Three Strikes, You're Out! -I'd really like a recount!

I don't know how time has flown by so fast for the past few months...I have a New Years resolution to complete a blog post each month -and as you can see, I was successful at that for a whole 2 months! So, here I go trying to make up for lost time and missed blog posts. My blogs for March, April and May will consist of recaps and reflections...and a hope that not all is lost in my New Years resolution.

Texas Fun

Since moving to Texas, we have had the opportunity to enjoy a few of the local attractions. Living in a large city affords us an endless list of entertaining, cultural, natural, culinary and social venues to experience. We continue to add to our list of things we "must do" while we're living here. We hope that many friends will come and visit us, so that we will have lots of excuses to accomplish our to-do list! Here are a few things we've done so far.

Randolph AFB Air Show-

 The Blue Angels lined up, getting ready for their performance.

In October, the Air Show came to Randolph. We couldn't have missed it if we wanted to...we were still in the base TLFs at the time, and for days before the Saturday-Sunday official air show, the planes were practicing their stunts and flights overhead. All day long, the sky was filled with jets flying from right to left, north to south, and 0-Mach in what seemed like no time at all. The Blue Angels gave an AWESOME performance with some of the most incredible flying maneuvers ever seen.



Occasionally around Texas you get exposed to the native die-heart allegiance to cowboys, country, and beef...here is one such exposure I encountered. I loved it so much, I had to double back on the freeway to take a picture of it! It's an advertisement for a Texas Rodeo.


We've also learned that Texans have a language of their own. For a while, we were confused by phrases and words that we heard. Then we got the following translating tool, which helped us to understand our neighbors better:

One of the fun entertainment attractions we have just down the road is the Retama Park racetrack. It's a live horse race track. For Tim's birthday, we took the opportunity to attend the end-of-the-season races at the park, and thoroughly enjoyed our evening. It made me think of the scene in My Fair Lady, when Eliza makes her public debut after her "polishing makeover" by Dr. Henry Higgens...Eliza gets so excited by the horses in the race, she forgets all of her "polite" manners and makes a social blunder. (If you haven't seen the movie, you must. It's a classic!). Anyhow, we had fun learning how to read the statistics given in the handbook, observing other people at the racetrack, and finally placing a bet of our own on a horse. The horse didn't win, but it was a close race.


Among other area attractions is the local Wildlife Safari Park. When Tim's brother, Micah, and sister-in-law, Hannah, came out for a visit, we took them through the drive-through park. We saw a bunch of different animals, and even got to feed many of them from our vehicle. It reminded us a bit of our favorite tourist attraction in Rapid City: Bear Country; except the Wildlife Safari Park doesn't have bears.

2011 End-of-year Recap

After moving, time sped up. I'm sure it did, because I didn't have sufficient time to keep my blog updated. So here's a simple recap of the last few months of 2011. After moving to Texas, we stayed in temporary lodging for a little over a month before moving into our new home. Searching for a home was a long and energy-consuming task for us. We finally settled on a house that is located just out of the south gate of Randolph AFB in a small, but pleasant neighborhood. Our commute to and from the base is one of the main reasons we love this place -Tim has a short drive into work each morning and doesn't have to fight traffic, he can come home for lunch sometimes, and he's able to drop in to grab study materials, if he needs them; I love having the base amenities so close by! Once we moved in, we had most of the boxes unpacked and out of the house within a month. There were final pieces of organization to do, but the bulk of it got done quickly.
For Thanksgiving, we visited my family in Enid, OK. It was nice to have a long weekend to get out of town, get to visit family, and enjoy delicious food! We took a trip to Oklahoma City to see an art exhibit of ancient sacred manuscripts that have been preserved-it was neat to see the special ways God's Word has endured through the ages. We originally planned to pick up our dog, Ellie, when we visited my family for Thanksgiving, because they were watching her for us while we moved -thank you!!! However, we had to put her down...actually my mom took her to the shelter to have her put down. She was a naughty dog and bit someone, so we decided it was best to put her down so she doesn't bite anymore. However, it was very sad to have to say goodbye...we are looking for a new dog.
Since coming to San Antonio, I have applied at several Christian schools as a substitute teacher. I've been subbing every once in a while; it's not much, but it's something, so that's good. I really enjoy my days in the classroom, but am thankful that it's not every day so that I have time to settle in at home and make friends.
We spent Christmas here at home. It was a nice, quiet holiday time that afforded Tim a chance to catch up on rest and relaxing. He has been studying very hard during his training, and the holiday break was much needed. We decorated the house with a live Christmas tree, lights, and several nativity sets. Over the Christmas break, we also went shopping...for furniture! We got a new couch set, living room furniture, and bedroom furniture. We feel so blessed! We're very excited that our new furniture makes our house look like a family home...instead of having odd pieces of furniture, we have pieces that match! The old pieces are upstairs in the loft area, providing an extra sitting area when we have company come and visit. We have yet to put curtains on the windows and pictures on the walls...but we'll get there soon.

