Back-up day - and a birthday card

Today my main objectives are to back up my Blogger blog to Word Press, which is where I copy over all my blog posts so I'll have a back-up - just in case.  I haven't done that in about a year, so I was waaaaaay overdue.  I just finished doing that and the back-up worked fine.

Next I'm going to do a "Restore Point" for my Windows PC.  That's something I always have in the back of my mind, but don't usually take the time to do.  Everything is working great on my computer right now, so this is a good time to do the restore.  If things start not working they way they should in the future, I'll be able to go back to today's computer system and restore everything back to this point.

Don't forget to back up your blog and also set a restore point for your computer from time to time.  Luckily I also have a few other back-ups of my documents and files in case my computer crashes, like it did while I was in Vacaville in February.  I lost my programs, but I own most of what I had, or had free programs, and was able to recreate the old computer pretty well.

Then I'll get down my printer, set it up (hopefully it will work) and print out some birthday cards for my grandkids.

It's going to be a "computer day." My favorite kind of day.

People have asked me how I put the copyright line on the bottom of my photos.  Well, I'd guess there are a lot of different ways to do it, and I think Picasa has an easy way of inserting a copyright line in your photos, but I don't use Picasa, so I'm not sure.  You can check that out if that's the program you use for your photos.  I use a program called Serif CraftArtist Professional 2, which I downloaded from the Internet years ago.  I had the first version which is no longer available (Daisy Trail Scrapbook Artist); CraftArtist is the current program Serif offers.  You can get a free program that does a lot of things, which is what I did in the beginning, then I bought the full program so I would have all the bells and whistles.

I use CraftArtist for digital scrap booking, greeting cards, Christmas cards, some photo manipulation when needed, copyright lines on my published photos, and lots of other things. I think I've posted about this program before, most of the silly graphics that I post were made in that program.  They have around 50 free digital kits available to download and use in the program, and you can also import any element or photo.  I've found it works for anything I need.

If you are interested in the free program to see what it's like, click on this link.  It will take you to the Daisy Trail website where the free program and kits are available.  I used the freebie for a long time before I broke down and spent money on the full version.

Here's the birthday card I've made for my youngest grandson using CraftArtist - I'm printing it today and mailing it in Deming on Thursday:

Front of card

Inside of card - folded in the middle

Back of card

Birthday cards are really fun to make for my GrandKiddles - those are the only ones I make, except for my Dad - I send him a homemade card every year, too.  Sometimes I have great ideas and the creative process goes fast, other times I make more than one before I'm happy with the final product.  I also have issues with my printer - it doesn't seem to like being on the road, and stored away.  In my condo I used my printer frequently and it always worked fine, but since I've been traveling, not so much.  I hope my birthday cards print out all right today - then they will be ready to mail.

I'm afraid this year Graydin's card, and also Drew's - his birthday is a day after Graydin's - might be late. I'm mailing them Thursday, so I'm not sure they will be on time.

I have to say, I'm getting used to this larger blog post format and photos and I think I really like it.  At first it looked too big and the photos looked huge, but after working with it and viewing the posts for a day or so,  I like it.  Thanks for your feedback, I'm glad you like it too!

Here are a couple of pics from last night's sunset:

It's amazing how the colors change to a bright orange when I zoom to a close-up.

From Me and Katie, have a great Monday, everyone!  :)

Rockhounding... results

POST 2 OF 2 FOR TODAY

Well, here are some photos of what I was looking for:

Aren't they beautiful?   These are actually photos from the Visitor's Center.  They have a lot of rocks on display, and whole as well as opened Thunder Eggs.  The third photo was a HUGE geode that was found by accident when someone was out in the fields with a large piece of machinery.  It ran over the geode, cracking it up, and the piece in the VC is only a part of the whole thing.

I was looking for a totally different rock - more of an egg shaped, light colored rock, like a chicken's egg.  This is what the Thunder Eggs look like from the outside. The first photo is a rather large one, and the second one was about the size of an orange.

This came from Rockhound State Park and is representative of the geodes here.

