Flustered Kingbirds

My little Kingbirds are back again this year, nesting in the same nest on the telephone pole that they used last year.  They are really a cute little bird but tend to get really flustered when I go out the door.  Tonight I was able to get a few videos of them to show you just how flustered they get.  You will have to excuse the camerwoman, by-the-way.....do you know how difficult it is to actually take a video of a flustered, flying around the sky, not liking you are there, Kingbird.

Bubbling Water from the Dam

Today we (my sister, her husband, and myself) went up to see how much water was in the reservoir.  The video show how much water is coming out of the pipes below the dam.  There is quite a bit of water but I have actually seen more coming out at another time.  Still impressive, though.  Just looking at all the bubbling water that is caused from the amount of water coming out of the pipes, can you imagine the undercurrent that is caused from all that water.

22 Rifle Target Practice

Yesterday, my sister, her husband and I decided to get in some target practice.  All we took were our 22 rifles, but we had a great time none-the less.  The gun I use is sited in fantastic.....rarely do I miss my target.  I know, don't break my hand patting myself on the back, right.  I have been raised around guns all my life, with my father teaching gun smithing at a college in Orem, Utah, and doing lots of work on guns out of our home.  I haven't been target shooting since being married, except for the last month and it's been a blast.  Memories, it sure brings back memories of my youth.

Grilled Salmon

A few nights ago, my sister, her husband, my husband, and I had grilled salmon.  Thanks to Dean (my brother-in-law), we had ourselves an excellent meal.  He brought the salmon and did all the cooking on a volcano stove.  Just look at those salmon steaks........they made your mouth water just looking at them before they had even finished cooking.  Towards the end of the grilling process, they were smothered with butter, which really put out the smoke from the grill.  Besides charcoal, he also used apple wood, which did a wonderful job of enhancing the flavor.  The salmon tasted so-o-o-o-o-o good, that everything else seemed pretty hum-drum. Are ya hungry yet? 

Passcreek/Loristica 4-Wheeler Adventure

Saturday, June 23, 2012, my sister, her husband, my husband, and I all went for a 4-wheeler ride.  We were trying to make up our other minds as to whether to head up the mine hill or go the Passcreek way.  Eventually, we decided to head up Passcreek.  Either way, from our home you can basically go in any direction you want without having to load the 4-wheelers on a trailer.  Everything was so beautiful and green.  We decided that our first stop would be Loristica, a place that is used a lot for girls camp.  These first two pictures are a few shots of the way up the mountain.

Here we are at Loristica, nestled right in the middle of the pines.  You can see why it would be used for girls camp.  In the center is a huge meadow and all around it is camping sites.  It even has restrooms.  It's a pretty nice place.

This is a camp site at Loristica where we stopped to have our lunch.  See the blue 4-wheeler, in the shadows.......well, that's my new toy that used to be my dads. 

This is another pretty place I spotted as we were headed down the mountain.  With the water though, I'm sure as the month goes on, it will be a nice breeding place for mosquitoes - YUCK!

About midway down passcreek, there is a turnoff called Bear Creek.  It was also a pretty drive.  You see much more from a 4-wheeler than you do when you are in a vehicle.

These butterflies were flying all over the place.  I've never been able to get a picture of a butterfly before - wahoo......my first.  Now, don't somebody comment and tell me they are moths and not butterflies...................cause no matter what they are, they are still butterflies, to me!

These next two picture are towards the bottom of the trail, our ride is almost over.....sad.  I enjoy this day very much.

These cactus were just out of the mouth of the canyon.  How can anything so pretty be so deceiving and hurtful.  Mmm-m-m-m, have to think on that one for a moment.  That comment could go many, many ways.

Grazing Buck

My sister, Maxine, came up on Thursday to visit for a few days and to bring me my 4-wheeler, that used to be my dads.  They dropped my 4-wheeler off at a repair shop to give it a tune-up before bringing it here to my home.  They also brought up their 4-wheeler so we could go 4-wheeling.  So for now, where my 4-wheeler was in the shop, we both hopped on hers and went for a ride out back behind our place.  We came upon this little buck out grazing so we stopped to take a picture.  He didn't seem a bit interested in whether we were there or not so we decided to see how close we could get to him.  We got fairly close so I shot some more pictures then ventured on slowly, inching our way towards him.  He still didn't seem to care if we were there or not.  We were even whistling and yelling to get his attention so he would lift his head for some pictures.  He would lift his head up, look at us, then put his head back down and start eating.  It was amazing that he didn't move........I know, it was a mind over matter.............food, food, food.  He wasn't about to leave.....must have been some pretty good munchies where he was.  We actually got to within a 15 foot distance before he decided to leave.  Amazing!

When we got back from seeing our little buck, I got a phone call from the shop informing me that my 4-wheeler was ready to be picked up.  When we got home, sis and I once again went for a ride out back.  We hadn't gone very far when I noticed a mama moose and her little baby standing in the trees.  She watched us for a moment then started heading through the trees in another direction, with her little one following close behind her.  We headed around the trees to the lower pasture, hoping to get a better view of them.  When we got to the bottom field, we didn't see them so we started to head back when I heard my sister whistling so I turned around and she had once again spotted them.  We watched them for a while but we were never close enough to get a good picture.  The baby moose was so small..........I've never seen one that small.  My guess is that it had to have been born within the week.  What a picture that could have been..................if only!



Youth Volleyball Activity

Tuesday night for a Young Women/Young Men activity, we had a fun game of volleyball.  It was pretty cool, a tad windy, and rainy.  But hey, their youth, right...........weather is not an object when you're having fun.  At first we were debating on whether to go inside and play basketball or something else but the youth insisted on staying outside, so outside it was.

