Our theme song should be The Beatles, "Hello, Goodbye"

If you don't understand my title, chances are you're too young, or not British, or just don't get my sense of humour.

How to work off that Christmas Day food

Location: Peoria, Arizona, USA
Housesitting: Fanci, a small standard poodle
Weather: 55ºF (13ºC) and breezy
Forecast: High of 55ºF (13ºC), low of 43ºF (6ºC)
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Note: You'll see some photos with grey skies and darker land than the others. Without realizing, I clicked on one of the filter settings on my phone. There really were blue skies and the land wasn't that green. Oops!

Today we went to the Thunderbird Conservation Park in Glendale, one of the neighbouring cities that makes up the Greater Phoenix area. It's a 1,185 acre park dedicated to preserving the desert environment. It has about 15 miles of multi-use trails of varying lengths and degree of difficulty. As we didn't have the trail map with us, we just started by following everyone else. I was surprised by how many other people were there. 

Dr. Phil and "The Honey-Do List"

Location: Peoria, Arizona, USA
Housesitting: Fanci, a small standard poodle
Weather: 64ºF (18ºC) at 4 pm
Forecast: High of 64ºF (18ºC), low of 49ºF (9ºC)
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My husband, Greg, is a handyman. When he feels comfortable with a house sit, he'll tell me to ask them, in one of my emails, if they have a "honey do" list. Before I could write this post, I went to my friend, Google, to see whether it was "honey-do", or "honeydew". Hey, I'm an English teacher, so of course I care about such details.

Re-aligning a gate last year - #1 on a wife's honey-do list!

Keying in "honey do" (my first guess), right after the dictionary I come across a Dr. Phil advice link ... of course I clicked on it! I now know there may be relationship/sex issues linked to those who don't follow through on a honey-do list. I rarely have a list as Greg gets most jobs done before they ever get to a list, or sometimes even before I even notice them! So, no worries there, Dr. Phil :)

For those who may not be familiar with Dr. Phil, he was a psychology advisor to Oprah many years ago, and has his own spin-off relationship TV series. I think Oprah is probably known worldwide.

This is our third sit at our current home. The homeowners are well aware of Greg's abilities, and hopefully know that he doesn't do any more than is requested, or without checking in with the homeowners. For this visit, the owner mentioned to Greg that the wooden bench needed oiling and he'd be welcome to do it if he wanted.

Here's a photo of the bench, in the back yard, from our visit a year ago.

First Greg sanded it, and sanded it again, and sanded it again. He doesn't have his power sander with him either, so it was done by hand.

See the before-and-after? Good job Greg!

He did the oiling over a few days, so I was able to get photos of it at various stages.

"Hmmm, that small can's not going to be enough"

"Hmmm, may need another coat?"

We sent photos to the owners as it was progressing, and they were thrilled with it. They decided it would now go in the front yard.

Yesterday Greg was finally satisfied with it ... or, at least, I think so.

So, here it is, under the "Christmas tree" (see the baubles?) at the front of the house. Nice, eh? (a little Canadian there, as that's how Greg would say it).

Once we put the cushions back on, we had Fanci pose for a photo. The bench had been drying for a couple of days, and we checked it for any tackiness. All clear for the photo.

Fanci's modelling her Christmas bandana too

Once Fanci was off the bench, we could see faint paw prints. I told her owners it reminded me of kids who need to make their hand impressions in wet cement. Fanci put her mark on the bench, but it was just dust and didn't stay.

So, the "new" bench is Greg's Christmas present to the owners, I guess. We already ate and drank the Christmas presents they left us! OK, Greg, I ate most of the chocolates, I'll admit that, but you helped me with those cookies ... and shared the wine!

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Follow us on Twitter @RUtravellers

Note: Photos of pets and homes are only used in the blog with the prior approval of owners.

My Top 10 List of Outdoor Displays

Current location: Peoria, Arizona, USA
Housesit: Fanci, a small standard poodle
Weather: currently 54ºF (12ºC) at 10 pm
Forecast: high of 60ºF (16ºC) low of 49ºF (9ºC)
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We were here for the Christmas holidays last year. Well, to be politically correct, I probably shouldn't use the word "Christmas". That's a story unto itself, which was told last year. Check it out, if you didn't see it, or don't remember.

Last year I was impressed by the various outdoor decorations, especially the way so many cactus were dressed up with elves' hats. This year, however, the decorations were slower to appear, and less plentiful. Maybe it's because I'm repeating the experience, but I really do think there's been less of an effort this year.

