered an invasive species in many places, including neighboring states. I may remove it.

Barrel cactus are blooming, too.

I’ve never seen this Yucca in our front yard bloom before. Amazing!

It has beautiful blossoms.

I’ve also never seen this tree in our courtyard have so many seed pods. My new app calls it Ebony Blackbead.

And finally look at this Silver Torch cactus is busting out all over!

What are the signs of Spring where you live?

Friday Flora

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Happy Friday! I was excited to see a few plants in bloom. Because it’s so hot — it will top 100 degrees today — I had to snap photos before the blooms wilt. I was especially excited with this red bottlebrush that was attracting multiple bees.

This will be something else when all those buds bloom.

More busy bees on the bottlebrush!

On another note, I was scheduled for a colonoscopy Monday. I had a referral from my primary to a specialist. When I made the appointment, I asked the scheduler about prep. I’ve done this before and there’s more to it than just showing up for the appointment. She said she’d text me the instructions. Well, I was texted the name of the doctor, address and phone number.

I tried unsuccessfully to send a message through their patient portal. It asked for an office location from a drop down menu that said “no location found.” Without that field, I couldn’t send the message.

Since it’s fast approaching my appointment, I called and left a detailed message explaining I never received any instructions for colonoscopy prep. I got a call back. I learned that I was scheduled for a consultation PRIOR to the colonoscopy. I asked why did I need a separate appointment since I my referral spells out the procedure requested by my primary. Consultation cancelled. Waiting for my colonoscopy date in April. Medicine these days!

Here’s the bottlebrush bush from a few steps back. I can’t wait to see this in full bloom!

And a photo of Red to go with the red bottlebrush photos.

Have a great weekend! What are your plans?

It’s Wild Out Here!

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All my backyard birds flew away when Mr. Cooper’s Hawk landed in our tree and then moved to the fence. There was a noise like “wooosh” when the quail took off. They sound like jets. I haven’t had many hawk sightings, which is fine with me. I think they are beautiful and the huge Harris Hawks I used to get look so regal. But they prey on doves and quail which I don’t like.

While my husband was out of town on business, this lone javelina stuck his snout through the fence under our bird feeder. I got pretty close to him, since I felt safe on the other side of the fence from him.

Next thing I knew, more javelina came out of the woodwork! In the end I counted seven. It was surprising that so many were hiding out in the brush behind our house.

Eventually they all walked away. You can watch this video and see how javelina seem to use their sense of smell more than their eyesight. That snout is busy moving and smelling me!

I was outside the other evening talking on the phone with a friend who lives close by. I spotted the biggest coyote I’d ever seen. I was sure it was a wolf, but my husband said we don’t have wolves here. I tried to get a photo of him, but he heard me and hid behind a shrub. I was looking for him through the fence and then decided I really should go inside the house and shut the door! What would I do if I found him? What if he could jump over our fence. I’ve seen coyote jump over the wall behind our house onto the golf course next door like it’s nothing. That wall is six feet tall.

Happy Wednesday everyone. I hope you enjoyed a glimpse into my wildlife. Hopefully in a few weeks I’ll have baby quail photos to share!

UPDATE: I googled it. There are wolves out here. Hubby is wrong. That was definitely a wolf I saw. It was twice the size of any coyote and a different shape. Didn’t look anything like a coyote. UGH.

How’s your week going? Do you have anything exciting going on?

Look for Joy

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Red sightings do give me joy. Always.

For Lent this year I am doing Pray40, which is on the Hallow app. On Sundays, Father Mike Schmitz gives a Bible reading and homily. Yesterday, the theme was “Looking for Joy.” Father Mike mentioned the following quote:

“Suspicion often creates what it suspects.” C.S. Lewis from the “Screwtape Letters.”

My major takeaway was that if we often find what we’re looking for. If we’re looking to be disappointed, most likely we will be. Distrust can be a self-fulfilling prophecy. I realized that life truly is what we make of it. It’s was a reminder that our attitudes can be our destiny. If we look for joy, we can find it.

I’m sharing some bits of joy I had this week, birdwatching at home:

The joyful couple together at the Bird Buddy AI feeder.

I watched as Red fed Mrs. and then gave her a turn at the feeder, but I wasn’t fast enough with the camera to capture it. It was heartwarming though!

Quail Egg Update:

I’ve only peeked a couple times on our quail nest. Last week I said we had four eggs. We’re now up to a dozen! I wrote about our quail nest HERE.

Where do you look for joy?