Time To Catch Up

Wow, almost two months have gone by without posting! I have to get back in the habit of writing.  Since we have been settled in one spot, it just seems like there is nothing to write about. However, that's not really true.

We have spent time with our kids and grandkids.

Jim has been helping our son in law out in his construction business and I have enjoyed doing whatever I want to do! :)

I have met some other rving ladies in San Antonio for lunch a couple of times.  It has really been fun to get to know everyone and I have enjoyed our many conversations about rvs and traveling.

Lunch at Cheddar's

We have made some modifications to our fifth wheel. Adding wooden blinds has been the biggest change.  Jim made the wooden box valances to fit over them and we really like the way it turned out.

We also (I guess I should say Jim also,  all I did was pick everything out, he did all the work) added tile to our backsplash to give the kitchen a little touch of home.

We liked the way it turned out, we removed the headboard behind the bed and added tile there.

We're also planning our journeys for when we leave here the first of April.  We're planning on going west through Big Bend, Tucson, make a stop in Phoenix to have our graphics redone, Las Vegas and into California going to Yosemite and then meandering up the western coastline up to Bellingham and then begin our trip back to Texas arriving back in November.  Of course, as rvers say all plans are in jello.

We have enjoyed getting together with our friends Bob and Susan from Travelbug Susan.  They have introduced us to Volksmarching and we have enjoyed several wonderful walks.  We have done two in San Antonio and it was great revisiting places I haven't been to for many years.

We also did one in San Marcos and then later took the glass bottom boat tour.

We had tried to meet up in Austin last week, but our refrigerator went out.  Now that is fixed and this weekend we were able to go on the Volksmarch I had really been looking forward to.  It was in Johnson City at the Benini Sculpture Garden.  We had passed this longhorn sculpture many times between Johnson City and Fredericksburg, but had no idea what treasure was awaiting down the road.

Upon arrival, I signed in for our 10K walk (hope I make it).  It was a beautiful, cool morning.

The dirt road meandered around the ranch with sculptures popping up everywhere you looked.  It was like a little surprise everywhere you turned.  Just about every piece inspired some kind of conversation.

 We continued our walk looking at the artwork surrounding us.  I think you could go on this walk several times and always see something different.  We would sometime backtrack down a trail and I would see something I had missed the first time up.

We came to the hill climbing to the top where the residence was located. What a climb!

However, once we came to the top, we were greeted with these wonderful vista views.

 We checked in at the top and walked around, then made our way back down going out of the ranch and walking the other 5K on ranch roads outside the ranch.

 After the walk, we went inside the gallery to take a peak at the are there.

 Next, we headed to The Kountry Cupboard for lunch, before heading out to the Johnson Ranch to tour  the ranch house and the living history farm.


We arrived at the ranch, check in at the headquarters getting our cd to tour the ranch and Susan and I stamped our passport books.  Our first stop was the Sauer Beckmann Living History Farm.

We really got excited when we saw this mama with her little piggies, they were only 5 days old!

 There were chickens, sheep, and this turkey too!  We enjoyed hearing about life on the farm from the docent there who went through all the food that would be made from the milk from that day.

 We quickly drove through the rest of the ranch wanting to make the last tour at the Johnson ranch house at 4:30.  We made it and were able to go through the house that has been brought back in time to recreate the way it looked when Lyndon B. Johnson was there during his presidency.

 After we left the ranch and were heading back to drop off Bob and Susan, Bob mentioned Dairy Queen.  We all thought that sounded great! So, after getting their car, we all headed over to DQ.  We were enjoying our blizzards when Susan saw something and began to grab her camera.  We turned around and saw this, is it a car, a motorcycle, or a plane?

