Len's brother, Dave, just called from Wisconsin to say "hi" and let us know how the New Lisbon, WI commencement went last night. He said they had a great time and he gave the annual Tammy Richmond scholarship away to a very deserving student. Brother John and wife Elaine also traveled from Meqon with Dave to attend the ceremony along with Len's mother Millie. Thinking of what a nice time they all had together and how we've enjoyed them out here, thought I'd share a picture of Dave and Len riding our horses last winter and of Len's Mom on her last visit. Notice the beautiful Dragoon Mountains....we get to enjoy this view everyday.

More Metal Art

Here we are getting ready to do Becky's woman-art. That's me on the left, Alice in the middle and Becky on the right. THE ARTISTS!
Here we are with our completed laser cut outs. Those laser cutters are the neatest tool. It's so easy to work with, I recommend you are completely sober, however, need a steady hand. Ha ha Notice Alice's head fell off. When pounding away a little of the excess, she pounded the lady's head off......heavy handed girl, I guess. Len came to the rescue and welded it back on and we gave her a stone necklace to cover up the welding. Notice also - this is February in Arizona....

Time to relax, drink a beer and toast each other on the really neat project we completed.

It was a great day, great art, great friends, great memory.......Love my Texan girlfriends.

Lil Abner, one of my toy poodles is on my lap. He's a momma's boy......

Metal Art at Birdsong Ranch

I'm having too much fun with this blog. Decided to share my "metal art" with you all. When my girlfriends, Alice & Becky Rogers from Texas, were here in February, we made the metal art you see hanging on the outside entrance wall to our house. I saw these metal-art women in a catalog for a price I wasn't willing to pay. So decided I could free hand draw them on freezer paper, cut them out, and trace them onto some heavy metal we found laying in the old corral. So when the girls were here - I thought it would make a great memory if we did the project together. Our friend Gary Woolever lent us his laser metal cutter and Len helped us get started. You'll see the girls "at work". We had such a good time doing the project and I'm so pleased with the way they turned out. Mine is on the left, Becky's in the middle and Alice's on the right. Mine has a hand that is hanging on a stone chain. The hand is made of copper and is my mother's hand. When she was in hospice and in her final days with us, the chaplain made a hand print for all of us kids. I copied the handprint unto another piece of paper, cut it out and then taped it to a piece of old copper we had and cut the copper. It is very special to me. My metal-art women are much bigger than what I saw in the catalog. I just love them.

Water Lillies and BullFrog

Okay - so I'm having fun with this new blog. I'm working tonight (I work from home doing emergency care nurse case mangement for oil rigging companies) and I'm waiting for my patient/employee to be seen at the hospital - so have some time on my hands. Here are my water lillies that grow in our little water feature and a neat frog sitting on the lilly pad. I have the best water lilly crop this year which is good. It helps hide the little koi fish we have. When we first moved here - we had about 40 little gold fish. Then one day, along came the blue heron and ate them all but 5 or 6. Blue Herons are very bold - he came back another day, so I went out with the shotgun and he just ran a few yards and stopped and stared at me. So, I raised the gun and shot above him to scare him off. I couldn't shoot to kill, but I did scare him off for a while. He managed to come back when we weren't around and ate the rest of my fish. So, this last spring, Len got me some new ones. We have one beautiful Koi that is about 6" now and I'm hoping is smart enough to stay away from the Blue Heron. Len said I don't have to worry till Fall now. I've got to come up with something to keep that booger out of my fish pond.......

Critters on Birdsong Ranch

This week has been exciting. While we had friends here from Tucson last Saturday playing a good, hot game of Euchre, the birds outside of our great room/kitchen area were making a big fuss. We went out to see what was going on and saw a huge King (Bull) Snake up in one of the tree branches. The Gila Woodpeckers had babies in their nest and were going crazy. Then we saw a small owl that we looked up in our bird book and saw that it was a Flammulated owl, flying towards the snake and pecking at it. We knew there must be baby owls up in that old tree as well. Well Len got a long rod and poked at the snake and the snake holed up in a old piece of equipment on the old green shed and things settled down. However, the owl never left it's post on another tree. It stayed there for along time. That evening, the noise started all over again, and the owl, woodpeckers and cactus wrens were going crazy again. We saw the snake in the crotch of the tree. Len got a ladder and put gloves on and pulled the snake off the tree and took it to another area on the ranch. A couple of days later, sadly, we found 2 baby owls dead. Here's a picture of the owl and the Snake Catcher. There's nothing he's afraid of......what a man...he's my man..

A new well on Birdsong Ranch

About 2 weeks ago, the water turned clay colored. We had suspected our well was going bad, but hated to admit it. The man that put in the new well, told us that a fly-by-night well driller came through this area and put in new wells with 4" plastic casing. Many of them have failed. We seemed to be one of them. Well.........we had a new well drilled this week. They went down almost 700 feet to hit good water. Took 2 days to drill that far - now they need to come back and pull the pump we replaced 2 years ago from the old well and drop it down into the new well. Soon - we will have good water again. We're showing the rig set up - very interesting to say the least. They use an auger that goes down with the 6" steel casing, with the hole created with high pressured water. It was noisy for 2 days, but worth it. Now, maybe our white's will be white again.....Life on the ranch........the price we pay... you won't believe the cost of a new well in these parts.

Baby India and Tammy's Visit

Tammy & Baby India came for a visit in May also. It was so great to be able to have fun with India and be with her. She is growing so fast and is such a happy little girl. She would get up every morning, come out to the great room and say a big "HI" with a big smile on her face. She was so playful and full of conversation. She loved Daisy Mae and Lil Abner and was extra special good with them. She loves to dance and exercise and do Yoga and loves to talk.....wonder where she gets that from? We visited the Zoo in Tucson and India fed the giraffe - his tongue touched her hand and she had a very surprised look on her face!!! We enjoyed their visit a lot and look forward to the next one.

Mother's Day, 2008

Jason, Edie's oldest son, came to visit us for Mother's Day, along with his lab, Shelby. We had such a good time together. Went to Wilcox on Mother's Day and visited the Rex Allen Museum. Very nice museum. Then went to local coffee shop and enjoyed an iced coffee. It was a beautiful day and great to have Jason with us. We spent the weekend, relaxing, cooking meals together and watching movies...good time.

What's New at Birdsong Ranch

We've been on our ranch since November 2003. So much has happened since we moved here - we only wish we had started this blog back then. But have decided to share our life with our friends and family in a way that will keep you in touch with us in an easy manner.

We'll start with May 2008.

One day in May, Edie decided she wanted to change the flower bed in the front of the house. She didn't like the old railroad ties and wanted them removed with a new flower bed created. Well, one thing led to another - and we ended up pulling out the railroad ties and painting the entire house in the bargain. It was totally spontaneous, but in retrospect a good move. The house looks great. The flowers aren't planted yet, but by gosh the house got painted.