Eagle Cloud Formation

Amazing eagle cloud east of Hwy 97

We were driving to Omak on Monday and I saw this in the sky. By the time I reached for the camera and took a picture, half its head and right wing had evaporated. Before I could take a second pic, the whole right wing was a small puff. I have never seen anything as clearly as this and completely devoid of clouds elsewhere in the sky.

Aspen are in bloom

We are feeling the pollen and here is one of the sources. Things are blooming including the aspen around us. The blooms are looking like skinny, fuzzy caterpillars. Achoo!
In the Okanogan valley the fields are mostly green, flowers are starting to bloom and buds can be seen on lilacs. Snow is expected Sunday night.

Today is 100% chance of rain predicted for the Aeneas Valley and we already had some. Here is the sky I woke up to this blustery day. We can use the dust control and the pastures need water to boost the grasses. The wild horses have only been by once in the last week. The long-horn cattle came by with a newborn black and white calf. It was so cute. Sorry I didn't have any good pics to post of them.

Storm a coming!

Daylight Savings is This Weekend!

So not having TV has a few disadvantages. I just found out Daylight Savings is THIS weekend, Sunday, March 8, 2015. Yes, that even happens out here in the Aeneas Valley.
So don't forget to set your clock AHEAD 1 hour Saturday night.
Talk to you later.

Welcome to my world,  Frontier Woman @ frontierlivingtoday.blogspot.com

Much to Do and Some Wild Animal Visits

Good thing I have keeping-up-my-blogs as a priority item on the to-do list. Writing seems to help settle the craziness in my head. There is a lot going on these last couple of weeks, but I will just go over new stuff.
The other night we saw deer right out the window. I am overcome with wonder when I see wild animals around here. There were only 4 deer, usually we see 5 together lately. Maybe 1 was out of sight. This 1 caught my eye as the sun was setting and lit it up! Frontier Hubby got the camera and took a bunch of pics.

There are some loose long-horn cattle out over the winter. The guy cannot afford to keep them in hay, so they are on the range which is not exactly how it is suppose to be done, but heck, we are all trying to make a life for ourselves. So be it. Two of these were duking it out in the field. They didn't stay to visit and were gone within the hour.

Then the next day the wild horses showed up. The car drove very slowly through the herd and the horses just moved off the road and watched them. Usually, the stallion pushes them much further away. Maybe he is getting used to such things.

Boxer babies? We hope so. Our son's male boxer is here for some R&R with our female boxer. Maybe we'll have little ones bouncing around soon. I hope so. We have been waiting for babies from this pair for years, and finally got them together while she's in heat. They are both such sweet dogs and should have some beautiful pups!

Welcome to my world,  Frontier Woman @ frontierlivingtoday.blogspot.com

Last weekend Frontier Hubby and I went to the Seattle area, Kirkland to be more specific. It was a birthday party for my granddaughter who recently turned one. It was a great party with lots of adults with 1 year old kids. My daughter-in-law made lots of tasty food and my son made punch.


What is that Thing? Yes it is.
(An unusual siting of a VW Thing)

After a day's drive to get there, we were certainly not the party animals. We did meet some very nice people and enjoyed ourselves.

My granddaughter's family prefers privacy so I am not posting pics of the party, I did however take many pictures of the drive over on Highway 2, one of the most beautiful, scenic drives ever.

The pictures start as we drove into Wenatchee about 3 hours after we left home. Including East Wenatchee, population is just over 40,000. The Columbia River divides the two, east from west.

Looking over Wenatchee

Leaving Wenatchee

The drive takes about 5 hours from Aeneas Valley with just gas stops. I put the pics in small, but you can click on them to see them bigger.


Welcome to my world,  Frontier Woman @ frontierlivingtoday.blogspot.com

Driving through Leavenworth



A rock tipped up on end

to become a mountain!







Leaving Leavenworth



On the road again . . .

Frost line way up high

Almost to the top of Steven's Pass



Steven's Pass has snow!

