I’ve taken a few photos I like this week of Red and other backyard creatures including quail, bunnies and javelina. I’m posting some of them here. It’s always entertaining to be surrounded by wildlife and to be able to capture the birds and animals with my Nikon or iPhone.
A papa quail perched in a planter above his family to keep watch.
Seven or eight javelina stopped by Monday night. They were mostly younger creatures including one wee one with a couple adults. The yellow flowers on the ground are from the Palo Verde trees. We had one night of rain and then a big wind and the flowers are down.
I watched a bunny dig a hole next to our tree. Maybe he’s going for roots? Or building a den?
Look at the feet on this guy!
Red with a mourning dove.
A squirrel and quail are sharing birdseed I placed on a boulder.
Happy Wednesday! Which photos do you like best and why?
I ordered a canvas print of Red to fill in the space to the right of our fireplace. A neighbor who is an artist and an expert at hanging paintings helped me with it. There used to be a Remington statue on this cabinet. But she moved it to the other side of the fireplace and placed this plant under Red. i’m excited with how it looks!
I was so excited with the canvas print I ordered of Red that I ordered one of the sea glass photo above. I’m not sure where it will go. Maybe in the casita. I’m having fun creating art with my photography. It’s a new way for me to enjoy it!
Finally, I ordered a third print of a pen and ink drawing of mine. This is the house I lived in from second grade until I went off to college. While I was in college my mom had to sell our home after divorcing dad. She couldn’t afford the upkeep, electric and gas. It was sad to lose our beautiful home, but she ended up leaving Snohomish and moving to Olympia. She married someone she knew from her high school days who lived there.
Finally, I’ll leave you with a Bird Buddy video of the star of my show, Red. There’s a smudge on the lens that you may notice. I’m thinking that mean old thrasher did that! But it was easily cleaned.
This is an iphone photo I took of our front yard yesterday when we returned from our morning walk. With everything in bloom you can barely see our house. I love this time of year with palo verde wearing yellow flowers.
I’ve reached the last two pages of my DIL’s syllabus for her AP English Class. I will confess that as the literature moved back decades in time, my reading fell off. I did a bit, but not all. I wonder if her students had a difficult time with these last few months of readings, too? I posted the syllabus at the beginning of each month if you want to take a look.
April Reading List
I’ve been more focused on photography than reading and writing. Here are a few photos from the past week:
A beavertail cactus in bloom with two flowers. There are more buds so more flowers to come!
Red hanging out under the birdbath.
I ordered a large canvas print of Red for our living room. For the five years we’ve been in this house, there is a blank spot to the right of our fireplace. I’ve been looking for art for that space, but never found anything I was crazy about. Red will go nicely there! A neighbor is coming over Friday to help me hang the print. She’s an artist who paints large canvases and an expert at hanging art.
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.
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?
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.
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!
