Birthday time

My handsome, hardworking guy Sam recently had a birthday, and the weekend before we drove a couple hours to Arivaca to visit with our good friends, Don and Linda. Plus, our good friends Gord and Linda (two Lindas!) came along and brought birthday candles and cakes!

Sam brought chicken fajita fixings, which Don cooked on his awesome grill.

We ate outdoors on the patio and were glad for nice weather. Don and Linda live in a 5th wheel like we do, and 8 people don't fit well inside! Matter of fact, Gord and Linda are now RVers, too.

Don and Linda are starting to build a house, so everyone inspected the site and talked about the floor plan.

Also, they now own La Tortuga, the tiny 12 foot redwood trailer that my Mom and Dad built about 14 years ago. Linda was happy to show Mom how well they're taking care of it.

And Mom was excited to see it again.

She met Linda's granddaughter Melody, who now uses Tortuga as her bedroom.

This fun day ended with a surprise gift for Sam.

Perfect for our Pumpkin Patch Ranch! (Special thanks to Linda K. for many of these photos.)

One day last week, we awoke to heavy fog, a very unusual occurrence in southern Arizona. We couldn't see more than 50 yards and it was rather unnerving to drive through.

A couple days later Mom and I took a long walk around the ranch.

She just keeps on truckin'.

Then Sam invited Mom up to our trailer for lunch. He fried wontons and anytime Sam makes food that could faintly be called Asian, he breaks out his collection of chopsticks. He learned to use chopsticks from our friend Fernando when they were driving a semi-truck together and visited an L.A. sushi bar. The funny thing is, Fernando is Hispanic and grew up in southern California! (Side note: we are hoping to visit this historic sushi bar on our upcoming weekend trip to Los Angeles.) But I digress...Sam wanted Mom and I to also use chopsticks, and we did just fine with the "cheater" ones that are joined at one end.

Life is never dull with this guy.

I hope you're all having a great week.