Christmas Get Together

 It was a beautiful but chilly day when I met Carrie in Colorado Springs!!  We met for brunch and had a great time just talking a mile a minute!

After we ate, we headed to the Broadmoor to walk around!

We were very excited to see the gingerbread houses on display - we had been here years ago and it was so fun to walk around and see them - but times change - and this year was ONLY the below display, which was really cool but we were sure expecting more!

Carrie's friend from TX had a few paintings in one of the galleries so we walked around trying to find them - we took a nice walk across the bridge and it was fun to see all the geese hanging out!

We FINALLY located the gallery and got to see the pictures inside - her friend is an amazing artist and even the very small ones start about $250 and go up from there!!

We ended our day by getting coffee and tea at their coffee/bakery place and sat in front of the fireplace enjoying ourselves!

What a great Christmas get-together!

December Happenings

 Well here it is the end of December and somehow I managed to NOT blog all month - excuses, excuses!!

It HAS been a busy month - just like every other month - but that is still no excuse so here goes!!

We DID have some snow on Dec. 2nd - and the only reason I remember that is we had went to the neighbors for a Christmas get-together and it was snowing like crazy when we left to go home - our neighbor's place is walkable but since it was dark and  I had to bring dessert, we opted to drive!

There are 8 of us that try to get together whenever the one couple (who own a VRBO) are here from Oklahoma - we all live withing a mile of each other and we all get along really well so that makes it fun!  Our Christmas get-together was a wonderful meal, plenty of wine and lots of fun laughs!

Here's the whole gang minus me who was taking the picture!

By the time we left, it was snowing hard so we were glad we didn't have far to go!  Our close neighbor, Alan, had foot surgery the week before so he was unable to plow himself out so Glenn got out the  skidster and plowed his driveway along with Gary and Suzie's, further up the road - Suzie sent me this picture she took of him plowing - we got around 6"! (And just for the record - besides a skiff of snow a couple of nights ago, we haven't seen ANY snow this December!!!  That's almost unheard of!!!)

Dec 6th was the Home Holiday Tour - I met Jaime and the girls in Divide and we all got coffee to drink before we headed out to the 5 homes!

Once again, the homes were beautifully decorated and it's so fun to see how others decorate their homes - we enjoyed all of them!

And then it was time to eat at the Chinese Restaurant in Woodland Park - always great!

Afterwards, Jaime raced home and changed her clothes and then came over to make jelly - talk about a jam-packed day!!  But with her work schedule, it's not always easy to get together!!  We made 4 batches and seem to get faster every year when we make it!!  It's a great time spending time together and I love giving out jars to my frends at Christmas!

November Photo Dump

 It seems I blinked my eyes and November was over - why oh why do Nov. and Dec. have to go so darn fast!!

But December is here and flying by quickly so here's the November Photo Dump!  First up are the family pictures from November!

I caught this full moon before it got too high and bright - beautiful!

I always love sitting in my recliner reading while looking at the Christmas lights!

The pretty sunrises have begun!!

We had a fun time and a great brunch with cousin Gary and wife Adrianne in Co. Springs!

Our Thanksgiving give-away at Food Pantry was HUGE this year!!  Lots of hard work involved in serving over 350 families!  I got to put the apple pies in the boxes!

And that's a wrap for November!

Thanksgiving 2025

 Now I remember why I don't usually book trips in November - it's tough to be all ready for Thanksgiving AND get the house decorated!! (but luckily I got decorated before our trip)

Even though we arrived home late morning on a Monday, I had Food Pantry at noon and it's our biggest one of the year - this year we were expecting 400 families!!  Which only left me a couple days to prepare for Thanksgiving!  Luckily I had some of the supplies bought and there was plenty of time to get everything ready - just glad that Jaime hosts each year!

This year we decided NOT to do a traditional Thanksgiving meal - after years and years of having a turkey with all the trimmings, we were all ready for something different!  Our choice was prime rib but that went out the window when it did NOT go on sale before Thanksgiving - so we did the next best thing - New York strip steaks went on sale and that's what we went with!

We decided to do appetizers, dips and punch at noon and then have our steak dinner around 4:00!

Here's Gwyn with the turkey hat!

The 3 grand daughters did the chartreuse board!

And Gwyn always helps me put the punch together - 4 batches worth throughout the day!

Jill had found a game on Tik Tok that looked like fun so I helped her with it and we put it in action during the appetizers - before we ate, everyone had to draw a piece of paper with a "task" on it that had to be done while we were eating the appetizers!  It was hilarious!!  For instance, I had to go around and hug everybody - Glenn had to pretend to call his pet on the phone (we have no pets so he pretended to call our dead dog Rocky!!!!) - Irene had to stand up and count to ten in Spanish - and on and on - one for everybody!!  But I think the best one was:  Jaime stood up and started saying the pledge of allegience and we all followed suit!!!  Great game Jill!!!!

