Homes

On our visit to San Antonio this Christmas, Mom and Dad and I drove around a bit near Trinity University. At one time my parents rented the second floor of a two story house there. It was their first home together. And my Oma, my Dad's mom, lived down the street in a small house. My other grandma, Nanny, lived in San Antonio too. We spent many a fun week or weekend in San Antonio going between the grandmas houses. They were 71 (Nanny) and 72 (Oma) when I was born and lived to be 89 and 95. I was blessed to have them!

My Oma's house. When she lived there, it was all white and had no carport.

My Nanny's house also had no carport when she lived there.


My parents' first home together was the top floor of this duplex.

Christmas 2006

This year we had a very quiet family holiday. My parents came to my house and stayed from Friday to Wednesday. Our time together was filled with eating, working, visiting and sleeping.

Mom and Dad asleep by 8:30 pm after a hard day!

Dad, of course, worked in my yard and around the house as much as he could. It's his passion and I think he prefers to do it alone... most visits we both work in the yard several days, but this year he just did a bit of clearing in my back yard and we put out mulch together in the front yard. Don't get me wrong, he works circles around me all the time, but this year even more so because I spent time with Mom, either around the house (watching her favorites on DVR - Reba, Everybody Loves Raymond and Frasier) or running around getting last minute things done for the holiday.

We had a quiet gift opening at my house Saturday night and then Sunday morning we headed for San Antonio to see my extended family. My uncle went to lunch with us at, you guessed it, Luby's (just like last year)... but my aunt was in the hospital for a colonoscopy, so we visited her afterward. She got out just after that and seems to be doing a bit better. I am worried about them both, though, and hope to be a better niece in 2007.

As you can see, the weather was worse and this is just a picture of the Luby's sign and a random Mexican restaurant we didn't visit.

I also hope to be a better daughter in 2007 too.

Dad and Mom, Christmas Eve 2006.

Equal time

I have bragged and posted pictures of my friends' dogs before.


First there was a visit from Blondie.

Soon there were visits from Dexter. (His picture is at the end of the entry.)

And after that a visit from Bauer.


Now when Blondie comes to visit, she brings her owner (my friend from college) and her step sister, Paisley.

Introducing Paisley!

Blondie and Paisley slept over.

The pressure is getting to me... (or more Australia pictures)

See, I started this blog for fun. It is supposed to be a place to catalog thoughts and share pictures. I really like blogging. I DO NOT like struggling to figure out a subject about which to write. It's clear that I am not a "writer." Some days I click through a list of blogs and read amazing entries. Entries written by real writers. These are folks who get paid to write and those who do not. Still and all, they are real writers. I am not!

But I can take a good picture now and then... And I would post one or two, but Blogger (no longer called Blogger beta) won't let me post pictures!!! Again. I'll keep trying, but this isn't doing much for my momentum.

Update: I can upload pictures through IE, but not Mozilla Firefox. Therefore, here are some more pictures of my trip to Australia in 2003. Cairns was my first stop in Australia, and I arrived just in time to lay awake for hours before "waking up" early to go up in the hot air balloon I mentioned in an earlier post.

The view from my hotel in Cairns, Queensland.

The Cairns Yacht Club.

Have you ever...?

Have you ever wasted a few hours watching bad TV? I have. I might have done that tonight. Stupid Lifetime Original Movies.

Have you ever hit a deer? Or rather, has a deer hit your car? It could happen; it happened to me in December. I saw the deer (plural), stopped, waited for them to head toward the tree line... Then I started driving again, very slowly, and the stinkin' deer turned around and jumped right into my car's passenger side fender. He did a movie stunt type maneuver, slid over the hood, onto the windshield and off the other fender. At the end of the day his hooves and antlers scratched the two fenders, the hood, the windshield, the bit between the windshield and the sunroof and the driver side windshield wiper. $2600. Over-achieving deer. The folks at Allstate didn't even blink. Neither did the folks at the body shop. They had given an estimate to a guy earlier in the day who'd run over a DEAD feral hog. Imagine calling the insurance company to say you'd hit dead hog. "I swear that it looked like a speed bump? Really!"

A deer made this dent on my front fender. Yes that's cracked paint too!

Giving it another go...

I'm not sure if anyone checks my blog anymore. I mean, if you were checking, then you gave up months ago, right?

Let's see if I can do a better job in 2007! I plan to post more frequently and use more photos. Here's hoping I keep this resolution (along with several others to be discussed at a later date).

I made another long weekend trip to New York City in December. I had a great time visiting a friend and seeing some shows. I recommend both The Radio City Christmas Spectacular and Jersey Boys.

Backstage at Radio City Music Hall with my friend Beth.

I took the Staton Island Ferry (free!) to get some pictures of the Statue of Liberty. After taking a few (or 100) pictures, I had to take a moment and enjoy the view.

Sunday, December 11, 2006