The Weekend

Spent the long weekend doing not much of anything. Mentioned I made more bread. Got to love these copper chef pans. The bread lifted right out and I just had to wipe the pan with a paper towel to clean it. 

Sunday I spent most of the day watching racing. Monaco, Indy and NASCAR in Charlotte. My favorite driver lost the Charlotte race by 1.5 seconds behind the leader who he was catching quickly. 
This morning we went to the grocery store with 11 things on the list, but managed to spend $181!!!! Bought another one of the pans pictured above to keep in the RV. And some meet to freeze and take with us on our trip.  Came home and vacuumed packed them. The Food Saver was one of our best buys over 15 years ago. Got it at an RV show. 
Another warm day so stayed pretty much inside. I've traced most of the pattern pieces for my new window on to the glass. I might do some separating the pieces here inside, but that is about all I can do. Don't need tiny pieces glass in the carpet. 

Sharing a picture of five of our great grandbabies. The are the children of our son John's children. Wish they'd had a chance to meet him. 

And that's it for today. Tomorrow maybe we'll take a load to the RV, I've got my "get ready to go" list out and have done a couple of things to get ready.

Stay home day.

Absolutely nothing to write about today. Got up early to watch NASCAR Cup practice at 6:00 a.m While watching it I cut out my paper glass patterns for the flowers and leaves and traced them on to the glass. Unless it cools down that will be as far as I get for a while. Today it was in the low 90's but too HOT in the garage to work out there. 
Also made a change in our travel plans so now have to change two reservations. I knew there was a reason I didn't like to make reservations. Most of this trip we won't be traveling on the interstates. Taking some off the beaten path smaller curvy roads. Bill says, No problem with this RV. And we will do our first dry camping in the new RV. Should be interesting. Discovered that one of the towns we'll be staying in is having a Hot Air Balloon Festival while we will be there. I've always wanted to go to one. 
Then I cooked nectar for the hummingbirds so their feeders will be full when we leave.
Also baked Bill some Focaccia bread using more of the frozen bread dough and one of my Copper Chef pans. Turned out really good.
Then for myself I made brownies, from a box mix, in the Copper Brownie pan. They turned out really good too and very easy to get out of the pan, the pan already cooks them into squares. 

Red Rock Canyon Las Vegas

It cooled down some today - only got to 99! But we still have the winds. 
Another neighbor is getting a new roof from the storms last month. The whole neighborhood is getting spiffed up. Now if they would just landscape the two new homes. The rock for the yards is sitting in a pile in a driveway - been there for a month. We have another inspection coming up in July - wonder what they will find this time?
Had to go out to the hobby shop clear on the other side of town to pick up one of Bill's planes that had defective landing gear. Under warranty still. Other than that did nothing today. On Tuesday I took my sewing machine in for servicing and to repair the lights on it. Hard to sew without good light. It will take about three weeks. 
Last week on one of the perfect desert days when the wind wasn't blowing we took the newest drone up to Red Rock Canyon to fly it. Luckily I also brought my little camera - got some pretty pictures. 
Blue sky and good light. The canyon is directly across town from where we live. We live on the eastern edge and Red Rock is on the western side. Driving up Charleston on our way there. 

Just before the entrance to the park is another radio control airfield. We stopped to look at it. A couple of unfriendly guys were flying their planes. Guess it must be on private land. 
Just getting ready to go into the park. We can use our Golden Age pass for admittance. That has sure saved up a lot of money over the years. 

 We drove past a couple of the really busy parking lots and overlooks until we found a place away from everyone else. Bill got his drone out and set it up. I on the other hand snapped some pictures. The rocks are really red out here. 

 This is one of the reasons I love the desert. How do those plants manage to grow in such an unfriendly environment. 

 There was a big fire here several years ago, can still see the plants that died. 

 And the new growth. There were lots of bunches of yellow flowers scattered around.

 Just to the east of this picture are a lot of hiking and climbing trails. 

 There is the drone - the tiny white spot. It is hard to keep track of, kind of blends into the sky. When it is up there you can't hear it either. 

 Just more pictures because I like the scenery. 

 The drone coming in for a landing. Had to watch out for cars. Every once in a while one would take the long way out by us. 

 Bill flying. No one around us. 

A guy pulled up on the road and asked, "Is that your drone?"  Bill said yes. Well the guy proceeded to tell us that flying the drone over BLM land was not legal. And that we could get a heavy Federal fine if a ranger came by. Why is it illegal? Because the noise MIGHT disturb the desert creatures. Most of Nevada is BLM land!!!  So here it is coming in for a landing. 