Brad cooked all the steaks to perfection and we added baked potatoes, crunchy coleslaw, corn, and homemade rolls by Jessi!  The meal was excellent!

All the grandkids had clean up duty and they did well!!!  It was gorgeous outside so some of us headed to the deck!

Kenzie was dismayed to find out that Parker was now taller than her!

Picture time!  I always love a picture with the grandkids!

And a few of us took all the dogs for a walk - it was a little windy and cold but that's to be expected in November!

And of course we all ate pumpkin pie and other desserts later on!  It was a fantastic Thanksgiving with family!

It's Time For A Boat Ride!

 We settled into a nice routine - Glenn loved fishing every day and I enjoyed doing my thing!  I had high hopes that the invasive species would just go away overnight but of course that didn't happen - but I still enjoyed looking at these cypress trees!

I did want to take a boat ride so late afternoon one day, Glenn came back to the house and picked me up and we took a ride!  It was WONDERFUL!  Quite an experience driving through these little canals with the trees on both sides!!

The lake is huge and I have no idea how you would ever know where you were at when it all looked the same to me!

There were some nice reflections toward the marina late afternoon!

You can see in the distance that there was the invasive species in certain parts of the lake - but other parts had none at all!

Friday night we went out to eat - found one of the open restaurants and it was on the water - very pretty!!  We sat outside and the waitress was a true Texas gal!!!  LOVED the hush puppies that were brought out for us before we even ordered, along with a plate of pickled veggies and a bowl of coleslaw which was excellent!!  Our fries and chicken were great!  

Saturday morning we headed out for home!  But only drove about 4 hours as were spending the night with Cindy and Rene!  It was SO GREAT to see them and their place - now I can picture that in my mind when we talk on the phone!

We all went out to eat in a nearby town - wonderful Mexican food!!  And we all talked and talked that evening till we finally had to go to bed!

We got up early the next morning as it was a long drive to Raton, NM where we were spending the night!  Raton is only 3 hours from home BUT with the early darkness and pulling the boat, it just wasn't an option!

Stayed at a nice motel and I was intrigued by this window seat in the room!

After a short walk to eat some fast food, we hit the sack and were up early again to make the short drive home!  All in all, a great trip to Texas!

An Interesting Evening in Karnuk, TX

 And the week continued.....Glenn would get up early and drink some coffee and eat - I would get up and see him out the door to fish and he wouldn't return till 1 or 2!  I would walk out to the "so called water" (ha ha) and back a few times to get some steps in - and then enjoy working on photo books on the porch or calendars or emails or whatever - enjoy coffee - and of course read!!  It was very enjoyable!

I was intrigued by the cypress trees, knowing their roots were right in the water!

There was one lone tree across the "water" that was colorful!!

Glenn came home the 2nd day of fishing with just as many fish - I told him he needed to start throwing them back but of course that didn't happen!

So Monday night I decided we would go out for dinner - right - I guess I hadn't researched restaurants much before we left!  There were only a couple in these tiny towns and they weren't open till the weekend!  But I did find one that wasn't very far away that was a bar that served food and people commented that the food was great!!  It was a "locals bar" and just 3 or 4 miles away - an interesting drive way out in the middle of nowhere that kind of gave me the creeps!!

We pulled in and there were a few trucks there - it was quite run down on the outside so had no idea what to expect on the inside - WOW - that's about all I can say - we felt like we had done a time warp back to the 1970's or 80's!!!!!  There were 2 rooms and it was darn rough looking!!  Plywood on the ceiling with nothing else - old, old tables and chairs and a couple of pool tables that had definitely seen better days!!

We walked to the room where some people were at the bar and a couple of tables of people eating - there really was only 1 other table there so we sat there but it was right under a speaker and was pretty loud!  As you can imagine, it was country music which we both love but it wasn't current music - it was 70's and 80's which was kind of awesome to hear the old tunes!!  Did I forget to mention that you can SMOKE in this bar??????????  YUP!!!!  There was a heavy set guy sitting at the bar smoking away - bib overalls on - with an entire bottle of Jim Beam in front of him!!  I'm not sure if they served mixed drinks or if it was bring your own as I ordered water and Glenn had a beer!!

Anyway, the overall guy looked and looked at Glenn and it was a little uneasy feeling!  We decided to move back to the pool table room as the smoke was already bothering me (along with the speaker)!  And soon the bib overall guy came back and apologized to Glenn for staring at him but he thought Glenn was his brother-in-law!!!!!  (Must have looked pretty much like him I guess)  Glenn said he must not have seen his brother-in-law for a while and the guy said "Oh yeah, I just saw him last week"!!!!  Crazy!

The food came quickly and it was excellent!!  We both had quesadillas - I  had shrimp and Glenn had chicken and they were HUGE and full of meat!  Anyway, it was quite the experience!!

