Wednesday, September 28, 2016

Alabama Road Trip

Nathan and Laurisa recently tied the knot in Laurisa's hometown of Mobile, Alabama.  Justin and I drove the fourteen hundred miles to the wedding, stopping along the way at Magnolia Market in Waco, Texas, and enjoying the beautiful scenery along the way.

Our first state to enter...

As you drive into the west side of El Paso there is a huge statute of a roadrunner on the hill.



We spotted this armadillo statute in the middle of a little Texas town.

In Waco we went and found my favorite fixer upper house.

After seeing the Harp House we drove over to Magnolia Market at the Silos in downtown Waco.

Of course we had to sample the sweet treats available at the Magnolia Flour bakery.


...inside a corner of the market...

If you don't know exactly what the story behind the Magnolia Market is, I'll try to briefly explain...
Chip and Joanna Gains are a couple from Waco that own a construction company called Magnolia Homes.  Chip does the demolition and remodeling of the homes and Joanna does the designing part before they hand it off to their clients.  They have their own TV show now called "Fixer Upper" and Magnolia Market is where they sell decor for homes, t-shirts and hats, garden supplies, Joanna's paint line, and so much more.  They used to have a smaller shop but just recently renovated "the silos" in downtown Waco where their market is located now.  They also have a B&B, the bakery, a small garden supply shop called "Magnolia Seed and Supply", as well as their construction business.  They are a very inspiring couple who work well together and create beautiful homes!  

Louisiana was a pretty state to drive through.  We took a little detour around some road work on the main road and passed fields and fields of sugar cane.  I've never seen sugar cane fields before so that was pretty cool! 

We also spotted a message.com sign while driving in Louisiana!

We drove for miles and miles on these bridge type roads above the swamps and small bodies of water.

When we entered Mississippi it was raining really hard so this is the only picture I have of the Mississippi state sign.  I tried to get a picture of every state sign as we entered but you know the one sign I missed was Alabama's :-/ 

The wedding was a grand event held in a gorgeous ball room.

Happily married couples :)

Joanna and I

On our way home we stopped at a Bass Pro Shop and walked around for a bit.  This is the biggest snapping turtle I've ever seen!  Thankfully I didn't come face to face with it back in PA in our neighbor's pond!




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Thursday, September 22, 2016

Camping at Patagonia Lake

Patagonia Lake is only two hours from our house, making it the perfect little weekend getaway spot.  Justin goes there quite a bit with his brothers to go fishing.  A few weekends ago Phillip and Natalia invited us and Jaylon and Hannah to go camping with them for a few days.  

Our little boat was pilled high with all the camping gear!  Phillip reserved the big island on the lake so we had to take everything out on our boat and the pontoon boat they brought.

Fishing right off the island was successful!  Jaylon caught quite a few channel catfish that were big enough to keep.

Phillip's parents stayed in their RV in the campground but during the day they came out to the island. Here Bro. John is filleting one of Jaylon's catches.

 Uncle Sheldon and Aunt Sharon brought their children out on Saturday afternoon.  Looks like the hammock fell down, but it didn't phase Uncle Sheldon a bit!! haha

 The number one activity for the little guys was throwing rocks in the water :)

 :: camp ::

Cooking the catfish and bluegill for our supper!

We had such a fun time camping and fishing.  It's always fun to go with friends!

Monday, September 5, 2016

Backyard Flock

A few months ago I thought it would be fun to build a chicken coop out of pallets and have a few chickens for a little "backyard flock".

The building process took place at the Strite's and then we moved it over to our house after it was completed.

Justin put up a small yard around the coop for the chickens.  This is the front...

...and this is the back door where I'll be able to gather the eggs out of the nesting boxes.

This is the side door, we'll open this for the chickens during the day and then at night we're be able to shut them in.

We have five hens, three of which are laying every day.

One afternoon I painted a chicken silhouette on the front of the coop, I like little touches like that :)

Thursday, September 1, 2016

Roosevelt Lake

We had such a fun time this past weekend cruising around Lake Roosevelt with Juliana and her dad in their boat.  Wake boarding, knee boarding, tubing, and waterskiing were the activities enjoyed on the water.  Hope happened to be here visiting over the time that we went to the lake so she got to try wake boarding and water skiing for the first time!


It was very windy on the first day so the water was quite choppy.  We went back into a cove and Hope got to try wake boarding.


Justin

After we finished wake boarding we went out of the cove and tubed for a while.  Juliana and Hope on the tubes.



Later in the day we cruised down to the bridge and dam.



*     *     *     *     *

The second day the water was perfect!

Justin tried to jump on the kneeboard but the time he landed it, I wasn't recording :(  
So he tried again but to no avail...





Hope is a natural at water sports!

kneeboarding...

...wake boarding

Juliana on the wakeboard.


Here's a little video I put together :) Enjoy!