Randolph AFB Air Show - Oct 2011

The Air Show is in town at Randolph AFB.  Since we are an Air Force family, Steve thought it would be great to take the kids.  In addition to the Blue Angel's (I know, Navy instead of the Air Force Thunderbirds but they are good too), there a lot of other air demonstration acts.  One of the acts was the Vietnam era show and it was fantastic.  They dropped smoke bombs and really put on a screaming show.  I got a call from my husband Dave who was working at the Live Oak Civic Center.  Some of the vendors saw the smoke from their parking lot a mile away and wondered if there was a crash.  Nope, just a great show.

There were also lots of static display planes to look at.  I know you can see it.  Steve and the kids are in costume again.  Might as well get mileage while you can.

This plane's civilian pilot was letting some of the kids take a look at the cockpit of his plane.

He asked Morgan to pose and you don't have to ask her twice!  She has all the moves down.

There were also helocopters of various kinds.

This was a medivac helocopter.  Fortunately they were more than satisfied to sit in the back and didn't want to lay on the stretchers.

There were walk-throughs in some of the larger planes.

You went in the front and came out the back of the plane

We did lots of walking across the tarmac.  It doesn't look crowded here but there were lots of people out there.  This was near the opposite end from where the planes were flying.

When the kids came out of this huge plane, the crew was handing out treats to the kids.  What a nice touch.

We stopped to take a little break just off the tarmac behind the booths.  Music was playing so Morgan had to dance.

Cameron is a little more shy but once he gets warmed up........

The Geico Nascar Number 13 was on display and the crew came over and asked the kids to pose with both their trailer and the car.  They said it would be on their website this week.

Of course there was the inevitable midway rides.  Cameron chose a Pirates of the Caribbean inflatable playground.

Morgan chose a bouncing castle.  I think she got a bigger bang for her buck.  They had a euro ball ride where you climbed inside an inflated ball and rolled around in a pool.  $10 bucks per ball, 4 balls in the pool, probably not more than 3 or 4 minutes in the ball.  Lots of money being raked in there.

Cameron decided to relax a bit while we were waiting on the Blue Angels to take to the sky.  Kids and dogs can relax anywhere.

Another fun day was had by all.

Halloween at La Villita

My son drove up from Florida for a long weekend to spend time with his kids and we are lucky enough to get to share in the visit.  I came home from Potter's Creek about lunchtime on Wednesday.  By 3:00 PM, the RV was emptied out and we took it back to the storage lot.  Steve arrived in time for dinner as he left about 6 AM.    This was Halloween weekend since Halloween was on Monday and the kids would be gone.  My daughter-in-law had already researched the Internet and found a Halloween experience available on Saturday.  The kids brought their costumes with them and Steve had his ready to go as well.  Here we have the cowboy wearing his grandmother's vest (yes, I had it when I was his age) and a princess although I thought she looked more like Alice in Wonderland.  Harley wore his camouflage suit.

Yes, I dressed up too.  My mother made this costume for herself when I was a little girl so it is also an antique.  It has gotten plenty of use over the years as I wore it to work on Halloween a number of times.

Our destination was "Halloween Street at La Villita".  La Villita is a one block square historic arts village on the river in downtown San Antonio.  It is a very interesting place to visit any time you head down to the San Antonio Riverwalk.  We lucked out and found a reasonable parking lot only two blocks away.  Can't beat that.  You can see that there were lots of costumes in evidence.

This was early before it got much more crowded.

Various businesses, radio, and TV stations had booths set up to hand out candy.  The lines became rather long at each booth but the kids had fun seeing all the costumes and there wasn't a word of complaint.

After a couple of hours, Steve and I were much more tired than the kids.  We took a quick break behind one of the buildings.  Steve got pretty hot in his costume mask.  I can't tell you how many people took a picture of him or wanted their picture taken with him.  All the kids knew he was "Scream" from what they had seen on TV.

It was a fun day.  The kids were excited because we got a big bag of kettle corn to take home which meant they wanted "movie night".  I mean you can't have popcorn without movie night, right?

