Friday, March 9, 2018 - Farewell to Mexico; Another Chore Done

Friday, March 9, 2018 - Farewell to Mexico; Another Chore Done

We wanted to make a last trip to Mexico for some shopping, and Pam and I wanted to get a pedicure.  Dennis and Pam picked us up about 9:00, then we stopped at John and Sharon's park, so they could follow us to Progresso.  We met up with Kathy and Olen before we crossed the bridge into Mexico.

First things first, Pam and I wanted to get our pedicures.  We took our seats, and the rest of our crew went outside to set at a table along side the road.  I'm sure it was more interesting than watching us have our feet attended to.  

Our crew waiting while Pam and I had our pedicures.

Next stop was lunch.  We chose a new restaurant today.  I cannot remember the name of it, but it was upstairs over a large store.  It had a very nice size eating area with a dance floor off to one side.  Someone was singing and a few couples were dancing.  

I was taking a picture of our group, when a man at the next table came over and asked if I would like for him to take a picture of all of us.  Of course, I did and was so glad he offered.
After lunch and stops at a few stores we headed back to the good old USA!  

From left - Sharon, John, Olen, Kathy, Pam, Dennis, Dean and Me

A fun day with great friends!

Another task marked off my list this afternoon - defrost the freezer!  It went well.  I planned to do a couple loads of laundry but we forgot to get quarters and the office was already closed, so that will wait until tomorrow.  

Thursday, March 8, 2018 - Cleaning Day; Taking Care of Business; Dinner with Friends

Thursday, March 8, 2018 - Cleaning Day; Taking Care of Business; Dinner with Friends

When I woke up this morning it was 6:00 a.m.  I couldn't believe I slept that late but it felt good.  Dean was already up and having his first cup of coffee when I got up.  It isn't often that happens.

Dean is playing golf with Dave this morning.  They are leaving at 8:30.  After coffee and a little cereal, I got started cleaning.  Bentley needs a deep cleaning and today is the day.  I was done shortly by 12:30.  I'm so glad I did most of the dusting yesterday rather than waiting to do it all today.  

After a quick lunch and a shower, the next item on the agenda is making some phone calls, and reservations for the remaining stops on our travels from Mission, TX to Wichita, KS.  Not much to share today.  It's good to have days where you just "catch up".  I needed one.

Dean returned from golf between 2-2:30.  He had a good time.  I'm so glad he's had the opportunity to golf while here since he enjoys it so much.  

At 3:30 Dave and Nancy picked us up.  We are having dinner at Casa de Marisco in Weslaco.  We are meeting Jay and Stella there at 4:00.  Just as we pulled up to the restaurant, Jay and Stella turned the corner  - the timing could not have been any better.  

I have to say this is the best Mexican food we've had this trip.  It is what I consider to be authentic Mexican.  Dean and I both ordered the Mexican plate which was one taco, an enchilada and a chalupa, along with rice and beans.  The taco was so full of meat you couldn't pick it up to eat it and the seasoning was perfect but nothing like "commercial taco seasoning".  The taco shell was corn and so soft it was easy to cut with your fork, so no worries  The chalupa shell was fried nice and crisp so it too was easy to eat with a fork. Often times the shell will be rubbery and difficult to eat - this was perfect.  The beans were amazing - not refried beans from a can - but the real thing.  The meat sauce on the enchiladas was a wonderful meat gravy, layered with a nice amount of cheese.  I was very, very happy with our meal.  I actually ordered a cheese enchilada but I'm glad they brought me the beef one instead.  I only ate a couple of bites of the enchilada.  I was so full and of all of the food it will heat up perfectly for leftovers later.  This is definitely a favorite restaurant and one I will look forward to visiting more than once next winter.  Dean did not care much for the chalupa since he's not as fond of beans as I am.  He thought the taco and enchiladas were great though and would just replace the chalupa with a taco or enchilada.

They also brought a small bowl of vegetable soup out before our meal.  It was quite good as well.  Cabbage, carrots, potatoes, zucchini were some of the veggies in the soup. 

