Getting ready for Christmas

How in the world did Christmas get here so fast? Have had two shopping expeditions (one with D'Lynn in which I got most of the shopping done and one with Shell which was very relaxing and we even had time for a movie). Shell and I had not been shopping together for years so that was fun. Even got to see Nicki and Randy and got to see Nicki's engagement ring (Randy did good).

Larry has a sub now and is going to have off this Thur., Fri, and Sat. He is sure looking forward to that.

Marilyn is in Houston now having chemo treatments and has to be in isolation for 4-5 weeks. We will miss her terribly at Christmas. They hope to do the bone marrow transplant right after this so I am praying that everything goes well. Pray for her and her family.

We have lots of things to keep us busy. I am hosting Bunco Christmas at my house this Thur. and Dr. Walton is taking the entire office (spouses included)to Bejas to eat and then to the Rock Box on Friday evening. Have not been there yet, but I have heard nothing but good things about the show so I am looking forward to that.

Rena gets to come home for Christmas so we are looking forward to seeing her.

If I don't log on again everyone have a wonderful and blessed Christmas with your family and friends and a great New Year.

Good news

Well, looks like Larry will finally get a sub for his route. They moved here from Oregon and he is going to work at PEC and she used to sub up there and has a vehicle all set up with right-hand drive. She is supposed to start learning the route on Thur. (tomorrow) so we will see. He sure hopes she works out so he can be home on Saturdays again and get stuff done at home (or go for 3-day camping trips). Other than that we are just getting ready for Christmas. Ho, ho, ho.

Lastest adventure

We took a short trip to The Canyon of the Eagles near Burnet on Lake Buchanan. It was a nice relaxing trip and by Monday morning there was no one in the park except for us. We took a boat ride up river on Sun. all the way to Colorado Bend State Park which was about 20 miles up stream and then on Sunday we looked around for eagles and then looked at the houses along the lake. Glad we don't have to pay for the taxes on some of them. The waterfalls along the upper lake were sure pretty and I bet they were really pretty while we were having all the rain, but I bet you couldn't get on the lake at that time because of all the trash. Here are a few pics of our little getaway.

We could not leave until Larry got off of work on Saturday so it was a little bit shorter trip than we would have liked, but it was still nice not to have to worry about anything at home and just kick back. If I don't come back on beforehand, everyone have a Happy Thanksgiving.

Hunting season

Well, Larry has had some pretty good luck this year. He couldn't let this one go. Not only does he never see one like this, but normally he can't hit it either, just kidding, kinda. It had 10 points and a 19" spread. Pretty nice for the ranch in Llano County.

Serena is on the high seas again. She left for Louisana on Sat. and had to be at Port something or other (close to Grand Isle) by noon on Sunday for the 2-hour boat ride to the barge. She thinks she may be out there for a week, but who knows. She will get back when they bring her back. I haven't heard from her yet to see what the food is like, but I am sure I will get a report soon.

I'll bet most of the men out there can not top the anniversary Larry and I had. I got wined and dined at the Cave Creek Wildlife Management Chili Supper. Try and top that guys. We did have an okay time and there was lots of good dessert and of course free beer.

I wasn't able to go to see Rena like I usually do on the first weekend of hunting season because we never know when she is going to get a call. Good thing I didn't since she had to leave on Sat. Hopefully I will get to do that yet this hunting season when she can ask to stay there for a few days.

That's all for now.

We are boring.

Well, there is not much going on. Rena is keeping the road to Louisiana hot. She has been called over there twice to do a fly over because the barge that is doing the blasting doesn't have a helipad. The first time she sat there for an hour and then had to drive back because they did not have their stuff together. She left a message again yesterday that she was going and this time she did do a fly over and they were able to blast and then she came back. So far she has not been out on a barge again, but I am sure that will change again soon. She kind of likes that she is able to be back home again in the evenings.

Larry will cook beans for the Cave Creek Wildlife Management Chili Supper on Friday since he has to work on Sat. So for our anniversary I am going to be wined and dined at the Cave Creek School. You don't get more romantic than that. Sat. he will leave to go up to Llano County and hunt with his dad, brother and Dennis and maybe the boys. Jerald won't be coming because they will just be coming back from Houston again for more tests for Marilyn (keep her in your prayers). Not sure what I will be doing. Rheingold is having an open house so I will be there part of the day and then I will see what kind of trouble I can get into.

