Catch of the Day

Our nearly 4 month old lab loves her walks on forest trails and dirt roads.  Every walk is an adventure and you never know what her keen senses will find.  Some days it's a new stick, a pine cone to shred, a discarded water bottle to crunch on, a squirrel to chase up a tree.  The other finds I can do without: the dead snake in the road, proudly carried all the way home; dead birds, dead field mice....basically anything dead.  It's such a struggle getting it out of her mouth, so I've decided she's part vulture and I'm just letting her eat the dead thing.  I'm disappointed she has such poor taste and standards in food.

Jim's SRP

We love the wildlife, but some of it we don't want in our backyard, nesting in the woodpile, digging up the new lawn, etc.  So I bought this friendly trap (is that a contradiction of terms?) called "Have a Heart".  Jim puts a big blob of peanut butter on the trigger mechanism and when the critter begins eating, the doors close.  Then, Jim drives out about 5 miles and releases it.  I have named this the SRP (for you Phoenix folks, this does not stand for the Salt River Project), the Squirrel Relocation Program.  We've relocated 8 over the past month.  We're hoping it's not the same squirrel making it back to our place for the peanut butter.  If it is, I think we should try squirrel stew.
Game and Fish recently stocked the streams with trout and Jim has been having fun catching and releasing, catching and eating, or now catching and relocating....another wildlife program called TRP; Trout Relocation Program.  There's a pool Jim has discovered that, after stocking, has a large number of fish.  Jim thinks it would be better for the fish if they were dispersed more evenly through out the stream, so he takes along a bucket, catches them and relocates them along other parts of the stream.

a Grand View

From the top of the ski lift at Sunrise is a stunning panoramic view of hills and valleys, trees and lakes, clouds and rain showers miles away.  The ski resort has a host of summer activities, one of them being a chair lift pass for the day.  Some people ride up, get off, look around, take a few photos and head back down.  Others ride up, and after the photo ops choose a run or a trail to hike back to the bottom.  The truly adventurous, bring or rent a mountain bike and put it on the bike rack on the back of the chairlift.  Some friends and I watched several groups of adventurers disembark.  All had helmets, most with chin guards, most had shin or knee pads, and elbow pads, and my personal favorite had a football jersey on over full pads.  There are 10 or more trails to choose from that range from easy to black diamond.  On our way down the mountain on the chair lift, we watched a couple bikers traverse the black diamond run beneath us.  It was impressive to say the least.  That is not on my bucket list!  However....a zip line is coming this fall and I plan to be back to cross that off my list!

Fabulous Flowers

Greer has had so much rain this summer that locals say it is the greenest they've seen it.  It truly is lovely here and wildflowers of every color are making a grand show.  I love the intricate design of every flower.  I would show you a photo of my first rose that bloomed that I planted this spring, but it never had a photo opportunity.  As I leaned down to ooh and aah over the pure white petals, Zella, the now 30 pound lab puppy, pounced and ripped it off the stem.  Today, on our walk she attacked a big fuzzy dandelion and wasn't as happy to have a mouth full of fuzz as she appeared with my rose petals.  And I thought I was going to have to be concerned about all the wild critters eating my flowers...oh, wait...a 3 month old puppy named Zella is a wild critter!

Oh So Close but Yet So Far Away

A refrain from an old song I'm singing today.  The installers came to put in place the last piece of the kitchen remodel, the granite counter tops.  This afternoon I was going to clean my new kitchen and start unpacking boxes and finally find a place for kitchenware. All was going well until after they cut the hole for the sink and put the sink in on top instead of mounted underneath the granite as we had requested.  A few phone calls later, they were uninstalling a gorgeous piece of granite that was now cut wrong and take it back to the shop to see what needs to be done:  is it salvageable, will they need to order a new slab from Phoenix, when will they be able to re-install?  Oh, it was so close, but yet so far away.

Zella the Hunter

Zella in the shrubbery.

Pounce position.

Zella is stealing the show with all the guests at the lodge and she makes me laugh every day.  She is having fun stalking birds and perfecting her pounce position.  Lucky for the birds she's on a leash. After her morning walk she likes to hunt in the shrubbery.  She is now 10 weeks old and she has probably doubled in size since we got her!  I always thought Jim ate too fast, but he wouldn't stand a chance against Zella.  She's like a vacuum cleaner...her meal is sucked down in about a minute.

Friends and Family

Lyn and Priscilla enjoying a rain storm on the patio. 

Jim and the Van Dam boys ready for backpacking and fishing.

It's been a fun and full month of friends and family here at the lodge.  We've enjoyed having our kids and their friends here.  My parents made it up for the first time. And finally, other than meeting and greeting our guests at the lodge, we had our first "old friends" as guests.  Chet and Veronica Fuller, who we knew from our kids being at the same school, came up and enjoyed hiking and exploring. Our dear friends, the Van Dams are here now.  Jim and Mark and his boys and nephew are off on a backpacking adventure while Priscilla and I are enjoying girl time.  Coming soon are friends we went to church with, before we were married couples, to celebrate their 26th anniversary.  We love hosting people in this wonderful lodge, but it sure is extra fun when we can share this place with family and friends.
Progress report on the kitchen.  The tile floor is all finished and the counter tops should be installed within the week.  It will have been 7 months without a full kitchen to use and everything either in unpacked boxes or open boxes in our living area to rumble around in to use for meal prep and storage.  I am so excited to get in after everyone is finally finished, to clean my new kitchen, unpack and organize all my kitchen stuff, and get ready for the launch of the breakfast part of the b & b!