Animals of the Desert

More from the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, do you have a feel yet how cool this place was!!

This barn owl weighs only a pound! He hacks up pellets of all the fur and bones of the little rodents he eats but can't digest! yuck!

Everything in the desert is smart enough to take it real easy when the sun gets high, including these Mexican Grey Wolves, who are still endangered.

This is a kiwati, or something like that, I can't find it on the Web and they aren't in Colorado. They look like a cross between a raccoon, ant eater and a little bit of cat!

The birds of prey were amazing, flying all over the place, landing here and there and then returning to their handlers!

River Otters are a "Hoot"!

Have you ever noticed that it doesn't matter the species ( even these Desert Sheep) the male has to have a higher perch?

That Grey Fox is trying to decide if it is worth it to try and catch that little bird in the heat of the midday sun.

That's a javalina-a hairy pig. My husband use to hunt them with a compound bow, even had one of the heads mounted-yeah.......do you know how sporting good stores get all their trophies they line around high up along the walls?....widows- the second the hubby is in the ground, the wife gets rid off all the dead things lining the house. Jon keeps his hides in his office-the rest of the house is animal free and his hunting passion has subsided for mountain biking- he still hunts deer and elk in the fall, he is a Colorado boy-but not so much the exoctic animals-though javalina is pretty good, so is antelope. He did bring home a bear roast one time, since the etiguette is if you help another hunter pack out game, you get some of the meat- yuck- you have to marinade it for like a week and then cook it for another- it has tricanosis, like pork, so you have to be really careful-thought he would try and make sausage with it using my Cuisinart food processor-took my a looooong time to de-bear meat that! We do eat a lot of Elk and Deer- between my husband and brother-Did have rattlesnake once, that tastes like chicken....humm don't know why all these animal pics made me thing of cooking wild game?

From the Cross

"Father forgive them for they do not know what they are doing" Luke 23:34

"I tell the truth, today you will be with me in paradise." Luke 23:43

"Dear woman here is your son. Here is your mother." John 19:26,27

"My God, My God why have you forsaken me." Matthew 27:46

"I am thirsty" John 19:28

"It is finished." John 19:28

"Father, into your hands I commit my spirit." Luke 23:46

Does This Need Any Words?

At the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum- Raptors in Flight.

wow!!

The Desert in Bloom

One day we went to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. This early in the spring, the water was flowing and everything was in bloom!

everything in the desert has thorns....for survival,

but somehow, life finds a way of living!

Tucson Trip--Pima Air Museum

We went to the Pima Air and Space Museum, next to the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base.

where I thought the most interesting fact was that even the Wright Brothers had to defend their historical flght!

In Search of the Sun

Spring Break this week, so to get away from this.....

we headed south with friends, to soak up the sun and do a little hiking, biking and sightseeing. We knew we were getting close when we started to see the saguaro cacti ( I checked that's plural) standing at attention.

Salt Canyon- is a really big dip and not that far across for all the winding and switch backs you have to do to get a cross...

The Salt Canyon River is the dividing boundary between the Fort Apache Indian Reservation and the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation.

Edward Curtis, one of the first photographers who set out to record the vanishing West, photographed the White Mountain Apache Tribe in the late 1800s. Fort Apache is also a really good John Ford Western, starring an amazing cast of John Wayne, Henry Fonda, Ward Bond and a teenage Shirley Temple.

Unfortunately there was a real battle between the Apaches and the US Cavalry in Salt Canyon, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel George Crook who later tried to bring in the infamous Apache, Geronimo, but was replaced by General Nelson A. Miles. When Geronimo finally surrendered, not only he, but all the Apache scouts who had helped the army track down the Medicine Man where sent to prison in Florida.   

Warmed up we headed the rest of the way to Tucson Arizona- where the sun was shining and we were ready for four days of playing tourist....more to come.

4seeds-thistles

The illustration is coming along. It is the biggest I have ever done, not by choice, but because I had to have it that big to have any chance of dealing with the hands. That is the biggest issue with fabric-I can only cut and stitch fabric that is so big-smaller and it literally falls apart. Am finding that the more realistic I want to go the bigger I have to in faces and hands.
If you can see it-the stitch I am using on the face and hands is not a basic whip stitch-have done that and it looks like I have made Frankenstein people. I stitch it at an angle and cover the whole edge- kind of what a surger might do. It can take some time, but have found the whole edge of skin, needs to be covered.
Have been intrigued with thistles and crows for that matter-been watching both along the country roads-Purple and black- being cool colors by nature hopefully will really pop out from the warmness of the wheat field- another way to contrast and bring attention- throw a cool into a palette of warms- or vice versa. I will be finishing the guy last because want to get the crows done before make a decision about his shirt-might have to take the whole illustration to the fabric shop to find the perfect fabric.
I'd say I am about half way done with laying down- don't know how long the crows will take- maybe longer, probably longer than I think- needs to do another row of thistles, this is not going to be enough and then weave stocks of wheat into them- then do the layer of stones and more struggling wheat and then the road-ahhhhh maybe I am not half way done.
I am not working on this all the time- have writing projects am doing as well.

scroll down to other posts to see the progression of  "4seeds"

Happy St. Patrick's Day

Yes in our family, you better be wearing green when you wake up...My husband is a Kelly by blood!
But actually I have more Irish family history on my side then he does.
Burns is actually Welsh- but the family migrated over to Ireland way way back when.
James and John Burns came over to the New World from Ireland and first thing they did was fight in the Civil War. James, my great, great, great? grandfather married Bridget and settled in the West.
We took a trip through Wyoming, through Grand Tetons and Yellowstone National Parks, up through Montana to go see my dad in Idaho, last summer and stopped in Butte Montana- for a break.

Butte is an Irish Town. Up on a hill, where the Immigrants mined for copper-it is Irish and it is Catholic. It was very interesting coming from such a Spanish/Catholic influence place like the Southwest. It is amazing in that it is so isolated it has held tight to its "Irish-ness"
One corner of the downtown was a liquor store-well you should call it a Whiskey store- for one whole wall was every brand, size and bottle of Whiskey there was-actually it overflowed to free standing shelves on the floor. The other wall was dedicated to Bourbon-what exactly is Bourbon, a derivative of Whiskey.
We were there about 5'ish and there were several well dress men, making a stops on their way home from work. Something men here would do, but be bring home beer-or wine- think there was a corner, small corner dedicated to a few bottle of other spirits.
Next door was a Celtic store- that we had fun purusing and talking to the owner- who was delighted to find out we were Kellys and invited us back for their Irish Festival. The Parish Priest came in and they actual conversed a little bit in Irish-( I know that is not the right term), think he was heading over to get some whiskey.
So it was a fun detour -got back in the car, having bought my dad some recommend whiskey and headed towards Idaho.
Here is the kicker- we got to my dad's house-told him the tale of our detour and guess what he said- " your great great grandfather lived in Butte, mined there and your great great grandmother is buried there, found her grave and figured out which house they lived in!"
So I walked amongst my ancestors and didn't even know it! I'm sure we will go back.
My g.g. grandfather moved after she died- to Kentucky- and like so often is the case, hired on the neighbor girl to take care of the children- my grandmother and sibling. Well he ended up marry her- Katherine and we always knew her as Grandmommy.
What my grandmother never told my father till almost on her death bed was that Grandmommy was the neighbor girl and not his real grandmother! He thinks she was worried he wouldn't feel the same way about her-he adored her and doesn't understand it, but go figure.
I have Grandmommy's piano and several of her textile work-oh my- tatting and crocheted edged linens and dollies and we named one of our daughter's after her and the first Burns to come to this country.