December 1, 2015 Busy

Wow, it's been awhile since I posted so this is a quick update on some of the things we've been doing other than seemingly endless travel time in the car.

Scott playing at my mother's house in Kansas.

Scott recovering from playing at my mother's house in Kansas.

This is one of Scott's favorite activities at the zoo.  It's a rope spider web that helps him burn off some of the boundless energy he has.

While at my mother's we took some side trips.  One was to a meet-up in Texas and another to see our daughter in Illinois.  This is where we crossed the Missouri River on our way to see some of Susan's old stomping grounds in Missouri.

The Missouri River.

Taken from a small town in Missouri.  I don't know if that was a former jaywalker or just a warning to potential jaywalkers.

Sunset in Kansas. 

Back in Overton where we got our motor home out to spend some time in the desert.  

Scott attempting to roast a marshmallow peanut over the charcoal.  They just kind of melt.

Susan bought some garden plants to put out but we gave them away when we decided to head back to Montana for the holidays.

Me-n-Scott at Lake Mead.

Raising the wind generator pole.

Wind generator up!  We brought two more solar panels from home and put them on the motor home in Nevada.  That gives us about 520 watts of solar power on the motor home.  I permanently mounted the panels about a week after this photo was taken.  It's enough to put us over the edge.  With the wind and solar power and the 3,000 watt inverter and the wood stove we very seldom run the generator now.

Scott picked out a new bow when we were in Walmart.  It's a compound with a center-shot window.  He has a hard time pulling it back and goes through all the contortions seen by adult archers who are over-bowed but he likes shooting it.  

Scott's going to slide and dice grandpa. At least he gave me a sword to defend myself with this time.  I think the chair is supposed to be armor to protect his back.

He found a knight costume and we bought it for him.  He wears it everywhere including story time at the library.  We went to Walmart after Halloween and they had a big clearance rack of Halloween costumes so Scott loaded up on them.  At a dollar each we let him get several.

Scott flying his kite while sitting down.

Scott flying his kite while laying on the ground.  It's a good thing he has a steady wind so that he doesn't have to work too hard at flying a kite.

One of our daily bicycle rides.

Scott always seems to enjoy them unless it's cold.  Obviously it's not cold this time.

After story time at the library he plays computer games on the library computer.

Veterans Day parade at Overton. After the parade there was a community cook-out at the park.

We always like to see the Christmas light display at the chocolate factory in Las Vegas.

Scott liked a lot of the figurines they had there.

We moved the wind tower around to the side of the motor home.  It put it in a more vertical position.  We padded it where it touched the motor home and quieted it down considerably.  Hopefully I'll get it mounted permanently this spring.  I finally thought of a way to make the tower extendable without spending a lot of money or making it too complicated.

We got to see new snow anyway!

Our daughter, son-in-law, and their kids are in the process of moving and stopped to camp out awhile on there way.  We had them pick up a half-cord of firewood from a local vendor.

Everyone helped get the firewood from the pickup to the storage unit.

This is a good place to store it.  We'll bring out about a week's supply at a time when we get back down there.

While we were out hiking around Scott found a little tiny cactus growing under a rock so we stopped to take it's picture.

This is a spring we hiked in to explore.  These little springs are all over the area and most are not hard to find. 

An evening watching the lake as the sun sets.

Almost time to hit the sack.

Susan took this shot of our SIL fishing.

December 31, 2014 - Enjoying life ...

Lots of photos ...

Decisions, decisions!  Scott must make a choice of which video he wants to watch.  On windy days it's not much fun to go outside so Scott ends up spending a lot of time watching videos.  When the wind is blowing we have lots of power from the wind generator so power use is not a problem.  Many times the battery voltage is so high (the inverter shuts off if the battery voltage is too high or low) that we must turn on all of the lights in the motor home to use up the excess electricity.  .

Time at the library in Overton.

Scott putting stickers on the Christmas tree at the Overton library.

The chocolate factory Christmas light display.

We swapped stoves in the motorhome.  The oven did not work in the factory stove so we got one out of another motorhome we acquired for parts parts.  Susan is cleaning it up.  I hooked it to the propane before she cleaned it and the oven and all the burners worked.

I had to enlarge the hole a bit but we got it installed and hooked up.  Then we learned that it had a gas leak in the oven valves.  (My eyebrows will probably grow back okay just like the hair on my arms that is now missing.)  So we're back to looking for a new stove.  We found that all of the new units have a large grill across the top instead of individual burner plates.  We're still trying to find one like we want but may end up going with the newer style.

The wood stove is great!  We learned that Mesquite and Tamarisk leave a lot of ash when they burn.  I had to clean it almost daily until we got some new wood.

Scott at the playground in Overton.

I brought my longbow with us this time and have enjoyed many hours of shooting it.  There's a lot of gravel around my target so missing the target is really hard on my arrow supply.

Scott has his bow too but likes to move in close when shooting.

Me and Susan on a bicycle ride.  We ride to the highway and back most days just for exercise.  It's three miles each way.  Mostly uphill going out and downhill coming back in.

Scott has his control center set up in the motorhome.  He sits up there pretending he's a pilot.  He has a toy computer and my calculator along with the television remote so he has lots of buttons to push (in addition to all the buttons, switches and gauges on the motorhome's control-console).  He has a plastic sheet of desert animal pictures that he refers to as his navigation chart.  He has a plastic milk crate filled with pillows for a chair with the barbecue tongs for a back rest.  He'll play for hours up there charting a path across the world.  It would be nice if I could record and play all the sound effects he makes (including radio transmissions to the control tower).

He's helping Susan play the keyboard now.

A nearby spring we occasionally visit on sunny days.

The water is about 80 degrees.  Not hot but warmer than the air temperature this time of year.

Scott loves playing in the spillway.

Our Christmas tree which had to remain outside due to there not being enough room for it inside.

Scott just being Scott!

Another day at the library.  This is the tree they had set up.  They had a couple of stuffed penguins which Scott pulled close while admiring the tree.  He was busy telling them all about the tree's decorations.

Scott and Santa in Overton one evening. Santa asked Scott what he wanted for Christmas and Scott said a motorcycle.  I think Santa thought Scott wanted a toy motorcycle but Scott wants the real thing.

Christmas morning and Scott is really getting into it this year.  He wanted to eat all the candy right then but mean old Grandma and Grandpa said "no."

He got some stickers for Christmas (along with a bunch of other stuff) and proceeded to plaster them on grandma's face and his own).

Not sure what he's thinking about here but he thought it was fun.  (He was "looking" in the mirror.)

Local wood for the stove and evening outside fire.

It was a bit windy for about a week!

One of our desert walks near camp.  The path is from wild burros and feral cattle.

Campfire time.

We found someone in Vegas who had about a half-cord of firewood for sale.  He wanted sixty-dollars for it so we made a trip in with the trailer.

We filled up the trailer and the back of the Expedition.  It's all smaller stuff which will be great for our wood stove.

Susan did her "polar bear" swim in honor of the New Year.  She challenged our kids to do the same thing at home but they declined (pansies!).  Seems that they didn't want to cut holes in the six inches of ice on the lake or brave the sub-zero temperatures.  They thought she was cheating because she used a hot spring with 80 degree water and the outside air temperature was around 45 degrees on the plus side of the thermometer.

Susan basking in the morning sunshine while writing in her journal.

Lest anyone think it's always a tropical paradise here we've had some nights when it got down to 38 degrees in the motorhome.  It was early in the morning and Scott woke up but decided he'd rather crawl in with grandma while grandpa got the wood stove fired up good and hot!