14 September. The hummingbird wars.
I started the day by cleaning out the stalls for all of the alpacas. Joy of joys. Actually it went pretty quickly. After a quick breakfast, some time in the hammock and some time in the sun I finally ventured into my Mom's pool. It's one of those large upright pools, big enough to practice flip turns though. Actually spent most of the time in the pool trying to practice my underwater headstands. I seemed to have lost the skill. Mom's birthday festivities started after that. Some good briskit, some good brotwurst that my brother made and lots of other good stuff. The afternoon was sprinkled with eating, drinking and time spent watching the hummingbirds battle over access to the feeders. They certainly didn't have to, there were plenty of slots for all of them, but they seemed to want to make a show of it all. Very entertaining actually. Took a few visits to see if the other female alpacas had birthed yet, nothing but had to once again battle the grasshopper plague there and back. Lots of grasshoppers popping up all over the place. Some more time on the hammock, then took little Dobe (the chihuahua) for a walk were he not only scared a few rabbits, he scared the alpacas too. Very cute.

13 September. Mexico adventure.
Nothing to report from yesterday, just a lot or relaxing at "Kokopeli Ranch". Today was our Mexico adventure though. My mission was to find a "Bienvendos, mi casa is mi casa"" sign (usually they say "mi casa is su casa" but I like the one at my Mom's place that says the former). After searching through most of the tourist traps in Nogales, I did finally find my sign. I also found the hammock I've been wanting along they way too. It's cotton and has a cotton 'lace' design that hangs off each of the sides. Very nice. We put it up at the ranch to try out. VERY VERY nice. Can't wait to put it up at Chateau Limon. In the afternoon I went in to Sierra Vista to look at dirtbikes with my brother Mickey and his son Josh, my nepiew. Great toys, but a little out of my league.

11 September. AZ trip: Mom's 60th birthday.
The trip down to AZ was nice and uneventful considering the date. Mom, Anne Marie (Mom's sister from Germany), Manuela (Anne Marie's daugher) and Vanessa (Manuela's daughter) met me at the airport. This particular AZ adventure started with a goose chase around Tuscon to see where Anne Marie could exchange some Euros. On the way home to Kokopeli Ranch, we stopped by to pick up one of Mom's alpaca babies that was loaned out to some perspective buyers. So got to ride home with a baby alpaca in the back of the Suburban.

I got a short tour of the new animals when we got home (including Dobe, the rescued chihuahua and Sophie the fennec fox), then, when we went back to check on the status of a pregnant alpaca, we discovered that she had just had the baby. Turns out we arrived just in time to save the little fella because his trachea was filled with mucas. After a lot of coaxing from mom, the little guy pulled though. Another female is expecting tomorrow.

I also discovered a new dessert of sorts. Anne Marie brought a pair of dessert glasses from Eschborn, Germany that I had liked. The story is that I worked the poor Eschborn "IceCafe" staff when I was visiting to try and get a rootbeer/coke float made. They had never heard of such a thing over there. After a lot of discussion they finally came out with a coke float in a great Italian glass. In honor of this, I set out to make a float of some sort of float in the glasses down here at the ranch. Well, we only had Dreyer's coffee ice cream and diet coke. Turns out to be pretty tasty though and everyone wanted one by the time the whole thing was over.

My brother Mickey and his son Josh arrive tomorrow. We're all off to Mexico on Friday.