Trip to Wimberly, TX

Leaving Blanco, we headed east across the Hill Country to Wimberley, TX.  It was a short drive through interesting countryside.  Once we reached Wimberly, we headed to the square where we had lunch at the Wimberley Cafe.  They have interesting specials and reasonable food with friendly service.  There are a lot of  food choices in Wimberley but we knew that our time there would be limited since the dachsies were waiting for us back at the campground and we had already been gone several hours.  Looking out our window while we had lunch, we saw this pomegranate tree right across the road.  It is very interesting as it has flowers and fruit at the same time.

There are a lot of interesting shops in Wimberley any time you go so be sure you allow enough time to browse.  Our trip was a bit hurried but we plan to go back very soon to attend the Wimberley Market Days and spend the whole day.  Wimberley hosts the oldest outdoor market in the Texas Hill Country and the second-largest in the state with over 475 booths of everything you can't live without. They have tree-shaded paths and live music.  Here is the info on Market Days:

• 1st Saturday of the month March-December
• Open 1st Saturdays 7:00-4:00 p.m.
• Clean, Handicap Accessible Restrooms
• Free Admission
• 3 Large Parking Lots - $5.00

We had time for a quick stroll around the immediate square but didn't get to browse around beyond that.  We saw these unique sculptures in front of one store.

And then we found a narrow walkway leading around to a garden in the back.  It was an amazing hill country sculpture garden.  I couldn't stop snapping pictures so I hope you enjoy the whimsical characters.

Nancy couldn't resist posing with this neat group in front of an artisan Texas flag.

There is a good variety of shops to choose from.  This "Kiss the Cook" was a kitchen store.

Everything for the  bird lover and all dressed up for Halloween.

A unique bed and breakfast right off the square.

This shop had pumpkins piled everywhere.

We had to leave too soon but stopped at an overlook to snap a couple of pictures.  The dark areas you see are shadows from the clouds because it was a very bright day.

It was very interesting to see them floating across the landscape.

We'll be back to give Wimberley a much better look very soon.

Blanco, Tx

Nancy and I were up for an outing today.  We planned to go to Wimberly but our first stop was going to be Blanco, Texas.  I have been through this town so many times on Hwy 281 but almost never stopped.  There is a state park here right off the highway too.  So we decided to check it out first.  This is entrance.  There are lots of picnic tables and nice areas on this side of the river for day visitors.  A road runs both ways along the river on the entrance side.

You have to cross the river using the low water crossing road in order to get to the camping area.  Once across you go up a small hill to the campground.

It's not a large campground, only about 25 or 30 spots.  There is one circle with full hookups including sewer.  The other circle has electric and water.  There are nice restrooms, a small playground, and lots of shade trees.  You can see several of the camping sites below.  It is a lovely place.  Swimming is in the Blanco River.  When you pass the park in the summer, you can see everyone having fun in the swimming area but you cannot see the campground.  There are plenty of places to walk and enjoy nature in this little jewel.

This shelter was built during the old CCC area and is really nice.  There is a nice fireplace in one end of it.  They also have screened shelters for rent with a concrete table in one end with lots of room to set up your own cots.

Another thing that is unique about this park is that you feel like you are out in the country but you can actually walk into town without much effort as it is only a couple of blocks to the town square.  Here you will find a couple of restaurants, antique shops, pottery, etc.  There is also a very friendly visitor's center just waiting to provide you with all kinds of info about the area.

As is common in many small Texas towns, the courthouse is at the center of it all.

Did I mention that Blanco is the Lavender capitol of Texas?  There are several lavender farms in the area and a big festival in the summer.  There are also wineries in the area.

Next we headed off to Wimberly--but that's another blog.  On the way, we stopped at this farmer's market.  While you can't see anything outside, there are things inside.  Since it is during the week, everything is "on the honor system".  You pick what you want and leave the money there.  As it is the end of October and nearly lunch time, fruits and vegetables are not in big supply.  But there were huge bouquets of beautiful fall flowers for really reasonable prices.  There were eggs and cheeses as well.  Very interesting.  Off in the distance behind the building we could see greenhouses and planted fields.

Stay tuned for a visit to Wimberly, TX.  And stop by and take a look at Blanco the next time you are in the area.  You won't regret it.