May 9, 2017

Where is Czechia?

May 9, 2017 

Duck diving for lunch

When I open the home page for my blog to write a new entry, I always check to see where the recent views have come from, and I am always amazed with the diversity in the list.  Today's list included Czechia.  I had never heard of Czechia, so I went to Google to see what I could find out.  It turned out that the Czech Republic has been renamed, but the new name is not "catching on" and is not being used.  One article I found is titled "Czech Republic Changed Its Name, but No One Noticed."  The name change actually happened about a year ago (April 2016).

Closer to home, during the last few days, I have been busy still unpacking and putting things away.  I had not gone grocery shopping for our house in 6 weeks and it was time for me to take care of that.  Sunday evening I managed to get to Wal-Mart to do that shopping.  It took a couple of hours and my husband was about ready to send out a search party to locate me.

Last Thursday night we drove to McAllen to have supper with our son and his family.  We had a great visit and two of the boys came home with us.  It was a a quiet visit.  They both went to the office with us Friday and helped with several chores.  We had a good time and so did they.  They returned home Saturday afternoon after one of them spent Saturday helping one of the men in our church build the scenery for Vacation Bible School.  

We had gone to supper with friends Wednesday night and I am having trouble with the Cochlear mini microphone.  I am not getting a real good pick up and volume from it.  I will try it a little longer and see if things get better.  The places I have tried to use it have been very noisy and that may be the problem.  In quieter settings it works fairly well.  I did use it in the nursery some when I was caring for our grandson.  I would leave it on and I could hear him in the other end of the house.

 Wild turkey

 

During my 4 days in Alburque, New Mexico for Easter, Saturday we drove to a wildlife preserve and enjoyed seeing a variety of birds.  This is in the area where the Sandhill Cranes spend the winter, but they had already left for their homes far in the northern part of Canada.  I hope to time a trip there soon to see them at the right time of the year.  

 Swallow

We took a picnic lunch and some shade and enjoyed watching the birds while we ate our sandwiches.  My son and I were taking photos while his wife did the driving.   It was very windy and my photos were not spectacular, but we had fun.

Black-chinned Hummingbird in New Mexico

This past weekend brought a good variety of birds to the back yard feeders and fountains.  The birds have emptied the feeders several times in the last week.  They are so glad to see that I am supplying them with food again.  I have seen one of the little migrating birds that comes every year, a Water Thrush.  He is so cute, but he is probably upset that the waterfall is not operating.  He always stays around it.  The bird photos in this blog entry are ones from my trip to Albuquerque for Easter weekend.

Canada Goose in New Mexico

While I was staying in Dallas during April, I flew to Albuquerque for Easter.  On Easter morning, I had wanted to go to a Sunrise Service.  Growing up, we often did that on Easter mornings.  The only one our daughter-in-law was able to locate was a large one in the city stadium.  That was not what I had in mind and I was not sure how well I would be able to hear.

In my son's backyard in Albuquerque

 

It turned out, that God woke me up on Easter morning and in my night gown, I went out on the patio in a small fenced portion of their yard.  No one could see me, but I realized that I had a perfect view of where the sun would rise.  I spent an hour waiting for the sunrise and mentally went over the Biblical telling of the events of the death and resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  As it got closer to the actual time that I would be able to see the sun over the top of the Sandia Mountains I was able to tell where it would crest.  

Easter Sunrise
 

There were two peaks on that section of the mountain where I was watching and what a gift God gave me that morning as the sun shown perfectly centered between those two peaks.  So as I sat alone on a quiet, chilly April morning,  I had an amazingly awesome view of the rising sun.  It would only be that perfectly aligned one morning a year (if I am correct), and I had a front row seat.  God is so good.  That is just what I needed that morning.

Sunlight pours through the gap in the mountain
 

As the sun continued to rise, the sunlight just burst through the morning sky.  What a morning.  After Bob and Vickey got up, we got ready to go to church.  They were having an Easter musical and the speaking parts of the program were written by their music director.  The auditorium was full and we were seated about 1/2 way to the front.  I started coughing and told my son I was going to get some water.  He went with me and we were greeted by a lady I assume was the church secretary who quickly got me water and led me to a beautifully decorated room with coffee, bottled water, snacks, and afghans hanging over the backs of all the lovely seats in the room.  (I guess this is their "cry room" for removing fussy children from the service.)  I told my son to go back and I would stay in there.  The sweet lady turned on a huge flat screen TV and the musical was live on the TV.  I could hear it so much better in that small room with a volume control on the set.  What a blessing as I watched the rest of the presentation.

 Dove's nest

We spent the afternoon with friends of theirs.  God continued to give me one blessing after another.  Right out the large window in the dining room was a dove's nest with two baby doves about ready to leave the nest.  In fact, one kept leaving just to walk down the branch and as his balance would leave him wobbling, he would scurry back to the nest.  What fun to watch the mother and father birds encouraging the babies to leave the nest.

 Dove's nest

 

Monday my son and I took the tram to the top of Sandia Peak.  They live fairly close the the base of the tram and it only took a few minutes to get there.  We were on the first tram of the day and it was so nice that we were able to enjoy the view and the quiet, and that we were about ready to head down about the time the loads of school children were arriving.  I love kids, but I don't want to watch them on the top of a peak like that.  It was time to go for another outing.  

 Sandia Peak Tram

 

We finished the day with a tour of Old Town.  I did a little shopping and took photos.  The flowers in the park and around a church in that area were beautiful.  When we finished up, we stopped for iced sodas before they took me to the airport for my flight back to Dallas.