Morning Bray Farm

If anyone ever tells you donkeys can’t tell time, be assured they don’t know what they’re talking about. Every evening, right about 5:30 or so, the drama begins. If you didn’t know better, you’d think the boys were starving and hadn’t been fed for three days. It usually goes something like this:

Bernard thinks flaring his nostrils and sucking in his breath makes him look super skinny.

Ellsworth prefers to play the sympathy card.

Ellsworth: Oh mamma, I’m so hungry I can’t hold my head up.

Ellsworth: Bernard, let’s try puppy-dog eyes and see if that works tonight.

Ellsworth: I wish Carolynn was here. I bet she’d feed me right now.

Nigel and Fergus: Oh my gawd. Can you believe these clowns? Do they have no shame?

Bernard: Heck no, I have no shame! Look mamma, I’m flaring my nostrils again! I’m so hungry and skinny.

Ellsworth: Mamma, we need sweet feed, stat! I’m just going to pass out this instant!

Me: Oh, Ellsworth. I love you, my angel. You do save the drama for your mamma. ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Trixie inspired me to look at things from a new perspective, made the familiar fresh again, somehow shared with me her recognition of great beauty in mundane scenes, and reawakened in me an awareness of the mystery that is woven into the warp and weft of everything we perceive with our five senses but can know only with our hearts. This may be the primary purpose of dogs: to restore our sense of wonder and to help us maintain it, to make us consider that we should trust our intuition as they trust theirs, and to help us realize that a thing known intuitively can be as real as anything known by material experience.

-Dean Koontz, A Big Little Life

I’ve always been convinced this is the primary purpose of dogs. After all, these are exactly the things that Enzi has inspired and reawakened in me. I’ll always credit the Diva for bringing me back to life.♥

If you’re looking for a good read – simple (in a good sense), yet good – read A Big Little Life: A Memoir of a Joyful Dog by Dean Koontz. What a lovely memoir of his beloved Trixie. ♥

Honest to goodness, yum. You’re going to love this recipe from Don’s dad. It’s one of our summer favorites and one of our new favorite ways to use fresh basil from our garden.

What you’ll need:

• 1 pound sweet Italian sausage
• 1 stick butter
• 1/2 pound mushrooms, sliced
• 1 medium-size red onion, chopped
• 1 teaspoon parsley flakes
• 1/4 cup fresh basil, chopped
• 4 teaspoons Italian seasoning
• 1 teaspoon garlic salt
• 1/2 teaspoon fennel seed
• 4 teaspoons oregano
• 1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese
• 16 ounces thin spaghetti, cooked and drained

To prepare:

1. Break up sausage into large skillet. Sauté over medium-high heat 5 to 6 minutes or until thoroughly cooked. Drain off excess fat and set aside.
2. Melt butter in large saucepan over medium heat. Add mushrooms, onion and seasonings. Cook, stirring occasionally, 5 minutes.
3. Add reserved sausage to saucepan and cook 10 minutes.
4. Add sausage mixture and cheese to hot cooked pasta and toss gently. Spoon into serving dish and garnish with additional cheese, if desired.

Thanks, Papa Sutphin! ♥

This flag is being carried on horseback by a member of the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Posse at the New Mexico State Fair rodeo.

Did you know?

Much of modern-day rodeo evolved from the working cowboy and his duties on the range. After months of moving cattle across the country, cowboys celebrated the end of their grind by roping more cattle and riding wild broncs for fun and friendly competition. It was from those informal, friendly competitions that on July 4, 1869, two groups of cowboys met to settle an argument over who was best at performing everyday ranch duties. This first competition was how the sport of rodeo evolved.

Look at what we received in the mail yesterday. Postcards from France. The boys were absolutely thrilled to know that someone across the pond was thinking of them. Thank you Vicki!

Vicki from I Need Orange recently returned from an amazing trip to France with her daughter. Be sure to check out Vicki’s blog to get the inside scoop.

Vicki found this postcard in Bayonne. It says, “You have cousins in Basque country?”  Vicki was sure she knew four guys in Albuquerque who did.

Then she got to La Rochelle, and there were donkeys everywhere. Donkeys everywhere – in pajamas! Sea salt is a major product of the area and donkeys help haul the salt. The “culottes” (typically described as stockings, leggings or knee-high boots) help to protect donkeys there from mosquito bites.

The postcard says the donkeys in culottes are one of the main folkloric elements of Ile de Ré – right by La Rochelle.

Needless to say, Bernard might be in a bit of a bind. I’m thinking Bernard would look adorable in a couple of pairs of culottes. We just happen to know someone who knits… Hi Cathy!

And then, goodness! Vicki said she saw this brochure and picked it up, but only as she was mailing it to us did she read it. They are keeping donkeys for their milk!  The brochure says that visitors can taste the milk, and that they make skin-care products, including soap, from the milk. As Vicki said, “Who knew??”

We’re surprised too! Vicki said that she ate lots of goat yogurt and sheep yogurt while she was in France… and just think, maybe she could have had donkey yogurt!!! ♥

Isn’t nature amazing?

I once read that the leaf bug’s camouflage is occasionally a detriment. Because of their remarkable disguise, they’ve been known to now and then mistake each other for real leaves and have been seen nibbling on one another.

Apparently there are quite a few species of leaf bugs. In some species, the edge of the leaf insect’s body even has the appearance of bite marks. And, to further confuse predators, when some leaf insects walk, they rock back and forth to mimic a real leaf being blown by the wind.

Now, really… how cool is that? ♥

One of my favorite pastimes is walking around the garden to admire our plants and flowers. Another reason I love having a blog: It’s allowing me to document our slowly expanding Albuquerque garden. ♥

Aster… planted this year. By the way, we’re gradually eliminating the gravel from our flower beds and can’t wait until it’s gone.

Basil… it smells so wonderful. Yum.

Sage. I’m not sure what variety… it was here when we moved to Albuquerque. The bees and butterflies love it.

Goldenrod… also planted this year.

A volunteer morning glory in last year’s pot. One of my very favorites.

Sedum ‘Autumn Joy’…  look at how much it has colored up. I don’t recall my sedum in Maryland being so colorful.

We’re having some serious technical difficulties here. For goodness’ sake, all I’ve wanted for the last few days is to show you my tomatoes.

Thanks to Danni at On the Way to Critter Farm, her support, and her tomato seeds, this is the very first tomato I’ve ever grown from seed. And I’ve been so excited to share it with you.

Instead, as I’ve downloaded pictures from my cameras these last few days, I’ve been getting this:

And, instead of this:

I’ve downloaded this:

Because I was able to download photos successfully onto another computer, here’s what I do know about this issue:

1. It’s happening to about two-thirds of my photos; not all
2. It’s not my cameras
3. It’s not my lenses
4. It’s not the USB cable
5. It’s not the USB ports 
6. Photos that I already have stored on the computer are not affected; only new photos that I download onto the computer are

There’s something going on with our computer and we can’t figure out what it is. Does anyone out there have any ideas?

By the way, the tomatoes are delish. Thank you, Danni! ♥

Don and I were sitting out in the corral relaxing and enjoying the company of the donkey boys and burro brothers on Sunday afternoon.

Watch what happened to Don’s chair when he got up and went into the house for just a few short minutes. Heathens, I tell ‘ya. ♥

I used one word repeatedly to describe where I was the last couple of days… gorgeous. Simply gorgeous.

Abiquiu. Georgia O’Keeffe lived here from 1949 until her death in 1986 at 98 years of age.

The landscape. The colors. The light. Gorgeous.

I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn’t say any other way – things I had no words for. 

                                                                                                                       – Georgia O’Keeffe