This Thunder Egg is from another place, and looks different from the ones found here.

So...  Jeanne suggested that I walk down to the Visitor's Center to see what they actually look like - that way I'd know what I'm looking for.  Thank you for that suggestion, Jeanne!  It's so obvious, I should have thought of it before we went looking for Thunder Eggs yesterday.  While we were there I took some photos and asked lots of questions about opening the rocks.  I left for camp, excited about opening the rocks to see what was inside.

I had one that might have been a Thunder Egg - it was the closest rock I had, and I was going to crack open that one first.  This is it:

My "Thunder Egg?"

Well, I took my rocks outside and first put them on a large flat rock by our door.  There were some depressions that worked perfectly to hold the rock on place.  I hit it as hard as I could with my hammer.  About broke my eardrums, but the rock didn't split.  I went inside and got some earplugs and tried again. Nothing. I put my screwdriver firmly on the rock and hit it's handle as hard as I could.  Nothing.  Whew, what a bust!

So I took them over to the picnic table which was higher and would give me better leverage.  Again, with and without the screwdriver, and with and without a towel covering the rock.  Yes! A small piece of the end of the rock came off.  Hummm.

 
It looked kind of interesting, but not like a geode.  I needed a larger piece - nearer the middle of the rock to see more of what was inside.  I think this poor rock is only a regular rock, though.  I tried and tried and couldn't break it up more.  I put it on the concrete pad with and without the screwdriver and towel, and... nothing.  Well, my friend Pete told me to get a really good break, I should have a saw - I guess a special kind of saw - to get a good clean, smooth slice. My hammer just wasn't going to do it.

So I gave up.  Sorry, folks.  :(  I could tell from the colors and shapes that the rest of my rocks wouldn't be geodes, so I didn't even try to break them up. 

I'm going to need to find someone that has either the right tools or more strength than I have before I try to crack open any more rocks.  In the meantime, following are a couple of really pretty rocks that are in the VC.  

And so ends the Thunder Egg saga.  Disappointing, but another adventure, and another learning experience.  And I'm going to keep looking.

The Volunteer in the VC did tell me the best place to go for Thunder Eggs, and Katie and I will be taking another walk to try to find some - now that we know where to go and what to look for.  I'm not hopeful, but the exercise is good for both of us and who knows?  We just might get lucky!

From me and Katie, have a great Saturday evening, everyone!   :)

A little tinkering with Me and My Dog

POST 1 OF 2 FOR TODAY

I've been playing with the blog this morning - I am getting a little bored with the format.  I can't decide if I want to finally change the header, and I wanted to widen the post area and also the sidebars.  I've also been checking out different sizes and colors and I've enlarged the photos.

I'd love comments on whether the posts are loading at the same rate, or if these changes are slowing things down.  And are these large photos coming in as clear as they did before? I'm not done tinkering yet, but wanted to see how things were going so far.

Also, remember that if the text is hard to read on any of the blogs you follow, just press the Control and + key at the same time, and it will enlarge things for you.  I always keep mine a little enlarged so I have an easier time reading the blogs with smaller text.

I spied a pair of House Finches sitting on a branch. Aren't they pretty?

Female and Male House Finch

Male House Finch in flight - one of those lucky shots.  :)

I have my hammer and screwdriver ready to start smacking away at the rocks.  I'll post later today about that...

Our new site, gems and birds

Yesterday morning we moved up the hill a bit into this nice campsite.  It doesn't have a shelter over the picnic table, but  I think I like that better.  This site feels bigger and more open, and being up the hill, we have a better view.  I think it might be the best of the six dry camping sites.

Our new site.

Some little rocks I picked up for my collection.  You can take up to 15 pounds of Rocks.

This is the sign for the trail we took yesterday.  

The Palms is there in the first row of RVs.  Quite a view!

These are the rocks I picked up along the trail.  I haven't broken them open yet, and I'm not sure how I'm going to do that, but we must have some tools that I can use.  When I have them opened, I'll post the photos, probably the next post.  Honestly, I wasn't sure what I was looking for, so I took a few that looked like "eggs" and the rest were just to increase my odds.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I have at least one good one.

