Featured Artist at Harlingen Art & Heritage Museum July 5 - Sept. 30

Bob has been very busy these past 4 months getting ready for his "showing" at the museum.  A sneak peek at a few of the nearly 50 instruments to be displayed and for sale.



Electric Millennium Falcon 4-string

4-string Electric Washboard

3-string Flames o' Fire Resonator

Electric Shovel Diddley Bow

4-string Dulcimer

3-String Lunchbox

4-string Stick Dulcimer

Tongue Drum

3-string Chicken Feeder Fiddle

Two more guitars by Susie

Kuba Cigar Box Guitar has 3 strings, piezio pickup, black leather corner guards and a sweet sound.
www.riverratrhythms.com

Golden Coinage Cigar Box Guitar

3 strings, ruby rhinestones and gold metal coins embellish the top.  There are clear crystal rhinestones inlaid on the fret board.  The strings are held in place at the bottom with the forked end of a fork.  Awwwwsome!

Susan's handmade Cigar Box Guitar: The Pirate Booty Box.  

  Check out more photos at www.riverratrhythms.com

Bob is making folk instruments.  He has cigar box guitars, dulcimers and canjos built so far.  He has 2 resonator guitars and 2 ukuleles almost complete. He is selling them at art fairs around the Phoenix area and doing quit well.  We've created a new website for his folk instruments.

www.riverratsrhythms.com   More pics on the website.  They really sound sweet.  Later this week I'm going to post audio of each instrument.

Bob's picked up a new hobby this past year.  He is busy making and selling canjos and cigar box guitars.  Bob's favorite thing to do is to make a custom guitar specific to the customers order. If you don't see what you want here, give him a call.  He will love to make a guitar just for you. A website is being built with his creative instruments, but not done, yet. Until it is up and running I will post some of his handmade instruments here.

This one is an all-wood cigar box with one string, a "pickup" and fretless.  Fretless makes this a great guitar to use with a slide. This sells for $40.00

Another electric guitar made from an all-wood cigar box. This one has frets and sounds so sweet.  It has only one string, too.  Price is $40.00

This is a tin can with 1 string, fretless with pickup.  $40.00

2 Canjos and 1 Spamjo. the have one string and frets.  $20.00 each.

Left is a fretless 3 string guitar with a lipstick pickup. $90.00.  The other is a mountain dulcimer.  It has 4 strings and frets. Made with cherry, walnut and western red cedar. Nice $190.00

Sad day for us!

We lost our little deck hand two weeks ago.  Wicket had been with Susan for 14.5 years. She was only 8 weeks old when Susan, Taylor & Heston picked her up & took her home.  She had a great life with lots of exciting experiences, but she got worn out and was ready to REST in PEACE.

She is sooooo missed.

Susie's little girl.

Cadillac Ranch Amarillo, TX

Only a mile west of Amarillo, TX is the creation of some 70's artists.

10 Cadillac's buried in a farm field, nose down.

The Cadillac's have all been stripped of seats, steering wheels, you name it and they have a million layers of spray paint on them.  Lots of people pulled off I40 to take a closer look, but you can see them as you fly by.  They are on the south side of the interstate.

Our little 14yr. old, 8lb. Yorkie, Wicket, can't do much anymore.  She's almost blind and can't walk far, but she sure loves to take a dip in the lake. One of her favorite things are "boat ramps".  She realizes she's on the ramp and she runs for the water.

 

Rocks at Lake Ute

 

 

Bob climbing rocks at Lake Ute north of Tucumcari, NM.

 

Antelope north of Tucumcari, NM

 

Newly developed website, www.snowbirdsinPhoenix.com now has a couple sister sites.  www.snowbirdsusa.com and www.snowbirdsinTucson.com.  The Tucson site still has a little work left to do, but it is about 90% done.  It'd be nice to get some "activity and entertainment" information from the activity directors at the RV Resorts, but I try to get as much info as I can from searching the internet. Hoping to have www.snowbirdsinYuma.com up and running in a month or so. Well, it may take more time then that, as we hope to be on the road to Mesa within a couple weeks.  Yahoooooo!

Bob has been a busy guy indulging in his interest of woodworking and music.  He has been making Cigar Box Guitars. These are photos of his first two as they are being constructed from a pile of lumber.

These first two will be electric. One will be fretless and the other will have frets.

You can see how it shines?  Well, it feels smooth as a baby's butt, too. He will be selling them if anyone is interested.

Great music in the middle of nowhere land - Pomeroy, IA

Doug Deming with harmonica player, Dennis Gruenling and the Jewel Tones

We saw them in July in Des Moines and can you believe it? They were in a little town, yesterday, of 662 people (Pomeroy, IA) for the evening. Not only are they all really good with their instruments, but they have sooooo much fun

http://dougdeming.com

Doug writes most of their stuff.  He's really good at composing with lots of upbeat tunes.

Sitting here this morning with only one good arm. All I can say is OUCH!

Thresherman and Collectors Show - Albert City, IA

Who woulda thought all this would be happening out in the middle of no where.