It wasn't too long ago during another youth activity that we had rain and out popped the rainbow and once again, we got our rainbow.    You could see both ends of the rainbow but not much of the middle.  Pretty, either way.

We also had a small fire going and after playing volleyball, everyone enjoyed making smores.  It was the lazy kind of smore where you toast the marshmallow and put it between two fudge striped cookies.  But as I see it, a smore is a smore and tastes wonderful.

Tumblebugs Addiction

I'm A-D-D-I-C-T-E-D!  Have you every played the computer game "Tumblebugs"?  It all started for me when I would go and visit my sister in Utah.  She has Tumblebugs on her computer and once I would get started on it, it was hard to give it up.  And so, I bought Tumblebugs and Tumblebugs2 off of E-Bay.  Both of the programs have 12 levels and each level has about 6 levels to complete before you are allowed to move onto the next level.  Except, Tumblebugs2 has a normal level of 12 and an expert level of 12.  On the regular Tumblebugs, I cannot for the life of me get past level 8.6......argh!  It is so frustrating for me.  On Tumblebugs2, I've finished the normal level and just started level 9...a bit tough.  I'm one of these people that says "I'll try it one more time to see if I can beat it"...and then, well, who knows how long that "ONE MORE TIME" has lasted - Ha!  Let me tell you, this game is so fun but on the other hand, very addictive!

Camera Earrings

Sque-e-e-e-e-e-e-al.  Look what I found and of course, purchased from E-bay.  For those of you who know me, you know how much I love photography.  When I happened to come across these earrings, I just knew I had to have them.  Someday, I am going to have the opportunity to take some photography classes so I can get my camera off of auto mode and learn how to take pictures the way I see them in magazines and on other blogs.  I dabble here and there with changing the settings but I have no idea what I'm doing and when I get a picture I really like, I don't remember what settings I used to get it - sigh. 

Peony's

Peony's are such a beautiful flower.  As I pulled into my driveway this morning, after going for a 3-mile walk, I was greeted by my beautiful peony's.  I have red peony's and white peony's but the white ones have not bloomed, yet.  They always bloom 1-2 weeks later than the red ones.   In China the Peony is known as the "Fuguihua"......The flower of riches and honor. It symbolizes wealth and distinction and is an emblem of love and affection. 

Every year, I cut a peony, put it in pretty, crystal bowl, and float it.  Each peony I float in my crystal bowl usually lasts about a week.  Floating in the bowl keeps it together so it can't fall apart.  It's so pretty to look at each day.  It brings a bit of beauty and aweness to my world each morning.

Father's Day Pop Can Cover

I was looking on some blogs when I came across this soda pop cover for dads.  I thought it was really cute and I wanted to make some for all the Young Women in our ward.  The only problem was that this one was 90% black and I thought that would eat up my ink cartridge pretty fast if I printed one off for every Young Women.

So, with that being said, I did what I enjoy doing.  I used the above as a sample and made my own, using very little ink.  I printed one off and adhered it to a can of pop and it turned out really cute.  I just love crafty people that let you use their ideas for a free download but in this case, I didn't use their free download, I just made my own.  For my bar-code number, I decided to use lots of X & O's for Hugs and Kisses.  After all was said and done and I'd gone to the effort to make my own, I realized that all I needed to do was make one copy of the free download template and xerox it - DUH! 

C-R-A-Z-Y Weather

Here it is the 9th of June and would you look at this snow storm.  When you look at the contrast between the white snow and the red peony's, it sure is beautiful.  Only thing is, this snow is heavy and wet and where the weather is warmer it is laying our hay field flat.  The last bout we had a few days ago layed a lot of the hay down and it still has not re-cooperated and now with this on top of it....what can I say?  My husband was out working in the West field on his tractor, with gloves on, and he came in and put his hands under luke-warm water because they were that cold.  He made the comment that he couldn't believe we were getting this snow storm the second week of June when he was trying to work the fields.  Strange weather!

Bridal Wreath Spirea

Our Bridal Wreath Spirea, that runs along our driveway winter killed this year.  These bushes have been along this driveway before I married into the family and I have been here since 1980.  They have been a beautiful bush which have flowered heavily each year in June.  The first picture is how they most usually look (a borrowed picture from the Internet) and the other pictures are how the bushes look now.  We have one little spot that flowed a little but there are lots of dead branches among the green.  Oh, breaks my heart that something which brings such beauty every Spring could be gone from our landscape.  Upon talking to other people in the valley, they have also reported losing lots of their landscape, including mature trees.  I don't know if it had something to do with such a mild winter with not much snow or what, but I do know how much it saddened my heart.

What Season Is It?

Summer, Winter, Spring, or Fall................can anyone please tell me what season we are actually in.  When I got up this morning and looked out the window, it wasn't the beauty of spring that you'd expect to see, but it was an inch of snow...ice snow...crusted ice crystals...I don't know what to call it.  It was like a slushy ice, very heavy with lots of moisture.

This is what was on my car....heavy, slushy snow.

Good thing I brought all my plants inside last night or I'm afraid I would have lost them all.  I actually have 3 more big plants that didn't get in the shot.  I actually left them in the house all day because according to the weather reports, it is supposed to freeze again tonight.

But all-in-all, it turned out to be a pretty good day.  I picked up my friend and took her to Arco for lunch.  We went to the Golden West Cafe  We selected different items off the menu and both were pretty good.  After I dropped her off at her home. I took the back roads home in hopes of getting some photos.  Didn't see too much but I did find some pretty, little white flowers/weeds, and a beautiful, Western Tanager.  Western Tanagers are one of my favorite birds, which I don't get the opportunity of seeing too often.

Sunday Afternoon Drive

I went for a ride after church today and look at what I found.  From the natural beauty of the outdoors to the restoration of history.  Hope you enjoy the ride as much as I did.