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Sunday, October 23, 2016

Living in the Sonoran Desert October 2016

Have you ever wanted to live somewhere totally different?
I think we all dream that dream sometime in our life.
Whether it is on a lake, by the ocean, someplace cold, or someplace warm, the thought has surly crossed your mind.
I thought Chuck had lost his mind when he talked about going to Arizona.
You all know how that turned out, now don't you?
I truly am enjoying the thought of being nice and warm when it is splitting snow and ice in Oklahoma.
I look forward to the beautiful sunsets that the desert brings.
What an adventure this season is going to be!
As I posted in the last entry we are getting our shed next week.
This is fairly exciting as it will allow us an area to put our "stuff".
You know what that is.....it's something that all Americans collect and think we can't live without. LOL.


I put a hummingbird feeder out last week and am happy to report that we have 3 regulars.
There is one little guy that really would rather not share the feeder but he seems to be calming down a bit and sharing with the other two.
They just sit on the branches and don't seem to be bothered by us humans.


Snakes have been spotted in the park.
We saw one that had been killed by a resident and it (rattler) was about 2' long.
A large rattler was killed over in another section on Saturday night.
At the same time the people were killing it, the guys were closing up the pool maintenance area and he walked in and saw a giant snake there as well.
Chuck is deathly afraid of snakes and I have to say they aren't my favorite either.
Hopefully the same wranglers can rid the park of these pest!!!!
All the talk about snakes has everyone watching. 
We came back to our rig and as soon as I got inside I realized I forgot my phone in our golf cart.
As I walk out and almost get to the cart our air bags in the truck make their usual noise and scared the crap out of me.
Chuck sure got a good laugh when I came back in and told him what had happened.  :)



We wentplant shopping on Saturday and brought home a few.
We found some golden barrel cacti and also bought a few hummingbird yuccas.
Got another plant called a Good Luck Plant.
With a name like that of course we had to have one.
It resembles the an ocotillo in a way.
I am wanting an ocotillo as well, but until we get the shed built I think we will hold off on purchasing anymore.



Paint colors for shed



The guy that is building the shed came by today to make final arrangements.
He will be here Thursday to install. 
Our colors are Medallion for the shed, with trim of Persian Carpet...sure hope it looks ok!!!












We had several "firsts" this last week.
Our activity directors, Joe and Kathy, have already been busy planning all kinds of things for us old people to do.
This is their first year as activity directors and we have taken a liking to them as they enjoy laughter about as much as we do!  (Our kind of people)
They have already earned nicknames from Chuck and I.
One of their emails they sent out was telling everyone of times of events, and the AM and PM in a few of the times were incorrect.
OK, so most people know that if they are telling you about a breakfast event, if you see PM, you can use logic and realize they meant AM.
Well,it seems some people had to make a bigger deal out of it and notified the higher ups that it was incorrect.
Anyway, we all just laughed it off and before the evening was over we had dubbed them AM and PM....
Inside joke, but so funny.


OK back to the things we did this week.
We had a "FIdo Friday" and yes it involved our dogs.
The town of Florence has a dog park, so we went to the park with the dogs and let them run and play.
Bronco is not that social with other dogs, but by the time the evening was over, she was getting the hang of it.
She met Chimmy, which is Joe and Kathy's little part chihuahua and min-pin, I think.
Murphy was there as well, he is a soft coated Wheaton Terror.
A few other dogs joined the group and it was so much fun watching them get acquainted.
There were a lot of laughs as we watched Chimmy bounce across the green grass chasing anything that moves.
Murphy was like a referee.
If he thought anything  or anyone was getting out hand he would come and break it up.
There will be more dog get togethers and we are planning on joining again as it was a lot of fun.
Hope Bronco enjoyed it too.
We had our first "Ice Cream Social" this afternoon.
We enjoyed meeting some new people and of course spending time with the ones we know.
We start another week of desert living and can't wait to see what is in store for us......as long as there are NO snakes!!!!!






Thursday, October 20, 2016

Transitioning 2016

Transitioning is a big word with big things attached to it for me.
I am making a lot of changes in my somewhat normal routine.
First I have transitioned my sticks and bricks business to a mobile business.
That alone was a major undertaking.
The store officially closed on October 14th but we actually were on the road to the second transition on Monday October 11th
As far as the store goes, I am pleased at the technologies of the 21st century in that I can take my business line of 25 plus  years and convert to a cellular phone.
My office is set up at the house and it turned out great.
I am getting the hang of carrying my phone and doing business right on the spot.

It was quite a whirlwind making all this happen in a timely manner  but I am happy to say that it is all coming together quite nicely.
I think I will be happy with the outcome of it.







So I said we left on Monday October 11th for the second transition.
That involves hauling our 43ft Taj-Mah-Hauler to the deserts of Arizona.
Some people just wouldn't like this dry dusty climate but Chuck and I took a liking to it.
So much that we purchased a little piece of the Sonora Desert in March of this year.














We spent a couple of nights on the road and about the only exciting thing we saw was that Bronco was up close and personal to a little cotton tailed rabbit on our stay in Tucumcari NM KOA RV Park.



















Our trip went a whole lot smoother than our first trip out here in March.
We made it here with all tires inflated. ;)
We plugged into our power supply and had no problems.
If you wonder why I say this I will add the link to our last trip to Arizona and you can understand my concerns for a few of these things.First trip to Florence

It was wonderful to see all the beautiful saguaro cacti start coming into view as we made our way to Florence.














Our lot was just as we left it....well almost!!!!
No weeds.... so it looks like the advise from others to spray with a good weed killer before we left was spot on!
We are the proud owners of a very very large ant bed, but not for long!
I got out my spray and powder and by the next morning, there was just a very large area of dead ants!!!!!














We are set up and getting settled in with our new 60x70foot lot, and just like last season, we are seeing some beautiful sunsets!!!











The planning stage of where to put the new storage building has begun.
Since we are in a Co-op the process to add a building involves drawing plans as to the location of the shed.
Chuck and I have agreed where we think it should go
The paint color has been chosen and now it goes to the board member for approval.

We are looking at cacti that we want to add to our landscape.
You see our lot consist of one Palo Verde tree (that I dearly love)  and it provides a nice shaded area for our temporary pergola.




Chuck is now playing horseshoes with the guys three days a week
I will start water aerobics soon
 Our little golf cart is a wonderful mode of transportation when we need to take trash to the dumpster or I need to do laundry as I am doing now.

We have met up with friends that we met in March that are in the park and also met some really nice new ones.







The park is beginning to fill with Snowbirds.
There is also a lot of movement with new park models being built.


We are getting the RV washed and waxed on Thursday.
After the love bugs it is in real need of some TLC.

The winds are blowing quite nicely today. (which is actually unusual)
Reminds us of Oklahoma ;)
Everyone is talking about how high they are, but to us it is just a breeze....LOL



I just had to share this picture of a song that was playing on the radio as we drove into Florence one day.
Chuck told me to check it out, and of course I had to take a pic to prove it was happening.








Things are calming down and it is time to enjoy our home away from home.
Stay tuned for more updates on our progress.

By the way....we got approval to build our shed, so looks like next week is going to be a very busy week,  as our contractor has told us instead of the November 11th date he originally told us, has now moved up to next Wednesday!!!!!
AWESOME, love when a plan comes together  :)