A policeman had pulled him over.  Susan, in reporter mode, goes outside and asks the policeman what's happening.  He tells her he didn't see a license plate (he did see it after he had stopped them).  We had a wonderful time watching what transpired. The policeman had his picture taken with the vehicle. A small crowd gathered several times. One of the Dairy Queen employees went out to get her picture taken with the car. My husband then went out to have a conversation with the owner finding out he has been stopped many times by police not knowing if this vehicle was street legal.  The owner said it can reach speeds of 165 mph and once was stopped by police in New Mexico going 125 mph.  Who knew you could be so entertained at a Dairy Queen?  What a wonderful end to a great day!

Where Did The Sun Go?

It has been a cold dreary week here in central Texas.  I don't think the highs were ever out of the 40's.  Even though it's been chilly outside, we have had some good times with friends.

On Saturday, our friends Bob and Susan from Travel Bug came out to our fiver.  We took the 15 mile trip to Lockhart, the barbeque capital of Texas.  I know of 4 barbeque restaurants there, but Kreuz is my favorite and that's where we went. :)

We got there a little after 12 and the line was almost to the door.  We visited while we waited and then made our way up to the room with the pits and placed our meat order.

After a great lunch and more visiting, we headed back to the fiver so Bob and Susan could teach us how to play pinochle.  We had a great time learning a new game and are looking forward to playing again.  We enjoyed the evening playing pinochle, watching the Alamo Bowl and munching on the snacks Bob and Susan brought.

The park had a potluck dinner on New Year's Eve that we attended.  We enjoyed visiting with others here in the park as well as sharing and hearing about each other's travel stories.

The rest of the week has been spent trying to organize our pictures.  There are 40,000 pictures on our external hard drive that have been recovered from another drive and I am attempting to put them in folders.  There's 10 years worth of pictures that need to be sorted.  I think this is going to keep me busy for awhile.  I am also going through our pictures we took this summer.  We both love taking pictures, but neither of us are very good about going through them and deleting the bad pictures.  So, I now have abut 10,000 pictures from our spring/summer travels to go through.  I think when this is all over I will have learned my lesson to go through the pictures more often.

Tomorrow, we're planning on meeting Bob and Susan in San Antonio for a volksmarch.  I'm hoping for a little warmer weather.  :)

Time To Catch Up

I can't believe it's been over 2 months since I posted, so I thought I would catch up on what we have been doing.  We arrived back in Texas the first part of October.  We wouldn't have gotten here that early except we were attending Jim's family reunion in east Texas.  This was the 90th reunion and Jim's father is the last remaining of 11 siblings.  All of his kids were there.  It's not often they are all together.

We have landed at Pecan Park RV Park in San Marcos.  It's a great rv park with great winter Texan rates, close to town, but far enough out of town to give you a peaceful feeling.  It's also a good halfway point between Austin and San Antonio where our families are located. We will probably be here until spring when we will take off again.

We have had sleepovers and get togethers with our 3 "grand girls"

Pumpkin Patch in San Antonio

We have gotten together with friends.  We met up with Bob and Susan from Travel Bug again in New Braunfels before they took off for Australia. (that's how long it's been since I've posted, they're back from their month there).

We also met our friends Byron and Linda in Wimberly for a fun day.

Byron and Jim were roommates in college.  Byron and Linda were married in June and we were married in August.  We will both be celebrating our 40th anniversaries in 2013!  We have sometimes gone several years before seeing each other again, but when we do, we take right up where we left off.

December has been a whirlwind of activities.

We went caroling on the river in San Antonio.  We went with my parent's church and rode a barge down the river as we caroled the night away.

We took the girls to Wimberly's Trail of Lights,

then went back to the rv to decorate Christmas cookies and have a sleepover.

Right before Christmas, the whole family met for dinner in Austin and then went to the Trail of Lights there.  It had been several years since the Trail of Lights had taken place in Austin and it was as spectacular as always.

We had a potluck dinner the Saturday before Christmas and enjoyed visiting with people staying here at the park.  

Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were spent with our families watching the girls open their parents and getting together at my brother's house in San Antonio.  It was a wonderful time spent with our family!

It seems there hasn't been as much to write about since we haven't been traveling,  but it is amazing how quickly the time goes by.  Here's hoping I do a better job of updating this blog. :)