I DID IT!

It took me 1 year 7 months but I finally finished reading the entire Bible from cover to cover. This is the second time I've read the entire thing. I just wish I could have retained everything I read. As is always the case, my favorite books are Proverbs and Psalms. I've also been reading the book my daughter , Cathy got me, "Jesus Calling" by Sarah Young which I enjoy so  much. Daily nuggets to read and apply to my life. Now I have to decide if I want to start all over and read the Bible all the way thru again. Maybe this time I should take notes. I find the Old Testament to be so fascinating, just from the historical point of view. The main thing I got out of the Old Testament is that God is a God of second chances....and third and fourth. Those people of old kept getting rescued over and over by God and still kept turning away from Him and he kept taking them back. Thank God, he still does that today. I can't count the many times I've fallen off the path and got back on.

Got the garden all planted. Every thing looks so sad. The sun really does a number on the seedlings which is why they are covered either by shade cloth or milk cartons. It looks like I am growing milk instead of veggies.

 One of our snakes came out for a visit. I should put him in the house so he could eat the mice. We've caught 9 mice in the house this month! Aren't they supposed to go outside in the spring and do mice things? The other morning I went to use the guest bathroom and found two mice in the toilet. One drowned and one looking up at me with those beady little black eyes. I just flushed those little suckers right down the pipe. May they rest in peace!

 Anyway, the snake lives under one of the containers. We have 3 or 4 of them now. They are so beautiful.

 Even tho everything is covered, all the plants look so sad. The milk cartons act like a mini green house plus shade the plants. Once they get a good root set going and get used to the sun, I'll take the milk cartons off and then the mice and birds can eat them!

 My strawberries are doing great so far. They've been covered with a shade cloth since day one so haven't suffered sunburn. They are getting blossoms on them so hopefully we'll get some berries before the mice get them. I'm putting D-con in the garden today so hopefully the critters will die before anything ripens. I've gotten to the point where I don't care if the Towhee birds eat the D-con. I was planning on shooting them with the pellet gun. They are fun to watch but so destructive in the garden.

 Good thing we save our milk cartons all year long.

 There are some pepper plants and broccoli in here. I planted some other peppers and cauliflower in another section of the garden and put some shade cloth over it. The wind came up and blew the shade cloth back and forth which acted like a lawn mower and cut them all down. End of those poor things. Gardening is so hard here in NE Arizona. If the sun doesn't kill your garden, the wind will. You also have to water every single day since it is so dry here. This may be my last garden unless we get some kind of hoop house and some decent gardening soil.

 I made this lattice thing to hang some plants from so the mice and rabbits would leave them alone. I got the planters from Dollar Tree. I think they are waste buckets. I cut some wire to form handles which I looped over the lattice. There are Petunias, Marigolds and some Nasturtiums. I hate to see everything die over the winter so bring a lot of plants inside and baby them. I got so tired of watering all those plants so may just let nature take it's course this year.

 Finally the lilac bushes are looking healthy in their little prisons. Everything you plant here has to be protected by some kind of barrier to keep the critters from devouring it.

The spiderworts are doing great. I transplanted these a couple of years ago from the field next door. Without the cages, the rabbits would eat them all. I read that people can eat these also.

The fence is all finished in the front of our property. Pa and I worked out butts off and got it done in less than two weeks. The gate is gone from the road. We heard we are going to get another letter from the POA because after we took the gate down, we temporarily put a chain across the road to keep the cows out while we were fencing in the front. Wouldn't you think they would know it was only temporary when they could see we were fencing in the front? Pa and I drove all over the north side of the ranch and found all sorts of properties that were not in compliance with the CC&R's. Just about anyone who fenced in their property, put the fence too close to the road. We took pictures and notes and are planning to do the same on the south side of the ranch. Then after we get our letter, I want to see an attorney and have him write to the POA and ask them to provide him with a list with other properties they targeted just to make sure we aren't being singled out for personal reasons. Our POA president says there are no exceptions which makes him the biggest hypocrite because one of his properties is a dumping ground, covered in old dried up wood that is blowing all over the ranch and is a terrible fire hazard. The CC&R's clearly state that you can't use your property as an uncovered storage area. He tore down a bunch of buildings and dumped all the wood on one of his properties. It's been there so long, it's useless and all dried up. We got lots of pictures of that!

I've been having trouble with my right knee. I can hardly put any weight on it. It's not the front of my knee but most of the pain is in the bend of the knee. Last night, my right calf was pretty swollen. I've tried ice and heat. The heat gives me the most comfort. Sometimes it feels like the knee is going to bend the wrong way when I walk. The front of the knee is swollen a bit also. I'm too old to be in pain so , yes, I'm calling for a DR. appointment. You know, I have to be dying to call a Dr. so you can imagine how much this hurts.  Plus Pa is tired me limping around and groaning in pain.

Lets see, what else is new? I got a hair cut this past week. My hair was so damaged and dry, the stylist said I really needed a hot oil treatment. She also said I need to come in every six weeks to get a trim till all of the split ends are gone. She asked when I last had my hair cut. Professionally, it's been years so I told her I whacked at it a couple years ago. She just shook her head. I don't have any pictures but it is basically a long shag. She cut about three inches off the back and layered it. Gosh, it feels so light now! I hated to get it layered because my main goal was to get it all one length so I could braid it and forget about it. Ah, the price we pay for beauty!

Pa really got after Tom the other day because of his AT&T phone. You can barely get two words out and lose the call. He has to stand on top of his 5th wheel to get a signal and that's iffy. Pa finally blew up and told him what a cheap @$$ he was. He is on his sister's plan which cost him $10.00 a month. We've offered and offered to put him on our Verizon plan. With taxes and all , it will cost him $14.59 a month. He finally agreed but I told him I wouldn't do it unless he let me buy him a phone like ours which is a 3G Barrage phone. It is heavy duty, lightly water proof and works all over the ranch.  I just got one for Pa off of Ebay. He agreed so I bought one off Ebay for Tom and it should arrive shortly. He refuses to keep his phone on because he doesn't want to be bothered by the world. We told him to just not answer if he doesn't want to talk to anyone! Plus it is harder on the battery to turn it off and on. One nice thing about the Barrage, it charges up in 15 minutes and stays charged for a week or more being on all the time. I'll have to ask the Verizon people to give him a pep talk. Pa has been helping Tom to get his truck fixed. He hasn't had any transportation for a month. He ordered parts and apparently needs more parts so ordered them yesterday. We took him to Show Low with us Wednesday so he could buy groceries. When he goes alone, it takes him the entire day to shop and he gets home after dark. That's only visiting 3 stores! When I go, I get there by 8 , visit 6 or 7 stores and am on the way home by 11:30 a.m. He can't believe it. But then, he has to compare every price, talk to every person he sees, compare more prices ( this bottle has 30 pills, each pill lasts for 4 hours is is such and such a price. This bottle has 20 pills, lasts for 6 hours and cost such and such a price. Which is the better deal?) Imagine doing that with nose spray, this bottle requires one spray up each nostril, this one requires 2 sprays up each nostril, this one has x amount of liquid in it and this other one has x amount of liquid in it and this is the price. If I shopped this way, I'd hang myself!!!!!  Ya gotta love him tho. He's really funny and entertaining and is a good friend plus being my garden mentor.

Well, friends and family and who ever else reads my blog, that's it for now. Yak at ya soon!