Suburban Country Lady: Back from Vacation

Whew! We are back from vacation and I have been so busy with my chores and tasks I need another vacation to recover! We had a great time and met some great people.

Cholla cactus

I mentioned in a past post about how fun it is visit small town museums and meet interesting volunteers at these museums. We had a wonderful visit with a lady named Betty at the Kenton museum in the Oklahoma panhandle. I was impressed that the town had a population of 19 and yet they had a very nice museum. We had a nice visit with Betty. She let me take some cholla cactus pieces with me to plant at home. This cactus is used to make walking canes. When the old cactus branches die the people who make the canes saturate them inside and out with honey and let the ants clean them up. Once they are stripped they make canes with them.

I met another interesting lady when we camped at Bell Cow Lake in Chandler, Oklahoma. We camped in the horse camp area and she was a member of a women's horse riding club. She said their club was unique because they had no officers and no membership dues. They just get together to share their love of horses and horse back riding. It was interesting to see all the portable corrals for the horses and the combination horsetrailer/campers there were. As I like to say, I learn something new almost everyday!

When we were preparing to leave the Black Mesa State Park I came across a tarantula when I took our trash to the dumpster. I watched it cross the grass and onto the blacktop pavement where I was standing. To my astonishment, the little critter started walking towards me. I backed up and moved over and it still walked toward me. I finally moved further away from it's sight and it went on to the grass on the other side of the road. Now who knows about tarantulas and can tell me why this little guy saw me and walked towards me? I was amazed at it's intelligence!

Finally, I will mention the precious baby donkey we saw when we left the Black Mesa park. She was among a small herd of donkeys on the side of the road. My husband stopped the car and I took pictures from the window. It was so precious, but what was even more precious was the way it's mother protected her baby. I love seeing God's wonderful work in nature. He taught us all to protect our family, be interested in our surroundings and to love one another.