Orange Juice

We have three, maybe four orange trees at our house.  It is so fun to go outside and pick oranges.  Most foods I make now have either some lemon or orange as an ingredient.  We love the bounty.  Today I picked some oranges, juiced them, then made a delicious Screwdriver to have with dinner.  And dessert is chocolate orange pudding, of course.

This batch of oranges turned into this juice, plus some extra in the freezer.

And it's five o'clock somewhere Screwdriver!

New Light Fixture

Dave had his hands full replacing a ceiling fan with a ceiling light.  This house had 11 ceiling fans and we really only need a couple.  And there was virtually no overhead lighting.  I don't know how people can live in the dark so Dave has been adding lights.  We're almost done with that job.

After he finished up we went swimming in the nearby pool which is now only a one minute golf cart ride away.  At 5pm we were the only people there.  So nice to have our own private, huge pool.

Dave always enters with a big splash!

Pizza with the Kids

We met Dave's nephew and family for pizza.  It was great fun being with the 3 and 5 year old as they weren't shy at all.  Dave did good with feeding the 3 year old.  It was surprising how much those little girls can eat!

Sunny Saturday

Now it's finally starting to feel like Arizona as winter has passed!

This morning I was able to get back into the pottery studio and start working on throwing.  The move took up so much time that I was ignoring my clay.  Still have not sold the old house yet.

Later I had to run to the grocery store and noticed the typical Arizona merchandise in front of the store.  It's always cactus themed or Mexican themed garden art.  Actually, a lot of people do have these metal cactus in their yards.  Or metal javelinas.

Little of This, A Little of That

This is a shot of some Saguaro cactus on our Deer Camp hike a few days ago, not too far from Saddlebrooke.  It ended up being over 8 miles, which really zapped me.  Plus is was one of the warmest days we've had.

Sunday nights are now taken up by Square Dancing.  This is surprisingly a lot of fun.  I will try to get a photo of all the goofy Square Dancers this Sunday to add to the blog.  Apparently there are 68 "steps" to learn and that number turns some people off from trying the dancing.  So far it is easy.

Today I took grandpa Van to Costco for some shopping.  He can't hear well but he has no problem walking or shopping.  I had to discourage him from buying everything he wanted, as he already has three of everything (at least) at home.

Before and Afters

Now that we are finally getting settled, here are some before and after shots of the house.

Living Room before.

Living room after.

Guest bath before.

Guest bath after.

Kitchen before.

Kitchen after.  

Basically we covered all the white in the house and opted for a warmer tone everywhere.  Now we just have to tweet a few things like hooks and shelves and we'll be all set.

Tonight we're going on an owl hunt.  We know there is at least one pair of Great Horned Owls within blocks of us.  Last night I saw one sitting atop a 35 MPH sign, but I couldn't get a photo.  We will find them!

About 85% Moved In

Yesterday was exhausting for me.  Even though I wasn't lifting furniture, I was organizing, unpacking, helping the movers to place things.  I actually did over 8 miles of walking - hard to believe.  It took three movers almost 8 hours to pack, move, and unpack.  I packed all the boxes of small things, they just did the heavy stuff.

This is loading onto the truck.

I picked a few oranges from our three orange trees and made fresh juice while I was waiting for the movers to come to the "new" house.

Unloading at the new place.

A peek at the new kitchen.  Counters will be swapped out from formica to Corian on Monday.  Once again I have labeled the contents of the cabinets/drawers.  Otherwise we'd never find anything.

The new family room is very similar to the old house and it's very comfortable.

Now we are exhausted

And we probably will be for the next four days.  Tomorrow is our last day to pack the house as the movers come on Thursday.  I've moved over many boxes already but I can only do so much since the carpet isn't in.  That happens Wednesday.

The old house is starting to look really empty.

We had three people look at our house yesterday with different realtors.  Only one is pretty interested, but, there is always a but, that person is in a 6 month rental and probably can't get out of it.  I don't think we want to wait that long.

Bingo was popular, and successful for me, last night.

There were over 240 people playing and amazingly, of the 12 games we played, I won one of them.  Too bad it wasn't the Blackout - that paid out $650!!  Next Bingo will be in February.

A Day in Phoenix

Went up to Phoenix today to get out of town and do a little exploring.  The Phoenix Art Museum was having a special showing of a Japanese artist's firefly lighting exhibit.  It was a mirrored room and the only lights were the thousands of colorful LED lights hanging from cords.  Very fun.

This was a free day at the museum as normally admission is $23, so there was a long line.

