Memorial Day In Santa Clarita

THANK YOU AND GOD BLESS YOU

Mystery Solved?

I think I have id'd the animal in the photo I took yesterday while hiking. I've been researching and it appears to be a Baja California Rock Squirrel. Guess he crossed the border too (LOL).

What Is This Animal?

Does anyone have a clue to what kind of animal this is? I saw it sunning itself on a rock during my hike yesterday. It appeared to be about 3 ft long. Thought it was a squirrel at first, but doesn't seem to be. You can make the photos a little larger by clicking on them.

What A Day

I went for a hike this morning since Ben had to work. When I got home, I fixed my lunch and settled down at about 11:30 to watch TV. All of a sudden the cable goes off...no TV and no Internet. I called Time Warner and they said they did have an outage here, but no idea of how long it would be off. It came back on about 45 minutes later.

At 4:45 the power went off! I called our guard shack and they said the electrical guys turned it off to fix a problem. Come to find out, all of the people across the street from us had lost power at 9:00 am. Anyway, our power was off for 3 1/2 hours and wouldn't you know it was the hottest day of the year so far...94 degrees, so we could not run our fans or anything.

Our power came back on, but the people on the other side of the street still do not have power and the street lights still are not on. It sure is dark out there.

Patio Visitors

First there was one, then there was two.

Had a couple of visitors on my patio today. They were not in the bird bath, but they were drinking from the hummer feeder. I still need to get a feeder for bird seed.

My Homemade Bird Bath

I've been looking around at the stores for a bird bath to put next to my patio.

My brother just put a really nice one in his backyard and I got to thinking I'd like to have one, but didn't want to pay a lot of money and I've noticed that they can get pretty expensive. My brother lucked out with his. He works at an Ace Hardware up in Paradise, CA and someone bought one and then brought it back claiming that it leaked. The store policy is that if something is returned, the employees can have the item free of charge if it is "damaged". My brother tested it and it did leak a little, but he asked for it and the store gave it to him. He got some sealant and fixed the leak and now he has a nice $80 bird bath for free.

Anyway, I decided to "create" a bird bath out of material I already had and a few items I purchased at Big Lots for about $6.
I bought a white "wire" plant stand and a terracotta vinyl planter saucer. I already had two terracotta vinyl pots, one slightly larger than the other. The larger of the two, when turned upside down, fit perfectly into the top of the plant stand. It "clicked" into place so it won't blow out if it gets windy.
I pushed the legs of the plant stand into the ground about 3" to 4" and leveled it.
I glued the terracotta vinyl saucer to the smaller of the two pots with silicone waterproof adhesive, then slid the smaller pot over the larger pot. I did not glue the two pots together so I will be able to lift the smaller pot with the saucer attached off for cleaning when need be.
Here are some photos of my bird bath creation. It's not professional, but I think it will do the trick.

After waking up to a very cloudy morning, it turned out to be a really nice day here in the Santa Clarita Valley.

My New Stove Arrived

I got up early this morning because I had a call yesterday that my new stove would be delivered between 7:00 am and 11:00 am. I got up at 5:00 am because I wanted to make sure I was awake and NOT in my jammies when the delivery guys got here. I also had to get Ben off to work. At exactly 7:00 am, the phone rang and it was one of the delivery guys. He said that they would be here in about an hour. They showed up at about 8:10 am and it only took them about 10 minutes to remove the old stove, bring the new on in and hook it up. I think it looks really cool. I had a few people ask why I bought it in black. Our old stove was white with a black front (black oven door). Our refrigerator is white, but our dishwasher and built-in microwave are black. When Ben and I saw the black one in the store, we both said, "that's the one we want".

Ben's Latest Eye Appointment

Took Ben to the Ophthalmologist this morning.
The doctor said Ben's eye was looking "marginally" better. He told Ben that he had to make the decision to either wait another 6 to 8 weeks to see if it clears up more or to have surgery where they put a "gas" bubble into his eye and suck out the dried blood. That takes about 1 1/2 hours. If they do that, after they do the "gas" bubble, he would have to sit with his head leaning down forward for 5 days then he would go back and they would do the laser treatments like they did on his other eye. Plus he'd be off work for 2 weeks or so. Ben decided to wait the 6 to 8 weeks and if the eye does not clear up on its own by then, they will do the bubble thing.

Windy, Warm Day

I'm sitting out on my covered patio enjoying the 80 degree weather and the wind. Just listening to my wind chimes and the birds sing. Did my 30-minute workout on my exercycle out here this morning too. I moved the exercycle out onto the patio the other day and put a cover over it. It took up a lot of room in the house. It was nice to come out here and read a book while I pedaled.

Went online and did my jury service orientation this morning in case I have to report in 2 weeks. If you do the orientation online, you don't have to show up as early the first day you report. Normal time to report is 8:00 am, but if I do have to report, I won't have to go in now until 11:30 am on the first day. I'm hoping I won't have to report, but if I do, that will be much better than sitting around all those extra house for nothing. Last time I had to report for jury duty, I arrived at 8:00 am and didn't get to leave until 5:00 pm. How boring that was.

Discovery Park Update

I took my morning walk and walked past the construction site of the new Discovery Park I've been blogging about. There has not been anyone working down there for about 2 or 3 days. I took a few photos of the area as I walked through.

This sign tells what they still have to do before they open

They will have picnic areas

They have sitting areas

They have a play area with faux rocks for kids to climb

They have a walking/biking pate

BUT THEY HAVE NO RESTROOMS????????

Macro Monday

Over the weekend, we were sunny and warm. Temps were in the mid to high 80's. This morning we woke up to dark gray skies and drizzle. Actually it's more like a mist. As we say here in SoCal, it "mist" Oregon and hit us. (LOL). Anyway, I decided to get my camera out and take some macros of some of the flowers around my yard.

Really Nice Day

I went over to WalMart this morning and bought a planter and some potting soil but could not find a plant I liked. I wanted one on my patio. I went up to Lowe's and bought some geraniums for the pot because they are a nice flower for a pot on the patio.

I hung and wind chime, a thermometer and a clock on the patio. Now that it's covered I can have those things because they won't be out in the weather.

I washed my resin patio chairs with soap and water. I have pads for them but won't keep them on all the time because the wind might blow them away. I will put them out whenever we need to use the chairs.

The weather was really nice. It was about 80 degrees.

Our Patio Is Finished!

They finished our patio cover today. It looks great! I think we will really enjoy the patio now. To me it makes the area look bigger and I feel like I'm "inside" but still "outside" too.

Now all I have to do is arrange the patio furniture and decorate.

These first 2 photos are BEFORE:

The rest of the photos are AFTER: