Desert Garden

Being sick has one advantage.  Lots of books get read without interruption.  I actually made a dent in the piles next to my bed and my Kindle list has temporarily shortened.  But that's the only positive.  I didn't even get to sleep in as I still had to get my daughter off to school.  But the bug has finally run its course and I am back in the Land of Living.  Just in time for a beautiful weekend.  Blue skies and warm temperatures beckoned me into the yard for the first time in a week.

It is THE weekend.  Finally.  I can put together the 6' x 8' raised garden bed that I've been thinking about for a LONG time.  We have officially passed the frost-free date for our area.  No guarantees, I know, but I can't back any longer.  The area in the side yard has been chosen.  It receives enough sunlight to make plants happy but gets afternoon shade so that they don't wilt and cry "Uncle" when our temps get high.  I moved the composter (full of larvae churning the kitchen scraps to nice black soil), cleared the old gravel, assembled the bed using my Christmas gift of bed corners from Gardener's Supply, and then began the arduous work of turning over a foot or so of the concrete - like "soil".  After about 5 shovels full I started to question my sanity.  I'm less than 24 hours from my sick bed  - what the heck am I doing?  Still, orange trees are blooming with their sweet, sweet smell which I could occasionally get whiffs of when my sinuses decided to momentarily clear.  Bees buzzed amongst them.  I guzzled water and reassured the hummingbird that was keeping up a running commentary on my progress.  Eventually I finished the digging and lugged over the 5 huge sacks of soil.... hmmmm... clearly not enough. So another trip to Home Depot and oops... 4 more plants made it onto my cart along with the bags of soil courtesy of my daughter. But how can you NOT buy this one:

This photo is from the Learn2Grow site here:  Learn2Grow

It's called "The Ravers/Pink Sugar" and it's an African Daisy.  Gorgeous desert sunset colors!  Once home, my kids unloaded the soil and turned the bed over.  Saved my back a little distress.  And then we began the fun work... planting!  We did a mixture of plants and seeds.  Tomatoes and marigolds together, herbs up front where I can pinch leaves and smell.  My daughter's sunflowers in the back where we can eventually tie them to the wall so they won't fall over when the summer winds start. Basil seedlings transplanted from the volunteers in my porch pots. Now it's water and wait.  Dream of the chiles and tomatoes that I will enjoy later. And start to scheme up ways to keep the neighborhood quail from devouring my tomatoes at the exact moment that they ripen to perfection.  My quirky daughter is looking forward to the nights when we go out with flashlights and pull of the cutworms and tomato hornworms and squish them with bricks.  Funny the things that kids remember happily from their childhoods!

So now I check the garden on an hourly basis, hoping that my seedlings have popped up.  I'll get bored in a few days and will stop checking.  At that point they will spring up.  In the meantime, I smile.  I love gardens.  I love the hard work up front preparing everything.  I love the gift of plants popping up and gaining strength.  I love cooking and being able to step out the back door to snip some parsley or thyme.  And I love being drawn outdoors where I can watch the mockingbird picking for bugs amongst my pots, listen to him sing his territory boundaries, hear the palm berries drop and bounce as a starling picks them over, and listen to the kestrel scold the world before disappearing into the palm frond nest.  Spring in the Desert.  

Dog eyes...

Sammy didn't like the rambunctious young 'uns.  She held herself aloof that first day.

There are three sets of eyes drilling into me.  My dinner is done, but all three are hoping that there is a tidbit somewhere that I've hidden away.  Sorry dogs.  It's all done and gone.  I ate it all.  I know my father has led you to believe that tidbits exist.  But not tonight.  I was hungry.  And you didn't offer me anything from your dinner.  So I don't feel bad.

But I look into your eyes.  All so different.  Sammy stares at me with an intensity that is hard to ignore. Black eyes in a yellow face, not blinking.  She doesn't move at all. Everything is focused like a laser on my mouth.  Maybe there's a tidbit hidden there.  Meanwhile, drool begins to form a long string from her right jowl.  Uck.  It appears at the least possibility of food.  Paws shift on the couch next to me, a slight intake of breath that isn't regular and my attention is shifted to Jake.  He's horrified that "his food" might go to another canine.  His golden eyes hold a panic, an intense "Oh no!" look.  He's also upset that the newest dog on the block (Buster) keeps stealing borrowing his bobos (toys).  Jake is torn between watching for the potential tidbit and watching to make sure that Buster doesn't make a move towards the nearest bobo.  No drool from him... just a lunge into my lap to make sure that he still the favorite dog.  He conveniently manages to wipe his mouth across my chest and take up the whole couch so that Sammy can't climb up.  Multi-tasker Jake.  Yep.  And finally a huge sigh is heaved from across the table where Buster has concluded that there will be no more food.  His dark brown eyes are almost invisible in his black face.  He smiles at me, with his pink tongue shining out of his face and then flops down to nap.  He's too new to worry about food too much.  Wait until he meets my Dad.  That will change things.

