Valentine Preparedness

Are you ready for tomorrow? If not, you should get in your car and head over HEB on Court Street. Along the way, you will see vendors selling flowers, perfume, gift baskets, balloons and who knows what else. I saw all of that as I drove to HEB to pick up some groceries and flowers for Tet tomorrow. These are shots at the store - there were a lot of folks looking and buying Valentine's Day goodies. I liked the orchids they had (right side of the top shot). Cupid was good to me and brought my flowers early :-). Thanks hon!

Beautiful Birds on a Beautiful Day

Does anyone know what these birds are called? I don't recall ever seeing them here in our yard before last weekend and I am fascinated by them. They're gorgeous. And they provided me with my first photography session in a long while. I saw a bird commotion while looking out the kitchen window and after a few shots from inside, I went out, accompanied by Smokey. That was interesting.



Got some great shots and a cool video of them (on YouTube if you want to see it) doing their bird thing, whatever that was. I couldn't tell if they were drinking or eating. I have never seen birds gather like that in that hole in the pecan tree. I have, however, seen squirrel activity up there. Perhaps the birds got into a stash hidden by the squirrels. Not sure and it's too high up for me to check. Darn.

The beautiful blue sky day last just Saturday. It's been cold, gray and rainy since Sunday and we are all ready for some sunshine. The great news is that the rain will hopefully mean gloriously rich fields of color as the wildflowers bloom this year. I'm hoping for millions of wildflowers. I miss them so and our drought last year meant very few flowers. It was so sad. Here's to a better year this time around.

Speaking of starting off a new year, guess what Sunday is? NOT just Valentine's Day. Guess.

Goat Sighting

So here's a sight you just don't see everyday, right? Well that's what I thought last week when the goats had gotten out from a nearby field and were grazing on the luxurious field across from our mill. At that time, there was too much traffic to stop and get a shot. THIS week, they are at it again! And since they were right next to the road, I just stopped at my stop sign, lowered my passenger window and snapped a shot or two. It made me laugh to see them. Reminds me of that Brady Bunch episode with the goat in the attic...

Durango's Mexican Restaurant

If you haven't been to our new Durango's, then I would recommend it. Very yummy breakfast, great service with a great smile and a very inviting environment in which to enjoy your food. Mark took me to breakfast this morning before we both went our separate ways to our separate work.

This is located near HEB, behind the Baytown restaurant, which we haven't been to yet but a friend of mine said he and his wife enjoyed the food there and recommended it also. I'm beginning to think I am turning this into a tour of food/restaurants. :-) But that's part of the fun of exploring our little town. Now, if I could just see a great Thai or Vietnamese place...

Local Office Depot

Today we had a gorgeous day though a bit on the nippy side. Check out our gorgeous blue sky! We had a lovely lunch with wonderful friends at a Mexican restaurant I had not tried before, Casa del Sol (very good chicken flautas, great service and clean environment). Afterwards, we stopped by the office supply store in town to pick up some organization tools - hanging folders, folder bins and a label maker! Isn't it cute?



Technology and the convenience it affords us these days continues to amaze me on a daily basis. This gadget was pretty affordable, compact and required no special software to be loaded on your computer. Very nice. I don't like bogging down computer performance with a ton of applications on the hard-drive. Anyway, it was so easy to use! You plug it into the USB port and it pops up a window and you start typing your labels. Though not a fancy model, you can still edit with simple graphics and font styling. Amazing. We are now organizing like crazy. Well, Mark is. :-)

I SHOULD be organizing. Instead, I am making soup! One of my favorites that I have not made in a while - lima bean and pork riblets soup. I'll let you know how it goes. I posted about it in January 2008 on La China blog if you would like to see what the soup looks like.

A Friendly Friday Face

Happy Friday everyone!! :-) I was a bit under earlier this week but thankfully it was just a 24 hour bug and not that yucky stomach virus going around (knock on virtual wood). Yikes. That one sounds bad though a friend of mine said he lost six pounds and used it as a launching pad for his purge and the beginning of hardcore dieting. What a great way to look at a stomach virus, right? lol

Here's a sweet new friend I made while I was photographing Mark out at the bee yard at My Father's Farm. I've seen this horse from afar but last week he actually came over and let me say hi and pet him a bit. He seems very calm and peaceful and he comes over to check us out now and then when we are looking at the bees.