Good luck to all the hunters.

Rena's visit

Serena came for the weekend to visit. It was really good to see her again, especially since we could hardly even talk to her when she was out to sea. She had some awesome pictures of the barge (especially those she took from the helicopter)and of the explosions. She went with us to the bbq for the volunteers for the Stonewall fish fry on Sat. evening and everyone who asked her what she was doing said she sure had an exciting job and enjoyed listening to her stories. She does miss getting rocked to sleep and requested some rockers on her bed. Also did not understand why her clothes was not washed, pressed and folded each day and was disappointed that there was not a large variety of food laid out for her each day. I told her to take a reality pill. She was told that she has the record for the being out the longest (3 1/2 weeks) and they were a little worried that she might quit, but she is ready to go out again, especially since she doesn't get paid unless she is working and they say that things really slow down in the winter. She wants to make some money while she can.

Larry is waiting to get a sub, but the way it looks he will have to miss out on the morning of opening day of hunting season. The new one is supposed to start on Nov. 5 so keep your fingers crossed.

Landed at last

Rena finally got back to dry land. She called D'Lynn today (with Cajan talk???)and said she was back. That is all I know right now. Will hopefully talk to her tonight.

Lost Maples Park

We had a great time at Lost Maples this last weekend. Vicki and Rick went also and we just kicked back and took it easy. That is about how our chairs were all weekend long. All we did was move with the shade and of course while you were up you went and got another cold one so you didn't get up for nothing. We did some hiking, but Vicki had learned from the last time that the hikes were "uphill both ways" and her and Rick did not go over the mountain like Larry and I did. It did have a 2200 ft elevation at the top and a really nice view of the other mountains. I know, I know, maybe they weren't real mountains, but when you are walking up one it feels like it.

This is from the top of the West Trail and then started the downhill part, which is almost worse than the uphill part because the rocks are so loose. Larry thinks it would be quite a challange for the jeep up and down those trails, but I think he could do it. It was nice to just relax. We also went on a drive to Camp Wood and that was almost like driving the switchbacks in Colorado. You did not get in a hurry on those roads. The trees had not changed, but the park people don't think there is going to be much color this year because of all the rain. That is too bad, because I bet it is really pretty then.

Rena is still out to sea and it looks like she may be there another 2 weeks because of the weather. She is learning a new card game and trying to keep herself occupied with movies and reading.

That's it for now.

More from Rena

Rena sure seems to be enjoying her job, even though it seems to take forever for anything to get done. She says she is going to pack less clothes next time and more things to amuse herself with since they can go for days before they get to where they are going and then it takes a long time to get set up. She says her laundry is getting done and the food is good. She does miss land. Sounds like she may be out most of the month because they are having to come in closer to land because of some threatening weather. She hopes her phone will work from there. I do miss hearing her voice.

Larry is not a happy camper since he no longer has a sub and won't have one until maybe the beginning of Nov. so he may have to miss the first weekend of hunting season which will not be a good thing in our household. He doesn't have time to get anything done at home since he has to work on Sat., but hopefully the new one will work out and things will get on a more normal keel. Will keep you posted.

That is all the excitement I have.

Quite weekend

Haven't heard from Rena since last Wednesday when she e-mailed. No telling where she is and they probably don't have any service there. Had 42 club Friday night and it was nice to catch up with everyone. Sat. I met D'Lynn in town for lunch and brought Ashlyn and Colten home with me to spend the night. Went to eat and Connie and Linvill just happended to call right before we left so they went, too, and then came over to play some 42. Connie and I skunked them the first game, won the second and they finally won the third. Compared trips (they had been on a cruise to Cozamel)and deceided that we would each go on the same trip again if we could. It was good to see them again. Vicki, Rick and Larry and I are going camping this weekend for a 4-day weekend to Lost Maples State Park. Looking forward to just kicking back and relaxing. No flights, no jumping into the Artic, no shooting a moose, just sitting and drinking beer and doing some hiking (as Vicki would say "hike uphill both ways"). Let you know how that goes.