There's a lot of activity around the campsite on these quiet, sunny, breezy days.  I haven't even put out the bird seed yet, and we've still had a squirrel and lots of birds.

Squirrel in our site.

I looked up the following bird, and I think it's a Lesser Goldfinch.  Let me know if I'm wrong.  NOTE: Hazel let me know it's a Hammond's Flycatcher. Thanks, Hazel!

Hammond's Flycatcher

Juvenile White-Crowned Sparrow

Remember when I was at Quartsite the first time and the Mourning Dove kept puffing up it's throat and no one knew why?  I was afraid it was sick or had something caught in it's throat.  I had forgotten all about that until I saw this White-Winged Dove yesterday, just sitting there across the road with his throat puffing, deflating, puffing, deflating, etc.  Well, I'm thinking it must have something to do with the mating season.

This is his normal throat.

Look how puffed up his throat is in this photo.  I wonder if he's courting.

We had a really pretty sunset last night.

Today is a little overcast - I wouldn't mind having some rain.  It would be good for all the desert plants, and maybe bring out some flowers.

From Me and Katie, have a great Friday, everyone!  :)

Rockhound State Park - our new home

Katie and I are at Rockhound State Park in Deming, NM.  We were lucky to get the last dry camping site, #5, when we arrived yesterday around 3ish in the afternoon.  It was a nice site, but I couldn't get us level enough, so this morning Katie and I took a little walk up the hill and found that two of the campers had left this morning and we moved to another site.

I was watching the birds out the window yesterday and found a new one I haven't seen before, a Cactus Wren. 
 

Cactus Wren

It's a very pretty bird, and the two I was watching were busy. One had feathers in it's mouth and landed right in front of The Palms.

Can you see the feathers in the beak of the bird on the left?

It then flew to a cactus in our site's cactus garden. It disappeared for a minute, and then was visible again, and I knew there had to be a nest right there.

You can see the Cactus Wren near the top of the cactus, and it's nest behind it on the left.

This morning I checked the cactus and got a good look at the large nest.  I took a close-up of the entrance, but it was too dark inside the nest to see anything.   I love this time of year.  All the birds are nesting.

Large nest in the middle of the cactus.

This was our first campsite - #5 - the last dry camping site available.

This little cactus garden was part of site #5 - the Cactus Wren nest is here.

Rockhound State Park Visitor Center

Did you know you can publish your blog on Amazon.com and sell it as a Kindle subscription item?  It costs 99 cents a month to subscribe and the posts are delivered to your Kindle automatically when they are posted.  I decided to publish Me and My Dog ...and My RV.  Once it was "live," I became a subscriber to see what it looks like.  I thought it was just fine and decided to keep it available.

Of course, anyone can read my blog for FREE right here, but if you'd rather have a Kindle version and are willing to pay the subscription rate of 99 cents per month, click on this link.

Me and My Dog ... and My RV (Kindle Version)

If you think you might like the Kindle Version but don't want to commit, there is a 14-day trial period, and if you decide it's not working for you, or not worth the additional expense, just cancel it before the 14 days are up.

Very interesting, huh?  Anyone who has a blog and wants to publish it to Kindle through Amazon.com can do so.  I checked today and pulled up a report on my blog, and to my surprise I already have subscribers.  I don't know how they found me, but I was really pleased.

We've only been here at Rockhound one day, and so far we are loving it.  They've got good, well defined trails which I like for me and Katie (they also have rattle snakes, and I figure we'll be safe on a nice trail).  I know my friends Gayle and Jim love the trails here, and they are serious hikers, so there's a good range of hiking trails.  This afternoon we took the 1.1 mile Thunder Egg Trail and I got some rocks - I'm going to break them open and see if I've found any geodes.  I'll show you some photos tomorrow and let you know if we found anything good.

TV reception is also very good here and my Verizon and Internet service are the best so far in Southern New Mexico.  

From me and Katie, have a great Thursday, everyone!  :)