The enchiladas I ordered at Las Margaritas were as good these - with the meat gravy and lots of cheese, which is the way it should be, not just a red sauce, however the beans were better here at Casa de Marisco.  I really love refried beans and it's not often you get the "real thing" that tastes as good as these we had this evening.  Thanks to our friends for sharing another wonderful restaurant.  I have to say we have not ate at a "bad" restaurant at all.  The food has all been good, with some being elevated to better or best.  It's really great to have all of these great recommendations from friends without having to guess what might be best.  

I fell down on the job and failed to take a picture!  I guess I need to tie a string around my finger to remind me!  

A great ending to a productive day!  It was nice walking into Bentley this evening with everything in its place, dusted and neat.  

We have another outing tomorrow with Dennis, Pam, John and Sharon, our Escapees friends.

Wednesday, March 7, 2018 - Shopping Trip - Gals & Guys; Lunch at Riverside Club; Cleaning; Evening Walk

Wednesday, March 7, 2018 - Shopping Trip - Gals & Guys; Lunch at Riverside Club; Cleaning; Evening Walk

This morning the gals (Pam & I) and the guys (Dennis & Dean) decided to do some shopping.  Pam and I headed to Old McAllen.  Thank you, Helen & Hoot, for telling us about Old McAllen!  Dean and Dennis had a few stops to make at Home Depot's and Lowe's looking for boards, lights, and stuff like that!

Pam and I made our first stop at Casa Kevin and then moved in to the downtown area and visited a few other shops.  This is a fun place to go!  After our last stop at the Pet Store, we headed back to Pam & Dennis' park so we could go to lunch.  After throwing out a few ideas, we finally decided on the Riverside Club - the place with the extra large pork tenderloin sandwiches.  Dean and I shared a sandwich and I was stuffed when we left.  My goodness those sandwiches are filling.  

We noticed this really interesting tree that gave off this vibe of don't get too close as we were walking to the restaurant.  Before we left I asked the waitress if she knew what kind of tree it was.  She said it was a kapok tree.  I sure would hate to stumble in to it.

After lunch, we took a drive to nearby Anzalduas Park before returning to Dennis and Pam's park to drop them off.  After we returned to Bentley, I started cleaning.  Dean is going to be gone most of the day tomorrow playing golf and I plan to clean the RV top to bottom, so thought I'd get a head start.

After having our leftover pizza from yesterday for dinner, Dean and I walked around the park twice to get a little exercise.  Recently someone spruced up our park bench lady with some new clothes, makeup, fingernail polish, jewelry and cowboy boots.  Dean really took a liking to her.  I'm going to have to keep an eye on him!

Our resident park bench lady!

Beautifully manicured nails!

New makeup, scarf, hat and earrings.

Is he ornery or what?

I forgot to share these pictures when we visited Rio Hondo so I'll include them here:

Apple Fritters from Orneala's Bakery in Rio Hondo, TX

The sunset as we drove home from Rio Hondo.

May you each have a blessed day.  Thanks for following along!

Tuesday, March 6, 2018 - Morning Walk; Planning our Route/Stops to Kansas; Dinner with Friends

Tuesday, March 6, 2018 - Morning Walk; Planning our Route/Stops to Kansas; Dinner with Friends

It felt good to get out this morning and walk after little to no exercise this past week.  We were able to get in 1.6 miles.  It rained earlier this morning, so we took advantage of the break.  The radar indicated it would be raining here most of the morning, however I don't think it ever rained again until later in the afternoon/early evening.

After breakfast, Dean emptied tanks and I started working on planning our route from here in Mission back to Kansas.  We plan to take approximately 2 weeks to meander through Texas to arrive in Wichita on the 29th of March where we will spend a week with our two boys and their families there.  

I enjoy the route planning process.  Today, I managed to get most of the reservations for our return trip home set.  I hope to finish things up tomorrow.  Typically I would just call ahead for the next stop, possibly two.  Since spring break is coming up and many Winter Texans are heading back north, I'm going to book all campgrounds for the entire two weeks.  I was very fortunate, as one place I contacted yesterday only had one site left for the dates we need it, due to Spring Break.  It was a place we really wanted to stay at so I was thankful it worked out.