Coming down some cool clouds

A moss covered tree lane

 

-Tunnel- Get ready to honk your horn

Rugged mountains on the wet side

No Trespassing

Many properties in Aeneas Valley have "No Trespassing" signs posted. Many people have not posted the signs, but expect people to know and understand that no one should trespass on private property, and this is all private property.
The public forest starts at about the top of Mount Anne to the north and the mountains to the south. So if you are unsure about whether you are walking on private property or public, don't cut across, especially if you are crossing a fence or gate. You know, they make maps that show where the public forests start.
Out here, not everyone plays nice. If you can, contact the owner of the property, ask for permission. Let them know your purpose and when you will be on the property.
Thankfully, the two people here are crossing with permission. A few others tried, mostly hunters or snowmobilers. Their trips on private property ended abruptly as they learned a little more about the facts of life and moved on to public lands.
Be sure to carry whatever it is you feel will deter the wild animals, too. Bear, cougar, wolves, and even deer can be aggressive at times. They are not likely to run from pepper spray, but it could happen. Are you feeling lucky today?

Welcome to my world,  Frontier Woman @ frontierlivingtoday.blogspot.com

Helping Friends

Today is a beautiful, sunny day. Frontier Hubby had meetings this morning and is home working on a friend's computer. We went to visit another friend to help her clean out the chimney. As of last night, she could not burn in it without smoking herself out of the house.
Saturday, our chimney was bad enough to get us to clean it out, so we have some recent practice! We had to take most all of it apart to clean it as the angles in the pipe did not allow for a straight though push of the brush. Now hers and ours burn hot and smokelessly.
Just a day in the life here. Not that we are always running around helping everyone, but it is a normal course of how life is lived here. Sometimes you help, other times you get helped.
We saw the wild horses earlier. They were about a mile away. Seems they are finding enough food that they are not at our gate begging anymore. I miss them.
Yesterday, our dog fence was broken. No idea why it happened, but sometime during the night, it happened. Poor Frontier Hubby was walking the fence line looking for breaks yesterday before church. It turned out to be a kink more than a break and it was about as far from the house as possible. Of course.
The dog fence runs along our field fence that goes around the area where we live and store stuff. We have not buried it. That would be simple, but a lot of work! So, we just occasionally wander the line to find the breaks. The most interesting was when the range cattle somehow got caught on the wire strung up along the field fence. It was pulled tight, about 20 feet from the fence was the break. Either they managed to pick up a foot to the top of a 4 foot fence and pull it, or got their head caught in it while looking over our fence. Easy enough to fix by just making the wires touch and taping them together.
The frontier sunset was beautiful tonight.

Welcome to my world,  Frontier Woman @ frontierlivingtoday.blogspot.com

Local Weather Link

Woke up to a feeling of very light shaking. Reminded me of a bus going by houses or apartments I have lived in. I am guessing it was a trembler, as in extremely mild earthquake. I really have no idea and there are none reported near here.
Seems I am getting a lot of  requests for the weather link I use for the local, and I do mean local, weather report for my surrounding square mile or so of earth. So, click here to go to the link. It is set up to see the weather at the entrance to Aeneas Valley. On the map, you can scroll in or out, move the center of the map to your area of interest and click on the most accurate spot that you can determine.


Frontier Living Weather Site

The screen shot is scrolled down from the top of the page, which gives national major weather warnings and such. Below the map, is the GPS location of where you selected and I think an average elevation of the area. It does not match my known elevation for where I live, and that is where I put my mark for weather. Once you have your place picked out, bookmark it. Easy.
It is fairly accurate as weather forecasts go and certainly better than general weather forecasts for areas miles away. I would say + or- 5 degrees Fahrenheit and if it says 20% chance of rain, usually, one out of 5 times it rains.
Just for fun here is a picture of where I set this weather report up, the entrance to the valley, taken last week. It is 12 miles east of Tonasket on Highway 20.

Right now a friend, who is working for a neighbor, is working to make the water running down our drive, less problematic. He has heavy equipment and used to make a living moving dirt before retiring. He is fast and accurate. The neighbor was having more egress problems than we were as he is farther up this road, so we will help cover the costs of making things drivable. What we need is about 10, 9-yard loads of gravel. At $200 a load, I don't know how to swing it, but it is the only way to prevent the gouging and dirt runoff we are experiencing now and probably for the next 3 months of rain this spring.
Maybe we can trade for the many tons of rocks we are growing in the pasture. Every year a many more pop up from the freeze/thaw cycle. That is when water gets under a rock, freezes and the expansion force of freezing water pushes the rock up, and eventually, out of the ground.
I am looking forward to being able to drive around again!

Welcome to my world,  Frontier Woman @ frontierlivingtoday.blogspot.com