Merry Christmas to All

Merry Christmas from Sam, Jan and Mom Virginia at Pumpkin Patch Ranch! Sam's 1976 International Loadstar is the perfect vehicle for Christmas lights and can be seen from all over the neighborhood. Pretty cute, huh?

Benson recently held its Festival of Lights Parade and we were a part of it. Benson School District Transportation Department decorated a bus with "gingerbread, icing and candies" and Sam volunteered to drive.

Sam's boss, Cynde, and her daughter donned the Benson Bobcat uniforms to greet the fans.

And I waved from the windows.

There were lots of pretty lights. 

Even the school marching band was glowing. 

A few nights before, Sam and I attended a family friendly showing of The Grinch. I believe it was the newer 2018 version. We don't have kids, so we've never really seen any of them! Needless to say, we didn't wear our jammies. 

We also caught the annual high school Talent Show. There were many fun and enjoyable acts, but these dancers were the highlight. You can hear hysterical laughter from the audience, which could have been me!

I attended an open house at Endeavor Gallery, where a few of my paintings are displayed. Members brought their recent works, which were fascinating to see and hear about.

We're kind of going backwards in time here. Earlier in November, Tim and Josie came for a visit and took us all out to lunch at Mi Casa, our favorite restaurant. 

They came back a couple days later for a barbecue, and Josie brought her famous pumpkin tart all the way from home! It was incredible, and so good to spend time with them. 

Sam entertained Mom Virginia, as usual, although she pretended she doesn't appreciate him.

Meanwhile, our lone gazania plant finally put out a flower, and it was a knockout.

Golden fall color came to Benson in the cottonwood trees along the San Pedro River. After 40 years in the Sonoran Desert, I love living in a climate where the seasons change. 

On the subject of yellow, one of Sam's students was moving and requested a mohawk, so we made it look like a school bus. It was a hit.

We had Thanksgiving at our house this year. Sam made the turkey in his "new" 1950's roaster, which did a great job. He also made pumpkin pies from the pumpkins that grew on our Pumpkin Patch Ranch this year, and they tasted great.

I made the mashed potatoes and organized the food. Do you see the aforementioned roaster on the right? The red light means it was cooking the turkey at that very moment. 

Our guests brought other dishes, so of course there was plenty. Dean is our expert turkey carver, and Peggy is the cook. Bill and Kathie always liven up the party.

Seating at Ma's is always tight, so Sam went looking for alternatives. 

Dean brought his homemade potato cannon, made of ABS pipe and fittings. All the guys tried it and we now have potato chunks scattered around the ranch. Maybe they'll sprout next year!

Overall, it was a great time, even the cleanup.

Last weekend, our dinner group (which we call "As Long as There is Gelato") were finally able to meet again after almost 2 years. Paul and Gaye were here for a visit, and we all had a great time catching up. 

Back at the ranch, I've started clearing out the tiny 1950's travel trailer we got months ago. Previous residents have been rodents, snakes and chickens, so it's kind of a big job.

Sam recently purchased a new Stihl weed trimmer and has spent hours cutting and leveling the native grasses, bushes and weeds around our buildings and driveways. He's creating a brushfire buffer, for safety. Doesn't it look so much better?

Early and mid December brought our first nighttime temperatures dipping close to freezing, so I spent a few days in the garden. I gathered over 300 tomatillos as I cleared out the plants.

Peppers and okra came next, and I still have to get out there to clear the tomato plants. 

I enjoy working outdoors. I spent way too many years working indoors at a desk job!

This morning I saw our first frost on this bale of straw, so I'm just in time.

I'll leave you with some recent early morning moments on the ranch. 

Where the light is golden.

The silence is rarely broken.

And the visitors may not be reindeer, but surely are a close relative.

We wish you all a blessed Christmas remembering Jesus's birth and a safe and Happy New Year!

Where does the time go?

 

It's October already! What happened to summer?

Last month, in honor of Homecoming weekend in our little town of Benson, Sam came up with his best mohawk yet.

Can you see the sparkles?!

He and the school kids (and pretty much everyone) had a lot of fun with it. A mohawk attracts a lot of attention at football games. An unknown announcer even thanked "the bus driver with the hair" for his school spirit!

The night before, the school held a good, old-fashioned bonfire. Who does that anymore?! It was really fun to see. And yes, the Fire Department was there in case of emergencies. 

Meanwhile, Mom Virginia stays close to home. Anymore, trips of more than an hour or two seem to disturb her peace of mind.

She does enjoy meeting people who come by, and we all enjoyed Greg and Susan's visit. 

