Jim's Blog & Photo Journal

The new stage after five days work

2012-01-30T09:53:00.002-06:00

I like this shot! It says that we are getting where we're trying to go.

Gonna look a lot better after we get the skirting on it. Will probably happen today.

And this one really shows where we need to stain the new wood. The darker wood is the old stage (old like in October)

We'll probably finish the construction work today or tomorrow and then do some more clearing of the area. Unfortunately the oak tree in the center will have to come down. There are more trees too to cut down but most are dead, small, or redundant. The stage is looking good!

Progress on multiple fronts

2012-01-25T11:23:00.001-06:00

A dam at the West Bridge

After many months of drought the pond is full again

First day's work on the new stage

The upper picture shows the little dam at the West Bridge that I finished yesterday. From previous measurements this looked to be about the correct height to keep the pond full. Now after all of the rain, the pond is full but there is about 3-4 inches of water going over the dam. So I'll add one more row of bags of concrete mix and that will keep the pond at about the level it is in the second picture. Before the dam, water would back up like this but after the rain it would quickly drain away. Maybe we can keep more of it now - and this should keep water in the creek too. The last picture is the stage after one day's work. We've moved it back and added to it. It was 96 square feet and will now be 240 square feet.

JamFest Photo Book

2012-01-20T21:59:00.001-06:00

So we're sitting at the bar at Brewbaker's Pub this evening having dinner (all the tables were taken) and there on the shelf behind the bar is a copy of the Wildernest Treehouse JamFest photo book. This one's is special though - Jeff is getting each performer to autograph their page.

Phone camera photo

2012-01-18T15:48:00.003-06:00

When I went into the living room this morning the sun was just coming up and the only direct sun in the room was on the G. Harvey (Dallas, The Early Years) and, even that, was through the lace curtains. Visually, it just had a mystical look about it. So I took a picture or two and then decided to play on the feel of it a bit by changing the setting to sepia. Of course the light was very low so the picture is blurred a bit but I think it all came together to make a very interesting image!

Going home from Brewbakers on a rainy Blue Monday night . . .

2012-01-10T10:09:00.001-06:00

The fourth of four posters

2012-01-06T09:23:00.003-06:00

This is the fourth of four posters that I did in December. I started this primarily as a learning project in Photo Elements 9 and it's a natural extension of the Master Gardener project at the Wildscape and the Shutterfly photo book I made about it. The MG's have a state meeting in March and there are competitions in several areas (write-ups of things that took place the previous year) and one of them is a poster competition. From what I know about it, it looks like this one will give us a decent chance to place. We've brought home six or more awards the last two years!

Happy New Year everyone!!!

2011-12-31T17:06:00.000-06:00

Another Poster - This one is for the Winnsboro Farmers Market

2011-12-30T08:52:00.002-06:00

The manager of the Winnsboro Farmers Market this year is a member of the Master Gardeners and when she saw the Spring Conference poster I did she asked me about doing one for them. This is it! I did several versions and they selected the one I like most. I'm going to the printer this morning to pick-up yet another one. It's a one-off that will be used for our entry in the Master Gardener state awards competition in March.

We recently found out what breed of cat Shadow is:

2011-12-27T14:15:00.001-06:00

She's a Russian Blue and this description explains a lot about her:

"The Russian Blue is a cat breed that has a silver-blue coat. These cats are known to be highly intelligent and playful but tend to be timid around strangers. They also develop close bonds with their human companions and are highly sought after due to their personalities and unique coat."

As many of you know, Shadow often comes running up to us when we step outside. She goes with us when we walk the trails or go to the mail box. She loves to stay with me when I work in the greenhouse and she just has a very fetching personality. We didn't really want another outside cat but quickly learned - when Shadow decided that she was going to live here - that she wasn't your ordinary cat..

World Famous Wildernest Zipline

2011-12-26T10:00:00.002-06:00

This is Brian and the water in the background is the English Channel - and on this day it's a cold and blustery part of the North Atlantic between England and Europe. And what does that bumper sticker say?

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-21T12:56:00.002-06:00

This is special!

2011-12-19T14:15:00.003-06:00

Perhaps you thought that all of my excitement about the little town of Winnsboro was just the raving of an old guy - but take a look at this list! It's a list of state cultural districts as designated by the Texas Commission of the Arts. All of them! And you see the names of all the big cities in Texas on the list - but down at the bottom is the little town of Winnsboro. The ONLY rural Cultural District in Texas! Pretty special! Almost half of them are listed as having "website coming soon" - but not Winnsboro. Here's their site.

