Photo Blogging Challenge (November 2020) – Thankful

I'm not sure how this year can be both moving at a snails pace as well as blowing on through to December already. Thanksgiving was a bit different this year, as I mentioned in the Food Blogging post, my wife tested positive for both COVID-19 and Flu B a few days before the holiday. So we spent it apart from family and even each other as I isolated myself to the guest room. Yet we still have plenty for which to be thankful.

We've had some gorgeous skies the last couple of months, the sun sets out our living room window so it can really catch your attention.

My dad had another heart scare early this month, what kept in in the hospital for 38 days eight years ago only took 36 hours this time. Modern medicine is amazing. They were able to replace his aortic valve again without having to crack open his chest. And here he is just a handful of days later like nothing had ever happened and stronger than ever. 

Sunrises like to show off a little bit too, sometimes.

I'm thankful that despite all the added hardships, these two gentleman, who have been friends since kindergarten, were awarded their Eagle badges in a joint ceremony and that we were able to find a place that was willing to work with our social distancing requirements to honor and celebrate them. 

Finally, but not really as I have much more to be thankful over, I am thankful for two wonderful yoga instructors who have shown me the ways of both the yin and the yang. The slow long stretches of yin yoga have really helped with joint issues and balance as I age, the vinyasa flows working on the yang side have helped build strength and stability.

I'm also very thankful of PJ for continuing to host this challenge and for all of you who participate as well. I always enjoy seeing what the world looks like from your eyes!

Food Photo Challenge (November 2020): Plate it

I may take too many food photos. When I eat somewhere new or something new, I like to document what I've eaten. More for myself than anyone else. There have been times when I remembered a particular dish but not the details. It's nice to be able to find that info when I want it.

This is not one of those photos. Thanksgiving was quite different this year as on Wednesday, my wife tested positive for both COVID and Flu B. She was feeling bad so had already isolated a few days earlier. I'm still clear and she's doing much better. But, she was cooking most of the meal and having her parents over (they are in our pod as they live nearby and Amy sees them just about every day). So we took what food we had to her mom and her mom ended up cooking for us and preparing a take out for us to enjoy. The boys and I had a quiet meal in the dining room while Amy enjoyed Turkey in bed. Since my dad was also unable to visit, I couldn't go a Thanksgiving without my grandmother's cornbread dressing so I made my own for the first time. That's it in the middle of plate and why I have two different dressings. It turned out pretty good so I think I'll be able to carry on that tradition.

 

Food Photo Challenge (October 2020): Candy

Welp, I thought the prompt was Sweets. Turns out it is Candy. Here is a photo of some Halloween cookies anyway!

Photo Blogging Challenge (October 2020): The Great Outdoors

This month's Photo Challenge theme was The Great Outdoors. We had some nice weather to enjoy outdoors for sure!

Started out the month hanging out at the cabin at The Ranch.

The drive-ins have made a comeback; unfortunately all of our in door theaters are going bankrupt. But it was good to see a movie on the big screen.

Creeping slowly back in to scouts. Trying to see who is still around before we have to renew our charter. Outdoors, masked, and distanced.

We drove up to Dallas to check out the Pumpkin Patch at the the Dallas Arboretum. Timed entries and masks kept everyone safe.

Quick temperature changes have made for some cool weather features.

That's five. Another month done. Check out the others and join us for November.

Photo Blogging Challenge – Snap Away (September 2020)

I've been away from the computer so I hope I got this done in time. Not time to waste!

We finally got some rain breaking our drought. Almost 9 inches total for the month.

 

Everything old is new again. Saturday night, social distanced, at the drive in. 

CreativeWaco, and art collaborative, commissioned some mask related murals around town.

It's Texas, so you know football is back, 25% capacity and masks.

Yep!

Food Photo Challenge (August 2020): Dessert

So much of our normal lives have changed due to Covid, we just keep trying to make the best of it. Our youngest headed off to college this fall. Traditionally, the school hosts a week long event called Line Camp. Those events went virtual this year, like so many events. We watched the events streamed on TV and enjoyed our own Baylor Bear inspired cupcakes. We were supposed to get a parent box with cookie cutters and decorations but another set back in that those never came.

