Puff balls have arrived

Puff balls. You have to look quick, or you will miss them. I just saw my first batch for the year. What are puff balls? They are the baby quail. They begin life by hatching and quickly drying off. At that time the term "puff ball" describes them perfectly. When just born they are about the size of a dime on two small little toothpicks for legs. They are buff color and blend in with the native grass quite well.

A quail family begins with over 20 of these puffs. The reason for so many becomes abundantly clear and the 20 quickly pare down to a dozen. Accidents are often along with predation from the hawks, neighborhood cats or snakes.

The puff balls quickly grow and grow real feathers to become young quail. If a pair of adults are lucky, they will raise 4 young to adulthood.

A pair of quail will mate for life, and both will take charge for the safety of their brood. Knowing this, it is sad to see a single adult continuing to care for the young. You know the other adult met their fate.

Last year I posted a blog about a male quail who only had one leg. I have seen him this spring. It would be difficult, if not impossible for him to mate, so he is doomed to bachelorhood. When I saw him, he was in the company of another male and a female. It is heartening to see his survival.

Wildlfe dining al fresco

I went out to my car on Friday morning. My new car. In the early morning light, something did not look right. As I walked closer, the image became clear.

An owl had snagged a rabbit during the night, took it to a safe location (the roof of my car) and proceded to disembowel the rabbit. There wasn't blood, but there was plenty of guts. Yuck. A little hair was clearly the hair of a rabbit.

I proceded to roll up the windows of the car and hose off the offending mess. The sunshine will help to further cleanse the car roof. I don't know how many car washes it will take for me to accept that the roof is now clean. Some things you just don't have in the city. You lucky people.

911, Do you have an emergency?

Woken up at 3:00 in the morning. Loud banging on my door. "Open up, Sheriff's department!"

OK, what did I do. Did a horse get out? Did someone come on my property? Run through a fence?

"Just a minute."

I stumble through my house looking for my robe, and after a few minutes, I decide what the heck, I was sleeping in sweatshirt and sweatpants. That hides everything. I go to the front door. No one is there. I now realize that he is at the back door. My dog is barking, and I am trying to calm her down. I go to the back door.

The Sheriff's Deputy is there with a flashlight shining in my face. He tells me the call center had a 911 call/hangup from this location. All they have now is a busy signal. They had to check it out and make sure everything alright.

Yes.

OK, the weather is wet. The phone has been shorting out during a rainstorm. I tell him that the phone has been ringing and no one is there. It was doing that the last rainstorm and I noticed it happening tonight, too.

I ask him if he could give me a light, and I would check the box right now. I yanked the phone out of the bedroom, and a phone cord. We go outside, and I forgot to bring a screwdriver to open the interface box. He uses a knife. I mention that the knife looked like it could do some damage. He says it could, but he is very happy to use it in this manner, and not in a defensive manner.

The box is opened, and I unplug the cord. I insert my cord, and I have a clean dial tone. Darn it, the problem is in my end. I tell him thanks, and I will see the phone is repaired as soon as possible.

This morning, I was checking my system. I have dial tone in the house, at the cordless phone. The corded phone in my bedroom is dead. OK, so I go outside, and there it is. The line to my bedroom is broken, and the live end, the one still attached to the interface box, is lying in wet soil. Water being a conductor, will short out and give a false signal to the phone company. I disconnected that line and that should solve the problem, until it dries up enough for me to crawl under and finish the hook up to the far end of the trailer, then I can rewire the bedroom jack.

Now how did it dial 911?

Oh, deer

It is time for the cotton harvest at the farms. I see a lot of wildlife driving up the road to the office. A couple of days ago I saw a white tail deer. He was an 8 point buck, and he looked very regal as he left the cotton field and crossed the road in front of me. The deer have probably eaten a lot of cottonseed in the last few days. White tail deer are fairly rare in this area, as the more common deer is mule deer, so named for their huge ears. Mule deer are smaller than the white tail, and I have seen mule deer dive between strands of barbed wire.