Over 600 exhibits & collectors show off their pride of tractors and gas engines.
 http://www.albertcitythreshermen.com/

Rotator Cuff surgery for Susan - Spencer, IA

The shoulder is the most flexible joint, so when I was able to only move my arm straight out to the side and straight out to the front without pain, I knew something wasn't right.  (Funny how you turn 50 or 60 or 70 and immediately following your birthday, something like this happens.  Is that a reminder to you of how old you are?) Following x-rays and an MRI, it was determined that one of four tendons, which make up the rotator cuff, has ripped loose and needs to be pulled back down over the head of the arm bone (humeral head).  The doctor will use a Dremel type drill to drill into my humerus(arm bone) to anchor a little plastic type "special fastener" which will provide the doctor something to attach the end of the tendon to with sutures. This plastic anchor piece will dissolve between 2-4 years following the surgery.

 

  There were several bone spurs in the shoulder, also. Those will be removed during the surgery, too.

Bone spurs form when the area becomes inflamed from osteoarthritis or tendinitis. The inflammation stimulates the cells to deposit bone in this area, eventually forming a bone spur.  Kind of like a stalactite in a cave.  The minerals accumulate to form a stalactite or in this case a bone spur. So what shoulder wouldn't hurt with a stalactite in it?  As you can see from the above photo, the bone spurs are usually located between the collar bone and the tendons.  Therefore, they continuously scratch and rub or in some instances tear the tendon because they are wedged between the narrow space.

The procedure is called Arthroscopy because a long, thin, lighted instrument will be used.  The arthroscope will be inserted into the shoulder area through very small incisions.

So that's what we'll be doing the next couple of weeks.  We planned to leave the NW Iowa area this coming Thursday, but looks like that won't happen until mid-Sept.  Lots of physical therapy will be needed following the surgery.  Maybe Bob can take a speed course in physical therapy and he can be my therapist while we are on the road? We'll see if that happens.

Snowbirds in Phoenix - My new Website

Check it out!

www.snowbirdsinphoenix.com

Tadpole gets improvements - Iowa

 Along the far right is the extension cord coming into the galley/pilothouse at the aft end of the boat.

So as you step into the pilothouse, this cabinet is on the right and behind the pilots chair.

The black bag is our enormous fishing tackle box/bag.  It is sitting on top of our Engel refridgerator/freezer that we used as we traveled on the Mississippi from Minnesota to Ft. Walton Beach, FL.

We will use it, hopefully, next summer.  We plan to put Tadpole in the Mississippi next summer for a couple of weeks.  We would, also, like to trailer her down to Lake Ponchartrain, LA next summer, so we can cruise around the Gulf of Mexico.  We shall see. 

We sold the solar panel with "Heron" last Oct. so we'll need to get another one and rig up the refrigerator like we had on Heron.  It sure worked great.

Bob has constructed the cabinet.  He plans to glue a piece of Formica/laminate on it to match the existing cupboard doors.

  

The photo below is the foot rest for the co-captain's seat. There is one just like it at the captain's seat. They are made of cedar strips of wood by Bob.

Notice the beautiful white seat.  Bob mounted it on a swivel mechanism and the same for the captain's chair. There was plenty of space between the chair and the outside wall to build a cubby, makes a great spot to store my life jacket.  You get a sneak peek at my next photo focus in this pick.  The wall around the windows was stripped of it's original surface by the previous owner.  He got stuff torn out, but no progress on putting in the new.  So there were only wood strips up on the fiberglass as shown on the upper right. Bob is putting beadboard on the walls around the windows.  It looks gorgeous.

Unfinished walls

The walls all around the windows were stripped down to the fiberglass and strips for mounting the beadboard.

Finished walls before the trim

The walls after the beadboard has been attached. Then, of course, the trim will go on around all the windows and at the countertop.

Aft deck. Bob made the cedar floor mat.

 He's working his little butt off today.  I'd better get out there and get more photos.  I'm sure he's gotten lots more done.

Motoring around Lost Island Lake near Ruthven, IA

Wednesday was a calm sunny day with very little humidity and temps hovering at 80 degrees.  Sweet.  Took "Tadpole" up 20 miles from Laurens, IA (where we are staying for a month in the 5th wheel). The 1162 acre lake is 3 miles north of the little NW Iowa town of Ruthven, IA.  The lake is stocked with bullheads, pike, crappie, perch, drum, large mouth bass, walleye, bluegill, catfish and a few more that I've never heard of.

All those fish and none were bitin' yesterday.   Regardless of the fishing situation, it was a beautiful day on the lake.  There were not too many others boating around, so we felt like we had the lake to ourselves.

Bob reads while I fish.

The algae was in bloom.  The warm sunny days promote that, so the ex-park ranger says. Makes for very green water.  At least there is no blue green algae, yet.  That is bad stuff and toxic to little doggies who think they can drink the entire lake.

 

Tomorrow we are heading to Spencer, IA about 30 miles away from Laurens.  We are going to a Grab n Go. The Grab n Go is an auto salvage yard where you can help yourself to parts.  My son bought a really good lookin' 1991 Chevy Blazer last Sat., but it needs a little TLC. I hope it is as fun as I'm anticipating.  Seems like a great scavenger hunt to me.

Iowa has over 1,200 bike paths/trails throughout the state.  And remember the state isn't very big. The newest addition and one getting the most attention lately is the High Trestle Trail. The name comes from the 13 story high former railroad bridge spanning a half mile over the Des Moines River between Madrid, Iowa and Woodward, IA.The trail is 25 miles long, connecting 5 Iowa towns. Those towns include Ankeny, Sheldahl, Slater, Madrid, and Woodward.

Can't do Ragbrai?  Well, check out the bike trails in Iowa and 

go on your own time & own terms.

  It is July 16th and Iowa is green.  A much needed rain would be welcome as the grass is being to brown.