 

Photo Blogging Challenge – Letters (July 2020)

July has come and gone. Time is flying yet simultaneously standing still. We were talking this weekend about how much we miss simple things like going to see a movie. Anyway, our theme for July was letters. Let's see what I've got!

Looking to get away but maintain social distancing, we headed to the woods. The forest, actually. Pecos, NM to be exact. We spent 4 nights backpacking near Pecos Baldy. Saw very few people outside of the four of us. It was pleasant.

On the way back to Texas, we passed through Ft. Sumner, NM. They are one of two places that lay claim to the final resting place of Billy the Kid. The other is about 30 minutes from home and being a proper Texas boy, I know the one near me is the real deal! 😏

While we were gone, my photo Drobo array failed. New ones are backordered. I have one at the office and was able to get my drives up and running and copied over temporarily saving me the time of having to restore from my cloud backup.

My oldest is no longer a teen. Happy Birthday, John.

July is my birthday month as well. My mother in law gifted me this. My college mascot is a bear.

There's five. There are letters in all those things! I wonder what August will bring.

Food Photo Challenge (July 2020) – Summer Drink

With COVID-19 still running rampant, my Friday night go-to, while open in a limited capacity, has become my Friday night to-go. I'm happy that they are offering curbside service so I can get my Tex-Mex fix. With the new rules, Texas now allows take out liquor drinks provided they are purchased with food. The containers also have a security tab that must stay affixed until you are out of the car. That's a lot of words to say that my summer drink is a refreshing margarita. Typically on the rocks as is this one. This particular one was even sweeter as it was enjoyed on my birthday!

Food Photo Challenge (June 2020) – Veggies

Is a pepper a vegetable? I hope so because this is all I got this month. I flaked out I guess. But take a look  at this sucker. It was huge. I wish I took one before I took a bite. That small bite was all I ate of it. It was pretty spicy!

Photo Blogging Challenge – The Notebook (June 2020)

It's time for another a lil hoohaa monthly challenge. This month's theme was The Notebook. I missed some obvious ones thinking back. But I have plenty of notebooks lying around.

This is my regular catch-all. It was a freebie from a conference a few years back. 

I really like Field Notes notebooks. Several years ago, one of my Boy Scouts told me about Recycled Firefighter. This one holds the Field Note memo book and is made of recycled fire hose by a retired fireman. This has traveled on all of our backpacking/canoeing adventures as my camp journal.

We have just a few notebooks at work holding the paper we don't need to scan or archive for long periods of time.

The last weekend in June is ARRL Field Day for Amateur Radio operators. I earned my Technician license a little more than a year ago. It is the base license and doesn't give me access to many bands. Normally that wouldn't be an issue, our club would get together in the park and I could work off a more advanced license. Due to COVID, our club did not have an official gathering. One of the other members invited me to his place, and practicing appropriate social distancing guidelines, allowed me to work his setup. We didn't get all the continental US states but we covered a great deal of them as well as Ontario and the Greater Toronto Area.

Do we still refer to laptops of a certain size as notebooks? As COVID numbers rise here in Texas again, I'm preparing to move my office back home for a time.

That's five and I'm done. Take a look over at alilhoohaa to see the other participants. And join in next month!

Photo Blogging Challenge (May 2020): Keeping busy

I work for an insurance company and we were deemed an essential business so I've had no real trouble keeping busy. We've got about 70% of our employees working from home now. The first couple of weeks of roll out were a challenge but it's working pretty great. I've done my best to keep busy when not working to try to maintain some sense of normalcy.

I've been holding Zoom meetings with a small group of new scouts who had just joined before the shutdown. It's not the same, of course, but I have enjoyed interacting with them and demonstrating scout skills. We even had a virtual campout.

I've been riding my bike again. The roads, even the back roads, are little less crowded. I love riding through the corn and wheat fields around my house.

I've been hiking a lot too. I'm lucky to have a beautiful city park with fantastic hiking/biking trails so close.

I did have to make a trip up to our Tulsa office to check on things. The Tulsa airport was packed with these parked American aircraft. It was surreal to see.

