Saturday Night
Saturday night, just like any night for me. That’s far from a bad thing. It’s been a busy day packing and showing the house. I’ll be glad when this house thing is done! Next week we close on the new house and can move and start settling in. We had dinner at my daughter’s after her family had a hard day of soccer. Yes, when a son plays two games and a daughter plays three, and the parents sit for hours in hot sun watching, it can be a hard day. Fun day, but hard day. So we relaxed and they unwound, we packed and moved boxes, and Saturday night becomes a time to stay home and read, blog, write, relax. I still have some wildflower photos to post, but first – great excitement.
A New Relative
My son-in-law has been going nuts on ancestry.com, working for hours every day compiling family trees. He and my daughter are going back on both sides of all four families – Matt’s mom and dad and my mom and dad. And they found Nick. My mother’s father George had a sister, Ruby, whom we were not much aware of. Ruby is Nick’s grandma and George, her brother, is my grandpa. That makes Nick second cousins with me and my siblings. I think. Anyway, Nick is thrilled because he didn’t know much about this side of the family and had no idea what became of Ruby’s brother George. And we are tickled pink to find that side of the family.
So – Nick is a fairly close relative we knew nothing about! He grew up in England and I have all sorts of cousins in England it turns out. He lives in Tanzania now working for a malaria control organization, but he’s going to visit Bakersfield next fall. So exciting! And here’s something bizarre. You know I posted the last few days about my jaunts through Arvin, Lamont and Weedpatch? We have all kinds of small towns around here, including one called Pumpkin Center. My husband works in Wasco, another small town, and Nick has actually been there. What an amazing world we live in.
Wildflowers
I travel Granite Road/Highway 155 all the time to get to our cabin. I find it beautiful in all seasons, but there’s nothing quite like spring.
We have so many beautiful fields but they are all fenced – at odds with the old cowboy song Don’t Fence Me In. In this case, though, they are not fencing us out, but the cattle in.
These guys were pretty funny. They watched me approach and as soon as I stopped and looked at them, they were off.
On the other hand, in this next photo, I pulled over to take photos and this burro walked a long way to come see me.
I took this with my cell phone. I’m pretty sure this is the same guy I photographed and used in the Burro Love collage last year.
I had my tripod with me – so I didn’t have to prop the camera on the car and run like crazy to get in the photo.
In fact, this was all I was trying to do when my burro friend wandered up. I spend some time scratching his face to make him happy. But the point is the wildflowers – gorgeous.
The most abundant flower is the fiddleneck. But isn’t it amazing how the same flower can look so different against rocks, trees, in different contours?
This is my favorite of the day’s trip.
Even man made objects like telephone poles don’t detract from the photo.
You can see a tinge of orange – the poppies are almost in full bloom. I mean, you can see a lot of orange, but I’m referring to the fiery orange a little over halfway up.
I like the two tanks on the hillside.
Poppies in the distance. This photo has so many hues in it. Partly the lighting but all the oranges, the lavenders, wow.
That brown lump is a cow. I did a post last year on photographing wildflowers. This may be a good time to link to it.
People like to make fun of hot, dry, dusty Bakersfield. But when you can take drives of several hours in spring, in all directions, and see such displays, what’s to make fun of? We take the bad with the good here, and there’s a lot of good.
I want to get out again and wander, but I think I’ll be consumed by packing and moving. I hope Lily and Tiger aren’t too disturbed by the move. Right now they are happily asleep on the bed, lifting a paw now and then for grooming. This is what they look like.
Of course, for more flower photos or other nature shots, hop over to the web page.
gorgeous. i felt my shoulders relax as i looked at the pictures.