Our Arrival & Assessment, Bird house is Full & Our Fish are Growing

At 3:30 the alarm went off and I heard the coffee start. It’s programmable so I had set it last night so when Gina and I woke up we would have fresh coffee. We both looked at each other and said just a few more minutes. We did get up at 4 o’clock and enjoyed our coffee together, and then it was like, we need to be on the road. We still had everything to load up into the truck. However, she did get everything packed so it was easy to load in the truck. The last items to load were all her new plants and there were more than what I thought she bought. Then she told me she went again Thursday morning and bought a few more. I like what John wrote about Brenda the other day about our wife’s. They seem to know how to blend new items into their existing things and then when we ask they reply back “I’ve had them or they’re old”. Anyway she thought I wouldn’t notice any additional plants. However, I did since I barely had enough room for what she bought Wednesday.

Well, we got loaded and our home shutdown for the weekend and got on the road at 5 in the morning. That was only an hour later than we had planned on so not bad for us. We talked on the phone just about the whole way since she was driving the car and I was in the truck. Let’s just say that when we start traveling a lot Gina is not going to be driving a car while I’m towing our home down the highway. She didn’t like it and neither did I. We did stop for a potty break and had to readjust the plants since some of them decided they were not secured enough. We made it to our house at 10:30 in the morning and started unloading the plants. Once they were unloaded Gina went to assess her Garden and realized that she had probably bought too many plants. She really expected most of her seasonal plants to be dead but they seemed to be blooming and looking great. They just needed to be pruned and cleaned up.

Still looking Nice

Blooms are out in full

Still a lot of Color

While we were looking around we noticed our bird houses had a lot of activity and realized that we had babies inside.

One of Gina's Bird Houses

Baby Birds

Ok, I know Howard and Linda and other dreamers are bird’ers but I’m not one. I’m like that is a blue one or a Red one and so on. I couldn’t tell you more than a few official bird names if anyone asked me what the name of that bird is. So if you want to know what these babies are I cannot tell you other than I call them wrens. I do not know if they are the same birds that come here every year but birds that look like them have been coming here every year for the past twelve years. They really like it here since they seem to build their nest everywhere around here even if it wasn’t meant to contain a nest. Gina has little bird houses all over her Garden along with bird feeders that seem to keep the birds happy and coming back every spring.

More of Gina's Bird Houses

Next, we watched our Koi fish in the pond and admired how much they had grown. Their colors seem to be getting brighter. We do not believe we lost any during the winter.

Some of Our Koi Fish

So all in all Gina was very pleased with how everything fared and looked. She said that she shouldn’t have as much work to do in getting her garden ready for the wedding next weekend.

My dad stopped by along with my aunt & uncle so we visited with them for awhile. We really enjoy visiting with them whenever we can it just doesn’t seem like we have much time. Once they all left we started unpacking the rest of the truck. We are learning what we want in our new home so we bring different things to it and then decide whether or not we like it. If not they get brought back to Louisiana. We had a lot of those items this trip. Gina had a hair appointment for 6 o’clock this evening. Around 7 o’clock Thomas and I decided we wanted to go eat. We decided on Outback since he likes their fried crawfish tails and I like their blooming onion. I called Gina and she said she would meet us there. We had a great time, the food was good, and our stomachs were full. Thomas left to see some friends and we went back to our house. Gina and I were both tired and I laid down on the couch and was out. I’m not sure what Gina was doing but she woke me up at midnight and said she was going to bed so being the good husband I got up and went to bed with her. We had a long day but it was a very nice day for us and we always enjoy coming back to Louisiana.

Until tomorrow Gina & I hope everyone has a pleasant and wonderful day, enjoying what our Father has so graciously blessed us with.

Heading to Louisiana, Bad Weather, Let's be Safe

This morning started off the same except I was excited that Gina and I were driving to our house in Louisiana this evening. I think it’s been five weeks since we had been there. I got another ride into work and Gina kept the car so she could get it packed up since she would be spending the week there. She has doctor’s appointments this week.

She called me at lunch time and said she was going shopping for a comforter set for Thomas’ bedroom. I said ok but do not forget about picking me up today from work. At 3 o’clock the sky turned dark and guys in the office were talking about tornado warnings being issued and then we got told that we could leave early to beat the severe weather before it got to Houston. I called Gina and she was stranded at Steinmart since in her words it was raining cats and dogs and the store had lost power. I told her to just stay there until the weather improved and that I would get a friend to drop me off at home. I left work at 4 o’clock and the weather was bad it took 45 minutes to get home compared to 20 minutes normally. Then Gina called and said that she was leaving and would be home in a few minutes. She did find a comforter for Thomas’ room along with some other items. I didn’t inquire about the other items since I wanted to discuss our drive to Louisiana. So we sat down after she got inside and we turned on the local weather which showed thunderstorms and tornado warnings all the way from Houston to Missisippi. Being that it was a little after 5 o’clock and we would be driving in bad weather the whole way we decided to play it safe and just wait until tomorrow morning to drive home and allow these storms pass through. After we made that decision we looked outside and the weather seemed to be getting very nice in Houston and by 6 o’clock the sun was shining through the clouds. We were both hungry but didn’t plan on being in Houston tonight but we always have something we can eat. So we decided to grill the chicken that we took out of the freezer yesterday. We had grilled chicken with a baked sweet potato. It was a tasty for a quick throw together meal.

