A Most Unusual Vacation...

Mikki and I headed out Wednesday afternoon in the truck and camper with a semi-plan of getting to Pagosa Springs, Colorado by Saturday and back to Dallas by Wednesday of the following week. We made it up to Homestead Heritage in Elm Mott, Tx and had a great visit and lunch. We left there with a wonderful sorghum / pecan ice cream for the road... and then after we drove off in gusty winds, we listened to the weather and heard that there was an icy front headed from Colorado into the Panhandle of Texas and New Mexico. After a little further digging we found that on Thursday evening they were predicting drifts of 20 ft due to winds up to 65 mph... ice on the roads in Witchita Falls and snow in Lubbock. Traveling further into the North was a recipe for disaster in this top-heavy camper rig, so we turned South at Lake Whitney and headed for Fredericksburg, TX.

We spent a couple days there and then came on over to Bandera and visited with Sue. What a lovely place she and Harold have! And of course, the hospitality and the coconut pie were wonderful. She even made me some strong coffee:-) Sue took us over for dinner at a little cafe in Pipe Creek and the food was excellent. Upon getting back to her house, we watched the deer, two red foxes, and a bunch of hummingbirds cavort about off of her back porch.

This has been very relaxing and a neat vacation. Sometimes, no plan is a great plan. We will leave Sue's today headed to where, well, I don't know.

Jonathan and Jack celebrate birthdays!

Jonathan and Jack and Grey at his party / dinner. Jack looks like my dad and Grey like the Ensey grandboys... but also a little like Mik's dad.

Grey and Jack at Black Walnut. Grey is 6 months and and Jack two years old.

Caroline and Papa G trying to figure out how a sword can be plastic...

My girls love to have parties. They especially love to have parties that get people to dress in some costume that makes you look especially nuts. Like a pirate! :-) But we dress up and have fun watching the faces of the grand babies stare at us and then have a little smirk...like they are saying "you really are nuts papa G, why are you dressed like a pirate?" Even Jerry Ensey dressed like a pirate for Jack's birthday. That was fun to watch.

Spring has sprung...

Wonder what this guy is thinking... "Where was I when they were looking for the Geico ghekko?", "After a frigid night there isn't a much better perch than a warm copper surface"... or maybe "wish the guy with the camera and that stupid hat would move along", or "if that bug will not turn back around I can pounce on him and have some breakfast", or possibly, "wow, that was a cold night. Need to find a warmer spot for tonight and a few bugs to eat...can't stay here long." Whatever he is thinking he is ever watchful for the guy with camera at his backside through that window. He only sat here and humored me for a couple minutes and then he lurched about 4 ft to a branch and scurried off.

We'll, we're underway with our compost tea operation. We are spraying the pastures and working all the little "bugs" out of the system, the compost mix and the machinery. Our early experiences are showing that the sand in our soil that we mix with our compost is creating a lot of filter issues. We are going to alter the mix so that we eliminate the sand issue. Lot of work and time cleaning filters repeatedly. We have sprayed most of the pastures this week and will start tomorrow on the orchard, yard and vines.

The fruit trees all budded out last week. We got things pruned and ready to go. Spring is a beautiful time of the year. It speaks to life in such a wonderful way.