Before I start this year's Top 10 decorations, I'll share my favourite from last year ...

It looks like a White Christmas in Phoenix!

You may recall that just two days ago we did a Christmas shopping trip to Petsmart. Here's Greg, happy with his selection.

The Undeniable Truth about Arizona

In 2013, Peoria, Arizona (where we currently live) was rated #7 of the top USA cities for early retirement. In fact, the photo used for the article in the above link, as seen below,

Doesn't everyone do all their Christmas shopping at PetSmart?

OK, enough of me whining about the cold weather here in Arizona; let's move on.

Let's first go back to this time last year. Same home, same dog (Fanci), and - as you're about to see - same Christmas shopping.

December 2014 - Greg at PetSmart

The Joys of Tweets & Texts!

So, my focus lately has been on the (poor) weather here in the Phoenix, Arizona area. 

Here's this morning's local weather update on Twitter:

Being grateful, on a cool rainy day

In my previous post, I compared the Phoenix, Arizona temperatures to our hometown of Niagara Falls, Canada. A little disheartened, I realized the daytime temperatures weren't that far apart. Yet we have come to Arizona for the warmth and sunshine. Here's a photo outside today, once the rain had eased up. The temperature at 8:30 am is 44 F (7 Celsius).

New Movie Sequel: The Hunt for Red "December"

Earlier this year we house sat in Tucson, in the Catalina Foothills. We saw some beautiful sunsets, and I did a post about it, "The Old Adage of Red Sky at Night".

The reason I mention this is that tonight's sky had a patch or two of dramatic colour in it. It was more vibrant than it shows here, and there were definitely patches of pink/red.

Sherlock Holmes, where are you?

On a rather dull weather, cool day, we went for a walk with Fanci today. We went outside of the gated community, and walked the scrubland area. We were last here in February, and, like many places, new housing development is progressively expanding the residential areas.

The area we first walked today was undeveloped at the time of our last visit. If you look at the section of a map near the end of this blog post, you'll see in the lower left area how housing has been approved. Here are photos of it today, taken from the street-side, over the wall surrounding the neighbourhood:

A concrete pad for a new house - no basements here

Taking a closer look at nature's beauty

I've now been writing this blog for over a year. I'm thrilled to say that some followers have been with me since the beginning. The complication with that is, given we're currently repeating a house sit we did twice last year, it poses a problem in that I don't want to repeat last year's content. However, chances are we'll repeat many of the things we did last year. It'll be a challenge.

For those who are new to the blog, I'll give a short introduction. We're living at Trilogy at Vistancia, in Peoria, Arizona. For those on Twitter, take a look at @TrilogyAZ. It's beautiful. It's like living at a 5-star resort, but you have your own home too. We are so happy to be here. Take a look at the current promotional video for this community.

Today in not-so-sunny Arizona

Arizona is known for the high number of days it has sunshine each year - 299, to be exact. Today is not one of those days. It's been overcast most of the day, although this morning was bright and sunny for my walk with Fanci.

On the bright side of things, here are some of the beautiful blossoms I saw today on our walk.

We've arrived in sunny Arizona

We've returned to our first house sit home in Peoria, Arizona. Last night we stayed in Holbrook, Arizona, home of the famous Petrified Forest National Park. We visited the park last year, and did a blog post about it, as we found it so interesting.

There are flowering trees and bushes everywhere in this community

Warm sunny days are on the horizon

As many of you know, we're currently on the road, travelling from Canada to Arizona. The photo below is of our "herd" a few months ago. I'm pleased to say that, looking at this same shelf just before we left, many of these "friends" have left home. My husband often calls me a "rotten shepherdess", because I get attached to them and hate to part with them, but I'm doing a better job these days. I'm sure he'll have no problem replacing them though, as he always does!

Heading south, in search of warmer weather

Today we started our journey south, heading for Arizona for an upcoming house sit in Peoria. We'll be returning to our first house sit with TrustedHousesitters, to once again spend time with our friend, Fanci.

Fanci

Three of our sheepish friends left the herd today

Today we’re travelling back from St. Thomas to our home in Canada. In keeping with our blog name, “Have sheep, will travel”, we brought along three friends on this trip: left to right – Savvy (from Savannah, Georgia), Slippery (check out the feet), and Disco (again, check out those dazzling ears and feet).

A visit to the beautiful island of St. John, USVI

Today was our final full day in the US Virgin Islands, at least for this trip. We chose to take the ferry from St. Thomas to St. John, its smaller sister island. Here's our ferry, which was far smaller than I'd expected.