What do you think??
We haven't found Julie Z. or Debby Kaspari yet. We'll try again tomorrow.
I'm calling this little guy a Least Flycatcher. I am admittedly poor at identifying flycatchers so if I'm wrong, help me out.
When I took this picture of the Black and White Warbler I didn't even realize there were two birds in the view.
Here's an immature Bald Eagle flying over the yard.
The hummers liked the clover better than my feeder.
"Dueling finches!"
We have many Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers breeding at Hasty.
I finally got a picture of the Golden-winged Warblers breeding at Hasty. I've seen them for three summers but this is my first photo. It's not a great shot but I'm happy to have it. This bird spent a lot of time hanging upside down checking out clumps of dried leaves for insects. When I looked it up in my Peterson guide, that behavior was listed as characteristic of this warbler.
Chestnut-sided warblers are very common breeders at Hasty. They seem to be very curious birds and are easy to pish in for a closer look. In fact, this bird sat a long time letting me take pictures, then launched himself right at me landing only about two feet away checking me out!
These Sandhill Cranes were about a quarter mile from Hasty but last visit we had three Sandhills fly over the camper. I've heard them down by the creek several times but have never seen them. Maybe with our new view from the balcony I'll get a look.
It was only last summer that I was finally able to hear Red-eyed Vireos and identify them by sound. Now they seem to be everywhere up there. They are another bird that seems to be curious about pishing.
Well, that's it. Time to finish my packing for the ROAD TRIP! We'll have wifi at the hotel so I hope to post from there. 
This angle is from our current campsite, roughly where we'd like to build a house some day. We had hoped to build the house shell this summer but had to change plans. Building a house would have required new home financing and we would have had to have the house, inside and out, nearly completed within a year. We wanted to do some of those jobs like finishing the kitchen, baths, flooring, wiring etc. over time and we didn't want to spend that much money in so short a time. So, after much thought, we abandoned the plans of building a house for right now. We could build a garage though. We had been approved as part of our variance, to build a 32X32 garage with a maximum height of 25 feet. The garage would be Art's dream garage with lots of space for building whatever he wanted. I wanted a bathroom with shower so he could clean up before coming back to the house (in the future...). I also wanted a little loft area for a workshop/office for him. We'd add a little cantilevered balcony for me to watch over Hasty Brook. It's all we talked about last winter. We wanted to make the most of the space we were allowed to build. I hoped we could use some of the garage level as a relaxing living space over the next several years. Then Art got the idea to enlarge the loft area to a second story. Using an inexpensive software package (by Better Homes and Gardens- $60 at Costco) Art put together the plans keeping in mind our 25 foot height limit. We'll have plenty of room for a small kitchen area, a long bedroom (or two smaller-haven't decided yet) and a good sized living area facing the balcony and my Hasty Brook.
This is our future bathroom- sink, stool and shower. The red tubes are for the in-floor heating for Art's garage so he can eventually be out there all winter. We won't install the boiler for the heating until later but it'll be all ready to go.
Here's the view from the garage toward the septic tank and mound. Tommy seeded the area and in two short weeks the grass has taken hold and it looks pretty nice. Wouldn't this be a nice spot for wildflowers? I've been grabbing up wildflower packets (on clearance!). Should I spread them this fall or wait until spring?
Before the rain drove us away Art and I laid down some long, skinny aspen poles to give me an idea of what the usable space will be like on the upper floor. Yes, Richard, it was lots bigger than I expected! My vision of this space changed and I could see that there was room for a kitchen area and sleeping area too.
On our next trip up: walls!
July 14, 2009
Art got quite the workout hauling big rocks out of the construction area for us to use later for landscaping.
A huge truck and trailer backed into the cleared line to drop the septic tank into the waiting hole.
I ran down the driveway to get a shot of the tank being lowered into the ground but missed it. The worker in the white shirt is standing on the concrete tank. The trench leading away from the tank is for the pipes which will lead on to the mound system. 
The tank is in. It was a little tricky for the septic designer to plan the septic system keeping it all away from the creek. We actually bought our second 10 acres last year in order to have room for a septic system site that would meet all of the set-back requirements. 
It was so nice of Tommy to spend some extra time helping me find the right spot and then set the rocks so they'd look the best. This is the largest of them.
It's nearly as tall as me!
More rocks appeared as he worked to bring the grade down to prep the site for the slab.
Skimming just a few inches over a large site makes a lot of dirt.
Next visit: the slab!We made a quick day trip up to Hasty today to deliver the shower. The plumber is coming tomorrow and the electrician on Friday. When we pulled up the builder shouted out right away that the stairs were built! Finally I could get upstairs to see the view.
I'll be posting the photos of the building progress over the next few days but I can't wait to share the view that I'd been longing to see.
In case you didn't know, the river is actually called Hasty Brook on the map.
Pardon the rain spots on the camera lens. It was raining buckets.
Left to right, front row:Volunteer handlers showed us the education raptors including this beautiful Merlin-
and this lovely mellow Barred Owl.
We spent a lot of time on the dock overlooking the turtle pond. There was lots to look at and talk about. Sharon let me try out her 2X converter on my camera and lens. Here's a photo of a pair of Mergansers and a Mallard that I took using Sharon's converter. The auto focus wouldn't work on my lens with the 2X in place so I had quite a bit of trouble focusing. I have not used my camera on the manual focus mode so I felt like I was all thumbs, but maybe with more practice...
What a nice fellow. Art, who can be a bit shy with new people said the meeting Richard was like meeting an old friend. Within minutes we were chatting like we'd known each other for years. Richard is a really interesting and multi talented man. His career history is amazing. 
Thank you Richard for letting me add you to my "Blogger Life List" and for your wonderful hospitality and friendship.
Work started on clearing the garage site while we were up there. Art and I had all ready taken down the trees in this area in early spring. It's hard for me to believe that we are finally moving forward with our dream of having a home up there. We think the loft will make a great place to stay when we visit Hasty until we build a home in the future. We'll be doing a lot of the finishing work ourselves but we hope to have a completely closed in building by late summer. We've chosen the vinyl siding, steel roof, windows and trim. We'll do the wiring, insulating and sheet rock/indoor siding ourselves. 
The creek water level was way down from our last visit. It's still a really birdy place though.
Chestnut-sided Warblers are singing everywhere.
American Redstarts are nesting near one of the tall spruce behind the camper.
We enjoyed watching these White-breasted Nuthatch babies beg (and beg and beg and beg) for food from their tired looking parents.
I love the song of the Red-breasted Grosbeak. Any opinions out there- is this a first year male? He sure looks tatty.
Red-eyed Vireo's song is a bit repetitious.
On one of our trips in to town to the hardware store I spotted two Purple Martin houses. They were just outside the nursing home. There were several faces in the windows watching the Martins swoop and dive. A friend gave me an old Martin house. I'll need to find out from Katdoc if our place at Hasty is a good spot for Purple Martins. 
