Happy Thanksgiving!

Our table won't look like the famous Norman Rockwell image. As a matter of fact, we still don't have a table in our dining room. The one we had was damaged beyond repair in our move a couple of months ago. At the time, it was a very sad day. That big table was usually only used for festive occasions and represented many happy memories of gatherings of friends and family. I was so looking forward to planning and preparing dinners to gather around that table again after our 2 year adventure in the RV. I loved the time spent travelling and we have many happy (and a few not so happy) memories from that terrific journey. One thing that was quite impossible was to have a big dinner. The tiny oven and scant counter space was fine for our every day meal prep and I learned a lot about efficient space management! Special days like Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter all have entwined a special meal with some family traditions well established in our minds. I truly enjoy planning and preparing those special meals for my family. The clean-up, not so much, but my family - especially my husband, takes care of that for me (what a blessing!). So, the table being damaged was a temporary painful blow as it was so much more than a piece of furniture in my mind.

As part of the many things for which I am thankful, however, the realization that even that table was just a 'thing' and my very special memories are more about the people and more importantly the love for and from those people in my life is the treasure that I value.

As we sit down today around a fold-up table with a tablecloth thrown over, I will have so many rich blessings for which to be thankful to God:

• God Himself, with His everlasting and ever plentiful provision for all our needs (spiritual, emotional, physical and material)
• my husband - such an amazing blend of strong and sweet
• my kids - each with their unique personalities that bring joy to my life
• my family - most reliable in their ongoing support, not always for everything I do - but always there for me
• my friends - wonderful companions in this life, whether near or far
• my country - with its' own set of challenges and worries at the moment, but by far the country that provides us with liberty 'to pursue happiness'

So, whatever your table looks like on this day, however the meal turns out, no matter who wins the football game - it is my hope that pursuit of the 'perfect' Normal Rockwell table in the photo doesn't get in the way of being blessed by remembering what you have to be thankful for. I know that I am so much more thankful for this little fold-up table than I ever would have thought!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Wow - over a month since our last posting! We've been busy and will summarize our goings on with this post.

After the kids participated in the Christmas play in our old stompin' grounds in Corpus Christi, we drove back to Abilene to have the 5th wheel repaired. The passenger side tire had shown some odd wear. After much deliberation and crawling around at the RV repair place, the conclusion was that the spring suspension had sprung. After several days of conversations between the repair facility, the RV manufacturer, the component manufacturers and us, the end result was a replaced set of springs paid for by the component manufacturer and a new tire paid for by us. We will monitor the new springs more closely as we proceed on our journey. We took the trailer and weighed the total trailer and also just the rear tandem axles. The total weight was below, but barely below, the limit posted for the rig. The weight on the axles, however, was well within range thus the component manufacturer responsibility. We probably could have fought more diligently for the tire replacement to be paid by someone else, but were weary of the discussions and wanted to move on.

Then, both kids caught a nasty stomach bug. Poor guys...it took a couple of days for the older one to feel well enough for travelling. Finally, we hit the road and landed for overnight stays in Van Horn, TX and Benson, AZ. Unfortunately, we also heard that Linda's family caught the same stomach bug after our departure - so sorry guys! Somehow, Linda and Craig were spared the ick and were good to go! The weather was great and we finally arrived northwest of Phoenix at McDowell Regional Park for our holiday time. We stayed most of the time with Linda's sister in Phoenix as the park was at least 45 minutes of drive time one way.

The park was, however, one of our favorite places to stay due to the wonderful views and spaciousness for each site. The park provides electric and water, so using the dump station was necessary on our way out - but no problem. The staff and volunteers demonstrated great holiday spirit by decorating the entry as a gingerbread house.

We'll include a few photos of our site and surroundings - the vastness of the desert views is impossible for us to capture. The drive through Fountain Hills was terrific each evening with the Christmas lights accenting the beautiful suburb and landscapes.While in Phoenix, we were able to watch Linda's nephew play in two tournaments. His team won both tournaments and he played so well that he was named MVP both rounds as well. We were so pleased to be able to participate as this is his senior year of high school. The second tournament added another bonus - another nephew was the announcer, being available while on his college break!Our guys enjoyed the time with cousins and we enjoyed the benefits of big city life with terrific restaurants and shopping just in time for Christmas. We hiked a few times on the trails within the city, catching beautiful views at dusk a few times and trying to work off as many calories as we were taking in with the Christmas treats! We enjoyed worship services at Scottsdale Christian Church on the Sundays before and after Christmas.

