Christmas Gift Sets, Sandhill Cranes, and a Coatamundi

I had a request from one of my customers for 2 small gift sets. They came out nice! What do you think?

You can purchase these small soapy gift sets on my website, as seen here:
Small Gift Sets

Or in my Etsy shop, as seen here:
Small Gift Sets on Etsy

This past weekend, Ray and I took a trip down to Whitewater Draw to see the Sandhill Cranes that winter there. It is an amazing sight! Usually by the end of December, there are upwards of 40,000 cranes in the area! That's right forty thousand. Ray has a blog post about our trip, and here is a pic to entice you to take a surf over to his blog to take a look.

Ray's blog -
Sonoran Connection

For Thanksgiving this year, we did something a little different. We went on a picnic! Me, Ray, and my Mom. Neither me or Mom really wanted to cook a full turkey dinner, and trying to go out to eat on Thanksgiving is sometimes a bit crowded, noisy, and uncomfortable. So, I made up a Thanksgiving salad (lettuce, cucumbers, carrots, celery, radishes, green pepper,  apple, and dried cranberries). I was going to cook up some turkey tenders, but of course by the time I got to the store all I could find was turkey wings and necks. hmmmmmm So I went with chicken breast. Cut into strips and sauteed with onions and a bit of BBQ sauce.  Served cold with the salad, it was perfect! We headed up to Madera Canyon down by Green Valley. We took a little hike at the bottom of the mountain, then headed up to the picnic area at the top of the road. We picked our picnic spot, and as we were getting the food out of the cooler, we had the cutest visitor! He came right over and was at my mother's feet before I even saw him. Look ..

 

It's a coatamundi, a member of the raccoon family. He was snuffing around, looking at us like he was expecting a treat. We were tempted, but decided it wasn't a good idea and we shoo'd him away. He finally left after giving us a bit of an indignant snort. Very healthy looking fella, so my guess is he is quite successful at getting treats from other picnicers.


All in all, a very nice Thanksgiving and Thanksgiving weekend! :)  I hope everyone else's Thanksgiving was just as nice!