Hi everyone,
I hope this letter finds you happy and healthy.
This week has been crazy busy and I haven’t had a chance to start the next story for my Great RV Adventure saga. On top of that, life keeps happening around me. I have so many stories and photos to share with you!
For one thing…we’ve moved.
But don’t worry, my address didn’t change. We didn’t go far. We rented our little upstairs studio apartment and moved into our newly built garage. Well, technically we moved into the RV but it’s in the garage, which by the way, seems almost cave-like. If it wasn’t for the two little windows Mike had put into the overhead doors, it would be almost totally dark inside.
“Those windows don’t look like they would be much good,” you say.
Well, you would be surprised at how much light they do let in!
Mike says he is going to install lights to come on and go off, simulating day and night. But our ultimate goal is to be able to travel and not spend all of our time here.
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Andrew, our grandson, has been to visit us a few times since we’ve moved, and I hate to keep bragging on him, but he continues to do things that amaze and surprise me.
On one visit we were staying in an RV park and Andrew was restless-- not wanting to sit and play with toys.
“Andrew, do you want to go take pictures?” I thought this would be a good way to channel his energy. I could see the yes all over his attitude and he immediately starts to look for something on the floor by the door. I was confused because he had his sandals on but it all became clear as he bent down, picked up a dog leash and held it high in triumph.
“No, let’s not take the dogs right now,” and I held out his camera to him. Andrew dropped the dog leash and took the camera. He flipped it around in his hands until he was holding it right and almost pushed the on/off button when he remembered he had forgotten something. He stopped and fumbled with the strap until he got it around his neck (a two handed job for him) then he reached for his camera (which was now down around his knees) and once again flipped it around until he was holding it right. Then he turned it on.
I’ve never had to tell Andrew to put the strap around his neck, not after that first day of taking pictures together. He always just did it. It had been a while since his last visit and he hadn't forgotten. It tickled me to see his ‘oh shit’ moment.
We said goodbye to Pop-pop and headed out.
Andrew is happily snapping away at pictures; mud puddles, the shadow he casts on the grass, his foot, the sky and trees and even one of me. We hadn’t gone far when I see the neighbors are watching this cute little guy with a camera. As we get a little closer their dog barks at us.
Andrew stops and looks at the dog for a moment then he turns to go.
“Andrew,” I call as he heads in the wrong direction, “let’s go this way.”
That little stinker looked at me over his shoulder, shook his head ‘no’ and kept on walking!
Now don’t go thinking I’m a doting grandmother and give him his way all the time, I don’t. I just choose to do battle only if it’s important, like his safety or my sanity, A.K.A. nap-time. Otherwise I use diversion a lot. This didn’t fall into either category so I shrugged to the neighbors and we went the way Andrew wanted to go.
We get back to the RV, I open the door, Andrew climbs the steps and once inside he picks up the dog leashes and thrusts them at me.
Okay. Now I understood what his defiance was about. He went back for the dogs. I really didn’t want to take the dogs out because it’s just too hard to wrangle the three of them. “No. We’re in now, we’re staying in,” I told him and he seemed to accept that.
Andrew has a couple of spots where he likes to play while he is with us. We’ve made a playpen of the upper bunk. We’ve put a blanket, a small pillow and two tubs of toys up on the deck and he’ll sit up there and play.
Lately though, Andrew has been climbing up onto our ample dash and playing in the front widow.
I have a desk that folds out of the dash. It’s deep enough to hold my computer during travel and seems to be a catchall when we are not traveling. One of the things it catches is a cat. Namely Baby Blue.
Andrew loves Baby Blue. He loves to pick her up and carry her around. Baby Blue is so good to tolerate him without using her claws or teeth. She was laying on the dash when Andrew climbed up and spotted her. He kept trying to hold her but she kept wiggling away from him. She wouldn’t go far and Andrew would get a hold of her again. This little cat and mouse game continued until Baby Blue ended up in the desk-well. Guess what else was in there?
My headphones.
Guess what Andrew decides to do with Baby Blue and the headphones?
“No way!” you say.
Yes way! He puts the headphones on the cat and she lets him do it too!
I know, right! I told you she tolerates him really well. You know she could get away from him anytime she wants to but she doesn’t.
“I have to get a picture of this,” I said and got my camera as Andrew sat back and patiently waited. He really is good about letting me photograph him.
I guess taking a picture of Baby Blue in headphones seemed like a good idea to Andrew too because he asked in Andrew-ese for his camera. By the time I got it for him and he got the strap around his neck and got the camera turned on, Baby Blue’s headphones had slipped a little and this is Andrew’s shot.
Andrew was still in the window when Daddy got off work and came to pick him up. Andrew saw him coming and took a picture as Kevin waved from the truck. (Andrew’s picture.)