This is one of the wonderful things about living in a small town like Seguin and being very near "the country." You can drive a few minutes and see some great landscape and all sorts of farm animals. And wild ones here and there. It's very peaceful and I enjoy it despite missing San Antonio and other cities of my past. But I only miss them occasionally. :-)

The Shrimp Barn

I've been meaning to post about this restaurant for about a month now! My friend Hope had told me about it and raved about the delicious food so I went with some girlfriends for a Christmas lunch and gift exchange. We loved it!



This is the plate I got. I can't recall the number or name but I believe it's the seafood combination, which includes shrimp and crabcake. It was yummy though I still feel no one has matched my mom's crab cakes. Still, this was a great lunch. The salad bar includes gumbo, which is awesome. Just the right amount of okra - it's always disappointing when you get gumbo and there's only two pieces in there.



And these rolls are baked fresh everyday we were told! The restaurant is SMALL so when you go, go early, late or plan to wait. It's worth it, however. The facility was very clean and the staff was super nice! It's the kind of restaurant that makes our small town awesome and welcoming. Go try it out!

Welcome Back!

To us, that is! Hi everyone. I wanted to get a quick post in before I head to bed. It's been a busy week and an even busier day as we spent most of it tending to the bees at the farm location. That was a lot of fun. I had not seen any of the bees in over a month since Mark checks on them during the week typically and I'm at work those days.

We've been traveling quite a bit lately to get supplies and equipment ready for this year's beekeeping activities. This last trip took us to Georgia but we took a detour to visit my side of the family in Florida. It was wonderful to see them even if it was just for an evening and the next morning. This is a shot from my parents' front yard and in the shadows, you can make out Lake Louisa. Very pretty. So yea, I know it's not Seguin. But since I wasn't in Seguin this week, I've got to share this one with you.

I hope you all have had wonderful weeks and that your weekend will be even better! :-)

A cold, cold January

It's been a while and I realized I had not written since the first of the year! Sorry folks! It's just been busy I guess and time got away from me. I hope everyone's year is getting off to a GREAT start! Our year is wonderful so far and we can't complain.

The weather's actually been rather exciting this winter. For one thing, it's actually COLD. I've been here almost fifteen years now and my body feels it more than when I first got here. It's okay, though, because I love cold weather since that means I get can all layered up and wear my favorite hat and scarves. This week was mild but before this we actually were in the 30s quite a bit with several nights in the 20s. Wind chill lower than that. Cold for south Texas for sure.

The second thing about the weather is that we've been getting plenty of rain! Woo hoo! You know what that means after a brutally hot, dry summer. WILDFLOWERS this year! Last year I was so sad that we had barely a wildflower in the area due to the drought. :-( So let's hope this year will be gloriously lush with blooms! Some of the trees and plants seem to have been hit a little hard by the freezing temperatures while others seem okay. I planted some potted plants recently and luckily they seem to be holding up just fine.

Welcome 2010!

Hope everyone had a wonderful day on this first day of 2010! Did you party hard last night? :-) Hope today found you safe and sound and happy for a fresh new start.

Now don't get too excited...Apple's not in Seguin (unfortunately!). I'd be happy if we could start with getting Target here in town. Who knows, maybe with Caterpillar and its affiliates coming to town, we MIGHT be able to finally get more high end retail in town. We'll see.

Anyway, we rolled into the new year by having an absolutely marvelous day together on a gorgeous day! The sky was blue as can be and the temperature was wonderful in the 50s. Mark's sister came and hung out for a while and brought a wonderful lintyl soup for us all and then we ran into SA to celebrate a very early birthday for my love. This has been an Apple sort of holiday season for us both. We both now have either an iTouch or an iPhone and LOVE them. Technology can be so darn cool, it is totally amazing! I love it. And the service is pretty darn impressive at the Apple Store. That's just so hard to find these days so it's refreshing.

Sky Watch

Happy new year, everyone! Hope you have a very safe and wonderful evening. Be careful out there!

