Sycamores

I don't know why, but lately I find myself really liking sycamore trees. I don't know if their wood is actually good for anything, and I know they don't provide much shade. But somehow or other, I like the way their trunks stand out against the surrounding backgrounds.

I guess I also find myself drawn a lot more to the single trees left standing here and there...specially when they are in the middle of a big plowed field.

Speaking of plowing, I am so ready to plant a few tomato plants and our usual bell peppers. But there seems to be a hitch this year....I bet I drove over a hundred miles yesterday, went to three green houses and one home center looking for the supersonic tomato plants and did not find a one at any of them. Today, I checked our local Walmart and they had even less.

I love the flavor of the supersonics when grown in our garden; for some reason, a lot of the others don't have a lot of flavor. But this year we really need to perform some tests. We need to pick several varieties and keep track of where they are planted, and see which ones have the better flavor.

Right now though, I need to tidy up the house....I have a quilt that I made that hangs in the dining room. One of the cats has been jumping up and pulling it down, and then they all sleep on it. I need to devise a better way of hanging it. Yet right now, one is snuggled in it and I haven't the heart to make him move. I will wait till he goes back outside before I do anything with it. It is nothing fancy...I wouldn't let him do that to a 'good' quilt, but this is just one I experimented on. You can see it here...

So I best get this published and see what I can get done.

Today...

Today, Roger killed a turkey...the biggest he has ever killed! It weighed 25 lb....We didn't measure the beard. I know he had one turkey with a longer beard before.
I just have to show you some of the feathers...you have to enlarge these to see what I am talking about. They have not been manipulated, other than I re-sized the pictures for this blog.
Aren't they gorgeous!
Look at that green on the above photo...that is really what it looked like.
And these! Can you believe the color?
And as an added treat, look at this red headed woodpecker! We took a short drive late this afternoon, and I spotted him on this post as we were going around this curve.
It is the first one I have seen in years and years. I only managed to get one shot before he took off.

My own personal sky

Please, please enlarge these...they are so beautiful. Even with a dirty lens, the bottom one is still awesome.
I took these last night when I was thinking about leaving the strip pits. Actually, I was trying to make myself leave because it was too dark to capture anything else but the sky caught my attention and I had to make one final round and catch a few different views of it. These were two of my favorites.

I must say that I am still concerned about the Northern Harriers...in the three or four times I have been out there recently, I have only seen one, and it in the distance. I could tell it was one by the way it flew close to the ground and seeing its white patch. Since one male can have up to 5 or 6 females, maybe the females are all on nests.
*******
I spent most of the day with the Little Bright Eyes...I had to be there by 7:30, though I got there a little earlier than that. She slept in till 9:00...got her up and we changed her diaper. You got to understand that she loves having her diaper changed. She kicks and talks and smiles and laughs the whole time. Even if she is fussy, if you go change her diaper it is almost guaranteed to change her mood.

Anyway, changed her diaper and then tried to give her a bottle. She has a bit of a stuffy nose, and I don't know if that was part of the problem or what, but she was not as enthused with the bottle as she was the other time I got to give her one. However, once we got it down, she was just a happy, cheerful little girl.

I didn't try to take pictures, though I should have. I did have Roger's point&shoot camera in my purse. She has decided she really likes her swing, and when her mommy got back and fed her, she wanted in the floor. She kicked and kicked and talked to us...had us totally entertained.

In other news, our other daughter should be heading home from Colorado in the wee hours...they plan on leaving 1:00 a.m. tomorrow. She has been out there for some training in crisis support. I know she is looking forward to sleeping in her own bed again.

Roger is turkey hunting...yesterday was opening day. Neither he nor his buddies got one yesterday. He didn't go out this morn, but went out before I got home. It is just amazing...when we were first married, there were no wild turkeys around. Now, we see them quite often, and sometimes big flocks of them. I think the National Wild Turkey Federation has had a lot to do with getting them re-introduced to our world again.