What in the WORLD? We had such a lovely lovely day at the shores of the south fork of the American River on Saturday. We took the Schnickle and his mama down to the spot where the S-Man and his Grampy tossed rocks into the river, just for the Halibut. There were oodles and oodles of big fat rubber rafts, each with a load of 7, that spent a good amount of time getting their bearings or jumping into the water or just splashing one another in front of us, there in the quiet part of the river, in Coloma. Yes, Coloma...the place where the Gold Rush began and the place where the sand still glitters a bit.
These two are just two peas, I tell ya. It doesn't seem possible that the Schnickle is only 2 1/2 when I hear some of the hilarious things he comes up with. He adored telling me a funny story and then retelling it 6 more times with the addition of HAH! to let us know that it was still a great joke.
Needless to say, we had a most magnificent day with just enough sun and fresh air. It was the late afternoon that tore it for us. Hmmm, hot hot hot and weird out. The clouds kept blowing in, threatening SOMETHING. They gave us something, all right...boy oh boy. We heard them roll in and the dry lightening storm did its damage. Over 600 fires were started here, in this bone dry state (I know...those of you in the Mississippi basin are saying...SO???) It is dry dry dry out there, so dry that our fork of the Weber Creek is drying up and it is not even July! Let's just say that I am thankful for a prolific well and a lifetime of water conservation practices, which keep me from putting in Water Features and lawns and crap like that. Unh uh. It is BROWN outside, brown because northern California is burning. Any wonder why we understand the Aussies so well? Bush fires...grass fires...all the same. Welcome to Summer. The Tahoe basin Angora Fire was just a year ago. Rod has been doing good forest management close to the house but we have a great deal of our forest that needs a good going over...and not by Mother Nature.
The garden got a good going-over by Bambi and his sister, Boopsie. They decided to have a nice tasting session and so here are a couple of the plants that they eschewed!
Oh yeah...Rod surprised me with a bit of whimsy, since I have been mooning over the goats in Wild Fibers magazine, lately. Even these guys could not protect my garden.
Baaaaaaaaaah...cough cough sputter.
What a lovely day you had! Beautiful pictures. Jacob looks so much like his grandpa, it's scary.
Posted by: Elizabeth Risch | June 24, 2008 at 04:20 PM
Too wet here, too dry there. Both bad situations.
Love the sheep! Wonder if they'd scare away bunnies. They're the critters doing the damage around here.
Posted by: Vicki | June 24, 2008 at 05:06 PM
Great rock garden.....baaaahh!
Posted by: Carol | June 24, 2008 at 08:05 PM
I saw the news yesterday about all the fires in northern California and saw there were even some north of Sacramento, I was hoping they were not near you.
A friend's husband makes a puree of jalapeno peppers and water and mists it onto his shrubbery so that deer will be discouraged. I think it helps some.
I love your little animals. Any chance you'd get a real goat?
Posted by: CarolineF | June 25, 2008 at 05:16 AM
I had to embiggen it to see the sheep, and then laughed--those are cute!
But meantime, I'm glad the lightning strikes didn't get closer! 842 was the last fire count I heard. It's smoky out there, even down here.
Hey, you--I bought a skein of merino/silk from you, tagless, so not sure which colorway name applies to it but I'm wearing it to the niece's wedding this weekend.
Posted by: AlisonH | June 25, 2008 at 03:57 PM
You guys okay up there?
Posted by: AlisonH | July 01, 2008 at 08:24 AM
I'm kind of glad it's working out that I can't stop by on my way to Montana - sounds like all the smoke would mess these crazy sinuses up in a hurry.
I'm on my way to Yellowstone and the ranch in Montana today. Will catch up with you as often as possible over the next couple of months.
big loves...
Posted by: Tom Clark | July 01, 2008 at 08:31 AM
Are things getting any better your way? We had a nice, less smoky day yesterday, but the high country was covered with smoke from the fire at Yuba Gap, which got worse yesterday afternoon... I am dreading a whole summer like this.
Posted by: Birdsong | July 05, 2008 at 01:21 PM