I trust everyone had a wonderful Christmas! I know we did at our house. As I had hoped, Santa was very good to me this year and brought me a new camcorder/camera. It is a very nice one with all the latest technology. Now my job is learning how to use it! I have been "studying" daily, trying to learn at least one new thing each day. I have never seen a camera that has so many bells and whistles. But I am slowly learning so please bear with me and I promise my pictures will get better. One of the first pictures I took with my new camera was this one below.
The best little present that was under the tree!
Summer Girl really enjoyed her first Christmas as being the resident mostly-indoor cat. Last year she was only allowed in the den, but now she has the run of the house (except the bedrooms because we don't want her hiding under the beds.) Her favorite spot was under the tree, so she could alternately nap and look at birds. Santa even brought her a present, although she is scared of it! It was a pair of plastic balls with bells inside, so when you roll them on the floor they make a noise. Oh well, she has decided to donate her balls to the Yakima Humane Society (that sounded a bit odd, didn't it?).
PUZZLES
We spent a lot of our time before Christmas putting together a jigsaw puzzle. We have done this off and on throughout the years. We find it is a good activity to do especially during the winter months because there is always a lot of "hanging around the house" time due to snow and cold temperatures. When we lived back in North Carolina, Linda and I put together several puzzles, one of which was shaped like a butterfly. It was beautiful. We glued it together and hung it up in the mobile home we used to have at Holden Beach. How I wish we still had that puzzle (un-glued, of course) so we could put it together again. We still have several puzzles in the closet that we have put together once or twice already, like the one below. It is titled "The Tower of Babel" and is the one we finished two days before Christmas.
1000 pieces
Have no fear, Santa was aware of our plight of not having any new puzzles to put together and he brought Linda no less than FIVE new jigsaw puzzles. She is really the one who put together the majority of the above puzzle. I usually wander in after it's about 75% together and put in some pieces. One of the best things about jigsaw puzzles is you can get up and leave them and come back later and pick up where you left off. And you don't have to boot anything up to do them, either. No wonder Linda likes them so much! This below is the puzzle we are working on now. I will post a picture of it when it is finished.
"Readers Paradise" also 1000 pieces
SNOW!
As usual for Yakima, we had a White Christmas. We got a bit of snow on December 22rd and 23rd, and some more on Christmas Day, so we were glad for that. I must admit we have become spoiled for having a White Christmas as there have been only a few years when we haven't gotten snow. I took a walk down to Kissel Park in the snow one day and it was so beautiful. Of course, along with all that snow comes cold temperatures. This was the temperature on Christmas Day when I got up.
Yikes...brrr!
At least the snow does offer photographic opportunities. However, I am still in the process of learning how to set my new camera to take good pictures of snow. My first snow picture is this one below. It was very dark that day and the picture was taken in deep shade, but I wanted to see how it would look. I think it came out pretty good considering the conditions.
Someone's been walking on our driveway!
Judging from the size of those footprints, I am guessing they were made by a California Quail. We do have them here year-round. They like to get beneath the feeders and scratch around in the dirt (or snow) for bits of seed. We also have a multitude of sparrows that like to forage around underneath the feeder as well. I saw this little guy below hopping around on Christmas Day. I looked at him closer and noticed that he didn't have a tail! I got a picture of him although it was pretty dark. But I figured a dark picture is better than no picture at all.
Tail-less Sparrow
CHALLENGE
For the month of December, Linda and I have been participating in a fitness challenge sponsored by our local newspaper, the Yakima Herald-Republic. Each day in the month participants have pledged to complete at least one 10-minute activity. You can do more than 10 minutes if you want, but that is minimum for the challenge. For most of our activities, Linda and I have been walking down to the park. A few days we haven't wanted to get outside in the cold and have opted to follow an exercise video on YouTube. Points are accessed to each participant for how many minutes you exercise and whether or not you post about your activity on social media. At the end of the challenge, each participant who completes it will get a "swag bag" full of goodies. It has been a lot of fun and I hope we have established a habit that we can continue after the challenge is over. This was our social media post picture for Christmas Day.
Bundled up!
PARTING SHOT
Birds are not the only animals walking on the snow on our driveway. Can you guess which animal made these cute little tracks?
Tracks in the snow
I just realized that next week's blog will be the first one for 2018! Here is what Summer Girl thinks about that...