At sea

Serena called last night and she got on the crew ship at 8 a.m. and they went 6 hours out to sea to get to the barge that she will be staying on. When they got close to the barge a storm blew up and the waves must have been huge and it was pouring down rain and she had to do a transfer from the crew ship to the barge in a basket. Afterward the storm blew over and there must have been a really pretty rainbow. Now the barge is being towed 16 hours out to sea to where the platform is. She is pretty excited. Here she thought she could lose a little weight, but no way, the food is too good and there is too much of it. They can go down to the galley anytime and get whatever they want. I will try to keep you posted as to what is going on as she can call.

Out to sea

Okay everyone, if you are actually reading this, please pray that Serena's first day out to sea is a good one and that this job is what she is looking for at least for the time being. She called this morning at 6:40 to let me know that she and the woman going along for her first time made it to Louisana and would be getting on the crew boat at around 8:00 (no helicopter this time). If this job goes as planned they will just keep them on the ship and go on to another site so she is not sure how long she will be out there. Keep her in your prayers.

Rena's move in

Well we got Serena's stuff moved to Galveston last weekend and she is feeling much better about everything now that she has a place that looks a little bit more like home. She is excited about her job and especially excited about getting steel-toed boots, a flight suit, all-weather gear, a laptop, cell phone and I don't know what all. She may go out for her first observation as early as next week. We will find out soon. That is all for now. We will have to live vicariously through Serena from now on and see what it is like to live at sea for a few days to a few weeks at a time.

Home again

Well, we made it home again. The moose is staying in Alaska and getting stuffed. Won't get it until next April or May. We are tired, but glad to be back and glad to have had such a great trip. We had lots of fun and did lots of things we had never done before and won't do again so it was well worth it. Life will get pretty boring again now so unless something exciting happens or we go camping, my blogs will be few and far between because we are pretty boring otherwise. Thanks for coming along on our trip and I hope you enjoyed the ride.

WOW

OH MY GOD, OH MY GOD, OH MY GOD!!!!!! We both got our wish. I went back to Denali and after two trips into the park I finally got to see THE mountain. It cleared up for maybe 10 minutes and I just stood there and took pictures and then I got a call from Larry and he said we had a decision to make and sure enough when I got back to Marrisa's house he had a moose. What a great vacation this was.

Quiet day in Alaska

Here is a pic of me in the -40 degree house, but as you can see on the thermometer behind me it was actually -50 degrees and they had wind blowing in there.

We had a rather quiet day today and yesterday. We drove to Delta Junction yesterday and stopped and looked at a few of the lakes on the way over there and also drove down the Alaska Hwy for just a little way just to say we had done it. The Hwy is 1488 miles long from start to finish and this would be the way we would have to travel if we ever brought the camper up here. The only other way is to catch a ferry that crosses on the southern side of Alaska. Larry and Drew left to go hunting again yesterday afternoon but only saw moose and bear tracks, no actual moose or bear. They decided to leave after lunch today (Thur.) and spend the night at Gary's cabin (a guy Drew works with) which is close to Circle, Alaska. So after we came back to Marissa's house I dropped Larry off and went to the Chena Hot Springs to see the Ice Hotel. It was a pretty drive (about 2 hours away) and the hotel was pretty cool, literally it was 20 degrees inside so that everything would stay frozen. Tomorrow I am going to drive back to Denali and look around again and maybe, just maybe the mountain will show itself. If not then I will just have to plan on another trip up here. Thought I would share a couple of pics of Reagan and the other "wildlife" in this house. I almost forgot, a moose came right up behind Marissa's house yesterday evening and started to eat off of a tree right outside the yard. That was pretty cool to see. We don't even get deer that close to our house.

This is Clare. I think she is going to miss us when we leave. Even Larry has been opening the door for her to go in and out.

We went to Pioneer Park, which is where the -40 below house is, and Reagan stopped to smell the flowers. She is such a cutie and she really enjoyed the slide, as you can see.