Back to the fun of keeping busy, I finally became one of those people baking bread. I found a copycat recipe for the Outback Steakhouse honey wheat bread. It was delicious.

We are just in the beginnings of June already. Summer will be here soon. Things are just so weird and different. My youngest child has graduated from high school. All of the college camps for the summer have been cancelled so his freshman experience is going to be so different as was his senior experience. I hesitate to call anything "the new normal" as people are wont to do. I don't think anything has stabilized enough to be called any kind of normal. We just keep doing what we do. Making the best of it. Keep taking pictures!

Food Photo Challenge (May 2020) – Snacks

I've been watching different folks over the last few months in my social media feed doing all sorts of baking. I've seen people even growing their own bread starters, naming them, caring for them as children, to counter the yeast shortage. I don't have the patience to grow my own starter but finally found some yeast. We had been talking about how good the bread was at Outback so I googled a copycat recipe and finally became one of those people baking bread. It turned out pretty good, if I say so myself!

Photo Blogging Challenge: April 2020 – Your (My) World

An April like no other April. This them was difficult as I had so many to choose from, if you don't want to choose, you can go check out my April. But here are the five-ish I pulled out.

Staying at home brought back new old activities. We haven't worked a jigsaw puzzle in years.

Nature keeps on like nothing is going on. Birds, squirrels, even snakes, have been particularly active.

Family Easter Dinner was unlike any we have experienced before. But it was great to see and hear from our family even if we are apart.


My baby sister, turned 50 this month. We had big plans for celebration but those were all cancelled. Instead, we had a socially distant tailgate party for her with cupcakes, Taco Bueno, and at least six feet of separation.
She can still do a cartwheel without breaking anything. Click through the video.


I rented a 24 yard rolloff dumpster and cleaned out our family garage/storage. 40+ years of old paint and garbage accumulated and is now gone. Room for new stuff!


I had to sneak in a sixth; I made it smaller. It wouldn't be spring without our family bluebonnet photo!


So there you go. April at home.Head over and check out the others at a lil hoohaa. And maybe join in next month.

Food Photo Challenge (April 2020): Dinner

Dinners in the time of COVID have been kind of different. My favorite local spots have been doing curbside and family dinners so I'm doing my part to help keep them going in these weird times. Bangkok Royal has been a favorite for nearly 30 years. Cashew Chicken (HOT HOT HOT HOT HOT HOT, no really a HOT number of stars).  It's so good. Not the same as being there but I'll take it!

Photo Blogging Challenge (March 2020): Seven

Wow, this month has ended quite a bit different than we started! The theme for this month is Seven. Let's go on and get started.

Baylor University is celebrating 175 years, it was chartered before Texas was a state. This is Judge Baylor. He has a pink nose thanks to the Noze Brothers paying a visit.


After the social distancing guidelines came about, we have tried to find some out of the way parks to walk the dogs. This one has a disc golf course. It was advertised as 9 holes, but it appears they are up to 18, sharing baskets. How fortunate that hole 7 is shared with hole 1(+)6.


How's about seven cows standing in a field?


We have a Jeep CJ7 that needs some work. John loves it but it just got to be too unreliable once he moved off campus. It's waiting for summer for school to let out so John can get back to troubleshooting.


I finished up the month with a 8K trail run/hike that was turned into a virtual. I had the course directions so went out and hiked it alone Sunday morning. I made a wrong turn or two and that added to my mileage. And then I dropped signal on the GPSr just shy of seven miles, that drives me crazy! But it still has a seven in it.


That's five. Let's see what the April challenge brings. Thanks for visiting.

Food Photo Challenge (March 2020): Lunch

A Jamaican restaurant opened late last year. What a great time to be trying to make a restaurant go, eh? Many places are doing curb side take out and family meals trying to stay open as long as they can while we are social distancing. Tru Jamaica is good! We've been once to dine in when they were just opened. They were having oven problems so we didn't get a meat patty. I was happy to find them available and even happier that they taste just like the islands. The plate is rounded out with some jerk chicken, plantains, roasted veggies and peas and rice. So tasty! And it was a lovely day so we at outside.