Vacationing in Our Own Back Yard

Yesterday Carl and his best friend, Bill, played their weekly golf game at a beautiful course about 30 minutes west of where we live. Bill's wife (and my best friend), Susan, and I decided to go with them and lay by the pool. The pool area is gorgeous: surrounded by huge oak trees and beautifully appointed. We had the pool to ourselves, there was a gentle breeze blowing, and it was like being on an island somewhere far, far away.

We read our books, talked, snacked on mini-corn dogs and played two rounds of Trivial Pursuit (both of which I lost by 1 pie).

It was relaxing and very enjoyable girlfriend time.

Workshop Arrives!

The foundation for the house is complete and work begins on a footing for our back porch deck (the first picture).

The exciting thing is that the steel building materials have arrived and as soon as the shop foundation is poured we can erect it. We plan to move all of our household goods from rental storage into the workshop and then move our RV to the property. We'll live in it until the construction has been completed.
Carl worked his tush off helping to unload the steel and slept very well that night.

Live Music in the Most Unlikely Places

We went to my sister's place on Lake Buchanan this weekend as that is where our freezer is located and we needed to get some meat. When we got there, my sister said she'd like to go to the Lost Creek Winery to get a hostess gift for a friend they are visiting next week. We got to the winery and found wonderful live music happening in a beautiful setting outside the equally beautiful tasting room. We were on a schedule so we vowed to come back at a later date.

Our schedule was to meet our aunt and uncle at a local restaurant in Tow, TX to hear some live music. We walked in and found a table reserved for us with a bottle of wine and a "Welcome Back, We've Missed You" card for my sister and brother-in-law who've been in Las Vegas teaching school from August, 2007 - June 2008. We then were treated to THE BEST chicken fried steak I've every had (and I'm a Texas) and some wonderful live music from two local guys (old country like Bob Wills and less old country like Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, etc.)

It was delightful and we'll definitely go back!

Free Timing with Free Cell

I love playing free cell on my laptop and, being every-so-slightly left-brained, I decided some time ago to play the games in order starting with game 1. My rules are that (1)I can't go the next game until I've won the game I'm playing; (2) if I've not won a game after 5 times, I put that game number on my "replay" list and move on to the next game; (3) each time I log on I start with the games on my "replay" list -- if I win it mark it off the list, if I lose I move to the next game on the "replay" list; (4) once I'm through the "replay" list I go the next new game.

As of today, I was playing new game #736 and I still hadn't won game #598. I thought I had approached it every possible way (obviously I hadn't because Carl has won it) but I FINALLY won it today!

OK, so this doesn't rank up there with an Olympic medal, but, for me, it was a victory!

Now That's A Foundation!

Well, the last update on the foundation left you with us awaiting the steel to be installed. While we were away at Bloys Camp Meeting, they installed the rebar and when we returned they poured the slab. Linda took pictures of the operation, which was amazing.
Click on the slide show below and you'll see that 126 cubic yards of concrete make for a pretty tall foundation. The last picture in the slide show is of Linda and Carl at our front door (or where it will be).

A Belated Birthday Celebration

My brother-in-law's birthday was on Friday, August 15, but we celebrated it today. We asked them to meet us in Johnson City at the Silver K Cafe for a brunch and music by John Arthur Martinez (JAM is a musician from Marble Falls who came in 2nd in the first Nashville Star competition).

The company was the best, the venue is great, the food was delicious, and JAM's music was enjoyable, as always.

A great time was had by all!

Beads, Beads, and More Beads

My friend, Susan, and I have been dabbling in beading (we're not bad at it and may, if we have the time, actually make some money at it!). She was wanting some silver wire to make some bracelets and hadn't been able to find it, so we went to a "Bead Show" in San Antonio on Saturday, August 16.

Three observations of the "Bead Show":

1. I had NO idea of the number of beads that could be in one place -- it was a space of 10,000ish square feet and it had beads of porcelain, metals, woods, glass, crystals, gems of every size, color, shape, and style imaginable. Thankfully, both of us were so overwhelmed that we weren't tempted to buy!
2. I had NO idea of the number of people who were interested in beading and would attend a "Bead Show"! We were there fairly early in the day and the place was PACKED!
3. I had NO idea how many men would attend a "Bead Show" -- I'm estimating that 1/3 of the folks there were male.

Susan got exactly what she went for (and at a price far less than she expected to spend) but it was WAY too many beads for us to look at!

An Extraordinarily-Special Camp Meeting

This site has been very silent for a couple of weeks. We were in the Davis Mountains from Wednesday, July 30 thru Monday, August 11. Once home, Carl had to play catch-up with work and I had to play catch-up with laundry, unpacking, mail, bills and all the other things you have to catch up with when you've been out of town for almost two weeks. I'm back on track now and plan to stay more current with my updates. I'll start with our week at Camp Meeting.

We went out early in order to continue to make repairs to our camp caused by a 300-year-old oak tree falling on our cook shed and taking out our bunkhouse, our storage facility, some plumbing and some electrical work. And, of course, there are the perennial leaks, shortages, stoppages, and other plumbing, electrical, and sewage problems that occur when you use an facility only once a year.

Everything was in tip-top shape by the time the majority of our campers arrived and we had an extraordinarily wonderful camp meeting!

1. It was my 60th and Carl's 18th time to attend;
   
2. My cousin and his daughter from Alaska were there and it was the longest time I've ever spent with them.
3. My nephew and his wife were there for the entire week; they brought a friend of theirs with them that we thoroughly enjoyed being with;
4. The Methodist preacher on staff has been newly-appointed to New Braunfels and we really like him and his wife (she's been coming to Camp Meeting as long as I have and we decided we most certainly attended Sunday School together out there!) so we are eager to visit their church;
5. As always, we had a wonderful time re-connecting with old friends and meeting new friends.

However, the event that made the week extraordinarily special was when our cooks walked out on us in the middle of breakfast on Thursday. I know this sounds like a deal-breaking event but our campers pitched in such that we finished cooking breakfast for everyone, we put together an amazing lunch (90 lbs of meat loaf, just to illustrate the volume we serve), we had roasts in the oven for dinner that night, and briskets in the smoker for lunch the next day. We had folks falling out to wash dishes, clean off tables, and handle all the details for serving lunch. Then we learned that we were hosting the camp preachers, the camp music staff, and their families for lunch -- we were asked if we wanted to reschedule, but we said "no" and lunch was FABULOUS!

All of us agreed that we had fun pitching in to help and I truly believe our campers are more invested in the process. It was a very special time!

And, the good news is that we had a new crew on board by 4:00 that afternoon and they are SO much better than what we had! What a blessing in disguise. . .