Our home in Texas...there's plenty of space for visitors!

Goodbye Black Hills. Hello, Texas. Here we come.

Being a military family, moving is inevitable for us. Our new assignment took us away from friends, familiar, and fun in the Black hills, but we look forward to our adventures in Texas. Our move came and went quickly. The packers came for two days to box up half of our goods, and then the third day they loaded it all up on a truck, and it was gone. We moved 1/2 of our stuff ourselves -a do-it-yourself, or DITY, move. It involved renting a truck and auto-trailer, packing up boxes and stuff by ourselves, and loading it all up. We were thankful for some help from friends!

 All set and ready to leave Rapid City, SD.

 Ellie's sweet ride...she got to be a passenger the whole time!

 Our caravan of vehicles packed with our stuff.

We stopped for a few days to visit my parents and sisters (L-R): Bill & Jeanne, Katie & Missy

Colorado-Utah Travels

When you return from a trip do you ever feel the need to take a break? You know, a vacation from the vacation? Also, have you ever returned from a trip to turn around a go on another one? Well, that's what we did. We returned from our trip to Jamaica and went through Colorado and Utah to attend a friend's wedding.

Our trip through Colorado took us to Steamboat Springs. We spent an evening going to Fish Creek Falls and dinner at a steakhouse afterward where we grilled our own steaks!

 The Fish Creek Falls. 

Grilling our steaks at 8th Street Steakhouse.

The following day was my birthday and Tim me up to the top of the mountain on a gondola ride. It was beautiful! We wanted to take the day and hike up and down a mountain, but didn't carve enough time in our schedule for that. So, we took in the scenery, and then went back down the mountain. I was very scarred taking the gondola back down! 

We drove to Utah and attended the wedding of our friends, which was beautiful and lovely. Then we returned home after our two vacations. 

Jamaica Paradise

As a treat to ourselves, or rather, as a retreat from the everyday surroundings of home and country, we took a "honeymoon" trip to Jamaica shortly after Tim returned from deployment. We spent a week at an all-inclusive hotel in Negril, a place known for it's peaceful and delightful beaches. We thoroughly enjoyed our time there and felt as though we spent a week in paradise. The weather was perfect -not too hot, not too cold, a bit rainy some afternoons, lovely in the mornings, and mostly sunny at the "just right" temperature. The water in the bay was just as complimentary as the weather -not too cold, just cool enough to be the refreshing interruption to our beach sunbathing. The natural life was just what you would expect of paradise -tall palm trees, short ferns, tropical flowers of all shapes and colors, birds singing in the trees, crickets chirping at night, crabs scampering across your path, lizards zipping here and there, and breathtaking sunsets that arrayed the evening in glory.

We decided to make the goal of our trip: refreshment. So we didn't max out the schedule, we simply did what we wanted to do and took one day at a time. We spent a lot of time relaxing on the beach or in the water, enjoying the delicious food that was made for us (and some mornings delivered to our room!), and catching up on lost sleep. One day we took kayaks out into the bay, rowing ourselves around the shore to see the neighboring sights. Another day we went snorkeling and took a ride in a glass-bottom boat. Tim thoroughly enjoyed the snorkeling, but I was scarred the entire time, though I tried to enjoy it too. When I stuck my head in the water and saw schools of fish swimming toward me, I would feel my heart starting to race, and had to remind myself, "They are just little fish and they aren't going to hurt you." (Seriously, I frequent the dog park where the animals are much bigger and have much more potential of injuring me, but for some reason, I was scarred of the little fish in the sea.) After our day snorkeling excursion, we decide that night snorkeling was out. We took a Catamaran cruise one afternoon that took us along part of the 7-mile beach. We stopped at a few rock caves, and got to go exploring for a little while. We tried to go sailing on a Hobie-Cat, but there wasn't any wind, so we couldn't go anywhere.

We spent a week in Jamaica and didn't want to come home when the week was over! If you want a great vacation sometime, we recommend visiting Jamaica.

Jamaica Slideshow

Early morning airport arrival...waiting for our flight.

Here we come!

Tim caught some Z's on the flight.

Necessary documents.

Jamaica coastline.

This is the stop we made on the way to the resort.

A famous Jamaican legend. 

Painting on the side of the building.

As stated, the national dish -we got to try ackee with saltfish while we were there, but didn't get to try the breadfruit. 

On the way to the resort.

Our resort room...tropical and clean!

My favorite part of the trip: breakfast in bed!

Beautiful beach.

Dinner out...there were several restaurants at the resort and they all served delicious food!

Tim going out for a night swim in the bay.

Spending a day at the beach.

Tropical flowers and ferns.

Another tropical flower.

Sunset.

Tropical sunset along the beach.