Rain! Yipee!

We live in the desert, so rainy days are not common. Two in a row are even more rare!

We went camping over the weekend for Mother's Day. It was beautiful. We went down south a few hours to our favorite Mother's Day camping spot. We enjoyed friends, cactus blossoms, exploring lava tubes, and great food. What a wonderful weekend.

Then we came back to wet weather. We need to open and clean the camper, but that won't happen until we get some sunny skies. Yesterday we had a few thunder and lightening strikes, too! We loved it. The grass looks green, the trees are all covered in new leaves, and the sky is gray.

Today the weather is the same: stormy and gray. We can't even see the base of the mountains today. I bet there is plenty of new snow up there, which is wonderful because that is our 'water storage'. Most of the water in our part of the country comes from the winter snow-pack in the mountains.

This is a blessing beyond measure to have more water this spring. We have more than 90% of our normal water for this year, which is great. But we would love to be at 100% or more of normal. Everyone in our area prays for water. Some places in our state are more than 100% this year because we have had so much wet snow, but there are plenty of places that are still less than  50%. It makes it difficult to graze animals when there is no grass. It also makes it difficult for those of us who buy our hay to raise our animals.

A few years ago the hay shortage was so bad that many people sent their animals to slaughter so they wouldn't starve. There were people who couldn't afford to slaughter, so they took their animals out into the desert, gave them a big hug, and then shot them. They couldn't stand to see the animals suffer from starvation. I felt so badly when I heard about that, for the animals and the owners. I can't imagine how I would feel if I was in that position.