I love the lights on the walkway to the dock!

Our friends Larry and Joyce called and wanted to come over and see where we were staying and take us out for an early dinner at a smoked BBQ place!  We had a nice drive to the place which turned out to be a HUGE place that had a gift shop and a place to eat!!  They also had a large commercial building where they do all the smoking and mailing the smoked meats all over the world!

Our meal was delicious - I had BBQ pork along with baked beans and potato salad!  YUMMY!!  And I got a picture which made me happy!!

Outside of the eating area was this huge bull and I couldn't believe how long his horns were!!

It was a fun time with friends - they dropped us off back at our place and Joyce sent me this picture that they had taken of us!

A fun afternoon with friends!!

Fishing Trip To Texas

 A couple of things to say BEFORE our trip to Texas!  Glenn DID get an elk on our friends' property!!  HOORAY!  It was great to get it all cut up and put in the freezer!  The day I arrived home from Iceland was a Friday so Glenn and I got to spend a few hours together before he headed to South Dakaota early Saturday morning for a fishing trip with my brother Jim!  They had a great time fishing for a couple of days and the first picture will be his BIG fish that he caught there!

In the meantime, I was trying to catch up at home!  It's amazing how much piles up when you're gone!  And I knew that by the time we got back from Texas, it would almost be Thanksgiving and I really wanted the house decorated by then so I did find time to decorate before we took off!

Our trip to Texas was a fishing trip for Glenn AND a chance to check the area out for future winter trips - we would be gone a total of 12 days since we were visiting friends on the way out and the way back so it all worked out perfectly!

We took the truck since Glenn was pulling the boat so he didn't drive quite as fast as he could have - but it was a nice trip to Amarillo where we were spending the first night!  We had no idea Amarillo was as big as it was though - took a couple of wrong turns trying to find the hotel as it was dark by the time we arrived but it all worked out!  The Hilton where we stayed was pretty new and very nice!  And I always try to book a hotel where there are eating places within walking distance so we don't have to get back in a vehicle and drive!

We found a pizza hut just a block away - the most DIFFERENT Pizza Hut we'd ever been in - it was also a bar!  But great pizza and tv's all over so Glenn could watch a game while we ate!

It was a nice drive the next day and we passed by a lot of cotton fields that were getting harvested!

We made it to Daingerfield, TX mid-afternoon to spend the night with our friends Larry and Joyce - they used to live in Woodland Park - I sang in the choir with Larry and Joyce was part of our "church ladies" group back in the day!

They live on a mid-size acreage, kind of a compound with 3 houses on it - their daughter lives in one place and their son and his family live in another!  We had a fun time seeing it all and taking a UTV ride with them to see it all!  Fall was still in season there and I loved their pond with the pretty trees!

That's pretty sad when you take a picture of the landscape and forget to take a picture of the people - duh!!!!!!  We said our goodbyes late morning and headed to our rental house which was about 1 1/2 hours from their place!  But first we stopped at a larger town before we got there to stock up on groceries for the week - we knew there was nothing much where we were going!

The tiny village of Karnuck was where our house was and the town of Uncertain conneceted to it  - yes, kind of strange names!!  The two little villages were right next to Caddo Lake where Glenn would be fishing!

The MAIN reason I rented this house was two-fold.  It had a nice screened in porch that I could sit out in and be outside but NOT with the bugs (I had no idea if there would be any this time of year!) and the other reason is it had a dock where Glenn could tie his boat up after he got it in the water down the road!  

So the screened in porch was just as I expected and it worked out PERFECT for me!!  I was thrilled with the house which had 2 bedrooms and 2 baths and a big living room!!

And I loved the long dock to walk out to the water!!!!   BUT - - - - and this was a huge but - there was an invasive plant species that was in the water and you couldn't even SEE the water because of it!!  Oh gosh, I was SO disappointed......

The cypress trees were beautiful - but the brown you see is NOT the ground - it's all the "stuff" covering the water!!  And it was darn ugly to look at!!

I just couldn't get over that there was NO WAY Glenn could tie up his boat in that stuff - AND the water was also low so he knew he would get stuck in the mud - so disappointment there!!  But Glenn took it all in stride and just had to put the boat in daily and take it out!  The place to put in was only about 1/2 mile down the road so it was very close!  And the brown plant stuff was NOT down there.....

We cooked that evening and got all unpacked!  Glenn was up early the next day all ready to fish!!  And he fished  6 days straight - OH MY!!!!  But you know Glenn, he LOVES to fish!!

I had brought my computer so I could work on kids' photo books for Christmas and the calendars so I had plenty to do, along with 4 books to read on my kindle!  SO it all worked out fine!

Glenn came home the first day with LOTS of big crappie!!!  He was thrilled!