Sole Snapshot of People at Garner State Park

A grand cousin, grand niece, and Dan.

Garner State Park, June 1, 2015

I was not feeling the greatest while camping; but, I am so glad I went because the younger kids were so friendly and adorable. They hung around our campsite a LOT which pleased me to no end.

In the mornings and late evenings, I would wander around looking for flying flowers (butterflies). I actually channeled Elmer Fudd and hunted down some "wascally wabbits" and succeeded. In the afternoons, a woodpecker would regularly invade our campground and I attempted to capture them. Unfortunately, I only took one picture of people. Maybe next time I'll concentrate on capturing people in moments of time.

These were taken on June 1, 2015

Horsemint

The "Wascally Wabbit", Jack Rabbit

Bordered Patch {Chlosyne lacinia} butterfly

Unidentifed

A faded Bordered Patch {Chlosyne lacinia} butterfly

A faded checkered butterfly; most likely Vesta Crescent (Phyciodes vesta)

My field Guide also calls it a "Vesta Cresentspot"

Woodpeckers at Garner, June 1 - 2, 2015

I felt like these guys were channeling Woody Woodpecker. They often showed up at the campgrounds late mornings and early afternoons. I had my camera constantly with me ready to shoot. I felt like they were silently laughing at me. They drove me nuts and I had a hard time capturing decent pictures.

Note: All of these shots are of Golden-fronted woodpeckers.

The pictures below were shot on June 1, 2015

The pictures below were shot on June 2, 2015

This one (above) is most likely a juvenile.

A Pair! The one that blends in with the tree is most likely a juvenile.

Chipping Sparrow (at Garner State Park)

{To see a larger image, go here.}

I think this is an amazing shot considering these birds are extremely flighty.

Thursday's Thoughts

A lot has happened since my last Thursday's Thoughts post. By the way, I just reread that post and discovered a major flub. And yes, "flub" is a legit word. The writing error drove me batty and the perfectionist in me could not leave it alone. So, I ended up editing the post to correct the mistake.

Garner is All About the Frio River
We went camping at Garner. We were there for almost a week and had a wonderful time. There was family around and thus, things seemed more normal. Garner isn't Garner without family. I loved seeing every single one of them. I did have a meltdown on the first day when I saw my eldest brother exiting a path from the river while sitting at our campsite. At the time, he was the spitting image of my Dad and I miss him so much. But, life goes on, right? Right.

As soon as I find the time to go through the pictures I took, I will post them. The general and family pictures will be posted this blog. However, the flowers, bugs and more will most likely be posted on my Pictorial Reminiscence blog simply because I do not desire to overwhelm my readers with a deluge of pictures. I will put out announcement(s) pointing you over to the other blog whenever I post update(s).

When we left Garner, we practically did a 180° in focus. We looked forward to our new house and started making plans. We decided to put the garage conversion on hold due to a variety of reasons. The process of converting the garage will be a lot slower. I think we are just anxious to move out of this rental and into our own house.

So, we cemented some of our plans and went over to the house this past Saturday after renting jackhammer. By the way, we rented the jackhammer from Saturday morning to Monday morning for the price of one day's rental. This is an awesome savings in my book. Anyway, our goal was to rip up the tile from the living room, hallway and the closets along with all the carpets in the bedrooms in one weekend. By the way, we are leaving the tile in the kitchen and bathrooms.
Dan started the work in the hall closet Saturday after lunch. Whenever he took a break, I would take over the work. We finished the hallways and the closets (three in all) just before five o'clock. The carpet was pulled from Bedroom #1 and #2 Saturday evening. We never did get around to ripping up that carpet from the Master bedroom; but, pulling carpet is easy. We began ripping up the tile in the living room just after eight o'clock Sunday morning and finished just before three o'clock. And yes, we had lunch. It turned out I finished up with the last of the tiles. He started and I finished. I thought it was interesting, no? Anyway, both Dan and I were so happy. We decided to just clean up, pack and head on home.

The State of Things
Let me tell you, ripping up tile is hot brutal work. I have an enormous amount of respect for people who do this for a living and never ever will I criticize the cost of labor. It is well worth it to have someone do it for you! With that said, I have to say that there is a sense of pride and accomplishment for managing to complete this work ourselves. And, we saved megabucks.

Anyway, shall I list the minor causalities? No? Well, I am going to list them anyway. Ha!

• Dan pulled a stupid and scraped the top of his middle finger while shoving tile aside without his gloves. It was a bloody mess; but, not really a bad wound.


• When I first took over the jackhammer, I slipped and fell on my right knee receiving a very tiny wound from the broken up tiles. I thank God that I decided to wear jeans even though it was extremely hot (90°+ temps) because the injury could have been a lot worst without the jeans.


• Dan got a major blister on one of his palms.


• I got three major blisters -- one on each thumb and another on the side of my right heel. Only one of these blisters busted and, as a result, it became very painful.


• I banged up the side of my right knee (with the jackhammer) over time and, as result, there is now a lovely bruise.

The plan for this coming weekend is to rent a jackhammer again to get rid of the thinset, pull up the carpet from the Master bedroom, scrape up the glue from all the carpet in all three bedrooms, rip up the baseboards and throw it all into a dumpster that we hope to get from a trash company. We will see how well we will do this weekend.