Such different personalities in these dogs.  My worried, needy-of-constant-love dog.  My brother's laid-back, sneaky dog (she can slide out of a room and get in the garbage faster than any dog I know).  Buster, Terry's dog, is the young kid whose biggest concern is getting someone to throw a toy for him.  He can play catch for hours.  The other two older dogs appreciate one or two throws and then need a nap.  And now as this is written, Jake has gone outside to see what the neighbor dogs are up to. He's barking his opinion to the world.  Sammy has taken the spot next to me on the couch and keeps trying to lay her slobbery jowls across my keyboard. She oozes love but I know she just wants as much body contact as possible.  Buster keeps spitting bobos at me, hoping that I'll throw them.  He left when Sammy quietly growled.  The old lady keeps him in his place. He's now laying with his head out the dog door, unsure whether to go out or not. He wants to join Jake, but isn't really happy with the dog door.


I shall leave the dogs to their lives...and go get my daughter from work.

Jake and Buster about a half hour after meeting. This is before Buster started borrowing bobos.  They aren't so close now. :)

My morning's Cool Bird

It's Sunday and I HAD planned on going birding today.  I wanted to go to the Rio Salado Habitat as I haven't been there and it is the season for migratory birds to be moving through.  Alas, as usual, life gets in the way of what I want to do.  So instead, I'm being a good girl and getting some of my work out of the way as I know Monday and Tuesday I will not have enough time to get it all done and meet two deadlines.

I woke up early - not that I wanted to but my body chose differently.  Once I heaved that sigh both the cat and dog KNEW it was time for morning kibbles.  They started the full court press.  Cold nose under the quilt, looking for warm armpits, fluffy tail flicked right under my nose, louding purring, and equally, no..., louder panting.  Dog breath.  Yuk.  That was enough to get me out of bed.  Kibbles done. I went outside and listened to the Thrashers as they called back and forth.  My morning "Witty-wits".  This morning one of them was singing.  Really nice to listen to that sweetness and watch the sky go from violet to lilac to pink.  I went back inside before it went to the apricot hue.  I was cold and the coffee had finished.  Morning Sudoku done.  2nd cup of coffee has gone cold.  Time to go out and rid my yard of the dog's week worth of poop.  Lordy, how he can poop! As I worked a sound kept tapping at the edges of my mind.  Not one I'm used to hearing around my house.  I wandered around the yard, looking for signs that the plants are ready to explode into Springtime bloom.  Nope.  No signs other than the Fouquieria that my Dad planted is in full leaf.  

He planted it as an 18" 3 pronged stick.  I think he picked a good spot to plant it as this puppy is definitely a happy Fouquieria.  It isn't an Ocotillo - though it is related.  Meanwhile, that sound continued to tap at my brain.  Wasn't getting through completely.  As I turned to go inside, I heard it clearly.  Kind of a wheezy "creer" that just didn't belong to my usual yard sounds.  Whatever it was, it was up in the pine tree in my front yard, and wasn't big and showy.  Ran and got my binocs and headed into the front yard.  Of course the sun was shining right about where the bird should be.  Repositioned myself so that the palm tree blocked the sun, raised the binocs to my eyes, and Voila!

Not my photo.  I got this from Wikimedia Commons.  Photo by Calibas.

 There it was!  A Red-naped Sapsucker!  Not a common bird around my neighborhood.  In fact I've never seen one in Phoenix before.  Guess I don't get out enough as other birders have seem them, and often enough that they aren't considered an oddity.  Ah well.  Cool for me!  I watched him for a while as he picked about the branches, round and round the tree.  And I realized that the "creer" sound was very much like the Hairy Woodpeckers up at my parent's home in Colorado.  Just got to get the brain in gear a little faster.  AND! After reading up on this bird, I'm willing to bet most of the birds I've been calling Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers here in the desert are probably Red-napes.  I really need to get back on the ball with birding.

So now I can go back to my work that I don't want to do.  Except that my daughter just called and wants to go buy storage containers so she can begin to pack her room in anticipation of moving to the dorm this August.  Anything that gets her to clean her room I am willing to help with!  And yes, Mom... I'm going to send the birthday photos right away.