Sam enjoyed having time to barbeque his famous chicken fajitas. 

A couple weeks later, Bob and Shelly were returning home from a trip back east and took a day to stop and see us. It was really great to catch up. We saw them on our trip to Yuma last February. 

Also in September, I ran my first (and probably only!) 5K Run-Walk-Roll at nearby J-6 Ranch. I've been "training" by lengthening my daily jog.

It was fun and also challenging. There were 7 or 8 people in my age category (60's) and I came in 3rd! Overall, I was closer to the end of the pack, of course. 

Back at the ranch, our garden continues to produce peppers, tomatillos, okra and tomatoes, although the shorter days and cooler temperatures have slowed it down a lot.

One day Sam discovered a pumpkin already half grown in the native grasses under the trees! Despite this being the Pumpkin Patch Ranch, we've never planted pumpkins. (Someday we'll tell you the story about that name.)

But here they are! Last Halloween I decorated a small one and it ended up in the compost pile, which spawned a bounty.

In my last blog, I showed you the colorful green caterpillar munching on our parsley. We never found a cocoon, but saw these black Swallowtails several times. What amazing beauty. 

Other recent critters are a large Clark's Spiny lizard that we named...Clark! A couple kinds of 3 inch grasshoppers. And several hundred one inch juvenile toads that were so cute, with pretty markings. Many were getting squished by cars on the road, so we spent one evening helping them safely cross.

Sam installed a trailer hitch on his Crown Victoria. What an amazingly handy guy.

Then he installed a new sink in Mom's kitchen. It's twice as deep and a little bigger and we all love the extra room for washing pots and pans.

It's hard for Sam to fit his broad shoulders under the sink, so my job was putting in the clips to hold it in place.

We also got new blinds installed. Mom's place is looking pretty spiffy!

Early October brought Sam's Fall Break at school and we spent a few days in Clarkdale, Cottonwood and Prescott for our 17th wedding anniversary.

Our first priority was to take the back highways and avoid the big cities, so the last few miles were through the old mining town of Jerome right at sunset. Bonus!

The next day we showed  up at the Verde Canyon Railroad. 

They had lunch on the patio and an Ales on Rails event, an Octoberfest kind of thing. And a Sam kind of thing!

Then we boarded the train and the real fun began.

The scenery was beautiful from the beginning, and so was the train.

We were assigned comfortable lounge chairs indoors.

But we spent most of our time in the outdoor car. It was a perfect day. 

The scenery was spectacular. 

There was even a tunnel!

Verde Canyon Railroad

The following day we explored several national monuments: Tuzigoot, Montezuma Castle and Montezuma Well. I can't remember if I've ever been to any of them; anyone else remember?

Tuzigoot is fascinating and must have been majestic in its day, about 1,000 years ago.

Montezuma Castle was a nice stroll. Sam's Aunt Ruth spent her childhood nearby and told him about playing in the ruins.

The creek was nice, too, with huge Arizona Sycamore trees. I might try painting part of this scene.

But our favorite was Montezuma Well.

This large hidden pond is replenished by over a million of gallons of water every day from deep in the earth. It then flows through a small outlet to the surrounding valley.

And it's been doing this for thousands of years! The Sinagua people built this pueblo under the rim.

A trail leads you to the bottom and around the edge of the water. It's a quiet, peaceful place; my favorite kind. 

On the way back up, we can't resist climbing on the rocks a bit.

While in the neighborhood, we stopped in the tiny burg of Cornville and Sam spotted a barber shop.

He needed a trim and we made a new friend in Lee, a 91 year-old Korean War veteran who cut (then) Vice President Richard Nixon's hair on board the Navy aircraft carrier USS Yorktown. People lead such interesting lives, if you just get to know them!

We spent a day in Prescott, where we honeymooned 17 years ago, in this very spot next to a wall of boulders. 

We had breakfast at Zeke's, where we ate several times on our honeymoon. And drove by the Target store where we went on rainy days to spend the Target gift cards we received as wedding gifts. Anyone remember giving those to us?!

As we started home the next morning, we found a pretty little park with a lake where we could enjoy our coffee, chai and pastries. 

We took the back highways east around the cities this time. It takes longer, but we enjoy it so much more.

Our thanks to Sam's sister Faye, my sister Becky, and our friend Tracy for their part in making this vacation possible! We had a wonderful time. 

I'll leave you today with this fun and appropriately themed photo of Sam on his first grader bus trip to Apple Annie's in Willcox last week. One of our jokes (and if you know Sam, you know we have many) is that he is 50 years old going on 5. And here's proof!