Ever tour a gold mine?

Yesterday we visited Oatman, AZ. If you have never been there, you must visit. Wild burros, that live in the hills, wander into town in hopes that tourists will feed them carrots. The savvy tourists come equipped with a bag of carrots. We got there mid morning and at first we saw only one burro, but by the time we had breakfast, many more burros were in the street. We fed them. They will actually eat carrots right out of your hand. They are soooo cute! They are tame enough that even the small children can feed them carrots. (They do ask that you not feed the baby burros because they might choke on the carrots.)

In the shops are the typical touristy things to buy. But besides the burros and the shops, the real attraction for Oatman is the Gold Mine Tour. They do tours all day long. You will go in a group into the gold mine, but its not scary, (if you are claustrophobic). They are very safety conscious.

At one point during the tour it was quite dark and as I looked to my side, I saw a man in a pair of glasses, (my husband has glasses) and the height was about the same as his. Who knew that the man beside me was not Richard? It was dark, and a little spooky so I did what wives do. I reached for his arm and said, "give me your hand."

With that, the person whose arm I grabbed for in the dark, darted ahead as if he'd been shot from a cannon. (Apparently, it was the other tall man with glasses in our group.) I was stunned, of course and turned around, by now it was a little lighter and I could see Richard. Of course I burst out in embarrassed laughter. Cousins, Donna and Galen were not far behind. She heard the fracas and knew instinctively what had happened. The four of us had another laugh when we exited the gold mine.

The gold mine tour was fascinating. They closed the mine, (I think in 1998), when Gold fell to $300 per ounce and it cost them $300 per ounce to mine it. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that is not a paying proposition and why they closed the mine. When it goes to $700, they will begin mining again and it is some over $600 at the moment. (I just checked and at this moment it is $646.40.) Our guide said they have a minimum of 10 years of gold still to mine. That will employ about 150 miners and be terrific for the economy of the Oatman area.

Oatman is a community unlike any other. Its a must see if you are anywhere near, and by the way, wear walking shoes.

my amulet purses

I just read that in ancient times, amulets were believed to keep evil away, even bring good luck. Certainly today we don't have those suspicions but they are just fun to wear. They take about a day to make.

my beading

This is my first beading "tapestry". It was fun to do and I will do more.

This is Richard's completed Buffalo

Not bad for his first try,huh? We think this is called 'carving in the round'.

A herd of carved buffalo- Richard's is in the back

My Gift to You!

If things are not going well and you need a little encouragement, go to our website. It's www.farriswheels.net. Click on 'Spriitual', then click on 'My Gift to you'. It takes awhile to read it but I think you will agree it was worth the read.

Happy New Year!

God is still and forever, in charge...........

I would like to know but I don't suppose we'll ever hear about it. The British version of the CIA was more than a little worried about the terrorists striking over Christmas. We have learned from the recent past that their intelligence is excellent. So what happens??????? Fog happens!!!!!!!

Planes can't fly. For that matter, if there was a US connection, not to worry, planes couldn't fly out of here either. With the huge snowstorm in Denver that actually closed the airport for the first time in over a decade, the trickle down afftect, screwed up airline schedules all around the country for days to come. What that means to me is whether it gets to be public information or not, we can rest assured that God is still in charge!

An E-mail Christmas letter

Today I had the best day! I sent a Christmas letter by email to about 80 people. I had many responses, maybe 16 within 5 hours of sending the email. Emails from people responding to my email Christmas letter.

When you send a card by snail mail...., it arrives...., you assume...., and you can imagine that the recipients have taped it with their other cards up around the archway between their living room and dining room... or you can assume that it is taped with their other cards around a mirror in the family room. Maybe your card is even nestled among other cards on their sofa table, the mantle over the fireplace.

Certainly it is not on the coffee table. Everyone knows you will need the coffee table before Christmas is over. Isn't that where everyone puts their pizza that gets delivered more often than normal at Christmas time?