This will probably be the last blog from this trip. When Larry gets back from hunting and I get back from Denali we will have to pack and get ready for the trip home. Unless Larry gets a moose or caribou or I actually get to see Denali. Then you may hear from me again. See you all in Texas.

Barrow, Alaska

Well that was quite a trip. First of all we got to sit in the Prudhoe Bay/Deadhorse airport for 2 hours with the pilot telling us that we may not get to Barrow that day and they may has to unload the people going to Barrow or fly us to Anchorage. We sure hoped they would fly us to Anchorage in stead of unloading us because the guys would be able to come get us there whereas driving to Prudhoe Bay means at least 2-3 flat tires and a cracked windshield. But they finally deceided that we could go on and then we sure hoped they could get us back to Fairbanks because Barrow is not exactly the kind of place you want to be stuck at for a few days.



Here are Marrisa and I at the Top of the World. The temperture was about 36 degrees and the longer we were there the more the wind picked up. They took us on a tour of the town (not a whole lot there), but they do have the schools set up well for the kids with indoor swimming pools, tracks, basketball, etc. so that they can do sports in the winter, too. The tour guide said the coolest winter he could remember was the temp. was -40 with a wind chill that made it feel like -90. Buuurrrrr!!!!! That was the only day he could remember the schools being closed. We also got to see a baby gray whale that would swim up and down the coastline just off shore scratching the barnacles off of himself. We got to see him blow his spout and come up once in a while, but of course I could never get a picture when he did that, but it was still pretty cool to see one so close.

Well here it is!!!! Believe it or not WE DID IT!!!!! Marissa and I have now got bragging rights over anything that any of you all could do short of a space walk. We were first told that there wasn't time, but the driver kept assuring us that he would get us to the airport in time so we changed as fast as we could and ran down to the beach (remember that is was 36 degrees and the wind was blowing) and ran in. The driver told us it was a gradual desent, but he lied. We took a few running steps in and the bottom just went away and down we went. There is an official watching to make sure you are fully submerged and when I came up he claimed the top of my head had not gone all the way under (I know it did) and I had to go under one more time. We honestly can't remember if it was cold or not because it all went so fast, but I think the water was warmer than the temp. out of the water. But I tell you what I have not ever had anything so salty tasting in my life. And no, I did not drink it, but when you have it on your face some gets in your mouth just because it is on your lips. We thought that he had taken the other people on the tour back to the airport, but I guess they wanted to see it, too because they were all there and now there are pics of us on peoples cameras from Chicago, Australia and Illisnois. We got applauded when we walked into the airport and got razzed some that they were sure we had not gone all the way under and should do it again. My niece and I now have a bond and share something that I will never share with anyone else and I think that is pretty cool. Maybe someday my girls and I will come back and do this. What do you girls think?

I also get to tease my sister that Reagan calls me Oma even though Marissa keeps telling her that I am Aunt Janie. We finally got her to start trying to say Oma Janie because no matter what we tell her I am Oma. The way we figure it no kid can have too many omas.

Larry and Drew have not had any luck yet. They did see a cow moose, but no bull moose and no caribu. They will go out again this evening, but time is running out. I told Larry I had done my part by jumping into the Artic Ocean now it was up to him.

That is all for now. We will see what kind of trouble we can get into today.

Later.

Alaska critters

Here are the critters we saw on the bus ride. Thank goodness we weren't hiking when we saw the bears. We were taking a 2 mile hike when we saw the sheep. Still can't belive we were hiking in Denali Park. Who would have ever thought we would be able to do that?

Denali National Park

Here I am again. Happy Labor Day to all. We are back from Denali and we managed to hit the fall colors just right again. It was beautiful. Of course THE mountain (Denali) has alluded me so far, but there are still a few days left and I may see it yet. The first few pictures are from the flightseeing trip we took and even then we only got to see odds and ends and bits and pieces (hey, that is an old country song) of Denali. Since it makes it own weather system it can be clear everywhere else, but not on the mountain. We did get rained on every afternoon, but they were short showers so it did not ruin anything. As you can tell from the pics I think anyone would have to be crazy to try to climb anything in here. There is nothing but snow, ice, glaciers and more snow and ice along with cliffs and narrow ledges, etc, etc, etc.


