April 24, 2004 - Peoria, AZ

Barb took all the following pictures, and I "let" her do the writing, too.

So, how common is it to look out the office door and see and 20' Saguaro cactus, eh?  And then there are the ones just beginning their spring bloom!  The little blue thingies up and to the left of the flower were some kind of bugs flying around.

Yep, most of our SOWER projects have gift shops.  This was an especially nice one which the ladies spent considerable time in.  The Native American jewelry/bead work is very popular and beautiful.  And SOWERS get a 20% discount on purchases.  So we all just had to get something.

Now, there's a good story behind the work of clipping Campbell's labels.  From my understanding, this project has obtained two brand new passenger vans for clipping and sending in one million labels for each new van.  That's right!  A brand new passenger van absolutely free except for cutting and sending a few labels.  Mind you, this place NEVER runs out of labels to be clipped, sorted, sized, banded in packages of 25, 100, then 500.  And people send these labels in from everywhere.  There are boxes and boxes and thousands and thousands of these things, and if anyone ever wanted a certain perpetual volunteer job, here it is!  We learn all kinds of things, don't we, and this was a first for us.   I think the wall-size Campbell's label must have come from the company, and it's proudly displayed.

Now, this was a very special occasion.  It was a "tea" at the (motor) home of the lady in the pink blouse (and fellow SOWER) on the far right, Pat Buck.  She and her daughter Sheryl Lynn Johnson actually provided these teas as a business in a past life, and they also published three wonderful books in the process entitled:  "Tea Parties from the Heart," "Mommy and Me in the Garden," and "Mommy and Me in the Kitchen."  The books are hand written with illustrations, sample invitations, recipes for candies, scones, muffins, sandwiches, soups, salads, etc.  The books, each one, are absolutely delightful to review, appreciate, and dream about the possibilities! What fun we had, not to mention the incredible culinary treats we were served.  Thanks again, Pat, for hosting the tea and letting us enjoy your special talents.

Now, here's you-know-who doing one of his favorite things, running a tractor-mower.  Did I heard someone say he was outstanding in his field? 

Now here's outstanding for ya.  This Killdeer blended so well in the field that you could easily have missed her.  But she got excited when the tractor got too close to her ground nest--which was also nearly impossible to see except for her agitation.  Those are pretty good size eggs for such a small bird.  Hopefully, the kids that were scheduled to use the field for a ball game missed the eggs, but we ain't going back to see.  She may just have to wait for another cycle to be a mommy.

Here are the guys doing one of their things on the grounds.  This was the last-day project (to which they all said Thank you Lord--just kidding, but maybe not), weeding.  Now, you wouldn't think they'd be lots of weeds in the desert but guess what--there are lots of them, and they get stuck in that hard desert ground and don't want to give up their home right away, so it's really tough work.  Charlie (on the right) backed up just a little to much for the photo and the cactus nailed him--ouch! (Is that what he said?)  Dave walked into one a few days earlier and said something like that too!