We will be leaving here the morning of March 14 and headed to Ron Hoover RV for the installation of the washer/dryer combo.  We need to be there between 9-9:30.  Hopefully it goes well and they can finish it in a decent timeframe.  We have a reservation at an RV Park just a short distance away for the night.   

At 4:00 we met our friends next door Dave, Nancy, Jay and Stella and followed them to Bubba's 33, a sports bar/restaurant.  We went for the pizza.  While these places tend to have good food, they are often loud with all of the TV's and music playing.  Fortunately there were not many people there yet, so it wasn't too bad.  We enjoyed watching some of the bicycling stunts on the TV nearest us, amazed at what some of these folks do.  On Tuesday Bubba's offers 2 of their signature pizzas for $19.99.  Most of those pizzas are regularly priced at $14.99.  We took advantage of the Tuesday special and purchased two - Meaty, Meaty and Hawaiian.  They were both excellent, and we now have dinner for Wednesday as well.  We both like pizza and enjoying trying new places.  We will definitely remember it for next winter.

We settled in to watch a movie on Amazon Prime.  We could not get in to it and both fell asleep.  We finally gave up and went to bed shortly after 8:30.  We both slept like a rock, so I guess we just needed a rest.  

Tuesday, February 27 - Monday, March 5, 2018 - Catching Up!

Tuesday, February 27 - Monday, March 5, 2018 - Catching Up!


Tuesday, February 27, 2018
I woke up early as usual with the idea of getting the pictures from the National Butterfly Center downloaded so I could get the post from Sunday finished.  I wasn't up too long and realized I wasn't feeling quite right.  I didn't even bother to turn the coffeepot on, and headed back to bed.  

Dean had made plans to play golf this morning with Dave.  He asked if I was going to be okay and I told him yes, to go on.  He loves playing golf and misses his daily games at home, so I didn't want him to miss out.  They left fairly early - 8:15 or so.  

The rest of my day was mostly a blur - as I was sick most of the time he was gone.  By the time Dean got home I was so sore from dry heaves I could hardly hold my head up, my neck muscles hurt so badly.  I slept on and off most of the day - I can only be thankful for that.  

That was pretty much my day.  Fortunately, Dean had a better day than me.  I'm glad he did. It would not have been fun here, and there was nothing he could have done for me.  Fortunately, I was no longer feeling sick, just very sore, and was able to get some sleep with the aid of Night Time Tylenol.


Wednesday, February 28, 2018
I slept so much yesterday that when I woke up at 3:30 this morning I could not go back to sleep.  I got up, but my neck and back hurt so bad it hurt to set up.  After going most of the day, with the pain increasing, Dean finally called the chiropractor to see if I could get in tomorrow.  They were not open, so he asked if there was any chance they could see me this afternoon.  Fortunately, they said yes.  I was so thankful and when we left his office I felt 90% better.  It was amazing how much it helped.  

The doctor did send me home with a TENS unit in case I had anymore pain before coming back Friday morning.  Later in the evening I finally decided we should try out the unit around 8, because I was having a little neck pain, but the battery was dead.  Dean offered to go to Dollar General to get one.  After eating a bite to eat, I decided I would just take a couple of night time Tylenol and go to bed.  I slept great and woke up feeling almost 100%, and best of all without any more neck pain.


Thursday, March 1, 2018
Today was wonderful in comparison to the past two days.  I was tired but felt somewhat normal.  I just expect to wake up every day feeling good.  It's a shock when it doesn't happen and really makes me appreciate how blessed I am that I am in relatively good health.

Later this morning Dean called Pep Boys to see if our tires had arrived and was advised they had been delivered.  He made arrangements to have the tires changed out tomorrow.

We made a quick trip to Wal-mart for a few groceries and just rested at home the rest of the afternoon and evening.


