Keeping up with the grandkids!

Here are pictures of the grandchildren- our little angel and our little busy boy. Yes, I know the picture of Will has his eyes closed, but it is really hard to get a picture of him remotely still. He is not hyper, just busy. We had great fun playing pool balls, watching cartoons on cable, visiting with family, riding rides and playing games at Chuck E. Cheese's. He talks so well, he is amazing for his age. His latest thing is to ask "so, how's it going? and how is your family?" in a very concerned and sincere tone!! (he even asked HIS mother this, which was a riot!)

Claire is so much fun to dress up and to hold. She loves to stare at you and has the most beautiful toothless baby smiles, it just melts your heart. We are so blessed to have the both of them for our grandchildren, their parents are pretty special in our hearts, too. Can't wait to see them at Christmas time in Big Spring in a few weeks.

My friend Tracey, who lives in Thailand currently, will be flying into Texas this Saturday. She will spend most of her time here in Katy before Sam joins her on December 15. Then they will stay at our house while we are in Big Spring during Christmas, we're excited that we can share our home with them and look forward to this special time.

Talking Turkey

Well, I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving... we all have so much to be thankful for. We were so blessed to have Lauren & Scott and the kids with us over the holidays. Kendall was not able to be with us and he was sorely missed. Though, it was convenient for Will to have his own room and bed at Nana's.

We had a great time with family at my mom & dad's house on Thursday. Lots of good food and good company and a fun family project to work on. Above is the picture of my dad showing the turkey to Claire! She is such a doll, and so photogenic. We basically had a very low key weekend... Lauren & I went shopping a bit after I got home from work on Friday. The bleary, blustery weather provided good shopping weather, though we had fun just being together, doing a little shopping with Claire in tow. Both of us have a good start on our shopping; Lauren & Scott also ventured out together to return for one sale and to puruse Bass Pro Shop and have the Starbucks experience.

We were able to have a fire burning in the fireplace most of the weekend since it was so chilly. The weather and the overcast skies did help everyone sleep in later in the mornings, which everyone enjoyed. Plus, chicken and dumplings were extra tasty with the weather as it was.

The weather is still so bad in West Texas that Lauren & Scott stayed here until this afternoon and are drove to San Antonio late this afternoon to stay with her Grandma for the night. Then on to home tomorrow, as the snow and ice melt away. Will has missed his first opportunity of the year to make a snowman, <:, maybe he'll have another chance. For our last afternoon, we took Will to Chuck E. Cheese for his kind of fun. A great time was had by all :), then home for naps for the kids and the jacuzzi for the mom & dad.

Tim & I thoroughly enjoyed our time with family and really feel like we had a good long weekend to be together and be thankful for our blessings.

looking ahead

The view we'll have from our breakfast room and from our back porch!!!!!!



Tim and I had a getaway weekend Sunday afternoon through Monday evening. We tried out a new (to us) B & B near our property south of Canyon Lake. This is a picture of the main house with the cottage we stayed in off to the right, we had a relaxing and fun time together.

This B & B was The Firefly Inn (formerly Aunt Nora's) and is approximately 6 miles from our land. We drove by the land as the sun was setting and then checked in at the Inn. I carried our bags as Tim is still restricted to how much he can carry after his back surgery. We met Tim's brother & sister in law in Gruene at the Grist Mill where Tim & I had the ribs.... yum, they literally fell off of the bone. We had a great time visiting with Paul & Shirley before Paul goes back to Chad next week. Gruene is a really neat place, very laid back, we listened to the music flowing from Gruene Hall, the lights for Christmas are up in the town square and the weather was great for sitting outside on the patio.

The next morning, the most scrumptuous breakfast was delivered to our cottage door, yum, yum. Then we sat on the porch in the porch swing and read the paper, etc.... Then off to explore the parks on the south side of Canyon Lake. We were searching for fishing spots for Kendall and fun places to take the grandkids. We found Crane's Mill Park and looked across the lake at Mystic Shores where Paul & Shirley have retirement property. They will begin building soon, they already have their finalized house plans. We, on the other hand, have a good basic idea of what we want in our retirement home and I have a plan I love right now, but it will be awhile before we can build and, therefore, are in the dreaming stages.

Then we went to our land and checked out the property, checked out the survey flags, checked out the view with binoculars, walked it, dreamed of where the house would be, etc...

This picture is off the deck of the vacant house on our street, similar to what our view off our porch or deck will be!

What the view from our front door will look like!

After we "played" on our land, we drove back to the B&B and checked out and drove to "Havenwood", a property in New Braunfels developed by the same parent company that developed our neigborhood ("Mountain Springs Ranch") and checked out the model home of the builder whose plans I like best at this point in our dream. We actually got to meet one of the owners/founders and loved the model and the quality of the home. From there we drove to Cracker Barrel and had a late lunch and then to a few select stores at the outlet malls at San Marcus for some goodies for the grandkids.

We had a great trip and FUN, Fun, fun dreaming & enjoying time together!

Tim returned to work today and put in a full day. He is doing great after his surgery. Thanks for thinking of us during these last few weeks!

Tonight, please pray for our long time friends Sam & Tracey and their daughter Vanessa. Vanessa was hospitalized last night and is in the middle months of her pregnancy. Exciting news of the day was that they are having a GIRL and she is fine on all counts. OOps, there's a lot of blue stuff going back!

We are looking so forward to having Lauren, Scott, Will & Claire here (Claire for the first time, of course) next week at Thanksgiving. My extended family is just beside themselves to get to soak up the kids for the day. Unfortunately, Kendall will not get to join us as he is a part of the retail world these days....., he will be missed :(

It's almost Thanksgiving and how thankful we are for all that God has blessed us with: Our family, our friends, our home, our faith, our jobs, our country,....our cup runneth over...........