Tea at The Peach Tree

Just back from a week in the Hill Country visiting my daughter and her family. Must start at the beginning... which was a bit shaky.

Tuesday I arrived at the airport at 2pm with a 3:20 departure schedule. 

First thing that happened was for the first time in a long time I didn’t get TSA preboarding on my boarding pass... so I needed to do all the ‘remove shoes, liquids in plastic bag, etc’. OK, I can handle that. 

Then they sent my plastic cartons containing my stuff (carry-on, purse, cell phone, etc.) down one aisle and made me and the rest of the people behind me move to another line! 

Then when I went to retrieve my cartons, my carry-on bag was missing. Well, apparently they confiscated it because the X-ray showed 2 cans (one Godiva dark chocolate pretzels and one tin of Kona coffee flavored macadamia nuts from Hawaii). I was bringing these to my daughter. So the TSA agent had to unpack my bag and check out those items (but didn't confiscate them).

Then... my flight was delayed (twice).

Finally- we boarded and were on the plane seated about 5 minutes when they came over the intercom and said that there was a maintenance problem and we needed to deplane (Great). 

Then we waited in the terminal until they took the first plane away and found us a new plane which we reboarded (of course - from a different gate)

I'm really not complaining about it all... (although it does sound like it). It's just that an hour's quick trip to San Antonio turned into a 6 hour ordeal. (not anyone's fault - just did). But I have to say that the next day I unexpectedly received an email apology from Southwest as well as a $100.00 voucher to be used at a later date. (How about that?)

Wednesday - I got to watch my grand daughter ride at an indoor arena where they're boarding one of their horses and 

Thursday - we headed out to Fredericksburg to spend the night and walk the cute little shops and restaurants there. 

me in our airbnb in Fredricksburg

Visited my favorite German kitchen store (Der Kuchen Laden) and had lunch at the Peach Tree Cafe and Tea room! Visited more shops, then back to our Airbnb to rest. Then off to the Fredericksburg Brewing Company for dinner. After dinner we headed to Old Tunnel State Park to watch the bats emerge from their cave (old railroad tunnel). The Park Ranger gave us the history of the old railroad tunnel and general information on bats while waiting for them to fly out... which they did around 8:30pm.

Friday morning - we hit Java Ranch coffee shop (really cute), walked town a bit, back to pack up and check out... then brunch at The Herb Farm - toasted faccacia bread with butter and jams, biscuits with white gravy and sausage, and English tea with cream! 

Then back home to daughter’s house (about an hour away).

daughter's house and land

Sunday - we visited the little German town of Gruene... just to walk the shops and have coffee... too hot outside to stay long. Home again to nap!

Her mama chicken and baby chick (lone survivor of rat snake that got her siblings) are very friendly. Mama jumped in my lap to get some French fries...

Pushy mama and her chick

And Moose (daughter’s new Great Dane) is a sweetheart.

Moose

That's Moose sitting on grand daughter's lap. He has a very nice profile....

Flight home was delayed also, but only once... and the rest was uneventful (thank goodness).

Cats are happy for me to be back home!

See how excited they are to see me back...

Now catching up on all the blogs I missed...

Nothing new to post about.  Summer is definitely here... it's 90 F today and will continue to get hotter.  Texas is not the place to be in July and August.  





I'm working on my wind chimes as my summer clay project. Haven't ever tried to make wind chimes before so it should be interesting. We have some out front that make a really nice sound and I've been wanting to get some for the tree out back... so I decided to make my own. They may be all ceramic or they may be ceramic and copper tubing. Haven't decided yet.

Also I took a Word 2016 class this past week. It was offered by the Library and was a beginner class. Now I've used Word 2007 for a long time, but probably only use a small percentage of what it can actually do. We were told that Word 2016 basically does the same things, but may just do them a little differently. Most of the things he showed us I already knew, but I did pick up a few new techniques. There's an intermediate class next week. 