More Photo Elements 9 - This time PhotoMerge Group

2011-12-13T11:30:00.002-06:00

In this exercise I'm saying that the picture on the right is the best picture except for Lizzie - in the picture on the left she looks a lot better!

So I marked Lizzie on the left picture and Elements moved that image to the picture on the right and also did a lot of editing to merge it in properly - making change' to Julies leg and Kevin's leg also.

When you call up the pictures Elements uses behind the scenes logic to sync the images and that's why the display of the picture on the right has a white space above it. It's pretty amazing when you view the changes with a mouse click.

Seeker of the Fleece!

2011-12-12T11:18:00.004-06:00

So - whose lap does Pancho chose to lie on? The one with the fleece throw on it. (Can be empirically proven.)

Wood County Master Gardener 2012 Spring Conference

2011-12-11T14:22:00.001-06:00

This is another Photo Elements 9 project that turned out OK. I think this will be the final version of the poster that we will use to advertise our conference in March! It pays to have the right tools!

Christmas Sharing

2011-12-10T14:38:00.001-06:00

Hospitality House Christmas Party!

A young little girl to Jack: "Do you go by Jack so no one will no you are Santa?"
Jack: "Yes, how did you know?". :)

This is a post from Jack's wife Linda on FB. That's Jack with the little girl in the picture. The beard really belongs to Jack and it's there all of the time. But Jack has a lot of Santa on the inside too. (And he writes, sings, and plays the guitar too - really well! He played at the Wildernest Treehouse JamFest!)

More Photo Elements 9

2011-12-08T15:13:00.001-06:00

I've been playing with several things in Photo Elements 9 today - skipping the watching of tutorials and just playing with stuff using the limited amount of knowledge I've picked up in the last couple days. These two are different treatments of a photo on the Cibo Vino Restaurant website. I like both of them. (BTW - take a look at the right column on my blog further down where I've added a few links to some of our favorite places here in Winnsboro.) My main project is the poster for the next music event here but I can't post that because it has several things on it that are just in the wishing stages right now.

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More learning Photo Elements 9

2011-12-06T17:04:00.001-06:00

I watched over 20 of the on-line tutorials today from the most basic to a few of the easier kinda neat things. Here are a couple tests of the "Out of bounds" feature. I'm definitely missing an important piece of this! There's a keyboard command to turn it on but it turns something else on when I do it! I guess that means some Google time is in order?

November 2011

2011-12-04T14:07:00.001-06:00

I like to look through my pictures at the end of a month to see what we've been doing with our time. Of course there are some posts from November below this one but here are a few more pictures with some captions: It was a pretty busy month!

Worked on our Wood County Master Gardeners Spring Conference arranging a speaker, acquiring a raffle prize, and worked on poster ideas.

Created the "Scrapbook Song" DVD for Alex

Found a picture of grandson Colby on FB. He lives with his father. (Starnes)

Spent a morning traveling around Wood County taking pictures of fall color - but this one is in the back yard.

Had tree removal done at the house and tree trimming done at the Treehouse

Did some refinish work in the chapel and we replaced the cross with one more appropriate.

Spent an hour or so one morning taking fog pictures. This one is almost the same place as the 'fall color' picture above.

Attended the Winnsboro Fine Art Market

Found a picture of granddaughter Haley on FB. She too lives with her father. (Gattis)

Had the JamFest T-shirts made and have sold most of them now.

The sign for the city of Quitman is going in. I worked on the project.

Attended two afternoons of music at the Winnsboro Fine Arts Market.

We are adding some stone pathways at the Wood County Master Gardener's Wildscape Garden at the Mineola Nature Preserve.

A cold Christmas season night in downtown Winnsboro!

Attended several music evenings at Brewbaker's Restaurant and Pub.

I completely rebuilt the upper pond - removing the stone, cleaning and repairing the liner, dug it deeper but made it smaller, and replaced the stone, pump, filter, and waterfall.

And, of course,there was Thanksgiving and the week of prep that goes into it.

Another Reyes record

2011-11-29T18:00:00.001-06:00

At three years, five months, and eleven days - Xander is the youngest to solo on the Zipline! He was pretty cool with it but when we took him off at the bottom he didn't know how to get back to the Treehouse so we did it hand-in-hand!