We purchased the hardwood flooring this past Monday and will be picking them up Saturday morning. We will take them to the house and leave it behind to get acclimated in the house. We will purchase the necessary stuff to put down flooring next week. The ultimate goal is to start putting down the flooring in two weeks (July 7th).

Wish us luck!



{You might also be interested in reading Demolition Man.}

Wordy Wednesday: Grasshopper Whisperer

The Grasshopper Whisperer

Last Wednesday, it was "The Butterfly Whisperer" (me with a butterfly). Today, it is Dan with a grasshopper. When he caught this thing, I snapped some macro shots of the grasshopper. This shot was done in fun. Here is another shot of him with the grasshopper:

I have not had much time to go through pictures from our camping trip at Garner State Park. But, from the few I have seen, they are pretty good. Dan also took a bunch and he will probably post those on his blog someday soon.

Last of the Camping Pictures Posted!

I originally posted about our camping trip here with pictures of us.

The newest camping pictures, Day 6, are posted here. If you wish to see "Day 1 & 2" and "Day 3 & 4", and "Day 5", click on the links provided within the above "Day 6" link.

As noted within a previous announcement, this pictures are posted in chronological order (the order the pictures were taken) because I couldn't figure out how to organize them.

Enjoy!

More Camping Pictures Posted!

♫ ♩ ♫ ♩
I'm late
I'm late
For a very important date.
No time to say "Hello."
Goodbye.
I'm late, I'm late, I'm late.
♬ ♪ ♬ ♪

Sorry I am so late in posting this. Busy, busy, busy! But hey, I still managed to get this posted on Monday like I said I would. :-)

Anyway, I originally posted about our camping trip here with pictures of us.

The newest camping pictures, Day 5, are posted here. If you wish to see "Day 1 & 2" and "Day 3 & 4", click on the links provided within the Day 5 post.

As noted within a previous announcement, this pictures are posted in chronological order (the order the pictures were taken) because I couldn't figure out how to organize them.

I will work on posting Day 6 (last day) soon. :-)

Some Camping Pictures Posted!

I first posted about our camping trip here with pictures of us. This trip turned into more of a photography trip than anything else. We used the time early in the morning to explore and take pictures. I took many because I wanted to get used to using the Macro lenses.

I had a difficult time trying to come up with some way of organizing the pictures taken while camping at Garner State Park. I decided to just let it be random favorites in chronological order (in the order pictures were taken).

Since there are many favorites, I will be posting them in parts.

Camping at Garner: Day 1 & 2 There is a link within this post for Day 3 & 4

I will work on posting more next Monday. :-)

Wordy Wednesday

Which Way Shall We Go?

This pictures isn't all that great as it was snapped through a dirty windshield inside Garner State Park. Both Dan and I thought this view was amusing.

Our Camping Trip: August 1 - 7, 2010

On August 1st, 2010, we went camping at Garner State park. We stayed for a week and had a very good time. We took lots of pictures and I'm finally getting around to posting a few. More will come later.

{Note: All pictures came from either three different cameras: Mine, Dan's, and a ugly Vivitar digital water camera that I got on an extreme clearance.}

These are a few things we did:


Of course, before we left, we had to pack. Or rather, he packed up all our crap and I watched. Ha! Dan took the time to set up and take various pictures. And, he came up with this one picture which I thought was cool.




Upon arriving, the first thing we did was set up our tent. I'm loving the second picture above, it looks like the rain shield is overwhelming Dan. Ha!


And then, we had lunch. One of the many eating times we had together. We usually either had just a sandwich or some cold Pasta Salad -- easy to get together in the heat.

By this time, it was hot as blazes. So, we changed, lathered on suntan lotion, packed some snacks, and went down to the river to check it out.


Geez, it's cold!

What do you expect from the Rio Frio? Frio means "cold" in spanish.


We went down to the river practically every late morning and/or early afternoon and stayed for "hours" because it was so hot.



We also cooked up and made dinner every evening. This was Italian chicken which turned out delicious. We also had Camp Spaghetti, Cola Burgers, Hot Dogs, Pasta Salad, and Baked Taters.


Every morning, while it was still just warm, I would grab my camera, go wandering and shoot people, errr, things. :-)

And, this is my bodyguard. He would just quietly grab his camera and follow me.


And, we do yet more swimming...


We did a lot of reading late in the afternoons.


Or, in Dan's case, playing video games.

We also watched the birds late in the morning and whenever we were relaxing at the campsite. We had set up a platform bird feeder and a bell feeder to attract the various birds at Garner.



This was our campsite. It wasn't much; but, it was home for 7 days.


More cooking (for dinner). This time was for baked taters (fully loaded).




We also went tubing one afternoon. How do you like my "big yellow boat"? Ha!

We took off from near our campsite and ended up at the Dam. We were told it is a 2-1/2 hour float. Ha! It turned out to be a 4 hour float. We walked up to the camp store and spent $6 to catch a shuttle back to our campsite.

So, that was our camping trip in a nutshell.


And oh, one cannot go camping without doing this on some late evenings.


S'mores. YUM!