Here's a view of our boys' favorite activity after opening gifts on Christmas day - play DSi, listen to Ipod and lounge in new pj's in front of a real fire in the fireplace!We stayed on at McDowell, leaving on New Year's Day to travel on toward southern California. Here's a few of our attempts to show you the glorious sunsets in the park:

We appreciate so much the hospitality of family that provides food, fellowship and rest in real beds in real houses from time to time as we are on this adventure. We are happy to continue our travels, but the visits provide a much needed respite from time to time!

Thanksgiving with family

We haven't been posting for awhile as we've been busy visiting family and working on a repair issue for the 5th wheel. We'll make a separate post of the repair issue as it is yet unresolved. Suffice it to say that we are blessed to travel safely still and thank God for his continued grace upon our travels!

We are steadily working our way south and are still enjoying glimpses of fall color as we travel! We've been seeing varying displays of fall color since August in Minnesota and are happy that our nomadic travels have had this particular perk of enjoying fall for several months instead of just a couple of weeks.

The kids were happy to arrive at their grandparents in time to help construct, paint and display a large nativity scene in their front yard. The pieces were cut from plywood and the guys had a great time helping with the tools! They were also introduced to post hole digging and tamping. We know that is a skill that will return at some point in their future!

We'll have to update the photos in a couple of weeks with the full display of an angel, star and donkey...and of course, the baby Jesus!

A local model railroad club had an open house to peruse their elaborate displays and operation of their trains. The boys had a great time taking that all in, but unfortunately - no camera for that adventure!

We were able to spend some time playing games and watching football games in a 'real' living room at Linda's brother's. The RV is great for a lot of things, but doesn't work well for gathering family to join in those kinds of activities!

Linda's sister and brother-in-law graciously hosted a fajita dinner the weekend before Thanksgiving for a large number of the family members that were together. As the extended family grows, expands and relocates in various locales in the country, it's wonderful to celebrate as many as possible getting together at one time. The food was delicious and the visit wonderful!

We also appreciated their hospitality as we slept at their house - well away from highway noise and really close neighbors! We love our travelling life for this season, but having the peace and quiet of a house without wheels was a nice blessing for us for a week or so. Add in the fun of fellowship over coffee in the morning and some Scrabble tourneys in the evenings and we just were brimming over with blessings.

Thanksgiving Day afforded another opportunity for family to gather with a take-out meal from Cracker Barrel. The food was great and easy clean-up allowed everyone to enjoy the football games and visiting in the afternoon.

Thanksgiving is one of our favorite holidays as it reminds us to take pause and reflect upon our many, many blessings.

A few of the things for which we are thankful in this year:

• First and always, our thanks to God, our gracious heavenly Father that loves us so much beyond what we can imagine



• Jesus, the Messiah and precious Savior



• Holy Spirit that indwells us so that we can better honor and glorify God



• each other (Craig and Linda) - we love our opportunity to be lifelong partners in all the ups and downs, over hill, over dale, etc.!



• our kids - precious and unique in so many ways - they provide us great joy!



• our extended family that is keeping up with our season of adventure on the road



• our country with its vast expanse of beauty and its unique offering of freedoms for its' citizens

ps - we couldn't including a photo of our neighbor at the RV park. We've seen a few of this type of rig on our journey, but this is the first time we've captured a photo. The ultimate bunkhouse - provides multiple private sleeping quarters with a shared bath/kitchen facility at the front, and lots of doors for individual access to the 'bedrooms'!

Birthday Fun

August brings a birthday celebration for our family, so we set aside studies and 'field trips' to take notice of this special occasion! We were in a lovely park in Osburn, Idaho that bordered the Trail of the Coeur D'Alenes. For 72 miles, a former railway has been converted into a scenic paved bike trail. Another more challenging trail is also nearby, the Hiawatha Trail - named for the Hiawatha Railroad which was named for, well....Hiawatha. That trail is gravel and some longer grades, tunnels and high trestles crossings. While exciting, it also has a significant fee to ride.

We elected to take the easier trail toward nearby Wallace. We had seen signs for huckleberry milkshakes and had to check it out. The birthday boy was very much in favor!