Other wildlife have been coyotes, and various birds like hawks and roadrunners. When I see the roadrunners, I think of my Dad and the roadrunner he had quasi-tamed. The bird would come up to him, and come into the house. This bird would sit on his leg while he fed the bird raw hamburger.

I recently saw a male Gambrel quail on my property. I saw that it was moving oddly. As it was moving away from me, it was hopping. On one leg. Was the other leg missing or injured. I couldn't tell, but for it to live, without aid is amazing. This bird has found a way to survive the best he can. With no complaints. Amazing.

Nouveau Rose Bracelet

I posted another bracelet on Etsy. www.beadcactus.etsy.com

This bracelet is a two drop peyote and the pattern is an original of stylized Art Nouveau roses. The piece between the beading and the lobster clasp is a gold toned rose and I think it compliments the piece wonderfully. This has been a long time coming, and I hope to be able to continue onward to my goal of being a name recognized bead artist and designer.

How do you make an Indian unhappy?

OK. So I work with the Tohono O'odham in the hay sales office. It is not a high volume traffic office. I have to answer phones (maybe 3-10 calls each day), clean the offices (sweep, mop, dust & sanitize), and sell hay. Between customers and after my chores are finished, I can craft or read.

My craft of choice is beading. I do several different stitches, but I work mainly in peyote stitch. I had a customer come in and his eyes lit up. He was needed someone who did the peyote stitch for his Native American feather fans. He was just so happy. I really hated to disappoint him. He came in on another day with a sample of what he was doing, a beautiful fan. Then I told him the bad news.

I am not Native American. He needed someone who was Native American to do the work, in order to keep the authenticity. He was so disappointed.

I am aware of the Act prohibiting non-Natives from presenting their work as American Indian, and would not do anything to jeopardize his product. I was flattered that he considered my work of a quality he could utilize.

I did offer to teach someone the stitch, so he could continue with his fine work. I hope he will be able to find someone to do the work for him.

UPDATE: Johnny came in and I made him an offer. I will teach anyone, he wants, to bead. He was thrilled with this. He knows of a woman who is alone and has a lot of time on her hands, and getting involved with beading would be great for her.

A wonderful dinner.

I am a member of the Inner Circle, a circle of friends who met on the Internet. Crafting is the main topic, but we go off topic as often as we can. As a member of that group, I got a once in a lifetime invitation from another member. She was to be in Phoenix and could we arrange a face to face meeting. Well, one thing led to another, and what started as a possible lunch date ended up to be an invitation to partake of a dinner in a private dining room at one of the top 10 restaurants in Arizona. It was one of those restaurants where the waiter places the napkin on your lap. It was so cool. I felt honored and made to feel as if I was one of the group. That is what you are sometimes able to get when you are a friend of a friend.

The restaurant was Kai at Sheraton’s Wild Horse Pass. It is on the Gila Indian Reservation. The staff was very helpful to little ‘ole me from the moment I stepped up to the door.

Carolyn chose the wine. An Amarone. It was a delicious red wine. She chose the wine, but then wondered about the cost. The host said no problem. The wine was delicious.

There were appetizers and I had lamb for the absolute first time in my life. Wonderful. There was a wonderful salad, made of an eclectic assortment of greens. I had choose a beef dinner, and that turned into a selection of meats. Each one more flavorful than the other. There was the palate cleansing sorbet, then a flan, with topping made of onions and pomegranate. Who know onions and pomegranate went together? I never would have considered the combination prior to this. The flavors are hard to describe. Definitively something new.

Dessert was a chocolate souffle, that melted in the mouth. Very smooth.

I really enjoyed to meal and met some wonderful people. My thanks to my host, BJ and his wife; and to my contact, Kaleene.

Sometimes it really pays to be in the Inner Circle.