I was talking to someone this past week who has recently retired and we were discussing the pro's and con's of retiring in place as to moving to somewhere they've always wanted to live.
In our cases, we both seem to lean toward retiring in place... as everything familiar is just too convenient... doctors, friends, classes, etc. (not to mention family). Not that we wouldn't mind traveling a little and visiting some wonderful places. But it's expensive to move and feel that retiring in place and visiting the other places would be the practical thing. Starting over (new surroundings, new everything) after a certain age seems difficult. But many do this... and it works out well. What are your thoughts?

It's Sunday morning and I've spent it drinking coffee and reading blogs. Well, not totally, I also cleaned up my computer room a little - while looking for a recipe that I had mislaid.   I've nothing much to write about today. DH is in the process of making us a batch of his wonderful Red Beans and Rice.... so the house smells wonderful.

I had come across what was promised to be a 'secret recipe for rice pudding'.  I love rice pudding, but like everything else, some recipes are better than others. So I'm going to try this one.  It calls for using arborio rice and a vanilla bean?  Sounds interesting.

This is Texas and while I was freezing on Wednesday (weather was in the 40's I think) and DH had turned off the heat in the house, today it's supposed to reach the 80's (more my speed). Sometimes I just get so-o cold that the only thing that will warm my blood back up is a very hot shower.  When I get this cold, I can touch DH on the arm and he will say, "God, you're freezing... how can you be alive?" But my daughter is the same way.  DH and the boys seem to be more hot blooded.

Well, it should be a good day to work on my hanging herb baskets. I try to keep basil, parsley, rosemary, and lavender in hanging baskets by the front door. This way the entry smells sweet and they are close by for culinary use.

A few cats pics:


 





    Tux among the towels







Jack playing...











Jack and Tux...






Waiting our turn...









Playing with bubbles...






Playing with Mardi Gras beads...






Rose loves plastic bags...



We live in Texas Ever since I started this blog, I've been meaning to do 'something' to remember where the 'bloggers I read' live.  Some are easy to remember by the pictures of the area they post. Others are generic or (like myself) change their pictures from day to day.  In the beginning when I read just a few, it was easy... but now since I've increased the number (and decreased my brain cells), I'm finding it more difficult. I'll be reading a site and then have to surf over to their 'profile' to check out their home base.  Anyway, now I've started a list that immediately shows me who is from where. Archaic, but hey,  it works for me.  The picture at the top is one that my son sent me when he was in West Texas doing some amphibian research for the Dallas Zoo. I figure it might help people remember that WE LIVE IN TEXAS. I know that I post a lot of pictures of New Orleans because that is where DH and I were born and raised (and our family is still there), but we've lived in Texas since 1971 and raised our kids here. That should qualify us for honorary Texas residents, don't you think?  (BTW, my oldest son was born in New Orleans, daughter in Florida, and youngest son in Texas - we stopped moving after that...)



Texas heat

This picture is just a place saver as I haven't time to blog this week.  We have family in town and are spending the days running around in the heat and 'eating'.  This morning we drove down to Terrell and checked out Ham's Peach Orchard.  We came home with an ice chest full of home-made peach and  strawberry ice-cream... (hmmm, really good stuff!)  as well as a fresh chocolate brownie pie, butter pound cake, and baskets of fresh plums.  And that was just this morning.  Yesterday we made buttermilk pie and stuffed artichokes... (we ate part of the pie, but are saving the artichokes for another day).  Anyway, I'll blog again in a few days.

Texas Horned Toad


Good Morning!  It's a little cooler here in Texas this morning, so I actually took an early morning walk. I love to walk, but once it gets into the triple digits, forget it! 

Anyhow, I have been reading old journal pages from my 2001 site and came across this one that speaks volumes.  It came about because someone left a comment on one of my pages that "people suck"... and it got me to thinking.  It's been over 10 years since I wrote that, but my belief system hasn't changed. It's served me well.

I guess if I had to give any advice that could be generalized, it would be:  BE KIND