Life in Arrey, NM

Hello dear friends,

We have been here now for a little over three weeks, and time just seems to be flying by.  The daytime weather has been mild, but the nights get colder than I like, some down into the 20's.  Today it is a beautiful, sunny day in the 70's, so we are enjoying it.

The Sunday after we arrived, Janice hosted  a welcome brunch and we got to meet some other campers.  We chatted with a couple named Russ and Jan, and and his mom Donna.  They have a huge 5th wheel and also like owls!  They are very nice folks and I hope we will keep in touch after they leave here.

Now I will share with you our little tale of woe.   One night, about five weeks ago our propane monitor (in the hallway down near the floor) alarmed around 3 am.  Jim got down on the floor and reset it, and we went back to bed.  This occurred again in about three days, and continued every three nights for about a month!  It seemed like we should do more than reset it, but alas, we didn't.  About ten days ago it went off (again at around 3 am) and it would NOT let Jim reset it.  After several minutes, he removed it from the wall and took out the battery so it would stop.  The next morning we called the RV sales and service store in Hatch and reported our problem.  He said that he had replacements but for us to bring a picture of the one we have so he could give us the right model.  Of course it  turned out to be the most expensive one!  But we brought it home and Jim promptly installed it, and our sleep has not been interrupted by that alarm since!  Here are some pictures I took at this place in Hatch.

This little fella stands in front of the shop, holding a motorhome on his hand.   We both laughed when we saw this, but to an owner, it would be a nightmare!

I'm not sure what fast food place she used to be at, but now she's in front of Franciscan RV offering her best burger and drink.  
They also have some vintage cars for sale there.  Then we went inside to get what we needed.  

These are the characters we saw inside.  One does not expect to see a pinball machine in a place of business!

The travel trailer is cute........but not with a huge tarantula on top of it!  I could NOT have worked in an office with that sitting right behind my head.


The park was having a yard sale yesterday from 8 am until 2 pm.  We had a lot of good stuff we wanted to get rid of, to free up space in our RV, so we knew we wanted to set up to sell.  I asked Janice if Jim could sell some of his wonderful home made breads and she said "sure, why not?"  So Jim was baking for three days before, and I baked two dozen muffins too.  It started out cold in the morning, but warmed up before long.  We sold most of the things we wanted to sell, and were quite pleased.  Afterwards I began getting more orders for my magnetic jewelry, and today Jim has already gotten orders for more loaves of bread!  This just might turn into a nice little addition to our bank account.  Maybe, just maybe, I will add home made jellies next month.  We shall see.  

Our friends Sherrie and Willie (we met them here last year and have kept in touch since) arrived last night.  They left Louisiana on Thursday night, and stopped to rest in Shreveport that night.  They really hauled it to get here by 9 pm last night.  We just can't travel that long in one day anymore.  Our longest driving day was from Quartzsite, AZ to Tucson last month.  That was about 259 miles, and we prefer our travel days to be less than 200 miles/day.

Our friend Mary Iron Elk got here about 10 days ago.  It's been nice spending some time with her.  Tomorrow she will take her van and her travel trailer to Hatch to get the vehicles registered here, and to get her New Mexico driver's license, so she can be a local too.  Like a tee shirt I have says, "Not really New, Not really Mexico".  

Last week we returned to the church we attend here, and I was amazed at how many of the people remembered us from last year!  It always feels good to be welcomed back and treated like part of the church family.  I am already being identified as "the owl lady".  LOL. 

I can't remember if I showed you my cuddly, warm owl blanket on the couch.  His name is Owlie North.  The pillow above Willie's head shows a hammock and at the bottom it says "Daydream".  That's my inspiration, to learn to relax and daydream sometimes.

Here's Millie learning to daydream too!  She's wrapped up in a fleece blanket that a friend made for her a few years ago.  

I wanted to also include our new garden flag for this month.  Our friends Pastor Ric and Mary are coming here for a early dinner of corned beef and cabbage with all the traditional fixins and Irish soda bread on St. Patrick's day.  We get in the mood right from the first of this month!  

Pastor Dudley gave a terrific sermon today.  He asked us what is your most precious possession.  He talked about how some people might say expensive cars, paintings, jewelry, designer purses or other things, but the Bible says your most precious possession has to be your soul.  THINGS do not last forever.  God always was and always will be, but things cannot last forever.  There was a time when each of us did not yet exist, before we were born.  But once we are born, our souls will live forever.  Isn't that an amazing thing to realize?  Now that you know that your soul will live on forever, you need to decide HOW you want your soul to spend all of that time.   Each of us must decide who is on the throne in our lives.  Is it our ego?  He also called that EGO as "Edging God Out".  Or is God on the throne in you life?  Are you ready to accept and proclaim that Jesus IS your personal Lord and Savior?  If you can say that, from the depth of your heart, then you are saved for all of eternity.  That, to me is the greatest blessing I could ever imagine.  I have told you before that I think most people use words like amazing and awesome all too often.  For me, those words can only apply to those gifts we get from our Almighty Father in Heaven.  He is truly awesome, and all of His gifts are totally amazing.  The decision about how YOU want your soul to spend eternity can only be made by each of you.  However, I will pray that you will choose to accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior, and put your lives in His extremely capable hands.  Pastor Dudley talked about some people not wanting to make such a long term commitment right now, but I would like to remind you that none of us knows what will happen tomorrow.  Only God knows.  We can make all kinds of plans for the future, but we do not know if they will come to pass.  However, most of us know, and accept, that at some point in time, our physical bodies will die, and life here on earth WILL end.  It gives me great comfort to know that whether that happens tomorrow or ten years from now, I know where my soul will go after that.  I hope you will think about it and make the right choice before it is too late.  Wishing each of you all the blessings God has in store for you.