may 2 & 3 danger! lots of photos!

here's how it looked when we got to fairfield on saturday- much like what we left in boise. good weather to be working inside.
after the obligatory dog romp with rocky, of course.

and a walk around to see what's growing .

wildflowers starting to pop up. i think a desert parsley.

and something else- maybe larkspur?- getting ready to bloom.

i think we'll have lupine and wild geranium and maybe camas too.

the willow are starting to really show color as they put on new growth.

here's how it looks up close.

and now inside.

my mission for the weekend was to get the master bath painted so we can tile, install sink & commode & get the final occupancy.

here i am putting on the primer. picked another dark color for the last bath. this is a dark, steely blue- similar to the stormy skies we saw all weekend.

steve's mission was to get the stairway painted & hook up the sink in the upstairs guest bath. the stairway was fun- the ceiling is really high.

looks great now! a few touch ups on the ceiling & it's done. glad we got the paint 'em to match sconces- they blend in nicely.

and- voila! a sink upstairs! woo hoo! we both took showers this weekend too. it is so nice to be able to do laundry & shower up here. we're getting there. even left some clothes in the new dressers.

a little r&r after a tough day. not much though b/c we had to dash off to the iron mountain inn to watch the derby. and eat some finger steaks for a healthy afternoon snack. and have an adult beverage. well, we deserved a small reward!

we missed the actual race (actually, so did everyone in the bar b/c the satellite went out at a most inopportune time), but we caught the amazing replay & the excited jockey & big fun in the winner's circle. then headed off to camas prairie centennial marsh.

by now it had cleared off some and the sky was beautiful.

there is a lot of water out here in the spring after the snow melt. it's pretty strange to see so much water in the midst of the sagebrush. from what i could tell this should be popping with wildflowers in a month or so.

there are all sorts of shore birds about- this is an avocet with a beak that curves upward.

i wish i'd taken the video camera & left the sound running- the bird calls & singing are just great to listen to.

we got quite lucky with sandhill cranes this visit. i like the way you can see the farm buildings behind this one.

got lucky and caught these two taking off.

and in flight.

lots of yellow headed blackbirds too.

saw this female pronghorn trotting down the road. did you know that the only place there are antelope is in africa? so even though we call these antelope they're not really.

on the way home, we pulled over to get some shots of these guys.

we've seen them in this spot our past few trips. on the way up yesterday, i caught the female sitting on what looked like a nest, but we weren't sure since it's in the middle of this bog.

but look what we saw today! eggs! it is going to be really fun to check in on the sandhill crane family as we go back & forth. we're going to miss the next 2-3 weekends, so there should be chicks by the time we are headed back up.

steve noticed this guy sitting on the rocks across from the cranes. huge bird.

we're pretty sure a golden eagle- due to size & coloring.

whew! great weekend! probably sparse posting for the next few weeks, but we'll be back. hopefully with crane chick photos. and blooming wildflower photos. and, oh yeah- more progress on the house:)