Willcox, Arizona

Good morning, my friends. It's shaping up to be a nice day here at the Traveling Three Cats Ranch. As I'm writing this, I have some Carrot Cake Baked Oatmeal in the oven. I'm hoping if I write slow, I can show it to you at the end of the post. On today's agenda will be a visit to Chiricahua National Monument. In a previous post, I was wringing my hands over the fact that the scenic drive was closed, and that meant there wasn't much of a reason to visit. When I checked the website last night, the road was OPEN!!! Yay! So, I'll check it again before we leave this morning, but I think our visit to the national monument is a Big Go!

But let's back up to yesterday's comings and goings, shall we? Mostly it was going...or coming...depending on how you look at it. We spent a leisurely morning since we couldn't check in at Willcox until 1:00 p.m. We left Benson at the stroke of 11:00 a.m. to drive 37 miles down the road. Before heading to the RV park, we did our grocery shopping, and that brought us within 15 minutes of our check-in time. 

Smitty and Sadie had a good morning. Smitty spent his morning on his window hammock.

Sadie preferred the spot of sunshine on the back of the couch.

I took the first stitches on the second block for Grandpa's Bridges.

And how could I miss when I had not one, but two stitching cats beside me.

We headed out under moody skies. The sky looked like this for most of the day. We got into a few sprinkles, but nothing major.

Arriving at our final destination, I spent some more time on my stitching.

While I was doing that, someone in the park took their cat out for a walk. We don't often see this unless it's us walking the cat.

It might have caused Smitty to turn into Fang, but he was 'zhausted from a day of driving. He had the do not disturb sign out.

By day's end, we were looking at those same moody skies. 

It rained some last night, but today's weather is an improvement. There is only a small chance of rain. Looking out right now, it's blue sky and sunshine with a few puffy white clouds mixed in.

Okay, so my baked oatmeal has just 13 minutes to go. I won't post this until it's finished. And in the land of internet time, it will seem to you as if it happens instantaneously! It's magic, I tell you! So here it is: 

It's served up with a dollop of fat-free vanilla yogurt. And, magically, we've already eaten it. It was very tasty with a nice texture. 

You can find the recipe right here. It was a good way to use some shredded carrots I brought from home.

Okay, and so today's agenda has us at the national monument, unless something changes in the interim. We have just one more night here, and then we'll be on our way to Las Cruces, New Mexico, tomorrow. We may head up to White Sands National Park while we're there, although we visited once many years ago. In that time, it has moved from national monument to national park status. Also, I'd like to get in a visit to a quilt shop. We have just two nights in Las Cruces before moving on, and so that might be an overly ambitious plan. 

If you've enjoyed this post, you can thank Sadie for her careful editing.

And now that we're finished, she's assumed her sunbathing position.

Life is good.

Carry on, my friends. And if you're coming to the national monument with us, you might want to lace up your hiking boots. If the weather cooperates, we're going to do some hiking.