Today's blog post will wrap up our trip down to Carpinteria, California, to visit Linda's dad. Our trip lasted three weeks (four days were spent driving) and we had a great time. I have always enjoyed going to visit dad because he is such an interesting person. He is always interested in how things work and why they work the way they do. He's always got something going when we are down there. I believe having all these interests in life has contributed to his longevity. It just goes to show you that the more you exercise your mind, the better off you will be.
My most favorite thing to do while down at dad's has always been to watch birds. He has the perfect set-up for bird watching...a nice deck on the back of his house with lots of trees and bushes surrounding it. He has a wonderful large bird feeding station suspended from the deck, and a nice cement bird bath nearby. There are a multitude of different bird species around his area, and I have added quite a few birds to my life list by observing them there. This trip I was able to add two more. One was the Tennessee Red Quail that I mentioned in last week's blog, and the other was Hutton's Vireo. We saw this bird several times at the feeder, but he was always moving so fast that I couldn't get a good picture of him to help in my identification. However, one day as I was sitting on the deck he landed in a nearby bush and I happened to get a shot of him. He was very similar to a little bird we used to see back in North Carolina, the Ruby-Crowned Kinglet. I used to call this little kinglet "my baby" because he was so cute and was always visiting the feeder in our back yard. They are both very small birds, similarly colored, but this one on dad's deck did not have the red crown on top of his head.
Could this be my baby?
I figured he was some other kind of bird, but since there are a lot of small greenish-gray birds it was hard to tell exactly which one he was. But I took note of the white eye ring and the white bands on his wings, plus the fact that he was not constantly on the move, and this pointed me to the possibility that he was as a Hutton's Vireo. I saw him visit the feeder almost every day. One day I was inside looking out the window at the feeder and all of a sudden the birds spooked and flew all at once in different directions. Unfortunately, one bird hit the window. I went outside to see if it was alright and it was the little vireo. He was still breathing and I didn't see any blood, so I moved him off of the concrete onto the grass. He fluttered his wings but acted like he was a bit shaken up, so I left him alone but kept checking back to make sure he was okay.
Hutton's Vireo
After an hour or so I went outside to check on him and he was gone. He had been moving about a lot before that so I concluded that he had flown away. At least, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.
Another bird that I had seen before at dad's showed up towards the end of our visit. He also was very similar to a bird we had back in North Carolina, but his coloring was different. I got this silhouette picture below of him. Can you guess what he is?
You probably noticed the very distinctive curved bill. That feature immediately reminded me of the Brown Thrasher that we had in our yard in NC. But this guy was a dull grayish-brown and turned out to be a California Thrasher. He posed for me to get his picture.
California Thrasher
Here are some more bird pictures that I took while we were at dad's.
A couple of sparrows enjoying a bath
Anna's Hummingbird
A Cooper's Hawk who visited the feeder (not for the seed, though)
Red-Tailed Hawk in a nearby tree
Anna's Hummingbird
Northern Mockingbird on top of a cactus
My first sighting of the Tennessee Red Quail
Alas, the day came when we had to head back home to Yakima. Linda's sister and brother-in-law returned from their vacation well-rested and ready to resume their duties as dad's caregivers. We all watched the beginning of the last game of the World Series, then Linda and I said our goodbye's and left for our motel. We wanted to turn in early so we could get an early start the next morning. Unfortunately, the people in the next room were also watching the game, and none too quietly. After a while they quieted down, but it was a rough night for both of us. However, we did get an early start the next morning. Check out the clock on the wall.
At the Starbucks in Carpinteria @ 5am
Fuel for the drive
The first day's drive back home was uneventful except for a couple of traffic delays. It was definitely more interesting than the drive down had been because we went back on Highway 101 instead of Interstate 5. We had learned our lesson.
The hills along Highway 101
Much better scenery than I-5
Lettuce fields
The garlic capital of the world!
San Luis Reservoir
Victory! We made it halfway home!
The second day's drive turned out to be very eventful at one point. Just outside of La Pine, Oregon (which marks our halfway point on that day), we encountered this below.
Needless to say, we were shocked to see snow falling when just days before we had been in over 100 degree heat. But we must remember that this two-day drive takes us all the way from southern California into the southeastern part of Washington, so the climate change is significant.
