I can't resist to keep taking pictures of these boisterous, and beautiful, Gila Woodpeckers. They're so photogenic.

Or how about these rather flashy little ducks ...

 

Aren't they gorgeous? They're Hooded Mergansers, small diving ducks, and they're overwintering here from Canada.

I'm starting to see some more signs of spring in the desert around town.
One of them is the yellow Desert Senna/Cassia on the left, and on the right Emu Bush. Both attract hummingbirds!

          

And I love these beautiful pink flowers. So elegant!

They're from the Orchid Tree, and I've only seen a handful of them in the yards around the neighborhood. I think they're rather delicate and not so easy to keep alive ..

In the meantime, this is what happened in our 'own' yard ..

                                                   

The steel-man was here (and it really was just one guy!), and he put in all the steel in the pool as well as in the jaccuzi, in only a day and a half, all by himself!

Not quite by himself, but with a little (or a lot) help from the crew and me, James finished tiling the bathroom and installed the shower sliding-glass doors.

  

 

So, this was the old (you don't see the shower curtain but it is there, on the left:

 

                

.. and this is the new and improved below ..

 

It's a beautiful thing!

I've done some touch-up painting here and there (ceiling/doors/door-frames), painted the garage side-door, and (now that most of the sawing is done) washed the windows on the outside.

Not much else, I'm afraid. I finished my jig-saw puzzle, which is unfortunate since I'm out of 'new' ones! Well, I do have more, but they are sitting in the RV.
I didn't think I'd make that many in the months we'd be here, but apparently I did. Oh well.
I could go over and get a few, but I've got a lot of other things to do, so I think I'm good.
For now ..

We did a little bit of sight-seeing the other day and drove towards Florence to climb the "Poston Butte', that everything is named for over here.



A butte, according to google, is 'an isolated hill with steep sides and a flat top'.
This particular one is noted for having the pyramidal tomb of Charles Debrille Poston at its summit.

The tomb can be accessed by a 0.6-mile (0.97 km) trail starting from the trailhead near Hunt Highway.
From the top you have a 360* view of the desert ..

That is Florence in the distance

OK. Been there, done that .. what else ..

Oh, I baked a bread pudding, a blackberry one!

                     

These were the blackberries we picked last summer at Wet Gulch in Idaho. I'd managed to cram them in the freezer and bring them all the way over here, together with a few baggies of apricots and wild plums.
I'd rather not have to schlep everything to Oregon as well, so we really should start eating through everything we have in the freezer right now.

Somehow I don't think that's going to be too big of a problem!

Yumm!