Friday, March 2, 2018
I had an appointment with Dr. Whitaker at 8:00 this morning.  While Dean was taking the tires off of the RV to take to Pep Boys, I drove myself to the chiropractor.  When I returned Dean loaded up the tires and headed out.  He returned in time for lunch, put the new tires on, put one slide back out, put one slide in, took off the second set of tires and headed back to Pep Boys.  He was back by 3:30 and he was finished with all of the work by 4:30 or so and we were back to normal.  It was a good productive day and I am still feeling great!  What more can you ask for?


Saturday, March 3, 2018
We have a few things we want to accomplish today.  First thing I headed to the park laundry.  After I returned and had things put away, we decided having breakfast down the road at Dona's was a good idea.  We both had the special (2 eggs, 2 sausage links, hash browns, toast and coffee for $3.99).  Dean asked for patties ($1 more) and I asked for bacon (same price).  We will probably return here. 

Dean wanted to visit Don-Wes flea market today.  He's looking for a part that will allow him to raise the handle bars on his bicycle.  Someone he talked with told him to check there.  Unfortunately, we did not find the part he was looking for, but we did find a new tire and tube for my bicycle.  Dean noticed the other day that my front tire was entirely flat.  When he looked closer he could see the tire needed to be replaced.  I am so glad we did this before we were riding in the State Park and it decided to go flat on me.

It was nice to stay in this afternoon and get some chores done.  I walked up to the office to reserve a spot here for next winter and to pay our electric bill for the month of February.  We are also going to change lots next year.  We will move directly across the street from where we are now.  We like our lot except it is entirely open to the wind.  The lot across the street from us has park models either side so it provides a little bit of protection.  The lots either side of us have been open about half of the time we've been here so there has been nothing to stop the wind from blowing everything on our lot.  It's knocked both our bikes and chairs over.  We tried putting out our mat, but immediately took it up.  Most of our site is concrete so we couldn't secure it.  Hopefully we'll like the new spot, although the downside is we will not be right at the fence near our Heartland friends next door.  

Dean changed the tire on my bicycle and I spent most of the afternoon and evening updating our budget spreadsheet for February.  February did not go as well as January - we went way over on dining out, although we were way under on several others, so it was all good - we purchased new tires and the camera, and we had lots of items under miscellaneous.  Once I had everything keyed in for the month, we set down to discuss the miscellaneous items and ended up adding a few new line items to better track some of those expenses.  


Sunday, March 4, 2018
At 7:00 I headed back to the park laundry to wash a couple more loads before getting ready for church.  

After church, we had a quick lunch, then met our Heartland friends next door.  We are making a trip to Old McAllen this afternoon.  Dean led the way with Dave following us with Nancy, Jay and Stella.  We spent about 2 hours walking up and down the streets, visiting a few shops here and there along the way.  I think everyone managed to buy something except Dean.  No major purchases but it was fun to spend time together and see the sites.  Afterwards, we stopped at China Sea Buffet for dinner, which was very good.  Once home, we rested for the remainder of the evening.

Monday, March 5, 2018
I had another appointment with Dr. Whitaker this morning.  I was feeling a little sore this morning and since we are headed to meet up with some friends afterwards I was glad to see him first.  I felt better when we left and still feel good this evening as I am finishing this up - about 10:00.  I think I am returning to normal - as normal as that can be!

After my appointment, we headed to Rio Hondo to the park where our friends Bob and Patty are staying this winter.  They too are from Southeast Kansas, and are members of our Escapees Chapter.  We had plans to meet last week but because of me, those had to be cancelled.  One of the things we wanted to do while there was to visit Ornela's Bakery to try one of their apple fritters.  We have heard they are the best around here and they freeze well.  Since Dean and I both LOVE apple fritters, we had to try one.  We first drove to Bob and Patty's and then Bob drove us all back to the bakery.  I could not believe these huge fritters were only $.85 each.  I bought a dozen for less than $11.  They were really good.  I will share some with our Heartland friends when we got home and I'll freeze the rest so we can enjoy them as we travel back to Kansas.