Pictures taken at a rest stop outside La Pine
We started to panic because we didn't want to be driving in snow for half a day and wind up having to go over passes without any snow tires or chains (which we don't even own). Fortunately, the snow eventually stopped and we continued on in clear weather. When we arrived in Yakima it was rather chilly outside but not snowing. However, the next morning was a different story.
The view out our front window
So, we arrived home to temperatures pretty much the same as when we left, with a little bit of snow as an added bonus. Another trip down to see dad was in the history books!
PARTING SHOT
Summer Girl was definitely glad to see us but did sulk a little bit. I would like to take a moment to thank our good friend, Linda H., for taking such excellent care of her while we were gone. She loves her Aunt Linda! Here is where she was for almost every second the day after we got home:
Summer Girl on my lap
Linda and I would like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas! I hope you get to spend it doing what you love with people you love.
Thomas Fire Update: I am happy to report that despite having to evacuate from the house three times during the Thomas Fire, everyone is fine. It was pretty scary for them but due to the diligent efforts of the firefighters and some pretty timely and efficient back-burning, dad's property was undamaged from the fire. It came very close but the firefighters were able to stop it from destroying any houses on the hills around dad's house. We are all very grateful for their hard work and sacrifice during this most trying time.
As I write this we are still hoping that dad's house has escaped harm from the fire. The focus of the media coverage is now on the Montecito/Santa Barbara area, so we don't have as many updates as we were getting. From what we can gather over the internet, the worst of it is done in Carpinteria. This is, of course, assuming that the wind doesn't change direction and blow it back up there. Nothing is a given with a fire like this. The firefighters did a lot of back-burning on Monday on the hillside right above dad's house, and it seems to have protected the buildings on the hill. The evacuation order is still in effect for that area, so we will not know absolutely for sure until dad and the family can get back in there. So, we are still keeping our fingers crossed. Since this fire is into its second week already, I have decided to go ahead and continue my post of our trip down to dad's in October.
TAKING A BREAK
Linda and I tried to get out and about in Carpinteria a couple of times during our two weeks as dad's caregivers. I would like to mention that Linda's son was there also during this time, as he lives with dad. He always takes the night shifts, being available in case dad needs help during the night. So when we wanted to take a break, we would ask him to stick around for a couple of hours. He was always accommodating, which helped us tremendously. On one of our breaks we decided to go out for lunch in Carpinteria. There is one particular restaurant that we really like in that town, Zookers, so we decided to go there (click here for their website).
We both decided to order their Stuffed Grape Leaves which are stuffed with ground lamb and rice. It was a nice meal and gave us an opportunity to get out and stretch our legs.
FLOWERS AROUND DAD'S HOUSE
My usual perch while at dad's was sitting outside on his deck, watching the birds. At every opportunity I was taking pictures and videos. Granted, my camera would not cooperate sometimes, but I did manage to get some pretty good shots. Here are some more pictures I took of the flowers around dad's house.
Angel's Trumpet
Can you spot the Silver-Spotted Skipper?
A Sulphur butterfly on the bougainvillea plant
Hummingbird getting nectar from a Bottlebrush flower
Not sure what this is, but it was in a large pot on the deck
I even got a couple of butterflies in on a couple of my pictures, which is always a plus. I think I should note that the bougainvillea plant in the picture above is HUGE! Back in North Carolina, I had only seen bougainvillea plants in hanging baskets. But in Carpinteria they are all over the place in people's yards, beside the road, everywhere. And they are all huge. Below is a picture that I took of this plant a few years ago before California was in such a bad drought. It is still pretty now, though.
Bougainvillea plant
MYSTERY BIRDS
One morning I was walking along the driveway from dad's house headed to the RV when I noticed a small flock of about 10 birds on the ground over near the hedge. I had my phone with me so I quickly took a few pictures and watched them walk across the street from dad's house. Then I went inside and got my camera so I could get better pictures. I found them in the bushes across the street and they didn't seem to be frightened of me. I took a few pictures which turned out pretty good even though it was still not very light outside. I had never seen these birds before, so you know I had to look them up after I got my pictures. It turns out they were Tennessee Red Quail. I knew they were some kind of quail from their body shape, but I had never heard of these. There was not a lot of information available on the internet, but it seems that they are a variation of the Bobwhite Quail and are mostly bred for hunting preserves. I can only guess that these either escaped from someone's farm, or they are a wild covey that migrated from a nearby hunting preserve. Wherever they came from, I was glad to see them as they were beautiful birds.