Is it time yet?

2011-11-17T12:57:00.000-06:00

So the joke was - during the time of building the East Bridge, the Treehouse, the Zipline, the Chapel, the Sky Bridge, the West Bridge and Zip Line - that all we needed now was a Gift Shop. I guess my question is - Is it time yet? We've got Wildernest hiking sticks and canes, Wildernest hiking stick medallions, "I rode the Wildernest Zipline" bumper stickers, Wildernest T-shirts, Wildernest Treehouse Jamfest T-shirts, Wildernest Treehouse Jamfest Photo Books, and assorted Wildernest DVD's ("Building the Treehouse", several Thanksgiving DVD's, several special Treehouse and Zipline events. I guess we could get some coffee mugs made too. So what do you think?

Just finished "Cross Fire"

2011-11-15T17:14:00.004-06:00

Just finished reading "Cross Fire" the last in the Alex Cross series of books by James Patterson. I believe that there were 17 of them. All were good reads and fast reads and entertaining reads. My only complaint is that he found it necessary to have the murders in each novel committed in a more grisly manner than the previous. In the one before this one he had to resort to a method made famous in the movie "Fargo". It can't get any worse so he had to stop I suppose. This last book was a wrap-up that finally did away with the menace that tracked him through many of the books.

I'll probably go now to another series of books that Patterson has written, The Women's Murder Club. There are ten in this series with the eleventh due out in next May.

Another weekend at Crossroads Music Co. & Listening Room!

2011-11-13T17:38:00.003-06:00

Here Comes the Sun. Listen to this and compare it to the Beatles sound! And look at the smiles - they're having a good time playing this!

Dave Walser and Brian Magnus on cello. We saw these guys at Crossroads last night and it was a unique experience. Dave Walser was a member of Beatlegras, a trio that played mostly Beatle music and they did a great job - and Dave voice was a big part of that. We were all singing along last night especially with the encore - "Hey Jude"! In addition to Beatles music he also did some Bob Dylan, some James Taylor, and a couple of his own songs. Wonderfully enjoyable evening! We liked every song! Brian is a freelance cellist and cello teacher. He also plays with Heather McCready (which I've posted about before - another Crossroads favorite) and with the Allen Philharmonic. (Another parenthetical - the other two members of Beatlegras, Milo Deering and George Anderson also play with Heather.)

The night before we heard Druha Trava, from the Czech Republic. These guys make it to Crossroads every year and I've wanted to check them out the last two times they were and we finally did it this year. They've been touring the US for six weeks and played in Wichita, Kansas the night after they played here. You may have seen my FB post - in the Czech Republic they have only one top music list (not one for each genre) and Druha Trava has been number one on that list this year.

I don't know how Gus continues to bring in these quality musicians to play at the modest venue of Crossroads Music Co. and Listening Room. I think it must be something like the Wildernest Treehouse Jamfest. It's just a neat place to play and the finances sorta take a back seat. (Speaking of seats, we've been fortunate enough to get good ones for these two shows and the photos here were taken from our seats.)

It's unusual to have two shows on one weekend but it happened this weekend. Nothing more now until the Saturday after Thanksgiving when they'll have the sixth anniversary show!

Wish I had a photo for this one

2011-10-28T13:32:00.000-05:00

We were walking the trail this morning and Glynda stopped suddenly and pointed ahead. About 20-30 yards ahead was a big buck (deer) probably an 8-10 pointer. We stared at each other for a minute or so then he raised his tail and trotted off.

(Shadow was with us but had dropped away at the time. We'd been at the Treehouse and she'd gained access to it by climbing a small tree beside it and then jumping over to it. When we got back to the house she still had not rejoined us and the last I'd heard of her sounded like distress. So I hopped on the lawn tractor and drove back to the Treehouse and she came walking down the steps to see me. I petted her a bit and since she was OK I got on the tractor to go back to the house - and Shadow ran over to the same small tree, climbed it, and jumped over to the Treehouse again. I guess she wanted to stay there awhile?)

Blast from the past!