Once we returned to Bob and Patty's rig, Patty made a pot of coffee and each couple shared a fritter.  We had such a nice visit and we are so glad we had the chance to make it over to see them before we leave.  We had hoped to fit in a few more visits with friends in this area, but losing those days last week really set us back.  We have several things to do in preparation for leaving, a few shopping trips scheduled, as well as a final get together with our Escapee group on Tuesday the 13th before we leave early the morning of the 14th.  

By the time we were closer to our park, we were both hungry.  We were looking for a place to stop when I noticed we were coming up on the corner of Business 83 and Tower Road.  Hmmmm, a Tower Burger sounds pretty good.  We decided to stop - and we stuck to our guns - and shared one burger between us with a side of onion strings.  A very good choice!  I'm glad we had the chance to try this place one more time before we head north.  

Monday, February 26, 2018 - Walking..RV Park; Tire Fiasco; Anniversary Day--Movie, Dinner & DQ

Monday, February 26, 2018 - Walking..RV Park; Tire Fiasco; Anniversary Day--Movie, Dinner and  DQ.

We walked in the RV Park today.  When we stepped out it was lightly misting - continuing the entire 3 laps we made, for a total of 1.62 miles.  We do not like to get too far away when the weather isn't favorable.

You may remember Dean ordered tires for the RV on the 17th of February.  The same day he ordered them he received an email notice from our credit card company notifying us of a payment over the threshold we have set with them, asking us to contact them if it was in error.  We had authorized it so we did not call.  We've never called in the past when this has occurred unless something was wrong.  We have never called unless we've had a problem.  As of today, he has not heard anything from Pep Boys about receiving the tires; or a tracking number from Simple Tires they said would be emailed to him.  This morning he called Simple Tire.  The representative said they had emailed him, but when he checked his email and spam he had not received an email from them.  They checked his email address to make sure it was correct.  That is where the problem was, someone transposed the first two letters of his email address. Once they had the address corrected they resent the email.  The email was asking for additional information.  Basically the problem for Simple Tires was the billing address we provided - our mail service address - does not match up with our physical address where we stay when we are in Oswego, and we are more than 50 miles away from the billing.  So, per their request, we provided a copy of his Driver's License showing our physical address, a copy of our RV insurance policy showing our mail service address, and a copy of our credit card, with all but the last 4 numbers blocked out, but with his name showing on it.  Upon receipt of the information, they will process the order and ship to the address we provided (at the Pep Boys location here for installation).  Well, that was done and now the tires should be on the way.  Whew!!!  

Now we can focus on our special plans for the day because today is our 24th anniversary.  24 years of wedded bliss - well, most of the time.  HaHa!  Honestly, we do get along well and truly enjoy each other's company very much.  You have to in order to spend as much time together as we do in such a small area day after day.  

One of Dean's favorite things is going to see a movie.  I'm okay with them if they are not violent and the language is PG-13 or less, but I admit I am not the movie fan that he is.  However, life is all about compromises.  It's something I can do for him because he does SO much for me.  The McAllen Cinema 6 offers $1.68 tickets for Seniors on Monday.  They do not have the most current movies, however they offer recent ones that have just moved from the main theaters.  That is fine with us since we haven't watched many movies in the past few years - we are still catching up!  Checking online Dean decided on the movie Wonder with Julia Roberts and Owen Wilson.  It is about a young boy, Auggie Pullman with facial differences, as he leaves the protection of home schooling by his mom, into mainstream 5th grade.  It's just one of those sad, happy, feel good movies that I love, so I was over the top with his choice.  To tell you the truth I'm not sure if the reason Dean likes the movies is for the movie itself or just to enjoy movie theater popcorn.  He is a popcorn fiend!  That was our lunch today since we are going to dinner later.  The movie was over around 1:00, so we returned to the park to rest a little before dinner.  I'm trying to get the pictures downloaded from our visit to the National Butterfly Park yesterday.  It's been quite a process with the slow internet service we get here.  I finally gave up and took a little nap instead.