THE WEATHER
The weather when we first arrived in Carpinteria was rather warm, but we were glad of it since we had left Yakima in below freezing temperatures. However, after we were there a few days the weather ramped up and got downright HOT. We thought we were back in Yakima in August. An interesting note for my East Coast friends is that hardly anyone in the Carpinteria area has air conditioning in their homes. They simply do not need it on a regular basis because it usually doesn't get that hot. We certainly could have used it for a few days, though. Here was the weather forecast for the second week we were at dad's.
The week's forecast
Do you see those triple digits on Monday and Tuesday? Yes, it definitely got that hot, and with no A/C in the house, it was pretty hot inside, too. I tried to stay outside as much as possible, but there wasn't even a breeze blowing so it was even hotter out there.
Actual temperature inside (top) and outside (bottom)
These temperatures were well above what is normal for the area during October. Thank goodness the temperature goes way down at night, so the heat didn't pose any problems for sleeping. And, during the day, we could go out to the RV for a little air conditioned relief from time to time. Since I am talking about the RV I thought I would include a picture of our little home-away-from-home. The inside was quite nice. This is where Linda's sister and brother-in-law live while they are taking care of dad. Linda's son lives inside the house with dad.
Our home-away-from-home
ACTIVITIES FOR DAD
Linda's dad is a very active person, even though he uses a wheelchair to get around most of the time. He can still walk without one, and he takes at least one walk every day using his wheely-walker. He also does stretching exercises every day to keep his mobility up. I hope if I live to be 97 years old that I can be as active as he is. He also likes to exercise his mental faculties by playing cards and reading the LA Times newspaper every day. This is in addition to all of the "business" that he carries on by phoning his friends in the Lion's Club. Even though he doesn't get out very much, Dad still is very involved in the community of Carpinteria.
Playing Solitaire...he wins a LOT
Dad is also very much a sports aficionado and if there is a game on TV, he's there! I mentioned in a previous blog that the World Series playoffs and the World Series games were played while we were with dad. We watched all the games and, of course, we were pulling for the Dodgers all the way. Linda and Dad both got into the spirit of things by wearing their Dodgers t-shirts. Dad has been a life-long Dodgers fan and it was such a treat for us to be able to watch them playing in the World Series with him...even though they didn't win.
Go Dodgers!!
THE LITTLE HAB FAMILY
You already know what happened to the original little Hab when he got red, but I haven't told you about the fate of his brothers and sisters. I had a total of two habanero peppers turn completely red while we were down there. The original little Hab and his red brother both wound up on my plate at different times during our stay there. Quite tasty!
The remaining members of the Hab family did not turn completely red while we were down there, so I brought them home and after they finally turned red, I dried them in my dehydrator and ground them up. But they were pretty to look at while they were in the process of turning red.
ARTWORK AROUND THE DECK
I've talked a lot about Linda's dad, but I haven't mentioned her mom. She was a wonderful, funny, happy-go-lucky lady who, sadly, passed away in 2010. However, her presence is still very much felt at dad's house. Linda's mom collected stone statues of animals which were made by the artist Isabel Bloom, who used to have a ceramics factory in Santa Barbara. They are still scattered around the deck and remind me of her whenever we are down there.
Many of the beautiful plants and bushes that she planted and tended while she was alive are still there, too. A few years ago we brought home one of her rose bushes, a yellow one, and planted it in our yard in Yakima. We have named it the Mom Rose. Here is a picture of her lavender rose that is planted in a very large pot on the deck, as well as more of the plants and flowers around the house.
Lavender Rose
Bougainvillea Flowers
A visitor to the deck
Side deck with flowers all around
Back of dad's house
One of the most striking plants at dad's house is this one below, an Agave Attenuata. He actually has two of them on his property and both were in the process of getting ready to bloom while we were there. It looks like a group of aphids really like that plant, as you can see by the little black things that are gathered on one of the flowers.
Black Aphids
PARTING SHOT -- WORDS OF WISDOM
One thing that has always stayed in my mind, from the very first time I went to dad's house, is this little plaque that he has hanging on the wall. It's in a pretty prominent place, right beside the dining room table, so you can't miss it. I love the sentiment, which puts growing old into perspective. I think this is a nice parting shot for this edition of the blog.
Next week I will wrap up our visit to dad's so we can get back to the real world after Christmas. So check back in next week.
