2025-12-8 Polar Bear Plunge at the Texas Ramblin' Roses Rally

Every Texas Ramblin' Roses is different and our hostesses, Anne Moursand and Teri Daughtry, came up with a unique twist for this one.......a polar bear plunge. 

It was very chilly, at least for south Texas. I volunteered to take the photos. Yes, I was a chicken in the cold. They set up a small inflatable pool next to the heated outdoor pool. The plan was to put in a bag of ice and some plastic bubbles that looked like ice. Well, our very helpful RV park manager, Bill, showed up with about 6 big bags of ice cubes. Water was added and the whole bunch froze together. Vicki is trying to break it up enough to wade in, lol.

Success.......Anne, Teri, and Mary take the plunge!

Vicki is next up!

Not to be outdone, Rita takes the plunge.

Anne and Teri hit the big pool next. The pool water may have been 85 degrees but the air temp was about 50 degrees. It was cold.

Rita confirms that it doesn't feel warm at all.

Mary is up next. Notice that Anne and Teri are the only two brave enough to sport bathing suits and full immersion.

Our shivering plungers are all smiles after it was over!

Jimmie and Barb separate the bubbles from the ice as part of the clean up. It all melted by the next day so that the little pool could be drained.
 

2025-12-7 And the TRR Rockport Rally Begins

Breakfast served by Wilderness Oaks RV Resort on Saturday morning. It was very good. They have lots of stuff going on because the Winter Texans are here and we got to join in.

Then on to watch a wreath making class in the activity center.  Olivia, Anne, and Teri were into the craft!

And then it was time for the Texas Ramblin' Roses Meet and Greet to get the rally started.

Fun is in the air!

 

2025-12-5 Rockport Holiday Parade and Fireworks

 Elaine and I left Schertz and headed down to Rockport TX on Thursday. We had reservations at Wilderness Oaks RV Park, our favorite place to stay in Rockport. The rally we were going to didn't start until Sunday night but we always like to arrive early and stay longer. Friday night the city put on a holiday parade that started down at the beach and headed along the bay. We thought we would miss it because we couldn't get to the beach because of the traffic but we really went for the fireworks over the bay. After we parked, we discovered we were actually near the end of the parade route.

It was actually a pretty long parade. Small towns put a lot of effort into their parades.

It was the coldest day we were in Rockport but we stuck it out.

The fireworks were shot out over the bay.

It was a great way to start our time in Rockport!

2025-5-19 Rockport Rally - the end

Okay, normally our rallies end with a hitch-up breakfast which as a hostess, I sometimes don't have because you just never know how many women to plan for. Some get up and go real early if they have a long way to go, some are in the middle of packing up, and some just want to sleep in. This particular hitch-up breakfast was going to be served up by the chapter officers. We had plenty left over from the brunch was it was a big spread instead of just bagels, cream cheese, and coffee.

But was the rally really over??? Well, some women were staying through at least Tuesday so Jimmie offered to have a fish fry Monday night. She spends most of her time here in Rockport and is a big fisher person so she had some fish she caught in her freezer. Hmmm.  A lot of women immediately expressed interest so another fishing trip was scheduled for that day.

Elaine headed out with a small group and was thrilled with the fish she caught. They fished from the bank because the water out a little further was pretty rough for Jimmie's boat.

Jimmie decided we should also give blue crab a try as they are pretty popular here but those came from a local shop. Elaine, our chef extraordinaire, had never cooked live blue crab before.

Cookie stepped in to show her how you toss them in the pot without getting pinched. Can't you tell Elaine is not really into this part of the process?

In the meantime, Jimmie is busy frying up pieces of fish. We also had some really great hush puppies.

I made a Caesar salad and several others brought salads or desserts so we had another feast. Rita brought some great chicken drum sticks for those not really into fishy food, lol.

This time the actual rally was over. What a really fun time if I do say so myself......everyone else did too.

2025-5-18 Rockport Rally Day 4

 Our chapter usually has a big potluck dinner on Saturday night. July rallies that I host at Wilderness Oaks are hot and usually mean that we order pizzas and fix salads for dinner. This year the rally was in May and Elaine, Barb, and I as hostesses decided to do something completely different. Okay, the pajama party was very different too. Anyway, we decided to host a big Sunday brunch. We had biscuits with sausage gravy or jelly and homemade friendship and banana bread provided by Elaine and me along with 3 kinds of juice, several great fruit trays, other whole fruits, meat and cheese platters and too many other items to remember. Being that I was in the thick of things cooking and serving, I didn't get any photos. I miss my friend Caroline Patin at rallies and I also miss never having to worry about getting photos because she gets them all. 

After the big brunch, there were announcements, and most definitely the big group photo of the Texas Ramblin' Roses.

It was dinner on your own again but Cookie and Eva invited everyone over to their rig for sandwiches so not many went out again.

2025-5-15 Texas Ramblin' Roses Rally - Day 1

 Check in time for the rally was Thursday afternoon from 4- 5:30 PM. Dinner was on your own and then we had a pajama party starting at 7 PM. Several of us made homemade cookies and there were a ton of other goodies for munching.  Almost everybody got into the spirit. I'll just let the pictures tell the story for the most part.

And then it got a little more spirited when one of the ladies urged everyone to strut their stuff modeling their outfits.

These are a fun bunch of women as you can readily see. Next on the agenda was a wild game of musical chairs. I am not great at planning group games and I was just hoping for no broken hips. I did check out the location of the nearest hospital just in case.

We also played a game of charades and everyone also jumped in to play. There were some prizes involved in each of the events but, in the case of charades, the prizes went to the performer for being such a good sport instead of the person who guessed. Their prize was to be the next performer. All in all, everyone seemed to have a great time and it was definitely a new rally event.