I asked Dean where he wanted to eat tonight and he gave me that silly little grin of his and said "Dirty Al's".  We ate here with Dennis and Pam not too long after we arrived and he LOVED it.  He has mentioned several times he wants to return before we leave, so that's where we headed about 4:45.  

We both ordered the medium shrimp dinner - 7 butterflied shrimp with red roasted potatoes.  A very nice meal that wasn't too much food.  We seriously considered ordering the banana bread pudding to share for dessert but we denied ourselves.....at least for a little while.

Once we left the restaurant, the Texas Stop Sign came up and for some reason Maxx (our truck) insisted Dean turn that way.  Those trucks sometimes have a mind of their own!  Once we arrived, I was horrified!  I really did not want to get out of the truck because of the hundreds; if not thousands of black birds sitting on utility lines behind Dairy Queen.  They were filling every single tree in the immediate area and it was just bizarre - all I could think about was the movie "The Birds".  You could hear them cackling as soon as we pulled into the parking area.  It was LOUD!  I literally ran the short distance from the truck to DQ - not because I was afraid they would swoop down and get me - but the ground was covered with bird-do!  Ugh.  I was thinking to myself, is ice cream really this important.......as I ran under them, praying I did not feel any "plops".  

Once inside, and safe, I chose the new feature blizzard for the month of March, a mini, Mint Oreo chocolate blizzard and Dean stayed with his new favorite, a small banana split blizzard.   We ate inside, enjoying every bite before heading home.  Yes, I ran back to the truck!  

What a very nice day we've had.  I am so thankful for such a wonderful, fun-loving, and amazing husband.  I couldn't ask for anyone better!  

As we left I snapped a couple of pictures of these birds - not real good, due to the glare - but wanted to give you an idea of what I was talking about.

There were at least this many birds, or more, on the lines in front of DQ as well as these shown here, located behind the store.

I'm not sure how many of these small trees (but at least 10) were in the surrounding parking lots but everyone of them was loaded with black birds like this tree above.  Click to enlarge this to see them.

Sunday, February 25, 2018 - Omelettes; Fruits & Vegetables; National Butterfly Park; Anniversary!

Sunday, February 25, 2018 - Omelettes; Fruits & Vegetables; National Butterfly Park; Anniversary!

As I mentioned in the last post we did not plan to walk or ride our bicycles this morning, because we are headed to Victoria Palms (VP) with Dennis and Pam to have breakfast.  This is the first thing Dennis and Pam introduced us to after we arrived.  We loved it enough we wanted to get in one last visit before we leave. The chef at VP makes the omelettes to order as you watch, and next to it is a waffle station.  I loved the previous omelette so I was back for another one!  Dean chose an omelette for this visit, as well as a large waffle that he shared with me.  It was nice and light and almost as good as the omelette.  A breakfast bar provides several other breakfast options.

Many of the resorts down here have various clubs and/or crafts there guests/owners can participate in.  One that seems to be very popular by many men and women are the woodworking and carving classes provided.  Here are a few pictures of some of the wood carving exhibits on display at Victoria Palms.

From Victoria Palms we took a side road down to Business 83, where Don-Wes Flea Market is held, as well as a fruit/vegetable "stand" that we visited before.  I bought a green pepper, a bag of large (5) sweet carrots, 3 sweet oranges and a pineapple.  Before we leave in a couple of weeks I plan to make another stop here to pick up several vegetables.  Once we are back on the road I will be cooking most days and I know we'll use the food.  Right now I hate to buy too much for fear it will go to waste.  There are just too many "dining out" opportunities here.  While we definitely enjoy the food, the opportunity to spend time with friends is just as important.

Dennis and Pam dropped us off at our park.  I started work on the blog, and soon I was able to post our day's events for Saturday and now I'm working on Sunday.  We are going to visit the National Butterfly Park this afternoon.  It's warm out but very overcast, so its not uncomfortable to be outside.  It should be a good day to sit in the park to watch the birds and butterflies.

