Obsessed with Trains

Desert Boy has been obsessed with trains for about a year now. Every time we go to a place that has train tracks, he gets excited, even if there aren't any trains running on the tracks. Fortunately we can usually find a few parked boxcars that will satisfy him. The only problem is that the nearest tracks are 65 miles away, so we have to make do with toy trains most of the time.

At Christmas, the Border Inn had a great little train set up, and Desert Boy wanted to go there every day to watch it go around and around. He would agree to do anything we wanted if the reward was to go out and look at the train.

For Christmas he got a little wooden train, and he spends about an hour a day playing with it. I enjoy rearranging the tracks a couple times a week to keep it fresh. Sometimes the little town gets set up, but that's not the important part. Having the train go up and down and around and around is the important part.

Desert Boy really likes to have someone play with the train with him. He'll pass off one train and say, "Here you go," and then take the other.

A super special treat was when Grandpa Dean took out his train at Christmas. Desert Boy couldn't get enough of it.

We found this cute Thomas the Train ride-on engine for $2 at the thrift store. Desert Boy insisted on new batteries so now I have the theme song in my head all the time.

When it was time to go to the hospital to have Desert Girl, Desert Boy was happy to go to his cousins' house, partly because he knew he had a new train in his backpack. In fact, I think he might have been more thrilled with the new train than the new sister!

Winter Grazing

I was driving down the road the other day and was startled when I realized that out in the inversion there were not only ice-covered shrubs, but also little lumps of animals.

Thousands of sheep were nearly blending in with the landscape. I really don't know why they all had their butts pointed at me.

They just meandered about, finding their preferred food. Sheep do particularly well at grazing in the desert in the winter because they can eat snow to obtain the water they need.

One sheep was on the wrong side of the road, so we were able to get a nice closeup of it. Then it decided it didn't want our attention and ran off to join the others. You can see how they manage to stay warm with that nice, thick wool coat on.

Introducing Desert Girl

I've been a little irregular about posting lately for a very good reason: Desert Girl! She entered our world February 1. It won't be long until she is following Desert Boy around trying to imitate him. Our family is looking forward to more fun and adventures, and we thank you for visiting this blog to share them with us.

Shipping Hay

My husband was busy loading hay trucks for a couple days last week, with eighteen arriving. Usually hay trucks are flat bed trucks, but in this case, the trucks were the more common box trucks. That makes for some interesting challenges.

Here's the inside of an empty box truck. It's long, narrow, and only open on one side.

Here's my husband loading a couple bales of hay into it. They just barely fit width-wise.

Then he adds the third bale on top. That one's tricky to get in just right.

There's no space to spare, as you can see. The next step is to push the bales back enough so that some more can be loaded.

As the truck fills up, a second loader pushes the first loader to move the bales forward. They keep pushing until the loader wheels spin.

It's pretty amazing what can be done with heavy equipment.

Here are a couple trucks waiting their turn. Then they'll take their backhaul and be on the road. I wish I could get a glimpse of how they unload the box trucks--that seems tricky as well.

Like Father Like Son