2011-10-26T16:36:00.000-05:00

Someone posted this on FB the other day and it reminds you what a special place the old Rubaiyat in Dallas was. It was THE place in Dallas for listening to this kind of music - this kind being in the folk genre. This is the calendar for March 1971. Almost all of these guys eventually succeeded in music to one degree or another and several made it to the international stage. The first guy on the list is Jimmy Johnson played blues for many years but, with the very common name, it's been hard to find anything current. The second act is Uncle Mike and Micky Mouth. Mickey is Mickey Raphael and he's been in Willis Nelson's band for year playing harmonica. Allen Damron ran the Chequered Flag night club in Austin for many years and was second in command at Kerrville. One of our favorites from him is "Is There a Heaven fro Balloons". John Vandiver stayed on the Texas scene until his death (about 1979 I believe) - here's a 2010 tribute to him by Shake Russell. . England Dan and John Ford Colley England Dan is Dan Seals of Seals & Croft, Summer Breeze, etc. Mike Murphy is Michael Martin Murphy, Wildfire. Mike Williams was another successful Texas musician and is now a pastor. I could find almost nothing on Karen Oznick. Frummox was Steve Fromholtx (The Man in the Big Hat, written by Steve, recorded by Jerry Jeff) and Dan McCrimmon - both successful Texas musicians and Steve is still making music. Three Faces West was Ray Wylie Hubbard's first group. It was him and Rick Fowler and Wayne Kidd. Ray has had some national success (Up Against the Wall Redneck Mother also recorder by Jerry Jeff) but is still a music maker on the Texas scene (and will be in Winnsboro later this year). And that was one month at the Rubaiyat. (It was fun reading the FB comments from other people that remembered it.)

You know you're old and in a small town when

2011-10-26T15:04:00.000-05:00

you say "Look, Jeff moved his car".

The pub, which is part of but behind Brewbaker's restaurant, opens onto Market Street. The restaurant opens onto Main Street. Jeff is the owner of both. We were going to lunch down Market Street and saw Jeff's car parked outside the pub - it's a yellow BMW convertible so at least it's a special car. A hour and a half later on our way home from the library we were driving back down Main Street and noticed his car in front of the restaurant. So I said "Look, Jeff moved his car". I guess small things get noticed when there aren't that many big things happening.

If you love our country you should check out this 2009 video!

2011-10-25T18:26:00.002-05:00

Antique Car Parade - One of the "Funnest" Days of the Year in Winnsboro

2011-10-22T15:39:00.000-05:00

Yep - that says "Willis" on there!

Lots of folks having a good time, lots of old cars! More cars than you can take pictures of. I said I'd do just a few this year so I only took 47 pictures!

Lindsey Gail at the JamFest

2011-10-15T17:09:00.004-05:00

They had to remove the video of Lindsey from Youtube so the link we had here doesn't work anymore - but check out her website. She was our headliner act.

See her website at Lindsey Gail.com

Wildernest Treehouse JamFest

2011-10-09T19:09:00.012-05:00

Gus and the blues band

Jack "Scruffy" Ainsworth

Ty Lenius

Amy Haid

Tami Hix

Kent Gooding

KMG - Kevin, Mia and Gus (with a little help from some friends)

Lindsey Gail

Alex and Kent

Lee Ann Mitchell

It had to be a cool Saturday evening when the moon is full (or close to it) and the hint of Fall is in the air. The woods can be dark but moonlight makes it inviting. Place was important because a stage in the woods at a tree house seemed to touch the imagination of audience and performer alike – and they all came. And our listeners were just right in number (about 100) and their appreciation for what they were listening to was there. Our lineup of talent was still growing just a few days before.

The performers – Jack “Scruffy” Ainsworth, Ty Lenius, Amy Haid, Tami Hix, Kent Gooding, Lee Ann and her group, KMG (Kevin, Mia, and Gus), Lindsey Gayle, Alex and Kent, Gus and the blues band. That’s ten acts – and they all came just to share music – and thanked us for inviting them. And there were a bunch of back-up guys too; Jim and Greg on bass, Limbo on mouth harp, Alex O., on guitar, Allen on percussion and the back-up guys with the others.

Gus Gustafson

Several of us worked very hard to try to make this thing come out right but it would have happened anyway without our efforts. But Gus is the man that pulled it all together organizing equipment, booking the performers, and much more - and we're really thankful to him. We're proud to say that the Wildernest Treehouse JamFest was a Gus Gustafson Production!!!

WilderNest Treehouse JamFest

2011-10-05T16:14:00.001-05:00

I'm getting a little scared - every time I go to town I hear someone talking about the "Wildernest Treehouse JamFest"!! Looks like it's the hottest ticket in town! Such a little stage for so much notoriety! There will be Gus Gustafson with a blues band that will be the anchor act with sets from Jack Ainsworth, KMG, Tami Hix, and Kent Gooding of Slightly Tilted. Folks just seem to really like the idea of music in the woods at the Treehouse.

