GOOD MORNING MY PEEPS

Looking northwest from the vineyard.  You can't see my house but I am behind the white house on the left of the photo behind the trees

What a good morning it is too.  I just completed my first class.  Emailed in my paper and I am done.  We had to write a three page paper and I was stressing a little bit about it.  I write here but I just write the stuff that fills my head.  My paper had to be a bit more organized.  For the life of me I just couldn't figure out what I was going to write about.  Then late last night it came to me and hit me like a ton of bricks.  I got to writing and I just couldn't stop.  My paper was only supposed to be three pages and I was writing a book.  I had to trim it back a bit, which I did.  I registered for another class this summer.  I ended up dropping all but one of my classes this semester.  I was in way over my head and drowning quickly.  That is no way to learn.  One class at a time.  All of the classes I was taking required me to memorize.  One can only memorize so much at one time and four classes of memorizing medical terms and law was just too much.  This summer should be a lot less stressful.  Besides me and Al want to go backpacking.  I am looking forward to that.  I haven't been backpacking since me, my mom and my sister went many years ago.  Me and Al are going to Granite Lake I believe.  We went there when we were in high school.  I told Al that I wasn't going to carry anything over twenty pounds and I am going to try to stick to that.  I was carrying my day pack the other day and I think it was about that heavy.  I might have to renege on the weight.
Today I was looking out the kitchen window and I noticed a goose I have not seen before.  I called Al told him what it looked like and he said it was probably a snow goose.  I looked it up in our bird book and sure enough it is a snow goose but it is a juvenile goose.  Juvenile snow geese are white with a dark gray beak and gray feathers across the top of their head going down their neck and back.  Eventually they turn all white.  How cool is that.  We have a snow goose on the property.  We haven't seen one of those here before.  He is alone though.  I hope he or she mates up and they nest here.  That would be so cool.  Right now we have our Canadian geese that nested here last year back and we built nesting boxes for our Mallards, Mergansers and Wood Ducks.  I just hope they will all nest here.  I am going to build more boxes for our little birds.  I want to encourage as many birds as possible.  I love watching them.  I also have an ulterior motive.  I want eggs.  I don't care if they are broken eggs I just love seeing the different colors and sizes.  I wish I could find some Humming Bird egg shells that would be really cool.  Al brought me a nest from a Humming bird last year.  Now I just need some eggs.  Last year we had Quail coveys but they have all gone.  Where do they go in the winter?  I hope they come back! 
I was driving into our driveway yesterday and there was a Hawk on the gate.  It flew off but landed in a tree at my eye level.  I got a really good look at it.  They are so beautiful.  We have a couple of different types of Hawks on the ranch.  We have a Pigeon Hawk or Merlin, a Red Tailed Hawk and I think there is another type but I need a better look in order to identify it. 
I will take pictures for you all to see but right now I am without a camera.  We broke it trying to put it up against the spotting scope.  The lens was jammed and we were trying to fix it and just made it worse.  The camera was a gift from my daughters Heidi and Dana.  It served me well for many years.  I am looking around for another one.  Boy have cameras changed.  I think I would like to get something I can change the lenses on.  We'll see.  Well folks I have some quilting to do talk to you all later.