A rather eclectic spot, the boys elected for Dr. Pepper floats while Craig and I sampled the huckleberry ice cream. Huckleberries are apparently consist of blueberry color and raspberry sweetness and makes into great ice cream.

We rode very literally toward the sunset along the tree lined trail. This section was never far from the highway, so we never felt as if we were in the countryside.

When we arrived at the camper, dinner was put together quickly so that we could get to another treat. Thankfully, for our waistlines, birthdays aren't every day! The birthday boy's choice was a large chocolate, chocolate chip cookie with chocolate ice cream, whipped cream, and embellished with caramel and chocolate sauces. Very rich! No one was able to finish their portions after the earlier ice cream treats but it was a nice end to a really nice day!

Oh no - we're not finished celebrating just yet!

The celebration continued with a trip to an amusement park in Coeur D'Alene. Triple Play park has bowling, go carts, bumper boats, climbing walls, laser tag, indoor and outdoor miniature golf an arcade and an indoor water park. We skipped the water park portion, but thorough immersed ourselves in the other activities.

The boys were completely exhausted and were sore the next day from the climbing wall, but it was another fun day.

So, having celebrated pretty exhaustively for two days, we prepared for returning to studies and sight seeing for the remainder of our Idaho stop.

Reminiscing

In a deviation from our 'normal' blog of our travel journal, I want to make note of our anniversary. We've been married now for sixteen years, but before those years, Craig and I were friends - good friends - for at least eight years.

Everyone has funny stories of things that happened at their weddings - here's a bit of ours.

We were married at Landa Park in New Braunfels, TX. We took the risk of planning an outdoor wedding because we both loved Landa Park and New Braunfels was a new beginning for both of us. Craig was working in San Antonio and I was working in Austin, so we selected New Braunfels as the place for our new home. It was a very exciting time!

The Comal Springs that feed the lake in the park, by the way, are a special environmentally protected area with signs posted all over the place warning that you should avoid contaminating the pristine water. My sister-in-law, a woman of many talents including interior decorating and landscape, had graciously agreed to help with decorations for the wedding. As we toured the park a day or so before the wedding, she recognized a unique water plant growing in the springs and wanted a sampling for her lovely water garden. Leaving Craig to stand guard, she crawled on hands and knees next to the springs and bare-fisted, obtained a healthy sampling to take home. Actually, perhaps she is actually working for the government to test the species viability in different climates? That may be our story if we're ever challenged. Craig and I had the chance to return to Landa Park in January and found the springs, the lovely water plants and fish to be in good form.

We knew that an event, Aquafest, was scheduled for that day in New Braunfels, but we understood that activities would be later in the day. You must also know that there's some kind of 'fest' about once a month in that largely German based community. We didn't know that Aquafest had a 5K run scheduled in Landa Park the morning of our wedding that created blockades at all the entrances. After explaining to the security guards that we wouldn't be getting in the way of the runners, we were allowed to proceed to the little gazebo near the Comal springs. Also, it was fortunate that the 5K route was not in the immediate area of our ceremony - so no runners puffing through the flowers and bridal party!

Everything proceeded on in good order from there. One of the groomsmen labeled their thoughts on the tuxedos as making them feel like a baked potato (silver tux on a very warm day), but there was no rain - just lots of humidity. My niece cued up the music on a boombox and the lovely little flower girls strolled carefully...away from the gazebo and through the park another direction as they focused on the rose petals instead of the path. We got them redirected and the ceremony commenced.

As the pastor lovingly told our family members to basically leave us alone, we couldn't help watching a water snake that lazily swam back and forth behind the gazebo and the pastor in the lake. Thankfully, he never 'landed' our direction.

The ceremony concluded, we took lots of pictures then met at the New Braunfels Smokehouse for a casual brunch buffet and off Craig and I went to San Antonio for the night, then off to Lake Tahoe for a sweet honeymoon the next day.

All in all, a really nice day with no real catastrophes. We appreciate all the friends and family members that set aside that day and took the trip to New Braunfels to celebrate with us.

Sixteen years later, we're still terrific partners in life. Interestingly, we picked up our 5th wheel in New Braunfels in January before beginning this latest adventure. Now, near our anniversary date, we are here just a few miles from our honeymoon destination of Lake Tahoe. These are the things that make us smile!

