So far we're having a beautiful summer, temperatures are (still) comfortable and the days are dry and sunny ..
 

Don, Sam's helper, has been cutting and spreading and baling the grass in the canyon (in between several tractor break-downs), ..talking about 'making hay while the sun is shining'!

Ahhh, nothing says summer like freshly cut grass!

I'm afraid it's not going to stay this comfortable for much longer though. 
Last Wednesday it was a very warm 95, fortunately only for a day, but the forecast is showing temperatures creeping up into the 90's over the next 10 days and staying there!

                                                          

                                                                     Thank goodness for AC!

I'm starting to walk a little earlier, to beat the heat. It's so nice out there when the sun is just coming up ..

A field full of Rabbit's Feet (Clover)

Like I said in my previous post, I'm not seeing too much wildlife these days, this week I only got a few 'butt-shots', like these of a trio of does and a coyote (yes, very hard to see but I swear it is one):

    

What I did find was this:

 

My eye caught a small white spot about halfway up the rocky hill and when I zoomed in with my camera it turned out to be a wild beehive! 
How cool is that? The honey is probably very good, and people have suggested to get it, but I'm not going to disturb them. So little is left 'wild' these days ..

Talking about 'wild', the apricots on the wild apricot tree were ripe and I set out early in the morning (too cool for snakes) to get some of them!

       

I ended up with 2 bags full! Pretty awesome! Which is nice, but now what to do with them? 

After washing the lot, I separated them in three piles; (slightly) under-ripe, ripe and (a little) over-ripe and/or bruised.

I used the latter batch right away to make 4 jars of preserves, and I baked an apricot/almond-cobbler:

M-m good!

The next day I blanched and froze some and than tried my hand at drying a few.
First I dried some in the microwave (defrost setting), which went OK, although it still took some time, and for the second half I used the oven, which took waayy longer (too long for me), and they came out much drier than those out of the microwave.       

     

I think I stick with freezing them (on the left).

I still have a whole bowl left, I hope they'll keep for a while in the fridge. I'm planning to make a pie next and maybe some scones and/or muffins. 

It's a lot of work, but absolutely worth it, they're so good! 

We tried to do some more sight-seeing last weekend, the weather was gorgeous, so we drove into town for a cup of coffee (bringing a piece of cobbler with us).

The small coffee shop at the end of town has a nice outside sitting-area, and we sat there for a while watching the traffic go by. 

 

That traffic is still greatly reduced by the way, because the rock-slide south of town is still blocking the road, and although they created a small detour, they only let a few through at a time.

Our plan was to visit the fish hatchery, just out of town to the south (well before the slide) but after  we drove up there (just a couple of miles), we discovered it was closed because of the virus.
Well, shoot .. maybe next time.

We'd never been on this road before, and we quite liked the little canyon with the small river (Rapid River) flowing through it.
It would be a contender of somewhere we'd like to live one day, that is if we would stay here, which we won't ..

We came across this Longhorn bull, look at the size of those horns! Wouldn't those give you a headache?

Since I've no other pics of our outing, I'll put up a few of last week from when we came back from Grangeville and drove the Old Hwy 95 grade down into White Bird.

We'd wanted to drive it ever since we arrived in Idaho but never made the time (or the weather was lousy or too hazy).

This historic old road with a zillion switchbacks (the arcs/switchbacks, if combined, would form 37 full 360° circles, an average of  950° per mile), is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as an engineering accomplishment, a "marvel", and was the only Idaho road north or south for nearly 40 years.



Farmers kept water troughs at a few of the precarious switchbacks for their livestock and folks who frequently traveled the road knew their exact locations, as they were a welcome stop for over-heated cars (this was in the 30's).
 

The new 7.2 mile grade (on the left in the pic above) took ten years to complete (1975) and saved more than 15 minutes driving time and ‘countless beads of sweat’ as people navigated the treacherous switchbacks on the ‘Old WB Grade’.
It's a fun drive, with almost no traffic these days, and we took our time to slowly wind our way down to Whitebird, while enjoying the spectacular mountain views.

OK, back to the current week, Austin (our 'neighbor', and Sam's new 'estate' manager, in the old house next to us) and his girlfriend Jessica have acquired a puppy, and when they went to Grangeville to do shopping on Saturday, they asked if I would mind checking in on her every now and than.
If I would mind .. are you kidding me? Taking care of an adorable 7 week old puppy?
I might not give her back!

 

Let me tell you though .. she is quite the handful! It's like taking care of a 3 year old! You have to have eyes and ears everywhere! She basically was just a blur, as you can see in the pictures .. I only got one sharp shot of her!
Thank goodness she came with a crate, and after each ferocious playing session she would conk out for a couple of blissful hours.

                
                   She's so stinking cute!

Nothing much else to report I think, other than that I finally finished this insanely difficult puzzle. Again.
It's the smallest 1000 pieces puzzle in the world, and the image is of a town I know very well, close to my hometown in Holland.

                                             

Even making it for the second time didn't make it much easier!

It's a challenge though .. and I do love challenges!