It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

Here at the RV park we have moved from Thanksgiving into the Christmas Season.  After coffee hour on Saturday we enjoyed a few hours of decorating the clubhouse, putting us in the Christmas spirit and singing some Holiday tunes.


On Monday evening, all the workcampers got together to decorate the park office and partake in some food and a little Christmas cheer.  Since it gets dark so early now, I was only able to get one picture of the tree with my cell phone.

Every year there is a contest in the park for the best decorated sight.  I believe our neighbors have won at least four times.  A look at these pictures will see that it is well deserved.



Every year they add a little more to the display.
Then you have our display, and you can see why we are not in the running for the prize….but then you only have so much storage in an rv. We do love our little tree though especially when it is lit at night in the back window.



This week also was the start of our craft group which meets once a week for four weeks.  This week we made the snowman ornament which is on the top of the tree.  We not only look forward to making the craft, but have just as much fun getting together for a good laugh and conversation.

This is just the start of all the hustle and bustle here, with so many holiday activities planned….can’t wait for more to get underway!

Counting our Blessings

Now that Thanksgiving is over and I am relaxing from eating a great dinner, it occurred to me that I haven’t posted lately.  Well, let me catch you up on our past week. 
It started Saturday night with Jerry waking us up with a terrible cough.  It reminded us of the kids when they were young and had croup.  We had no idea what the problem was but of course, the vet was closed on Sunday and he was still coughing.  We recalled that one of our friends who we play cards with was a retired veterinarian and decided to see what he thought.  Of course Jerry, being the perfect dog that he is, performed perfectly by coughing for him.  It turns out that he had swallowed a bur.  They are very plentiful here this year due to the very dry weather.  It was lodged in his windpipe and all we could do was wait for him to dislodge it or for it to dissolve.  After two days he was back to his old self. We are so thankful for that.



Tuesday evening our park managers, Guy and Juanita had a party to welcome all the work campers.  It was held at their favorite restaurant, Agave, where we had a great dinner followed by dancing afterward.


We have begun working in Activities, with our first coffee hour and Margarita night.  It was nice to see so many of our old friends back, but just as nice to meet some of the new guests in the park and welcome them.



That takes us to Thanksgiving Day, where as part of the activities team we hosted a wonderful dinner attended by 96 people.  The turkey was prepared by a restaurant here in the valley, and each couple at the table brought a side dish.  We were fortunate to have such great volunteers to help us with set up and clean up. To top it off, it was a beautiful 85 degree day, perfect for taking a walk after dinner and visiting friends.

I have to say, as great as all this was, nothing was as special as face-timing with our kids, being able to see them together, chat with them, and even see our granddogs. We have so much to be thankful to God for!

Ranching and Reminiscing

On Thursday Ray got a phone call from the manager of our park Guy Carvajal, asking him to meet his dad to give him a hand feeding his cattle.  He had helped him once before and I knew what a kick he got out of it so I had to go see for myself what he did.  Guy and his dad and his cousin own cattle, a bull, two llamas (or impalas as Mr. Carvajal calls them), two horses and two burros. The baby burro (named Bob by Guy’s granddaughters) was born a few days before we arrived at the park.
 
First things first, moving the feeder over to the fence.

And then throwing the hay to the cattle along with the feed which is a mixture of corn and mesquite beans.

The benefit to having the llamas is that they will contract any diseases first, thus alerting the rancher to protect the cattle.


This is mama burro with baby Bob.  She is very protective of Bob but I was able to get a photo of him milking and Ray was able to get close enough to him to pet him.

This is the bull with the ring in his nose.  He is very tame, however.  I told Mr. Carvajal he probably has no choice being the only bull among all those female cattle.


I just love this picture of Ray and Mr. Carvajal.  It took them about 15 minutes to feed the cattle, but we spent about 1 1/2 hours there.  Not only did we enjoy watching the animals (especially when the horses would kick at the llamas) but were so privileged to be able to listen to so many stories told by Mr. Carvajal as well as to learn so much about his life, the cattle and the history of Mission, Texas and the Rio Grande Valley.

Time Flies When You’re Having Fun

Since we have been here in Texas we can’t believe how fast the time goes and how we have managed to keep busy.  As members of the Activities Team we are responsible for all the events in the clubhouse, and that means cleaning it and getting it ready for the season. Fortunately a woman was hired to do the bulk of the cleaning, but we were still left with the kitchen and everything in it as well as the storage room, grill, etc.  This took a good portion of Monday, and I must say it was a very warm day and we really worked up a sweat.  We did have a lot of fun working with the other two work camping couples, Bruce and Patsy and Jim and Gayle. 
Monday also found Ray and I attending a trade show sponsored by Welcome Home RGV.  There were several vendors there with useful information to bring back to our park to assist us in planning events and activities.  Ray has also been busy helping with small projects around the park and I have been helping out in the office when needed.
The next month will bring many more of our friends to the park as well as the start of our activities including coffee hour, margarita night, movies, dances, entertainment, bingo, crafts and guest speakers.
So, what do we do for fun you ask?  Well, we always manage to get a long walk in every morning, a swim in the afternoon, and a happy hour with friends here and there. We have also been getting together with friends to play cards and as soon as the weather cools down we will try our hand at washer toss and golfing and get more bike riding in.
We do find time to relax, either reading, spending time on the computer or taking snapshots around the park.

