Bandits and A Winner

 

I cannot thank you all enough for embracing me and sending such warm and caring emails, comments, and even a very special gift (which I will be telling you about in a future post) regarding the loss of my dear friend Dan.  I know he would be so happy that I shared our unusual story of friendship, and I loved hearing about how some of you have had similar experiences in your own lives!  The internet has truly transformed the way we communicate, often portrayed negatively in the media, so it was wonderful to find out that many of you have found love and friendship through this amazing global technology the same way I did!

 

 

The other evening as the sun was setting, Mr. Tide was grilling and shouted for me to come outside.  He said we had some guests, and sure enough up in a wild cherry tree along the back of our property was an oh so cute and furry dinner guest!  He had scampered up our fence and then onto the tree to have a little feast or maybe some dessert!

 

 

 

Then Mr. Tide told me to look a little closer.  Instead of one furry visitor, we had two!  Mr. Tide told me that before I had come out one of the raccoons had run back down the tree to tell his or her friend about the all you can eat cherry buffet in our tree, so the second furry friend had eagerly joined the first.

 

 

 

They were so cute, and reminded me of when I was younger when my brother had rescued a baby raccoon from a camp where he worked each summer.  We had “Bandit” for just a few weeks, while we fed him and helped him grow.  One day we came home to find him up a tree where he was making a horrible noise letting us know he couldn’t find his way back down.  Eventually my brother released Bandit back to the wild and it was a sad day knowing I couldn’t come home each day to play with him and feed him the baby food that he loved, but in time I knew it was for the best and that he would be happier living life with his own kind.  These two raccoons, which I like to think are some of Bandits relatives, had no trouble bouncing around the tree and they were really quite acrobatic and comical to watch as they swung on not so sturdy branches and feasted on the fresh fruit.

 

 

The light was waning, so it was hard to get a good clear shot, but it was as if they didn’t mind posing for the crazy humans so enthralled with watching their sweet little bandito faces!  I hope they come back again sometime!

 

Ok, now it’s time to announce the winner of my End of Summer Giveaway!!  Thank you so much for the tremendous response to my latest Giveaway, and I promise I won’t wait so long to host another one.  I have some ideas already about what I want to give away next, so keep checking back to see what I’ll be offering soon!

 

This time when I entered the number into Random.org I put a 0 as the lowest number and then 152, one number higher than the actual number of comments, to make sure that the generator would include everyone.  I’m not sure that it ignores the lowest or highest number, but I decided to make sure by doing it this way for a change.

 

 

And the winner is…drum roll please…Sue (Someone’s Mom)!!!  Sue has been a longtime follower of my blog and she is a lover of everything beachy so I know she’ll give these items a happy home…congratulations Sue!  Just send me your mailing address Sue and I’ll get your package winging it’s way to your house!