Spring in the Desert

Birds on the wall - greening of the desert

Things are sprouting here now, which makes me so happy I survived another winter.  Of course, it was extremely cold this year and not all the plants will make it.  There are sad looking ones all over town.  Raven’s enjoying all that spring has to offer too as he watches the lizards emerge and birds and chipmunks scampering about outside.  Happy chirping and animal sounds come in through the windows.

Lizard on wall

 

 Tootie and Raven napping

He’s friends with Tootie now and they take naps together.  Koki still watches from nearby.  I hope she accepts him eventually.

Rain storm with rainbow

 We had a rainstorm here the last two days.  It’s unusual to have much rain in the desert and it doesn’t last long, but the skies can darken rapidly from not a cloud in sight in the morning to dark dreary skies by late afternoon.  The winds have been chilly so I had to shut the windows, much to the disgust of the cats who like sniffing the air.

Painting of neighbor's house

The neighbor had her house painted last week and it really looks nice.  She lives across the street from me.  This was the highlight for the day, watching as the workers masked everything off and took the rain gutters down so they could spray on the new color.  The cats watched from my window upstairs while I worked on the room since I’m still cleaning it out in there.  I wonder if I’ll ever finish.  Raven did get tired and took a nap in a bag on the floor.

Raven getting comfortable in a bag on the floor

 Someday soon a house will be here

There are two vacant lots on the left side of our house and now one owner is going to build a house.  They’ve been bringing in loads of dirt over the last two weeks.  We’ll still have the vacant lot next to us and then the new house.  The neighbors aren’t pleased because it will block some of their views.  I’m actually surprised we haven’t seen any action over there before now because those two lots were sold way before we moved here.

Chipmunk in bird feeder

Bird of Prey on our back gate

I caught a chipmunk that made his way up the shepherd’s hook and into the bird feeder.  I wish I had a shot of him shimmying up the pole.  A bird of prey also came to visit.

We drug out the tunnel we got for the cats years ago – actually a kid’s toy from Target.  They all love it.  It’s seen its better days, but all the cats still enjoy it as they race through it and the best of all – it makes noise.  Raven’s enjoying his kitten hood so much he didn’t even come to bed for two nights.

 Raven in cat tunnel

He eats like a little pig and is getting bigger.  I always have to wash his face afterward because he has cat food on his nose.  He’s good about getting his face washed, but I wish he’d stop rooting.

Today I read in the paper that a nice couple adopted Quiver.  She’s the cat that was shot by an arrow a couple of months ago.  The lady I got Raven from was nursing her back to health after they did some surgeries on her to repair all the damage.  I hope the kid gets some kind of sentence when he goes before the judge on April 2.  There’s been quite an outrage over it here.  I don’t know why anyone would do such a thing.

That’s it for now from here.  We’ve had workers here and have everything finished up except for my part of getting rid of things and then shampooing the carpet.  My husband’s chomping at the bit to get the for sale sign up.

My next posts here will probably be for the A to Z challenge the month of April.  I have most of them written, which is good because it’s going to be busy around here.  I’ll be visiting as many blogs as time allows.  Don’t forget if you want to participate, go to Lee’s blog here and sign up.  You have four days left to do so.