Shot this sky last Sunday evening as we were driving out to a friend's home for dinner. It was so spectacular and beautiful. Great thing Mark drove so I could shoot out the window! :-)

Check out Sky Watch this week for other great shots.

I'm back!

I hope everyone's had a nice Christmas holiday so far and that you have a great new year coming up soon. Be safe!

These are some snowflakes I quilled out of paper I had. Then they were glued to card stock and crafted into a little card for friends and family. Yay! I finally ventured beyond Valentine's hearts like I normally make for folks! :-)

I've been having some technical issues these past couple of weeks. Well, quite a few actually, so that's why I have not posted. Hopefully I am on the mend though I seem to be pushing my luck tonight since this post is not looking quite like I planned. So I will say goodnight for now. It's nice to back though.

Sky Watch Friday

This was a shot I snapped when I was roaming around, away from the bees that Mark and a friend were placing at My Father's Farm, an organic vegetables farm that is now home to ten of our hives. I haven't had time to take more pictures of the farming operation but I will soon. I have been wanting to take a closer look at what's currently growing in the garden. I know I saw great looking cilantro when we dropped off the bees. :-)

Be sure to check out other wonderful sky shots today at the official Sky Watch site! Have a wonderful day, everyone!

Boxed & Shipped

We made it to the post office today during lunch so that we can get these boxes shipped off to family and a friend. Today was the last day to ship in time for Christmas using parcel post and even with that they couldn't absolutely guarantee it'd get there in time. This year, we noticed that with priority mail, if our box exceeded certain measurements, they were going to tag on some surcharge. WHAT?? When did that happen?? I guess I should have thought to read the US Postal Service site or something. I just had not heard of that and on some of our boxes, it more than doubled the priority mail cost. Needless to say, those went parcel post. Hmm...might be time to look at FedEx and UPS next year. :-)

CMC Christmas Party

Today we attended the CMC Christmas Party and had a very wonderful time. Even during these touch economic times, the company still held to tradition and I think that does a lot for employee morale. We are very active in the community and I am so proud to be a part of it.

I won a door prize and so did my friend Sonia! But more than that, I really love seeing everyone together and I always have a great time working the gift table where we distribute gifts to each employee and their family. Fun! I got to work with a friend and I also met someone from another department. I am very thankful for a great group of coworkers at CMC Steel Texas! It's great to be able to enjoy this cool event.

Spurs Love

Despite a bit of a slump, I still love my Spurs. Going through pictures for posting, I wanted to share something fun that makes me happy to kick the week off right! Here's my favorite mascot ever - the Coyote rocks and so do the wonderful Spurs. They are a great part of the community, not just in SA but in all the surrounding areas. This was at a fan appreciation event last week and I am really glad we went. That day had been a really rough day for me at work and it lifted my spirits to be with Mark, having fun at the Spurs event.

Hope everyone has a great week!

Skywatch Friday

Good morning, everyone! What a wonderful Friday it's going to be for me. I am on VACATION today! Though I'm not traveling anywhere, I have a packed day and a busy weekend lined up for myself and I'm looking foward to some Thien time.

It's pretty cold outside and we wait expectantly for some white fluff to fall from the sky. I so miss seeing snow but I'm not going to hold my breath today. I'm just happy it's cold. I can't really get into the holidays if it's 80 degrees! :-)

This is my Skywatch shot for this week. This is off FM 775 on the outskirts of Seguin at My Father's Farm, which is a farm growing all sorts of organic veggies they take to local markets. (That's a separate post for sure.) This is the bees' new home and in the shot, Mark and our friend's son, Chris, are unloading the ten heavy hives and placing them on their stands. Here's a shot of them placed -



As some of you know, we recently drove to Mississippi to pick up some bees from JN Russell of Russell Apiaries. Very fun time - roadtrips with Mark are awesome! Snacks, laughs and lots o' bees. But NO stings! Yay!

Check out the other Skywatchers also! Great shots this week.

A Visit to Green Gate Nursery

Before we left on our pick-up-the-bees trip, I went to Green Gate to pick up a pretty poinsetta for our daughter and her husband. If you haven't been to Green Gate lately, you should go soon. Christmas is one of my favorite times to go because of all the beautiful plants they have for gift giving and decorating your own home. The poinsettas are always lovely, as was the case when I went so it took me some time to decide. In the end, I went with pink since I know Melissa likes that color and it's pretty unique. I love pink, too!