After Christmas, friends and relatives will toss all the cards that aren't photographs. They may save a few whose addresses are new. Some will look again at the signatures, some will save them in a bag for next year. Most won't.

Lets examine the financial aspect. First you invest cash for 'kind of nice' cards, that actually mention the birth of Jesus and aren't too expensive, but don't look cheap. Then you call people whose addresses you don't have. If you aren't on a good cell phone plan, you will spend money on a land line phone bill. Next comes the time...........hour after hour after hour, with the help of a glass of wine, writing addresses, tearing up envelopes that have the right address but the wrong name......rewriting addresses...., pouring another glass of wine for courage to get through the project.

Even if nothing goes terribly wrong, you go to the post office to buy stamps. To send the same 80 messages, oh my gosh..... it would have been $31.20. Of course, I never would have sent 80 greetings. Maybe 20 people at the most would know I was thinking of them and wishing them the best this Christmas

Instead, I spent a couple of hours to send them individually and within hours I was warmly "regreeted" by 20 percent.

And so, it was.... the end of paper greeting cards in the Farris household.

leaving the mountain

It's not often people are whining about Arizona being cold but we will be leaving Prescott and going to the Bullhead City, AZ and Laughlin, NV area and we're excited that finally we'll be back where its warm. It has been too cold up here to go outside and do any wood carving.

They say there are a lot of Javalinas and Coyotes around here, so its easy to talk myself out of setting out alone for a walk in the chilly temperatures. I see men out walking with a big stick. I could do that....or I could just skip it.

Not too long ago while out for a walk, I was bitten by a stray dog and had to endure the series of rabies shots. I will stay indoors and work on my beads.

In just a few days we will be joined by cousins. We will spend Christmas and New Years with them. Of course, I'd rather be with my grandkids, but since there are hundreds of miles between us, cousins will have to do. Donna and Galen are fun and we will enjoy their company.

Prayer Warriors for the President

On November 13th I put out an invitation to everyone to commit to become a Prayer Warrior to help to protect President Bush. Please go to the Archives for November 13th for the original article and hopefully join us as we prayer for protecting the President against his many enemies, not the least of which are the liberals in this country.

Be among the Prayer Warriors already in Arizona, Colorado and Minnesota. Also please pray to protect our men and women of the Armed Forces. Give the President and the troops the "feeling" that "We have thier backs."

Nice to spend time with family

Since we've been up here in the chilly mountains of the Prescott, AZ area, (That's where my husbands kids are), we have enjoyed several meals together with the family. There is just no substitute for family. Since we aren't close to mine, I'm so happy to be here with his. It's getting close to Christmas though and then I will wish I were with my kids. We are far away out here in AZ.

Many people we have met have resolved this issue. They have Christmas at Thanksgiving or have the kids come to them for Christmas. So far we have not stayed in one place, long enough or been in a place we could invite anyone to. Hopefully, by next year we will have a house to supplement our full time RV lifestyle and we can invite them all to come. I don't suppose they will, but we'll invite them.

A house! Think of it!

It is cold in the AZ mountains.

Living in an RV has its limitations and one of them is trying to survive in an RV park when the temperature dips below, way below.... freezing.

Something we know now and even did talk about a couple of days ago is to fill the water tank and disconnect our hose that leads to the park water. Of course it froze. It didn't burst, thankfully, just froze up. No water, no how. I even was thinking of using bottled water to flush the toilet. We have a Reverse Osmosis water system and that had water in the tank so I used that and we still have the bottled water that is saved for other more normal uses.

Just an hour down the hill, I guess down the mountain, the temperatures are more moderate but we paid for a month up here and we have about a week to go yet.

The Prescott, AZ area is quite beautiful. Between Prescott and Dewey are a few traffic lights. Not nearly enough of them, though. The people who live and shop on the roads without lights, must get tired of waiting and waiting for a break in the traffic. It seems you can never get a break in traffic from both directions at one time so you do the half way system. Get out in the middle divider and wait for a break in traffic coming at you from behind. It is frightening!