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| Letting the good times roll at La Madeline. Shared my mimosa with Martha. Her first! |
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| Met Joyce, Al, and Emma at La Madeline for lunch before the Centenary College Choir's presentation of St. Matthew Passion by Bach with the Shreveport Symphony. |
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| Between lunch and the concert, I met Dad at the hospital to visit with Charles. |
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| Intermission. The performance was held at First Baptist Church. Excellent experience! |
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| Another blurry photo. Sigh. Here I am with my state representative Gina Hinojosa. Fellow Sierra Club member Eileen McGinnis is reviewing the bills we support with her. |
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| Heard a familiar voice in the ladies room. It was Lynda, mother of Ryder's best friend Seth Nesenholtz. She moved to Fort Worth years ago. She was at the Capitol lobbying for Planned Parenthood. She's a retired attorney who was one of my job references when I graduated from law school in 1994. She's still as compassionate and kind as ever. |
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| April 11 was Conservation Day at the State Capitol. I joined about 20 other Sierra Club members to speak urge elected representatives to vote for bills to keep/make Texas more green. Only got to speak with two representatives,as the House was in session, but with office staff of eight other representatives. I parked the Zoomer at the HEB grocery store and caught a Capital Metro bus downtown, only having to walk two blocks from the bus stop. Parking wouldn't have been any closer. |
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| Motorized scooters are very popular in Austin. Thank goodness they're prohibited on Capitol Grounds. I've almost been run over on downtown sidewalks. |
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| Looking up, up, up into the interior dome. At 302 feet, the Texas State Capitol is about 15 feet taller than the U.S. Capitol building, but is not the tallest state capitol building. I'm proud to say the honor falls to Louisiana, with a 450-foot tall state capitol building (not as aesthetically pleasing though). Sorry, Texas! |
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| Had to take a sip from the fanciest water fountain I've ever seen. A little research shows there's a more fancy one outside. Check out https://memorialdrinkingfountains.wordpress.com/tag/austin/. Will make a point to drink from it next time I'm on the Capitol grounds. |
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| Love the doors and doorknobs! |
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| Even the door hinges are gorgeous. |
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| We heard this hawk calling from its perch in one of our elm trees. The squirrel in the next tree froze in place for the longest time. We brought Zephyr indoors. The hawk probably wasn't large enough to be a danger to her, but just in case . . . . |
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| Birthday girl Cheryl chose Denver as her 60th birthday destination. We had flights of award-winning beer at Tommyknockers in Idaho Springs, just west of Denver, on April 5, her big day. |
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| Yes, it's possible to order flights of bacon at the Bacon Social House in Denver. Cheryl tried all the flavors (applewood, BBQ, candied, habanero, paleo, and a featured flavor). I tried none. Instead, you can see arugula on my plate, which also contains an egg white/veggie omelet. I did splurge and have a cheddar bacon biscuit. We weren't sure about the shears, but guessed they were for cutting the bacon. |
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| Cheryl and I stayed in a HomeAway in the Pearl/South Broadway area of Denver, much like Austin's SoCo neighborhood. I couldn't help but think of you, Anjanette, when I saw this octopus/sea diver candelabra in one of the antique stores along South Broadway. Shouldn't the octopus hold eight candles? |
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| Patio on a gorgeous Spring day on South Broadway |
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| You keep a snow shovel on the back porch next to your covered patio furniture. |
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| A snowmobile is parked next to the recycling bin in the driveway. Flatlander here at first thought the snowmobile was a jet ski. |
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| There's a boot scraper at the building entrance. |
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| Waterfall in the snow at Idaho Springs, a former mining town. Many of the miners were from the tin mines in Cornwall, England. They brought with them their elves, called Tommyknockers, who lived in the mines and either created mischief or good luck if left food or gifts. |
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| The Mt. Evans Scenic Byway runs from Idaho Springs, just west of Denver, to Evergreen, just south of Denver. We weren't able to take the spur to Mt. Evans itself, where we could have driven on the highest paved road in North America (14,000 plus feet). Due to snow, the road is typically open only from Memorial Day through Labor Day. |
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| View from the Mt. Evans Scenic Byway. |
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| I promise you, we were in the middle of nowhere, several miles outside Evergreen. I'm guessing maybe hikers and cyclists were parking their cars along the road for extended periods? Probably wouldn't get too far in 30 minutes. But maybe a friend could drop you off and pick you up. |
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| The indoor hot springs called Indian Springs are surrounded by lush flora. We met the gardener, Ken McNickle, who was a contestant on Survivor and listed in Cosmopolitan magazine as one of the 50 hottest bachelors in America (!). He also works with the homeless in Denver through a nonprofit he founded, HumaneKind. |
