Tag Archives: photography

The Final Month of Reading

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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.

What does April have in store for you?

Happy April First!

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?

We’ve got eggs!

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I walked by a planter growing an Elephant Feed plant. Two quail wooshed out like jets taking off. I scared them away. This planter has been home to a nest before and there were a dozen quail eggs in it two years ago. I peeked in the planter and saw two eggs. Later in the day, I had to take another look and there were four quail eggs!

The main issue is to not make the parents uncomfortable. That means I must stay away as much as possible. But the location of the planter is an issue.

This planter is in front of the gate to our garbage and recycling bins. If you want to read more about me getting written up and pink-slipped over recycling, you can find that post HERE.

I stressed out momma and papa quail a few times because I had to take out trash and recycling. I noticed the egg count has stopped at four. I decided to move my recycling into the garage. With a steady flow of Amazon packages coming daily, I tend to recycle a lot! But I talked over the garbage bin with hubby and we decided to leave it where it is. It’s going to be hotter than 90 degrees this weekend and that could end up being a smelly problem to have inside our garage. With our HOA, it’s not like I can move the trash to a new location without getting a fine.

So here’s to me not needing to use the garbage bin more than a few times a week.

UPDATE: Now we have five eggs!

We’re hoping the eggs will turn into these guys:

I remember telling a good friend that I had a dozen quail eggs in a nest two years ago. She asked me when I was going to harvest and eat them!

Have a great weekend!

What plans do you have for this beautiful March weekend?

My brain is mush!

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I did it! I got our taxes ready for the CPA. I realized because of my foot surgery late January, I was behind my usual timeframe. I also had a hard time focusing. But powering through Friday, Saturday and Sunday — I did it! But now my brain feels like a bowl of mush.

Consequently, there will few words on this post. I’ll rely instead on photos of mostly Red and one of Mrs.

I like the photo above because of the flower. It looks like Red is wearing a fancy head ornament. I’ve had a few close encounters with Red. I call out to him and he doesn’t flit away like normal. I’ve been a few feet away from him as he waits for me to fill the bird feeder.

Red with a House Sparrow.

Red waiting for his turn in the feeder.

Mrs. on the fence.

More Red photos. He hung out last evening right outside the casita.

My goal for 2026 is to be better organized with the taxes. It’s something I could do monthly, to keep track of my husband’s business and rental home expenses, rather than power through 12 months the following year! But I’m already starting out behind the curve, two and half months behind.

Do you have a strategy for preparing taxes that works for you?

If so, please share and give me some tips!