Although the weather has been very good this week, temperatures around 72, we're getting thunderstorms almost every afternoon/evening.
It doesn't last long though. After some very dark clouds, some nice thundering and a few crackling light-claps, the sky brightens, the sun comes out again and everything dries up quickly.

 

I guess that's the mountains for you. Those heavy clouds collide with the hills and have to rain out to get over them. Or something like that?

Something else typical rural Idaho is the next scene, that I witnessed from my side window:

Marianne and Wade 'working' the steers. Whatever that means ..

♪ Move 'em on, head 'em up
Head 'em up, move 'em on, see 'them dogies rollin', rawhide!♫

Rollin', rollin', rollin' ..

Unfortunately I don't have a horse, so I'm just walkin', walkin', ...
These are pics of  another of my hikes, this trail is circling the house on the back side, looking towards the valley below:

 

It's where I came across some more deer .. a little fuzzy, but aren't they a cute pair?

And a few more birds, of course, like this little Yellow Warbler:

 And a (sharp pic this time!) Western Bluebird ...

Somewhere along the creek I came across some honest-to-god Rhubarb!

It must be a very old plant, a leftover from an old vegetable garden that belonged to one of the Homesteads that used to be here.
Look at that, I picked myself some nice stalks!
 

I happened to have some strawberries also, so I made a sauce, and the rest I used in these pretty little hand-pies.
I remembered having them at the Amish in Ohio, and how much better they upheld with 'saucy' fillings than regular 'big' pies, who always go soggy and ooze/fall apart when cut.

 Look how perfect! Much easier to eat and very portable too!

 


Let's see, not much else for this week, I think.

Oh, we went 'down the hill' for grocery shopping and a material run, and we stopped for coffee at White Bird.

We sat outside on the terrace where you have a great view of the 'floating' bridge over White Bird Creek.
The opening of the bridge in June 1975 completed the multi-lane Highway US 95 44 years ago, following ten years of construction.
It starts it's climb from here, up to the White Bird summit at 4,245 feet above sea level after which it descends to Grangeville on the other side.


After coffee we drove over that summit to the Grangeville golf Club where we played 9 holes, followed by an excellent lunch at their deck.
It was beautiful weather and we really enjoyed our day 'off'.

(The road back and forth put the fear of God in me once again though. I'm so not looking forward to having to leave in the Fall!)

On a lighter note, these Irises are flowering in the border next to the RV. Aren't they gorgeous?

James is feeling a lot better, although he still has a lingering cough, and he's making steady progress with the master bedroom suite.
He's pretty much finished pulling all the electric wires ... spaghetti!

Now if everybody could make up his/her/their minds about this renovation, things would progress a lot faster, but as it is it's a rather slow process with a lot of different opinions (the girls, Sam's, Ronnie's), we are caught in the middle, and nobody is making any decisions fast.

It's a little frustrating to have to do things twice, or to change things that were already done ..

Oh well, it will get done eventually .. we hope.