The scenery was outstanding from the plane. There were seven people on the plane and it was full so you can tell how small the plane was. We all had a window seat.



The bottom photo is of one of the many, many glaciers that are in the Alaska range. It is just incredible to think that this ice is millions of years old and still frozen and creeping along. No telling what is still buried in there.

Well, here is all we saw of Denali when we were on the bus ride in the park. This is from the best viewing point in the park and this is only the bottom half of the mountain so you can just imagine how big it is. This is the most I have ever seen of it and that was pretty incredible. Talked with one young man who has lived in Alaska for nine years and has only seen it once so I will count my blessings to have seen this much of it.

After our drive in the park we went south towards Anchorage and after about 40 miles we turned around and were presented with a rainbow over the mountain range. It rained on us and there was even a little bit of slushy ice mixed in so the mountains were getting their first dusting of snow. I thought the rainbow added a very nice touch to the drive.

I will send another blog with pictures of the critters we saw on the drive in the park. This was all that this one would let me download.

Finally made it to Alaska

Well we made it to Alaska. Wed. was a very, very, very long day. Nothing like getting wined and dined in airports. TGIFridays in Minnasota and Anthonys in Seattle. The picture of the mountain was taken from the plane because that was the only way we got to see any scenery on Wed.


By the time we got to Marissa and Drew's house we figured out we had been up for 24 hours or so. That is waaaay to long for these old folks. We got up early on Thursday and got the rental car and toured around Fairbanks for a while. The flowers that are planted everywhere are just beautiful. The leaves on the trees are just starting to turn yellow and red and it seems like they turn more every hour.
And of course little Reagan is just a doll. She is talking some now and likes things her way (what 2 year old doesn't?). Larry and Drew left to go scouting late this afternoon and tomorrow we head for Denali National Park for a 3-day stay.

We won't be back here to Fairbanks until later on Sunday so we will see how the flightseeing trip, park trip and raft trip went.

Later.

North to Alaska

Well, the countdown is on. We leave very, very early tomorrow morning (flight leaves at 7:37 so the alarm time will not be pretty). I think we have everything packed, but who knows, besides there are stores up there, too (only more expensive). I looked at the weather report and of course it is supposed to rain the first weekend which is when we wanted to take a flightseeing trip and a rafting trip so we will see what we can and can't do. Will try to post things as soon as possible so you all can see whether we are having fun or not. Blog you later.

RENA GOT A JOB

If you have already looked at D'Lynn's blog then you know the good news. Rena got a job with NOAA (National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration) in Galveston and will start right after she moves there on Labor Day Weekend. She will be doing some type of helicopter training the Wed. after she gets there and will be going out to oil rigs and staying on boats and all kinds of stuff she will have to explain to us when we see her and after she has worked for a little while. Anyway, we are very proud of her and wish her the best. I knew she could do it and now it is coming together for her. WAY TO GO RENA!!!!

We were winners

Well, that was something else. We went to the CTEC meeting last night and son of a gun if we didn't win a door prize. When we came in we already got a canvas cooler that will be perfect for the Alaska trip and then Larry won a $50.00 Walmart gift card and a really nice, large leather bag that will be perfect for packing and taking on the plane. I think someone is trying to tell us we need to get away. Anyway, that was all the excitement I have for now.

Finally getting this figured out!!

Well, I think D'Lynn has finally helped me figure out how to get pics into e-mails and my blog. You all may regret this. Anyway, we are having a busy day at work and I am trying to do this on my lunch break so I will stop for now, but Marissa is setting up our Barrow, AK trip so we can go to the top of the world. I am excited about going.

Shaking things up a bit

I changed things up a little on my blog. Did not like the other colors. I do like my purple as you can tell. Started packing for Alaska and called and confirmed everything so we are set to go.

Not much else going on, so we may see some of you at the fair.

Just me again

I found it again, but I don't know how I found it. There will be all kinds of odd comments by me until I get this figured out.

Me

Trying this out

I am just practicing to see if this works or not. Silly, I know, but the only way I know for sure.

Me