 Then we just finished driving the scenic loop with me taking pictures out of the window of the scenery. 

 Beautiful bluer sky with some puffy white clouds. 

 Other colored rocks and bushes. 

 On the way home I caught this utility box. 

A very nice day outside, before it got so warm. 
I've been working on making reservations for our upcoming trip. First time ever we've made reservations for a whole trip. We
will be on the road for 26 days. Hopefully seeing some pretty country where we can play with the drone. And I can get some nice pictures. 
The community where we live has finally set up a way to pay our land rent on line. Up to now I've had to either call or hope someone would answer an e-mail so I could pay. The rent fluctuates monthly due to water [one bill for the whole park - divided up] and trash bills. So we'll see how it works. 

Metal Plants and Difficult Drones

Hello again from warm and windy Las Vegas. Very warm and very windy. This thermometer is in the shade always. It is about 2:30 - four hours from the hottest part of the day usually. And the wind is back in force - gusting 30 to 40 again. 

Back to Boulder City - I've always wanted to stop at a shop there right on the highway that sells metal yard art. So colorful. So on the way home we stopped. I love the bright colors. Should we have gone with metal instead of real?

Sun flowers, Bird of Paradise, cactus, breaklights etc. etc. All beautiful.

Bronze and green cacti. Some with flowers some without. 

I love him. Maybe next year...

Big animal sculptures too. See them in the background. 

Isn't this a neat idea for a fence.

Colorful cacti.

A flying pig - if I had a place to put him...Maybe hanging in patio?

Daises all in a row. They were about 20 dollars each. 

I've mentioned we've - yes both of us - have been playing with the drones. This time Bill launched it from the street in front of our house looking west. Taken with the camera on the drone. 

Looking east out over the wetlands. We were out just before sunset as it was cooler, not so bright out and no wind - for once. 

We took it up to Red Rock Canyon Park and Bill took lots of movies and snapshots. When we got home we realized they were all in BLACK AND WHITE!!!! So... reset the camera - now it is taking pictures in color again. BUT when I reset the camera it changed the movie format again. Can't use mov files without a lot of fussing. So have to remember to reset the video back to MP4. Someday we'll get some good shots. I did have my little camera with me in Red Rock so will post some pictures from there one of these days. 

Thought this was interesting - Snacks, [can't read] HandWash and Dog Wash.

I am going to make another window for my bathroom, for the big window over the tub.
These are the pattern - one is for cutting the pattern out, the other is to build the window on. Small shot of what window will kind of look like. It will be 45" x 22" when it is done. 

 Stopped at the glass shop today and picked up some green and red glass. Green for the leaves, yellow for 3 of the sunflowers and dark red for one sunflower. I just saw on-line that there are now deep red sunflowers. And the blue for the sky background. Haven't decided on what for the frame yet. It will wait a while though either until we get AC in the garage or the weather cools. 

Our plants are flourishing! Lots of new growth and flowers. 

 We'll see how they do in the heat. 

We got the RV back a day ago and got it all cleaned up, the new mattress in it and things put back in it. Then we asked management here at the park if we could change parking areas. Where it was stored the space was so narrow we barely fit - big RVs on both sides of us. And at an angle...So anyway they said yes so now we are in a space Bill can pull straight into and best of all there are boats on either side. So we have lots of room to open the doors.
The last couple of days we've been planning a road trip. Leaving a week from today. Looking for cooler weather. 

More Boulder City

Continuing our walk around Boulder City. If you didn't read the article I linked to in the first part of the Boulder City blog - read it now. It is really interesting.
Didn't go in here so don't know what it is about. There is a statue of an alien next to it and a flying saucer in the back.

 The Boulder City Theater from another angle.

 A Spanish Dancer? Forgot to read the plaque. 

A couple of the many murals around town. 

I just thought he was cute.  

 More sculptures 

I thought this was interesting. Of course there would be women if there were lots of men.working there. 

 They also didn't plan for children. 

 Boulder City Mural

 No matter where we are Bill can find someone to talk to.  

 One of the old gas stations. Part of a park now.

 The lake and the mountain goats. This is in another park. 

And that kind of finishes our tour of Boulder City. Leaving the town heading home we stopped at a shop ;that sells all kinds of metal yard art. That is one of the reasons we went to Boulder, I've always wanted to go there. But will save it until tomorrow. We were busy all day today - in the 100+ heat!