My first Rattler!

I will never forget today as long as I live! I have only seen rattlesnakes in zoos and photos and never thought in a million years I would get so close as to almost stepping on one - YIKES!!!! Only a few days ago I was on the NCsnakes.com site familiarizing myself with the poisoness snakes in our area again as we are getting close to moving and I wanted a refresher course. When I got to the property I let the puppies out and tied up the mom dog so I could clean out the kennel and get them fresh water and food. The puppies usually stay within 20 feet or so of the kennel and don't go too far. They run in the grass, in the wooded area behind the kennel, which has wood piles, a small garden and our guinea hens on the other side, about 15 feet away. On the side of the guinea cage is a water tank that Terry has hooked up to collect rain water and has a tap on it. Terry had hooked a hose up to the tank and brought the hose over to the kennel through the wooded area and told me all I have to do is turn on the nozzel on the hose to get water. Well, typical me didn't listen properly when he explained it a few days ago so I was thinking I had to turn the water on at the tank so I headed over that way. Since I first saw black and king snakes out at the property in the last few years, I am always on the lookout for black colored snakes, never thinking any other snakes would be around. I got within 2-3 feet of the tank, didn't see anything black and started to walk to the tank and looked down and stopped in my tracks. There he was, all 4 1/2 - 5', big, fat and scary next to the guinea pen looking for mice and birds. His head was the other way so he didn't see me. Of course I backed away asap and immediately FREAKED OUT! Before I called Terry the only think I could think of was the puppies running around and they always come back by the guineas and oh my gosh my heart was pacing so fast! I ran back and grabbed all the puppies and basically was throwing them in the kennel (I was gentle though but fast!) When we go to put them back in the kennel, they think we are playing and they run all over the place so I was very happy that they cooperated. Rachel (mama dog) was still tied up and the daddy dog was in the other kennel because we have to lock him up when we let the puppies out because he growls at them. The only dog running loose was Paula Dean and I didn't see her at the time. After the puppies were in the kennel, I grabbed a shovel and went over by the snake and stood on a log and did not take my eyes off that snake as there was no way I was letting this poisoness snake escape! I had my cell phone in my pocket and I couldn't dial fast enough and called Terry and he DIDN'T ANSWER HIS PHONE! I called and called and he didn't answer and finally about the fifth time he answered. And I'm like "where are you, there's a big rattler here and oh the puppies, the dogs, where are you?" He was only 15 minutes away and I'll tell you, that was the longest 15 minutes of my life. Okay, I admit I was practically in tears at this point because all I was thinking about was what if I would of listened to Terry in the first place on how to turn the water on that I would of never went over to the tank and I would of never had seen the snake and one or more of the puppies might have been killed today. As I stood there on the log with my shovel watching this snake, I was thanking God that I didn't listen to Terry!

After I called Terry he called his friend Doug, who by the way could be on Survivorman, he is an ex-cop, a hunter, kills his own chickens, eats turtles, and well, you get the picture. Terry finally shows up 20 minutes later and asks me to go pick up Doug (lives 4 miles away) because his truck was being repaired so I ran to my car why Terry watched the snake and drove as fast as I could, missed Doug's driveway and had to turn around. There he was, cage and snake stick in hand and we headed back. He walks up to the snake like it was no big deal and starts talking to it, (like the snake is going to say hey, whats up? - hee hee). I'm shouting "Wait, I want to get my camera" so I ran and got my camera and had a Kodak moment with the snake and Doug tucked him away in his snake box. Doug was going to take the snake over to another area far away and release it as he will not kill snakes. Doug is the one holding the snake and that's Terry on the right.



(Click on the photos for closeups and you can see the snake better!)
Terry left to take Doug and the snake back to his house and I took Rachel for a walk around the fence perimeter of the property, about 3 1/2 acres. And of course I was walking a little slower and a little more alert and when we got over by where the snake was I walked really slow, so happy he was gone. I did see a black snake though and I walked right by it as they really don't bother me, I just don't want to see a poisoness snake.

Okay, to change the subject away from snakes I have a few crafty things to share. The first is a wall hanging that I altered for July 4th. I used some Melissa Frances papers and the U.S.A. letters are wood which I took off of another wood item I had. I covered them with some Rusty Pickle paper, inked lightly and glittered with German Glass Glitter. I sanded the edges on some of the stars to give it a rustic look.

And, a Thankyou card I made using some Basic Grey Eva papers and chipboard, crochet trim, rick rack, ribbon, glitter and rhinestones.

I won't have alot of blog posts probably through the end of July as we will be moving in about three weeks and then my dad is coming around the 10th of July and will be here for a few weeks. I've been going out to the property alot lately, gardening and doing some landscaping. Terry even let me do some caulking in the house this past weekend. My attic craft room and the second floor should be mostly completed in the next 3-4 weeks but I won't have a kitchen yet and I completely fine with that. We will get a basic fridge to use, one that we can put out in the shop later after we get our appliances, we'll have a microwave, toaster, coffee maker, a BBQ and my Wolfgang Puck panini press so we will be just fine. Hey, my tomatos will be ripe before I know it and we will be eating tomato sandwiches all summer so who needs a kitchen, right?
(I will still be visiting my blog buddies though)!

I hope you all have wonderful, beautiful summer days ahead!
Annette