In the meantime I suggested to Dean that we walk to our park's office to see if they had posted a sign up sheet for an excursion discussed on Saturday while I was there doing laundry.  It consists of a 3.5-4 hour boat excursion that includes a variety of things to see and do - dolphins, visiting Ports of Isabel and Brownsville and concludes with lunch at a restaurant in the area.  We walked in to find a couple of ladies visiting.  While we searched the many sign up sheets for various events, posted on a large bulletin board, one of the ladies left.  We were soon having a conversation with Shirley.  When visiting someone for the first time here you go through a gamut of questions: where are you from, is this your first time in the valley, what site are you on, how long have you been here, etc.  Once we had addressed these, we struck up a conversation about Instapots.  Some ladies are going to do a session on them here in the park.  Shirley has one but has never used it, so I had to tell her how much I loved mine.  We discussed recipes and before leaving I promised to bring her copies of the recipes I use, and told her about a couple of Facebook pages I follow as well.

Soon after this point, I grabbed my camera as we headed out the door, hoping for some really good pictures at the National Butterfly Park. Upon arrival, we checked in, paid our fee of $5 each, and double checked the time they will feed the birds.  While  visiting the park several days ago the curator told us they fed the birds at 8:30 and 1:30 each day.  When I asked the curator on duty if the feeding would be at 1:30 he told us it would be at 2:30.  It was a bit frustrating since we hurried to get here before 1:30, but we made the best of it and enjoyed a leisurely walk from the park building to the bird feeding area.  I took pictures of some butterflies and numerous signs along the way.  As we worked our way to the feeding location, we noticed several people crowded together and it was apparent they were looking at something.  As we approached them, told us they had sighted a painted bunting.  Dean and I both looked and watched for quite awhile.  Dean is pretty sure he saw a glimpse of it but it eluded me.  A number of birds were flying in for "leftovers" from the previous feeding, which gave me the opportunity to get some nice pictures.  At 3:00 we finally left without anyone ever showing up "to feed the birds".  When we stopped at the park office I asked him about it, and told him of our disappointment the feeding never occurred.  We still had a good time and I have several decent pictures.  

Mocking Bird

Cardinal

                                       Green Jay

Golden-fronted Woodpecker
I'm disappointed the first two pictures do not show up better here. You might try enlarging them to original size to see the colors better.  Very pretty and difficult to get a picture of!!

Three in 1
I believe these are a white tipped dove, red winged blackbird, and I'm not sure of the one at the bottom - he was a bonus I didn't know I had until I saw the picture.  

Long billed Thrasher - you can see he was really giving the ground a thrashing!






I could not find a picture in the flyer I have that looked anything like this bird, but we had fun watching him splash in the bit of water on this rock.

An Altimara Oriole.  So pretty and fun to watch.

A Great Kiskadee.  He just would not allow me to get a good picture of his face but he has the markings in the picture I have.

This little guy would not stay still very long and it was the best picture I could get.  It is a titmouse, I believe a black-crested one.  He flitted back and forth between this log and the tree to his right so fast he was a blur.

In the office they told us the butterflies are not really in here yet due to the cooler temperatures this year, so these are all I managed to get photos of.

Unknown

Red Admiral

Unknown

Pretty yellow flower on an interesting looking weed.

Once we returned, I actually made a "meal" for dinner tonight - spaghetti and meatballs.  It hit the spot, and provided an opportunity to use food in the freezer, so we'll have space to store some goodies we want to bring back with us.

Tomorrow is our 24th wedding anniversary.  I am so blessed to have such a wonderful, fun-loving husband.  It's hard to believe so much time has passed, but we are fortunate that we still enjoy one another's company as much, if not more than we did when we said our "I do's"!  Happy anniversary Dean-o!  I love you!

I'm sorry for the slow post on this.  Besides the time it has taken to edit these pictures and select the ones I wanted to use, I had a bug that had me down for two full days (27 & 28).  I would try to blame it on our anniversary dinner, but we both had the exact same thing.  Fortunately, Dean was not affected by it.  

Since I've lost those two days, I am behind on several things in preparation for our leaving here in less than two weeks, so bear with me again as I try to get things caught up - probably all in one post.