Life in the Desert

I wish it was life in the dessert! Oh, well. We caught another one. There seems to be an abundant, never ending supply of gophers here in the desert. Mice too. And of all things, we are going to Chuck E Cheese today. More mice. I spoke with my neighbor the other day and she told me that the elementary school where her son goes just put out poison for the gophers a couple of weeks ago. The kids couldn't go outside for six days. Well, they picked up over seven THOUSAND dead gophers on the lawn at the school. Yeah, thousand. Her son looked outside of his classroom one day and said he could count over a hundred right outside the window. That's a lot of gophers. I guess I am fighting a losing battle. A whole bunch of the bulbs that I planted in the spring have been dug up and eaten. I thought I was victorious again when I caught one in the trap at the beginning of the week. Then I walked out to the slope and found a huge pile of soft dirt and a couple of holes in my lawn. That's where I draw the line. Well, I was watering, so I stuffed the hose in the hole. Instead of bubbling out, it went down. So, I waited. It kept going. So, I waited. It started to finally come out halfway down the slope. As I was pulling the hose out, I looked about halfway down the slope and saw fur. Grey and wet. I yelled to Scott to come out and help me. He ran outside, without shoes on, and brought a shovel with him. I had the hose and kept water on the guy. He was coming straight at me! He was about two feet away when he went sideways on the slope and behind a big flowering bush. He was trying to dig, but I kept the water on him and he was moving really slow. Well, Scott and the shovel came to my rescue. His innerds became outerds, so to speak and the gopher was no more. I guess this will be a continuous battle. Bummer. I will not be able to have bulbs out here. Not until there is more civilization around me. Or maybe just in containers. My calla lilies in the planter are coming up nicely. Of course, they will probably burn up in the heat before they have flowers. Oh, well, such is life in the desert. At least we don't have the quantity of stink bugs that my sister in law has at her house, crawling all over the place. Yuck. We don't have cockroaches out here and we don't have fleas. I haven't seen any scorpions yet and only a few black widows, not like in the valley. But mice and gophers are abundant. No more mice in my car. Good incentive to keep it clean!

I had to juggle activities tomorrow. Possible activities for tomorrow included helping my mother in law's friend Andy pack up his stuff to move, go see my aunt who I haven't seen in almost a year, go cherry picking with Dad, go to a birthday party. Well, we will be going cherry picking EARLY in the morning, like at 8:00, then off to the birthday party. With the kids running around, I would probably be more trouble than help with the move. And thankfully my aunt understands. This is why it is important to look at your calendar before you make plans. I, who never have any plans, made multiple plans on the same day. I am beginning to feel like someone else I know, who can't make any plans until she checks her calendar! Thankfully, I am not that busy. But I do need to check the calendar!

The girls are doing very well. Looking forward to the birthday party. They helped pick out the presents and Jess has been counting the days until it is time to go. She loves parties and being with people. She has had the dress picked out that she is going to wear for a few days already. Rebekah has been building with lego's lately. She built a "robot" and a house. She said she needs more lego's. We have been listening to The Chronicles of Narnia in the car on audio CD's. It is wonderful. And the girls have watched the movie so many times that Rebekah has even memorized the lines. She sat on my lap and looked at me and frowned. "Well, I ain't gonna smell it, if that's what you want!" I burst out laughing and so did she. It was very funny. She's funny without trying to be. I just love my girls.

We are getting ready for Jessica's ballet recital on July 1. She "performed" for us the other night and did the whole thing perfectly. I know because yesterday in her ballet class we got to watch the whole class do it and she was great! Her teacher said she knows the material, she just doesn't listen very well. When I was in grade school, they always told my mom, "Amy is very smart, she just doesn't apply herself." Well, my mom's request that I get a kid just like me, so I know what she went through came true. Jess is a lot like I was. What am I in for? A fun time, I think, she is a joy to be around and always has a smile on her face. She likes to do things for others and she really cares for kids smaller than her. She is always doing something. We just have to channel that. She is already doing chores. It is now her resposibility to vacuum under the kitchen table and take the swiffer mop and mop under the table. She does a great job, too. For a five year old. She misses stuff, but she is learning. Gotta start somewhere. She makes her bed and cleans up the playroom, too, but not consistently. That is what we have to work on. She will get to enjoy her summer and then, in the fall, we will be on a new schedule...School!

Cherries!

Well, I have already gone to two cherry places and the cherries are good! Cherry season officially opens on Saturday the 17th. So, they will be available for at least three weeks after that. We went to one place on Sunday after church to check it out and the cherries were $3/lb. The place I went to today was $2/lb. At Rhodes Ranch today we got bing cherries and they were good, big and sweet. Rebekah and Jessica sat down at the table when we got home and ate cherries. The air was cool at the orchard, a lot of people had light jackets on. Breezy, about 70 degrees. Nice! We only got five pounds of cherries, I picked three and the girls each picked one. But we had fun! It only took about 30-40 minutes. We had fun. They wanted to get more, and so they are looking forward to going again.

What a Day!

Some cute pictures. The girls are just cute all the time and the sunset was absolutely gorgeous on Sunday night. The sheep were out on the field across from our house, you could hear them making sheep noises out there and the sunset was beautiful. This is the view of the sunset we have from our front yard. One good reason we like living where we live.

As far as the gophers go, I caught another one. I have figured out that if I "bait" the traps, they come running. That is, set the trap, put it in the hole and find a half eaten bulb that they have destroyed and put it just outside the trap. Has worked twice now. The dumb gophers are still eating my gladiola plants and I don't think I will get a single flower from them. They are also eating the strawberry plants that are in the ground. And one dared to dig a hole in the grass. That was the last straw. They must die. So, I set the trap, baited it and WHAM! Checked it the next morning and there he was.

Oh, and I had a mouse in my car. The lady at the deli gave Jess and Bekah chocolate ladybugs and I left them in the console between the seats. Got back in the car later and found a scrape in the top of one of them. Okay, throw them away, just in case. Wait, where is the third one? Couldn't find it. Found it yesterday after I opened the door to my car and saw a mouse run under the seat. I think it got in through the heater vents under the seats. Anyway, cleaned out my car, which wasn't very dirty and found the other ladybug, on the floor behind the seats, with all the aluminum foil peeled off and a big chunk of chocolate missing from the top of the ladybug. Dumb mice. They must be female mice. What with the way mice reproduce they are probably all PMSing all the time. They need chocolate, too! I am going to try baiting the traps in the garage with chocolate! One hershey kiss in each trap ought to do it! I'll show them!


I never thought I would see the day that Scott would put a bug outside that was in the house, but he does a lot for his little brown haired girl. She found a little black beetle in the house the other day and decided it was a baby bug and that we needed to take care of it. I finally convinced her to let Daddy put it outside and let it find its family. So, Daddy did the honorable thing, but it took all he had not to squish it. He was good. The next morning the girls were looking out the door to see if it was still there.

At the grocery store last night. Trying to pick what flavor of yogurt the girls would like. Woman standing next to me. Jess stands next to her, (she is on her cell phone), looks at her and says, "Do you know who the devil is?" I wanted to disappear into the floor! Well, luckily, the lady's response was, "Yes, I do, but I also know Jesus!" Thank heaven for small miracles! We had a little discussion about tact. Talk about embarrassing!