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| Very happy gigantic yucca plant |
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| I wonder what these hanging blossoms are? They're beautiful! |
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| When planting flowers in the rose garden, I came across Fox's buried treasure from a couple of Easter hunts ago. I left it on the front porch for Fox to find. |
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| Before Fox found her egg, rascally raccoons , who must have found lost Easter eggs from other hunts loaded with candy, absconded with the egg. They left it broken open on the driveway near Papa Tom's truck. The egg is safely indoors now. |
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| Portland Trail Blazers' fan Otis spent Spring Break at basketball camp. He's on the far right in the back row. His favorite Trail Blazer is Point Guard Damian Lillard, #0. |
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| Second graders made items to sell on Market Day as a way to earn money for their next field trip. Each child had his or her own table. I couldn't resist a glow-in-the dark fairy wand, birdseed ornament, lucky rock, and seashell ornament. Fox is quite a persuasive salesperson. She made suggestions and recommendations to potential customers, who included other students as well as parents and grandparents. |
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| Every year, we raise Painted Lady butterflies to release into the garden. One cocoon is empty; the other contains a butterfly ready to emerge. See the spots on its wing? |
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| Two butterflies in the habitat, on the front porch ready to release. |
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| Papa Tom encourages one of the butterflies to fly free. |
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| The butterfly alighted briefly in the grass before fluttering away. |
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| Fox with the Chuy's fish and her new stuffie, Woger. She explained that the stuffie's name is "Roger" as said by a baby. |
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| Fox and Amon stuff the pinata for her birthday celebration. |
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| Fox only took two whacks at the pinata before it broke. |
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| Anjanette and Fox |
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| Fox lights the candle on her birthday Rice Krispie treats cake. |
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| Jake, Anjanette, Fox, Amon, and Papa Tom |
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| Happy 8, Fox! |
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| Took in Irish music and bouncy house action at NXNW with Amon and Fox on St. Paddy's Day. |
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| Yup, that's a man in a green plaid kilt with a cowboy hat and cowboy boots. |
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| Congrats to the Destination Imagination Transporting Llamas for winning first place in North Carolina on March 16, and to their fabulous manager Brandy. They're now on their way to the global competition in Kansas City in May, in which kids from 19 countries will compete. |
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| Here's what Brandy said about the event: "Mya and her team have worked SO incredibly hard since the fall! I am the team manager and it has been a ton of work to get the kids where they are today! They won their challenge for the elementary level at the state tournament and now are headed to Kansas City for the global tournament in May. It's going to cost a pretty penny to get there so any help is so greatly appreciated!! Don't know what destination imagination is? The kids had to put on a play without the help of any adults, making the costumes, backdrops, props, sound effects and they had to incorporate a flying aircraft that is able to take off from one spot, drop payloads into another spot 5 different times and then land in a landing zone. These kids are 4th and 5th graders so the fact that they were able to do this blows my mind!! They also had to do an "instant challenge" where they had to work together as a team to complete a challenge that was unknown to them until walking into the instant challenge room and get scored on how they did. They are amazing and I am so proud of them and am so excited for them to get to experience competing with teams from all over the world." |
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| Our Black Jack winner turned 8 on March 15. Don't worry. The marks on his face are leftover movie make-up, thanks to Mya's creative ability. |
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| And here's the link to "Apocolypse," the film made by the Asheville Lewis kids, starring all of us. |
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| We waited for more than an hour to get into Robert Rodriguez's "Red 11" and his discussion about how he and his son were the only crew for the under $7,000 film. He made it as a tribute to "El Mariachi," a film he made 25 years ago in 2 weeks, starring family and friends, and for the $7,000 he earned as a "lab rat." We didn't get in and neither did several hundred badgies (primary line). |
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| We were so lucky that there was a second showing with Robert Rodriguez a couple of days later, and we got in! Actually, his presence was lagniappe. Usually, filmmakers only appear at the first SXSW showing. Robert was the cinematographer, and his son Racer was the sound man. His son Rebel was one of the actors in the film. After the showing, Robert told us how the film was made in his office building and how special effects were created using magnets, filming action in reverse, etc. Pretty interesting. |