Another exhibit was this 25,000 black paper butterflies, representing the migration of Monarch butterflies.

I also liked this giant hamburger on the wall.

Tile is done!

This morning we headed out to do errands at 7am.  Stores open much earlier here and I don't know if that's due to the old people getting up so early or due to hot summer weather.  This is me, in an electric cart, just sitting and waiting for Dave to find his items at Home Depot.

Here is a shot of the kitchen/family room area.  I am very happy with the wall and floor colors.

But now we have 28 extra boxes of tile.  Apparently, this is a discontinued line and the manufacturer sent a lot more than requested, just to get rid of it.  It's really beautiful and I wish I had somewhere else to use all this extra tile.  It's also very heavy.

The House is Coming Along

This morning when walking around I noticed this woman's car.  She has four bath scrubbies tied to her roof rack.  Maybe she thought they looked like flowers.  Typical old person thing to do.

The tile guys are working fast.  Now that they have a lot of the tile laid I am very pleased with the color and style of tile.  They will start grouting tomorrow.

Here is a peak at a few of our citrus trees.  Most are laden with fruit.  We'll starting picking, processing, sharing and cleaning them up once we get in the house.

Surprisingly, we also inherited this sizable strawberry patch in the backyard.  We may get berries this spring.  We're curious to see how these will grow.

Th

The Tile has Arrived!

As I was checking on the painter's progress today the floor tile was delivered.  The tiling begins tomorrow and the painting ends today.

These are the pallets of tiles.  The deliverer still had to drop off the bags on thinset mix.  I have heard that tiling will be very dusty.  Hopefully all the dust, from cutting tiles, will be in the garage.

I also visited the local Pima county library today.  I was interested to see the keyboards on the public computers.  I have never seen such big letters on the keys.  I guess the library really knows their audience - old people with vision problems.

An Owl Mystery

We used to have a nice pair of owls by our house until a neighbor removed the palm tree where they nested.  We are hoping to find more owls once we settle in the new house.

However, I discovered a pair of Great Horned Owls right behind the pottery studio this morning.  And they have a large nest nearby.  I am hoping they will have some chicks and I am going to watch over the next few months for signs of babies.  Today I only had my cell phone camera so these photos aren't great, but I'll keep working on getting better pics.

This owl is hard to see but he is almost exactly in the middle of the photo. He's the lump.

The mate was way up high looking down at me.  He is in the center, near the top, of this photo.

A totally rainy day, again!

I might as well be in Portland.  Not really.  This upcoming week should be nearing 70 most days so  we'll be happy.  But Pickleball was definitely rained out today.

When we go to the "new" house to work on cleaning I always check the mailbox.  We are still getting tons of mail from the previous owners.  The most interesting mail is from lots of charities.  I guess the thing is to send actual coins to the homeowners in the hopes that they will donate.  So far I've "earned" about .85 from all these charity envelopes.  Plus we're getting at least four magazines as the previous owners have not cancelled any of their subscriptions, yet.

Those are real nickels!

The sun is working hard

The last two days have been about 30 degrees in the morning, but have warmed up nicely to a sunny 65.  Good Pickleball weather in the afternoons.

The painter is working amazingly fast.  In one day he almost got all wall surfaces covered with the first coat of paint.

Our house was listed yesterday and we already had one person come through and take a look.  Haven't heard back yet if there is any interest in buying.  It should be about two weeks until we can move into the "new" place.  One Pickleball friend told me that all my neighbors will be about 85 years old so I won't make any friends there.  We'll see.  We know there are older neighbors on one side of us, but we haven't met anyone yet.

Morning sighting of javelinas

It has been really cold here.  The mornings have been in the mid 20s.  This was my view from the Pickleball courts yesterday where we played while wearing many layers, gloves and hats.  We even had a few snowflakes during the game.

This morning on the 7am walk we startled a herd of javelinas!  As we approached they kept scurrying to get out of our way.  There were probably 15, including two babies!  Since it was still a bit dark my camera phone wasn't good enough to get any great shots.  They look pretty funny in these photos.

After I am warmed up from the three mile walk I've been heading straight to the "new" house to scrub it.  Here is what the living room currently looks like as I pulled up the carpets to paint the baseboard. This afternoon the painter is going to start painting the walls.  I can't wait!

New Year's Day Snow

The sun is shining right now and water is dripping everywhere.  I know the snow will be gone by tomorrow, but we are enjoying its beauty while we can.

Our poor Mesquite tree!! We lost two big branches.