I posted about Green Gate and a certain bird back in 2007 also.

Bill Miller Pies

Yesterday a big group of us from work met at Bill Miller in order to celebrate a friend's birthday (yay Terry!). It's located along Interstate 10 and should be seeing a lot of business from all the workers building the Caterpillar site.

I noticed all the activity in the back room and watched several workers getting pies into pie boxes and found it fascinating. They were moving pretty fast - I would have worried about dropping pies. I am getting clumsier by the year it seems. lol. Anyway, there were all sorts of pies ready to go for ordering in, taking out for now and taking out for Thanksgiving! I opted for vegetable beef soup (very yummy) and a baked potato. For Mark, I took soup and a peach cobbler to go.

I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving break with family and friends. May it be filled with love and happiness as we are blessed with so much to be grateful for in our lives.

Book Talk - Corpus Christi Public Library

The weekend before last, we went to Corpus Christ for another presentation about the research Mark is doing for his books (book #2 in process). The library system there is celebrating their 100th birthday and all year there are keynote speakers visiting their fair city, with former first lady Laura Bush headlining. :-) Pretty neat stuff. We had a great time on our little getaway. Mark gave a great presentation about how to use local resources in doing African American genealogical research. We had local customers as well as library staff in attendance so it was a lot of fun.

Green Pastures

Shot this one on a trip around the outskirts of Seguin one weekend. I love seeing the new babies out in the field - they're so cute! And even cuter when they stare at you from the field.

Bank Cameras

This is new at our bank, Randolph Brooks. It allowed us to see our bank teller as we completed our transaction and I assume she could see us also. Pretty neat since it's nice to have a face to go with the voice.

Sky Watch Friday

It's another beautiful south Texas sky for your viewing pleasure. :-) Isn't it a great looking spot? I snapped this on one of our jaunts around the countryside around Seguin. I always enjoying exploring new areas (and even familiar ones) with Mark. It's one of the ways we like to relax - cruising and talking or listening to music. Check out other Sky Watchers this week for more great sky shots.

I just got home from Irving this evening and I must say it's been the best trip I've had in a very long time. I actually was there to do training observation and assessment. Nice. I love doing that sort of work. And writing up trainer evaluation. So the big news for me is that I am transitioning from my current role to a new one that will allow me to focus on what I love -- trainer development and training delivery. Monday my replacement and new boss will be joining the company. I am VERY happy about this! And because I have an abundance of that great feeling right now, I hope that you will also have a wonderful day tomorrow that will bring you the same happiness that I feel right now. Have a great one!

City Cleaners

Here's our cleaners we like to visit. Mark's been going to them for many years now and I take my things there also whenever I need special care for my clothes. This is family run and they are really nice folks who remember you and if you forget a Spurs pin on your lapel (several times), they will keep it safe for you. :-) We like frequenting family operated business like City Cleaners.

Downtown Seguin

Gosh it's been a tiring week and today was another eventful and draining day at work. It's the weekend, however, so that's a chance to relax and do fun things for ourselves. This evening we started with another great workout at the Wellness Center, a yummy pizza (yah! no cooking!), a great visit from my step-daughter Melissa, playing online, finishing up my James Rollins book and watching the Spurs (though they are losing, again!).

I was going through some pictures I snapped recently and I liked this one enough to share. I shot this downtown on River Street, just outside the doors to City Cleaners. I'll post about them soon since we like taking our clothes there. As you can tell, it was a gorgeous day with a beautiful sky to go with it.

Tomorrow's fun? Bee activities and then lunch with a great friend from SA. Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Sky Watch Friday

Hello everyone and happy Friday. The Caterpillar plant is coming along nicely and looks to be quite a big and great looking site. And lately, the weather has been absolutely gorgeous here! It's been a great fall so far with an awesome amount of cool days of sunshine and slightly chilly nights. I love it like this. As you can tell from the green of the grass and the amount of water in the retention pond, we've been getting a decent amount of rain finally. Things are blooming still and everything's beautifully lush.