We really don't know how many are coming but a few businesses in Winnsboro are planning on closing as soon as they can to get out here. I think the mayor is coming? AND - It's the second evening of the "Autumn Trails" celebration in Winnsboro. Folks are already talking about the "Second Annual ---" Facebook event for Crossroads Music Company and Listening Room.

Two weeks from today is the JamFest!!

2011-09-24T14:22:00.002-05:00

Stage in waiting - with some protection from the weather

Looks like a good size group coming so we'll need a little traffic control!

All music stages need a rug - so we've got a rug! (and a little "Wildernest" banner!)

The Orange Trail is under there somewhere!

2011-09-19T15:33:00.000-05:00

Conversation at breakfast after the storm last night:

Glynda: How much water was in the rain gauge?
Jim: None.
Glynda: None? How can that be?
Jim: It had blown over!

Hummers are getting ready to go south!

2011-09-10T13:33:00.000-05:00

Yesterday we were holding the feeder in our hand and they were still coming to it and sometimes several were swarming around our heads.

Today I've been photographing them through the kitchen window. Seven on a feeder at the same time happens only just before migration when they don't attack one another.

Another shot through the kitchen window.

Wildernest Treehouse JamFest

2011-09-07T15:42:00.000-05:00

Plans are moving along for the music event in October. What was initially looking like a modest gathering has been growing. Right now there are plans for about a dozen musicians and a pretty good size crowd in attendance. The confirmed musicians include the Blues Monday group from Zazuz, Kent Gooding of "Slightly Tilted", KMG (Kevin, Mia, and Gus), and Tami Hix. Jack "Scruffy" Ainsworth will be there and will hopefully do a few songs. We've cleared a much larger area around the Treehouse and have added a stage, mowed a good size area in the west meadow for parking, put out a bunch of solar lights for the trail, and there's a generator onsite about 300-400 feet from the treehouse. I think that Gus is planning on bringing the Crossroads sound system. Word is getting around town and it seems like everyone wants to come. It's really hard to know what to expect but - we'll find out. It's just over a month away!

It's now what you know . . .

2011-08-31T16:32:00.001-05:00

The Treehouse tree is stressed and needs water. I've been thinking about what to do for several days - 700-800 feet of garden hose and water it from the house?? Generator and pump and 200 feet of garden hose and water it from the pond??

Then after a work session there this morning and while having coffee at the Treehouse started talking it with Alex. He made a phone call while we were there to Cory of C.Miller Water Well's. It's about six hours later now and the tree has been REALLY watered. A gasoline powered water pump from the pond - water hoses the size of fire hoses and a volume of water coming out that could easily put out a big fire. There's probably an inch or two less water in the pond and were going to do it another 3-4 times before we have to return the equipment. But I'd rather have the water at the Treehouse than in the pond. I'll try to post a picture tomorrow!!

La Madeleine - then and now

2011-08-30T18:34:00.003-05:00

I had a La Madeleine breakfast for lunch today - was in Dallas for a Dr. appt. and was in the area. The next step of degradation was there and I'm beginning to wonder how low they can go.

If you go back to the founder who's name was Patrick Esquerré, was French, who supported the local community, and wanted to create a French dining experience you'd find it quite different than it is now. The "American Breakfast" is what we ate there every Friday morning. The meal included a big, flaky croissant, two big and tasty sausages, and scrambled eggs. The table had a little vase with a fresh flower. Jam was served in a little white china dish. The paper napkins were big and fluffy and were printed with a nice logo picture. Coffee was made by the pot and was fresh and hot. the food was brought to your table by a friendly wait person and for many years, where we went, it was a guy named Gerber that became a friend. The manager and other staff became friends too. It cost $4.99.

