Bocce with Kim and the girls

Carl had a dentist appointment, so Kim and the girls and I decided to try playing bocce. The girls had played before, but not on formal courts -- they were very good at it!

Kim and Lianna won by a wide margin!

 

Daughter Kim visit

Daughter Kim and granddaughters came to visit -- they were scheduled to come for spring break, but flights did not cooperate (and that turned out being the week that Carl found out he had pneumonia and ended up in the hospital, so maybe it was for the best). They had said that they may be able to come after their school was out for the summer, and were able to get flights, so they came the first week of May.

We headed to Usery Mountain Regional Park to go hiking. It was a beautiful cool morning. 

The girls studying information provided on the signboard.

Climbing up on a rock

Near the summit of Vista Trail

We saw these soybean-like pods on the Palo Verde trees...

... it turns out (according to Google) that they are edible and, when green, similar to edamame (aka green soybeans) and a good source of protein.

Granddaughter checking whether the barrel cactus is thorny!

We had had a cold front move through so had a couple of really gorgeous days while they were visiting.

Golf rules for seniors

We saw this posted in the bulletin board area at the post office:

I thought that a couple of friends/readers of this blog who are golfers or married to golfers might get a chuckle out of it!

Another century plant

I had posted about century plants blooming in our community a couple of months ago (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2026/02/century-plants-about-to-bloom.html) -- one sent up a flower stalk a few weeks ago on the block where our RV lot is located...

Since this one is right in front of our friends' house, you can possibly better see how tall that flower stalk is -- probably 20' tall (it extends up into the fronds of the coconut tree). Doc (the owner of the house) said that it grew in about 4-5 days.

This stalk is much later than the others to appear -- the blooms have not yet fully appeared. On the ones that I posted pictures of earlier, the stalks have bloomed and died and the host plants are dying, but there are "pup" plants in the same area of ground.

Miss Kitty on the hunt

Carl has stopped showing mouse videos to Miss Kitty because she became so demanding for them. But a few days ago, he put up a second monitor on his computer and put a mouse video up on it for her to see...

... once I got her to focus on the computer monitor, she was quite energetic going after the mouse...

... at this point, she had actually stepped on the computer mouse so it brought up a grey box with selection items on the screen, but she was still going after the mouse on the video...

... her paw looks small here because it was in motion and blurred.

She enjoyed the video for a while, though she went to the edge of the monitor and looked behind it as the mouse hole in the video makes it appear that the mouse is escaping behind the monitor. She couldn't find the mouse behind the monitor and so got bored.

Wildlife exploration

While Pamela and Dylan were here, Carl asked if they would like to go scorpion hunting. We had never done this, but had heard that it was possible to see scorpions along the back walls of our community, especially at the dog park. Carl had gotten a black light several years ago because that is supposed to be the way that you can see them, but then he decided he really didn't want to know if there were scorpions around -- if you don't see them, they don't exist, right?

Anyway, we decided it would be interesting to go look for them, so we drove the golf cart over to the back wall -- we didn't find any along the back wall, so we went to the dog park. There, we also were not having success, but we asked another resident (who was there with his dog), and he indicated that the part of the wall that would have been facing the sun as it was setting (and therefore warm) was thought to be the most reliable place to see them.

We went to that part of the wall... our black light flashlight seemed to be getting weaker and we were sorry we hadn't brought more batteries when suddenly...

... there one was!

We had been told to look in the cracks, and near this one we saw another one between the blocks.

This video is when it was first moving:  https://youtube.com/shorts/eNeHLB7CVwk?feature=share

Then it came to a stop and was like a fake florescent model of a scorpion stuck on the wall (as in the picture above).

Dylan found a short stick and encouraged it to move:  https://youtube.com/shorts/1lMNR60wccA

You'll see that it goes into the crack between the wall and column.

 

Since we saw them at the dog park, and since that is all the way on the other side of our community (about 1/2 mile away from our lots!), we're going to pretend that there are none around where we live... and we're not going to be going out with the black light flashlight to prove or disprove that opinion! 

Daughter Pamela visit

Daughter Pamela contacted Carl about a week ago and said that she and Dylan could come to visit if it was okay with us. We have the casa available for guests to use so they came for a few days...

They had work and school that kept them busy during the day, but had evenings that we could do things together, including a trip to Organ Stop Pizza.

Pamela and Dylan had come near the end of the season (they were here for the end-of-year concert). They stayed outside the park and came in and drove our golf cart around the community a lot. This time, they stayed in our casa, and were surprised at how empty the park was compared to just a few weeks ago. It was gorgeous weather while they were here which made it really nice too. And, they got to use the golf cart as much as they wanted!