I pass this site going to and coming home from work. All I have to do on the way home is pull up to the light at Kingbury, roll down the window, point and shoot. Hence the power lines. I could have edited out them out using PhotoShop but most of the time, I like to keep my stuff simple and unaltered. :-) Maybe next time, I will park and cross the road for a clear shot. Maybe. It's a busy intersection.

Be sure to check out other Sky Watchers if you want to see some cool shots of skies around the country and world.

Boo!

Happy Halloween everyone! Be safe this evening. :-)

Spurs Fans

Guess what time it is, Spurs fans?? Basketball season! Last night we went to the first game of the season against the Hornets. We beat them and we looked great though defense was not so great in the second half. The guys looked energized, Manu looked great and Timmy only had to play like 22 minutes. Unfortunately, we lost to the Bulls tonight. And we looked pretty awful. Still, I love my Spurs.

Here are a couple of shots of great friends at work who are also big Spurs fans like me. :-)

Wedding Festivities

This weekend was a fun one with plenty going on around town and for us as well. Before I prep for the work week, I thought I'd post about some of the fun I had. I shot this while sitting at the reception for our friends, Jessica and Tim -- congratulations, you two!

Mark and I met up with Sonia and we had a lot of fun in New Braunfels at the Conservation Plaza. I'd never been there so it was neat to check out the old buildings and decorations. It was a pleasant enough evening though a touch on the humid side. We are suppose to get rain over night so I'm glad it held off for the wedding though a few sprinkles did come down after the outdoor ceremony was done.

Mark and I also drove around the countryside a bit to spot a new bee yard and a potential new bee yard. It's so exciting to think we're going to get more bees and that we'll have a good spot where there's plenty of food sources for them. When it's all worked out, I'll let you see a shot. And of course, you can always check out the Gretchen Bee Ranch blog for more information on the bees. It's always interesting to me and I seem to learn something new every time I visit them with Mark. Today I saw them acting in a way I had not seen before and Mark told me they were robbing a hive. More than likely that hive won't make it but he still has four good ones out in the country.

Butterflies & Moths Abound

Happy Thursday, everyone! Lots of butterflies and moths have been meandering through the area as of late. I just feel terrible when they kamikaze themselves in my windshield. Elevate, butterflies! Elevate.

Do you think these two are sharing or fighting for the right to enjoy the bloom solo?

The Wellness Center

Shot this one with the Blackberry so it's not a crisp one; however, that's fine as I would not want to pull out the real camera and make everyone self-conscious or whatever. So I snuck this one as I was walking on the treadmill off to the side. It's hard to get a good shot when you're walking! LOL. So, I love that there are two walkers reading books. If I tried to do that, I would become so engrossed, I'd forget to walk. I tried watching football on Sunday while I was on the step machine and when Brady threw the 40 yard pass to Randy Moss, I caught myself stopping mid-step and beginning to yell at the TV! Yep, I better just use my time on the machine to listen to music or simply think about things.

We are really enjoying the Wellness Center here in town. Not only do we feel better, but we also get to see friends there. We're going to really try and stick with it by encouraging each other to go, even when we're tired or just feeling lazy. It's amazing to me how great I feel when we go to the gym and I get so excited about it but then it's so easy to get out of the habit of going. Crazy. Well, now we have a goal in mind so we're going to shoot for that. I should do before/after pictures.

Anyway, if you haven't been to the Wellness Center, then you should check it out. The staff is great and the facility is super clean and the equipment new. There's such a great variety to choose from -- regular treadmills (and fancy ones with individual TVs), all sorts of step machines, all sorts of bikes (with fancy tracking software, racing software, etc.), indoor pool, hot tub, racquetball court (did that in college, not interested in getting smacked by that mean ball), classes, weights, and so on. Oh, there's a juice bar as well. It's really cool!

Friend-ly Bikers

The past several days have been wonderfully cool and low in humidity around here and I love it. If my allergies didn't get all crazy, I would spend even more time outdoors! LOL. This past Saturday, because I knew we were going to check on the country bees, I geared up by doing not one but two nasal rinses and took Zyrtec AND an Aleve-D. Still managed to get a bit of a headache but it was worth it to enjoy the great outdoors a bit with Mark and the bees.