After we ate I noticed that the blackwater tank was full so I went outside and opened the valve to empty it. For whatever reason Gina and I were not tired tonight maybe we just had too much adrenaline flowing through our body since we had been so excited about going to our house in Louisiana. We had stayed up watching TV until after 11 o’clock even though we both knew we had to get up at 3:30 in the morning for our trip to Louisiana. Finally, around 11:45 we got in bed and said goodnight to each other.

Even though we did not drive back to Louisiana today, it was still a wonderful day. Neither Gina nor I are looking forward to next week since I’ll be in Houston and she will be in Louisiana. She’s dreading her doctor’s appointments and I do not want to be in Houston by myself since I have gotten so used to her being with me every day. But we both know Thursday will be here very quickly and it’s only four days and it sure beats six to eight months when I was riding ships in the Navy.

Until tomorrow Gina & I hope everyone has a pleasant and wonderful day, enjoying what our Father has so graciously blessed us with.

Spring Showers and Plant Shopping

I woke up this morning moving very slow and tired. For some reason our AC decided to drip water / condensation on the bed in the middle of the night and Gina thought one of our dogs pee’d on the bed. So I had to get up and see where the water came from. Then if that wasn’t enough my phone rang at 2 o’clock in the morning only to be a wrong number. I normally can fall right back to sleep but I was restless and seemed like I just never went back to sleep. I got another ride into work today. Gina wanted to look around town (shopping). A lot of days I drive in to work and come home at lunch and drop the car off to her since she doesn’t get moving very early. However, I knew today I wouldn’t be able to since I had a meeting with the president of the company I work for along with meeting with the client I’m working for right now. Besides that I knew I would get a very nice lunch out of the deal. It’s pretty hard for me to pass up a really nice (FREE) lunch. Well let’s just say when I called Gina at 12 o’clock she was at a plant nursery and when I was finished with lunch she was still there.

This where Gina spent her day

I think this time of the year is the best for Gina because she loves her garden and she loves to expand it. So today was a very good day for her. She was in her element, plants, plants, and more plants. I called her again at 4 o’clock to let her know that I was getting a ride home and she was still at the plant nursery and said just meet me here and then we can go home together. I said ok I’ll meet you there.

Gina searching for the best plant

Low and behold when I got there she had three carts full of plants and she wasn’t finished. We decided that they were not going to fit in the car so we left and went home and got the big truck. So who do you know that takes a big semi-truck up to a plant nursery to pick up their purchases? We do, everyone there just stared at us as we got out of the truck and started wheeling out three carts of plants and began to load them in the back of the truck.

Gina ready to load her plants

When we finished Gina tell tells me to meet her inside since she wants some more bedding plants. She began shopping some more. All total, she spent 8 hours at the Houston Garden Center. She was there so long that when she checked out, the young girl said, you must be tired since you have been here all day. Gina just replied back, no, I feel great!! Once we left the plant nursery the spring showers, really they were thunderstorms let loose. It was ok until I had to back my truck up and I could barely see out my mirrors. We waited a few minutes and it slacked off enough that Gina was able to get out and make sure I wouldn’t hit our home. Now it’s just sprinkling but you could tell it was not finished raining. Of course my lovely bride says we have to take the plants out of the truck or they will die. So we take all of the plants out of the truck and put them in front of and under our home to protect them from the rain. Just as we finished moving the plants from the truck it let loose again. We made it inside before getting too wet and we both looked at each other and said that was close now let’s eat. We were both hungry and even though she had taken chicken out of the freezer to grill we decided to have leftover taco meat and made soft tacos. This was a full day for Gina, but she was extremely happy with her selections and now she cannot wait to see how they are going to look in her garden. Finally at about 9:30 we went and got in bed and I know I was out quick. I’m not sure about Gina but I’m sure she was out quick too. We both ended our day very happy. Gina with all her new plants and I was happy because when my bride is happy, I’m happy.


Until tomorrow Gina & I hope everyone has a pleasant and wonderful day, enjoying what our Father has so graciously blessed us with.