God has blessed us so richly over the years through happy and sad times. If anyone asked us why our marriage is so strong, I would have to say that first and foremost that God gets the credit for teaching us how to love others - but especially your spouse. In our human frailty, if we can capture even one iota of selfless love from the Author and Creator of perfect love, we can build such strong ties with one another! Added to that most important element is a tremendously healthy respect for each other that had roots before we ever dated one another. We were best friends before we married and we're still best friends. Lastly, is the knowledge that each of us believe to our core in lifetime commitment that creates a wonderful safety zone for each other. We do and will love each other forever - no doubt! Thanks for joining us in a trip down memory lane! We'll return to current events in our next blog post!

Easter and Texas TEA

We're headed west to see sights and also to avoid the frequent violent spring storms in the Southeast. Arizona and New Mexico are much more pleasant before sweltering temperatures arrive with the summer season! En route from east to west, we took some time at our home base in Texas to visit family, swap schoolbooks for the kids and some other items in the storage unit, add some features to the truck and camper, and triage the mail that had been collected by Linda's sister for the past couple of months. We were pleased that the timing worked out to spend Easter with family and also participate in a Tax Day TEA Party. Wish we could say we planned that out in advance, but not so – just coincidence!

It was great to see family! Email, cell phones, web photos help to keep in touch, but it's definitely nice to have the hugs and direct conversation and fun! We parked at the local KOA and gave the camper interior a 'spring clean' vacuuming and wiped down – then a dust storm hit and covered everything with a fine layer of red dirt. Gotta' love West Texas! So…we cleaned again, ordered a bike rack that would accommodate 4 bikes for the family and a tool box for the truck. LOVE the tool box and how it frees up some basement space in the camper. We continue to work at keeping only what is truly necessary with an eye on the weight and logistics of retrieving items. New, moderately priced bikes for the boys and Craig are now part of travel. Our youngest needed bike riding lessons and what better place than at the grandparents lake house! Nice, long, traffic free dirt driveway and lots of encouragers on hand! He picked up basic riding in only one day – no training wheels! He loves his new bike and we're already having a lot of fun at some of our stops with the built in entertainment and exercise.

A trip to the storage unit took care of trading completed school books for fresh material and a couple of kitchen items that are now deemed essential enough to travel along with us. The truck got routine maintenance. We intended to wash the exterior of the camper, but the dust storm and pending travel westward became handy excuses to skip the work – for now. We've had relatively few problems with the camper and the few things that are more nuisance than absolute malfunction, so no warranty work – so far.

Easter was nice and relaxing at the lake. Bluebonnets were in bloom, the weather was very pleasant. We were able to sleep through a possible hail storm under a secure roof with slight worries about our camper parked nearby, but no worries about physical harm to the family! Grandma had boiled eggs for the boys to 'dye' and we prepared 'resurrection rolls' for Easter morning. Resurrection rolls are plain yeast rolls, rolled and stretched to allow placing a marshmallow, cinnamon, sugar and melted butter in the middle. The roll is then folded around the goodies and 'sealed'. After baking, the inside is hollow – representing the empty tomb. This is a tradition for our family, so we just review the symbolism of the marshmallow as the body of Christ with the traditional application of oils and fragrance as we prepare the rolls together. We like the simplicity and also find the rolls yummy for Easter breakfast!

Crappie fish were biting and plentiful, so the boys had a great time fishing with their PaPa – and a tasty dinner.

We didn't take our camera, so no pictures from the Tea Party. In this relatively small community, hundreds turned out with handmade signs to peacefully protest our government's current overwhelming spending spree. From our perspective, this is a long-standing problem but has dramatically escalated at an alarming rate since the last national election. The problem is broader than the presidency but primarily lies with a majority of congressional and senatorial leaders that do not value fiscal prudence on behalf of the taxpayers. Media reports of Tea party events did not portray the people that we saw standing with us on the street that day. We believe that many people are concerned about the future of our country and the financial burden being built up not only for us, but for our children and grandchildren as well. We have written letters and made phone calls in the past to our representatives to voice our opinions on these issues, but we continually find ourselves ignored by the voting record. We don't know what the end result of Tea party participation will be, but we feel strongly enough about the erroneous political direction that actions may speak louder than words. We will be watching for more opportunities to show ourselves opposed to the gross deficit.