On our way back from the bee yard, we have to travel on some country roads and as we pulled up to a stop sign along the way, we noticed two bikers. It was a friend of ours from our San Antonio Library days! She and her husband were scoping out the route for an upcoming ride and there they were. We pulled over and had a great visit -- it really is amazing to me that I look out the truck window and there's a friend I just would not have expected to see riding a bike out in the country near Seguin (she lives in SA). Hi Letty & Gilbert! It was GREAT to see you guys. :-)

More Prettiness

This time the prettiness was photographed on my drive home. Right around the corner from us on Camp Street is this great big mass of vines and on the vines are some of the most amazing flowers you'll ever see. I have been wanting to stop and shoot these for some time (like every year they bloom for the past 3 or 4 years) and yesterday I decided it was time. And the lighting was nice I thought.

I love the vibrant colors. With all the rain, everything is so green, so lush. And the layers, textures and numerous elements of these flowers just amaze me. There are different varieties in different colors. If I could find one potted, I would take my mom one. She has such a green thumb and I think she'd love the uniqueness of this. Do you know what it is? (Without clicking on my Flickr b/c I put the name there.)

Prettiness

...at the Mill! These flowers are blooming at the Mill and I love looking at them. I don't know what they are called though so if you know, tell me please! :-) Lately we have finally started receiving steady rain so everything is green and lush and flowers are everywhere. I'm glad since this is a little extra goodness for our bees! Speaking of which, the ones here in the city are MEAN. You know what that means...

Hope everyone's having a great week. We are half done with the week already!

Happy Friday

Made it through another week and it was a pretty great one overall. And to celebrate my uplifted spirits, I chose this shot because this little guy looks happy to me. Work is still a bit rough but I'm just trying to get through as many projects, assignments, etc. as possible without getting all stressed out. So in an effort to de-stress, I have made it a point to do things I have always enjoyed doing but moved away from for a while. Here are my highlights fo rthe week:

1. Took pictures. Even if it was just with my Blackberry! Not at all satisfying but it allows me to document something significant in a pinch. Wouldn't want to be a photo snob, right?
2. Spent a little time each day reconnecting with a friend.
3. Called family members. Got a lot so I still need to make the rounds.
4. Set aside time each day to meditate, pray and center myself.
5. Met Hope for lunch. What a sweet lady! Hi Hope! :)
6. Met Josh for the first time. He's been an online friend and so it was wonderful to meet such a nice person and great photographer. I love his work.
7. Went to a SPURS game!! Yes, it was preseason. And no, we didn't win. But I had a blast with Mark and we enjoyed seeing the new players.
8. Sold out on our honey. Can you believe that?!?
9. Laughed a lot. I love to laugh. I don't like it when I realize I hadn't laughed all day. Luckily, if this EVER happens, all I have to do is tell Mark and usually he has me in stitches pretty fast.
10. Started a book -- Ice Hunt by James Rollins. So far, so good.

And now? I shall go check out a new website to see if I want to print some of my photos for Christmas gifts. I'll let you know what I think later. Goodnight and I hope you all have a really wonderful weekend! Tomorrow's suppose to be gorgeous!

Tools, Tunes and a Cold One

Who says you have to be a man to appreciate this thing! Check out this fancy toolbox. I'm not even sure you can call it that. Perhaps it's more of a work center. Not only are there drawers for your tools (if I had it, I'd put all my bead stuff in there!), but it also has a CD player (yes!) AND a mini-refrigerator on the bottom left!!! How cool, right?? Check out that price tag. We spotted this at our local Home Depot. :-)

Pink Flamingos & Some Honey

Hello everyone, I have two pictures for you today. The pink flamingos just make me happy because I love pink and on Saturday, when it was all dreary, the burst of color along College Street really brightened the day!

Mark and I worked on our bee business a bit this weekend and had so much fun! We have launched a new blog (check out Gretchen Bee Ranch and see what you think), designed a special tag and packaged some of the honey we are selling. I probably won't blog much about the bees on this blog anymore now that they have their very own site. I just love the way the honey looks with the natural lighting.

A Cup of Joe & Some Art

This is a mural depicting scenes from our town's past and can be found on the side of the Chiro Java, a coffeehouse down on the square.