This is a view of the sunrise out our back window every morning. We love to sit and have our morning coffee and diet coke and watch the sun rise.

This dragonfly came to visit the bush in our yard and posed so still for us. These two palm trees are across the street from our site.  I believe they must be the tallest ones in the park. 

Every day since we have been here has been a picture perfect day!

First Responder Meeting

Our park is starting up a First Responder team which Ray has been asked to be a part of.  There are only a few seasonal folks at the park as of now, but hopefully as the season gets underway there will be more people to add to the team.  Today we attended a meeting which was held at Waterford Garden.  We had no idea until we arrived there that we would be going to an Assisted Living Facility.  In the 7 years that Ray worked doing disaster plans for nursing homes and assisted living facilities, he has never seen one as nice as this one, which is why I had to blog about it.
The facility did a wonderful job of hosting the meeting, with a great Mexican cuisine lunch, door prizes, etc.  But what impressed us the most was the beauty of the grounds.  The pictures don’t do it justice.  There is a lovely courtyard with a fountain leading to a large garden area with more fountains, ponds, and butterflies everywhere.





We learned from the woman in charge that there is an elderly Winter Texan couple that lives in Wisconsin who still likes to come to the valley because their friends come down. They stay at Waterford Garden for the winter months. They are too old to travel down so the facility flies someone to Wisconsin to bring them down to the valley.  They do this for other people as well. Also, if someone is taking care of elderly parents and wish to take a vacation they can have the parents stay at Waterford Garden while they are gone and pick them up when they come back.
Ray and I thought it would be a lovely place for our children to put us when we get old…..of course, I’m sure it comes with a lovely price tag and chances of them visiting us very often from New York would be slim.  So, my answer to that is…..we will never grow old!

Home for the Winter

After only 3 1/2 days of driving we arrived at our winter home in the Rio Grande Valley.  It was so nice to be “home” and to get such a warm welcome from Guy & Juanita, our park managers and friends.  There are only about 6 other rigs here right now, but I’m sure within 2-3 weeks all the winter texans will start moving in. 
They had no rain here since we left in April, and you sure can tell by how dry everything is.  Fortunately there are underground sprinklers to water the landscaping around the patios, but we still lost one Esperanza bush.  The landscaping crew came on Thursday and removed the dead bush and trimmed everything back so our site looks great now.  It won’t be long until everything grows tall again to offer more privacy. 

The butterflies are so plentiful here this time of year. There are at least 10-20 on our front bush at any given time.  And of course, the woodpeckers and Vermillion Flycatcher have already come to visit.


Today Ray helped some good friends of ours, Gayle and Harvey Pagel paint their coach house while I did laundry and cleaning.  The temps have been in the 90’s so we don’t overexert ourselves.  We did manage to give the 5th wheel a washing to get all the road dirt off and it looks much better.  When the weather cools down we will do a more thorough job. All this was followed by a cool down in the pool.

On the Road Again

After spending the last six weeks with our kids, we got word that our 5th wheel repairs were finally done. It is always bittersweet for us to leave New York and our family and friends but once we are on the road we are anxious to return to our winter home and our Texas friends. 

We decided this season to only do one night stops on the road on our way down south.  We left home on a Sunday morning and were in the Rio Grande Valley on Wednesday.  I don’t think we will be doing that again, as 9 hours towing the trailer is way too grueling. 

Our first night was spent at Grandma’s campground in Shepardsville, KY.  It is a great overnight park as it is right off the highway.  Whenever we stop here we always seem to run into someone we know.  This trip we pulled in and heard someone holler “Hey, old man”.  Ray turned around and there was a couple that we met at the campground in NY.  She is from Wolcott, NY where we were staying and he is from Shepardsville.  Such a small world. 

Our second night was spent in Hot Springs, AK at Catherine’s Landing RV Resort.  Our GPS took us down all the winding and hilly back roads which made us a little nervous not knowing what may be ahead of us but it was well worth it.  We just loved Catherine’s Landing, from the large pull-thru sites to the nice lodge and pool, to the beautiful lake.  Hopefully on our way back to NY we will be able to spend more time there and explore Hot Springs and all they have to offer.

The lodge is very modern and the pool is a heated saline pool with no chemicals. 

The park also has several of these yurts to rent along with cottages.

 

 

 

 

 

The beautiful autumn colors reflected off the lake and was followed by a beautiful sunset. 

Our final night before reaching our destination was spent in San Marcos, Tx at Pecan Park campground.  While nothing special, it was fine for a one night stay.