Kevin parked and as he came around the truck he pulled out his picture-taking cell phone.
Andrew was absolutely delighted! He laughed and laughed!
Once his giggles subsided he was able to get a picture of Daddy taking a picture of him. (Andrew’s photo -- wiper blade and all.)
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Here in Missouri we have been having some awful storms with big winds and lots of rain. Lake of the Ozarks was created with the construction of Bagnell Dam. At the other end of our lake is Truman Dam which creates Truman Reservoir which is operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. When it rains a lot and Truman has to let water out of the reservoir, our dam has to open it’s gates and let water out too. This is the second time (in the seventeen years that we have lived here) that all twelve of the flood gates have been open.
Needless to say, this event is causing quite a ruckus. Aside from the flooding issues both on the lake and the river below the dam, it has brought a lot of people to our area. Mike and I were among the hordes flocking to the dam to take photos. I wandered around looking for just the right angle and when I had all the photos I wanted, I turned to go back to where Mike was waiting for me and I see he is chatting with one of his old cronies.
Over his shoulder I spot all the pigeons lined up on the rail and decide I’d see what kind of a picture they would make.
That was when I spotted a heron sitting on the rail. Did you see him further on down there? So I took a few photos of him.
While photos with all twelve of the flood gates open are impressive because of its rarity, once I saw this shot of the heron on my computer, I loved it. And that is a really long way around to saying, this is my current desktop photo.
“Did you see the kayaker?” Mike asked when I joined him but I hadn’t.
“Where?” I asked trying to spot him.
“He’s gone now but he was right out there,” Mike said indicating the turbulent waters of the Osage River.
We left the observation area below the dam and went on down to the public boat ramp. The parking lot was partially flooded but cars were making their way through a flooded section of road to a dry parking area beyond so we did too and that’s where I got this shot.
While we were there, our kayaker came in and Mike spoke with the wife as she waited for her husband. They had come down from Columbia (80 miles north) just to kayak in the flooded river. In this shot he is in the parking lot and you can see a boat ramp warning sign up to it’s neck in water behind him.
The next day, after even more rain and high winds -- the tornado sirens had gone off here in town -- Kevin calls me on his way into work.
“Did you see the barge broke loose last night?” he asked.
“No.”
“A lot of people didn’t see it because they are busy looking at the dam.”
Needless to say I made a special trip down to the dam, where this barge is moored and took a few shots of it.
I posted this picture to Facebook and my beautiful niece Bambi asked how the plastic chairs didn’t get blown away. I didn’t have an answer for that and I still don’t. I could make a couple of guesses but I won’t. Instead, let me just say that I knew there was something about this photo that bothered me (for lack of a better word) and didn’t know what it was until Bambi pointed it out.
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It hasn’t been quite as hot outside the last couple of weeks and I was able to walk the girls a little more often, and I’ve seen tons of wildlife, both insect and critter.
“I’ve got a picture of a cute little spider,” I told Momma on the phone one night and the only reason I even mentioned it was because I was flipping through photos while we chatted.
“There is no such thing as a cute little spider,” Momma replied.
I think this little guy is called a crab spider and these kind of spiders look like they have glasses on their face, at least to me. What do you think?
You’re siding with Momma?
Well, no matter what you think, you have to admit that spiders play an invaluable role in the ecosystem.
Look at this deer would ya? Are those ticks on the back of her ears?
I missed the wild garlic. Either that or it didn’t come back in the same place it was last year. But something that is coming on right now are the brambleberries.
Itsy won’t have anything to do with the berries but I’ll eat some and so will Ginger. I always stop and pick us a few before we move on. We get down the road a little ways and on the opposite side of the road I see another patch but the berries are less mature. I wasn’t going to stop when I spot a ripe berry. I’ll get it for Ginger, I think. Then I get a little closer. Hey! That’s not a berry!
I snapped a few photos of what I think is a black snake in the berry bushes then I go looking for the head, carefully mind you. So there I am, walking around the bush, up on tiptoe, crouching down, peaking around and among the leaves and about the time I spot his tongue tasting the air and think about taking his picture, he detects me, drops out of the bushes and is gone in a flash!
“Isn’t it amazing how something with no arms or legs can move so fast?” Momma asked when I told her about it.
I saw a whistle pig lounging around outside his home. That’s what my grandfather called woodchucks. He looks almost like a seal, I thought.
It should have occurred to me that he was watching something but it never did. Not until I saw this guy across the field. Then I knew.
And here’s something I don’t see very often. A hummingbird moth.
Lots more to show you but I’ve kept you long enough.
Let’s call this one done.
Lots and lots of love,
Peg and Mike
