Home for Memorial Day weekend

This is the view of one of Mom's rose bushes and her bird feeder from her kitchen window. She has some really beautiful birds that come and eat. They really are lots of fun to watch.

We had such a good time while we were home. We helped Dad plant some trees (or rather, Pooker did). We helped my brother build a fort for the grandkids. (I guess I could have taken a picture, except it is mainly just poles in the ground at this time--not much to see yet.) I helped Mom make the lunches and dinners (fried soft tacos, grilled hamburgers, roast beef and baked potatoes). We ate really well. I may have eaten too much as it was so good.

I had Dad take Brownie and I rock hunting in one of the pastures. We were looking for arrowheads mainly as it is one of my goals in life to find a complete arrowhead. I have lots of ones that were being carved to be arrowheads, but not one that was actually completed. I'd like to have at least one. Dad drove us up a very rocky dirt road, then off the road and bumping across the pasture. When we parked and got out, he grabbed a big stick from the back of his truck and he said it was to kill any rattlesnakes with. We probably walked around for two miles. We found several that had been started, but nothing complete. I also found some rose quartz, which I thought was really pretty (I'm not only limited to arrowheads or the makings of one when I look for rocks--whatever strikes me as neat, I pick up.)

At one point, Dad went on ahead a little bit to sit and rest. When Brownie and I caught up with him, he was sitting on the side of this little hill, right beside a big hole (burrow) with fresh little tracks in front of the burrow. When we walked up, Dad asked if I wanted him to poke his stick in the hole and see what came out. He thought it might be badger, then went on to say that badgers were a really ferocious animals. I told him to definitely not stick anything in the hole. He asked if I would leave him there if a badger got him and I told him no, but as I had no stick, I wasn't sure how much help I would be getting the badger off. He didn't poke it in the hole and we went on back to the pickup.

We got in and were driving off. We were bumping around in the pasture, going up a little incline (in which we could not see what was beyond the hood of the truck) when Dad's seat flew backwards. He did not let off the gas and for a little bit, his hands weren't even on the wheel, but he finally righted himself and we made it up the incline. It was pretty funny.

It wasn't until after we got home that Dad mentioned that he had actually never killed a rattlesnake with the stick he had been carrying. I was glad I hadn't known that earlier, as I had been walking confidently behind him, secure in the knowledge that if anything popped up, he'd take care of it. I guess the only thing the stick has been used for is to herd cattle.

Unfortunately, I didn't take my camera with me as I didn't have anywhere to put it. I saw so many beautiful wild flowers that I would have loved to share with you. And it was so cute to see Brownie following right behind Dad and his stick at times when we were going through knee high prairie grasses. Dad has said he'll take us again, but we'll try a different place next time and I'll try to be better prepared (ie. have a place for my camera and maybe have two buckets with me instead of the one bucket of water that I carried for Brownie because I really didn't have much room for my rocks, either).