After Mackie finished up with his meetings we headed to Catalina Island for a little relaxing. Didn’t have too much time. One whole day, and two nights. We got into the island late, spent one day sightseeing, and then left the next morning. Catalina Island isn’t a big island, 22 miles long and 8 miles across. Basically it has two towns. Avalon and Two Harbors. We stayed at Avalon, but took the Flying Fish/Dinner Boat tour to Two Harbors on the second evening. It was lots of fun. So enjoy some of our trip with us! And as always, I was busy playing with my camera.
Leaving Long Beach CA to head to the island
Mackie in his dress clothes……can you imagine! 
Breakfast snack along the waterfront
Ready to go sightseeing
Airport in the Sky
The trees that kept our Bus from going down, down, down…..he was a crazy tour bus driver!
Eating a bite of lunch
And having a Diet DP break!
Honey, I NEED a new airplane! lol
I love these boats, thought they made neat pixs as we crossed to Two Harbors that evening. And I didn’t edit them! Can you believe it?
And the palms and surfboards, and kayaks made some neat photo subjects to me.
Mackie’s yacht (the one man boat) that is!
Golf Cart ride….enjoying the island the fun way!
Our hotel
Downtown Avalon
We had lots of fun for a short visit. Catalina Island wasn’t the tropical paradise I thought it would be with lots of flowers everywhere. Since they are a very dry place. In fact, they said they usually get 9 to 14 inches of rain. But this year they have had O inches and the year before 7 inches. That’s dry! But the site it was located in was very pretty and the harbor where all the boats where docked was beautiful.
Categories: Fun items · Trips · photography
September 22, 2009 · 2 Comments
We headed to the West Coast (San Diego, CA) for a Midyear-Masonry Meeting. While Mackie ‘enjoyed’ all his meetings and seminars, I walked along the bay front of San Diego. Lots of beautiful sights. I walked alot, took a lot of pictures, and in general had a lot of fun, just playing around with my camera in the manual settings. Trying to remember a little from my previous class! So enjoy the sights of San Diego bay front!
Well, here I am taking birds again…..but they do make neat subjects.
These trees had such interesting roots…
The San Diego Skyline
One of the many yachts docked here in the bay
This was such a touching memorial in front of the USS Midway. A sailor and his sweetheart saying good-bye during WW II
Kites flying in the breeze
There were all kinds of neat sculptures along the bay front. This one was interesting…….can you see the chickens in the popcorn chicken!!
I loved the many bird-of-paradise growing along the walk
One of the water parks, I passed on my walk downtown to the shopping center. Very interesting.
And to come later our visit to Catalina Island. Mackie took off an extra day…so we could do a little sightseeing! So til later……
Categories: Trips · coast · photography
September 10, 2009 · 2 Comments
We enjoyed a few days on Labor Day weekend at the coast. It was lots of fun….and relaxing!
Autumn showing off!
The girls surfing in a ocean with very few waves. 
Don’t you just love this face! Contentment….
Wow! the beach!
It can’t get any better than this! 
Playing in the Sand
Feeding the Seagulls OR the Seagulls feeding Mason???
Aunt Val & Autumn playing in the sand
Jean-jean & Mason playing with Autumn’s floatie
More Bread, Mommy!
Waves here I come!
All dressed up with stickers!
Love that sweet grin!
My little Man!
Kent & Valerie
Jeff, Crystal, Mason & Autumn….and for some reason the kiddos had had enough of jean-jean’s camera!!!
He’s just too tough!
And that’s all folks!
Categories: Autumn · Family · Fun items · Grandparents · Mason · Port A...Coast · TX · Trips · coast · photography
We headed to South Padre Island to check on a condo job we have going…and took Dad & Mom with us. Made for a nice trip.
The job is in the background. It was really hazy the morning I took this!
A light house we stopped at. The day was perfect for pictures!
All in all we had fun….on a business trip!
Categories: BMI · Family · TX · Trips · coast · photography
We enjoyed a day at Fossil Rim Safari a few Saturdays back. The guys were headed to Glen Rose to play golf….and we decided to tag along, and go see the animals. It was lots of Fun!
Categories: Autumn · Family · Fun items · Grandparents · Mason · Trips
OK….this post got a little ahead of itself. I meant to schedule it for later after some others, but hit publish instead. We had a fun time at the zoo last week. Really enjoyed the new exhibit. Ate lunch together, and even hit one of the spray parks afterwards. Don’t know who was more tired the kiddos or us adults. But it was a blast!
We girls (and Mason) enjoyed a trip to the Zoo. The new orangutan exhibit was great! We spent several hours there.
Hey jean-jean do you see what I see?
Playing on the otter slide….and no otters were in the exhibit!
And someone was really tired! Aunt Valerie had to tote her out!
And also a few pixs from Lexi & Autumn spending the night. They had quite a time!
Ouch! Stickers everywhere!
Bedtime….and this took a while for Autumn to slow down. She was having too much fun!
I had a lot of fun having the girls over. Lexi likes to play with Autumn, like Crystal use to play with her years ago. We had two full days! And then poor Lexi headed back to school! She was problably exhausted!
Categories: Alexis · Autumn · Family · Fun items · Grandparents · Mason · TX · Uncategorized
We celebrated Kent’s Birthday a little late with a seafood supper. Followed with cobbler and homemade ice cream. And of course, he had 27 candles on his cobbler.
Mason enjoyed helping Uncle Kent open his presents.
He was quite impressed with the Butterfingers in the gift from Mamaw & Papaw!
And poor Autumn slept thru’ most of the night. She didn’t have a nap earlier in the day…..and didn’t want to wake up when she got here!
Categories: Birthdays · Celebrations · Family
I am so far behind with this…..but here’s a few pictures from when the grandbabies came and spent the night! Jeff & Crystal went on a two day, one night trip for their 6th Anniversary on the first of Aug. We got to celebrate with both of our grandbabies spending the night. It was the first time for Mason. But he did great! I was a little anxious at first…but we all had a great time.
First we had to play in the pool….and of course, I found they had swim clothes after I got them out of the pool. So we have fancy swim clothes! lol
Bedtime! Autumn was all into her books! We had to go to the Library and get her some princess books. She was impressed. 
Forget the books, let’s play ball. -mason-
Peek-a-boo
I thought, Mason was going to take a nap! lol Instead Autumn got in the playpen, and they were playing peek-a-boo!
Categories: Autumn · Family · Fun items · Grandparents · Mason · TX · Uncategorized
We took a couple of days off last week and went to the beach. Here’s a few of the pictures I took!
This looked to be a old buoy that washed up on the beach!
This was a total goof-up that turned out kinda neat! I blew everything totally out except our Tahoe!
Mr. B……himself……chillin’ out!
And of course, we can’t forget a coastal bird!
Categories: Port A...Coast · TX · Trips · coast · photography