Then the business was sold and became a business - the kind where profit was the driver. You could tell from the beginning that middle managers were looking for little ways to pull a few more pennies into the profit column by cutting down on what was being provided. The cut flowers were the first to go. Then the napkins became tiny little things that made you pick up 3-4 to take the place of the one (false economy there). And they were plain - no more pictures on them. We noticed each of these as they came along and joked/cryed about them to the manager. Prices started going up too. Then the little china dishes of jam went away in favor of a little plastic container with its snap-on top and they were half full. Again we found it necessary to take 2-3 to make up for the one that was taken away. The sausages became smaller and then smaller again. Now they're crusty little half-dollar size things. Then, after a bit, they started using the blinking-vibrating things that told you when you were suppose to pickup your own food. No more Gerber bringing it to your table he buses tables. Today I experienced two more cost cutting devices. The croissants that were once so excellent are now little more then crescent shaped bread - not worth the name croissant! And the final (the restaurant we visited was one of the last to make this change) the coffee is now served in a very large thermos - and was barely warm! The eggs? They are about the only thing that I haven't noticed changing for the worse. I paid $6.39 for my breakfast today.

Of course we're retired and living in the country now and only make the breakfast trip a few times a year. But there's really no longer any reason to go back. Nothing special there any more. We've got a couple friends that we have lunch with every Wednesday at a local east Texas coffee shop. We discovered a short while back that during the time we were having our Friday breakfasts at La Madeleine, they were having Saturday breakfasts there. As we compared notes we found that we were all noticing the same changes as they took place. So it comes under the category of nostalgia now. But it was once very nice!

So it's like this . . .

2011-08-23T11:10:00.001-05:00

"Blues Monday" at ZAZUZ Pizza in Winnsboro.

A few weeks ago Gus (the guy in the blue shirt) suggested to Alex that, when it gets a little cooler, they get together at the Treehouse for a jam session. Gus is sorta the go to guy around Winnsboro when it comes to things musical and he's the one that runs Crossroads Music Company. It then turned into plans for a little gathering and we scheduled it for the first part of October. Now there's been time for talk to get around and we're now planning for a generator for the music systems, several professional musicians in additions to guys like the group in the picture playing at ZAZUZ, how to get the equipment in, parking for fifty cars or so, food, and a bunch of other stuff - even porta-pottys. Looks like good times are coming!

Gift cards

2011-08-23T10:52:00.001-05:00

. . . paid for a new bench at the chapel!

More on Aunt Maude's old photographs

2011-08-16T12:15:00.002-05:00

Aunt Maude had lots of old (1904-1920) photographs - many of them very high quality and in good condition. Unfortunately most do not have any identification on them - but some do. And for the past week or so I've been using my genealogy software to try to find people that might be interested in having these. A story has developed about the picture above. Norm, the owner of the tree I contacted looked into it and his living cousin, Helen, is the sister of the two boys. They are from Michigan. Helen wanted to know how the picture got to Texas and I told her about Aunt Maude, whose maiden name was Littleford, and that she went to college in Chicago and that we have family there. She then asked if Maude was related to (brother and sister) George and Lottie Littleford because they were friends of hers. And, yes, Maude is related. She's the daughter of another brother. I'm still not sure why Maude had the picture of two boys whose last name is Weller. (It's a 1920 Christmas picture.) Maybe there's a relationship somewhere, I sure don't have it in my tree. But I'm pretty sure that Aunt Maude would enjoy this "discovery" and the knowledge that the original of the picture will soon be on it's way to Helen! It's been an enjoyable connection and exchange of information and there are a couple more working now.

On another note, I noticed today that there was one of those little green leafs on my cousin Jerry's (Jerry Ray Zapata) name in the Family Tree Maker software. When I clicked on it I found his death record - he died last November 25th. He was the last member of that part of the family except for one child of his and three children of a sister.

Working with Family Tree Maker and some old photographs

2011-08-13T19:27:00.002-05:00

And this is one of my favorite old photographs. Her name was Isabel Jeanette Van Hagan. Her mother, Margarette, was a Flanders and was the sister of my great-grandfather Charles Lorenzo Flanders. I just think it's a great photo that shows how photography was thought of at the time. And the time was 1906 and Isabel was eighteen. She was probably named after her grandmother Isabella who emigrated from England.

Zoe Elizabeth Smith

2011-08-03T10:42:00.001-05:00

Zoe Elizabeth Smith - born on her great grandfathers birthday
July 31st to Julie and Kevin!

She looks ready to get started with life right now!

Day One - Learning Photoshop Elements 9

2011-08-02T15:08:00.001-05:00

BEFORE

AFTER

Old - but still good!

2011-08-01T14:45:00.003-05:00

We enjoyed this!!

2011-07-29T16:54:00.005-05:00

You see the little guys on the right?? They are there when you need them!

I don't post many movies but want to share this one! It was a fun movie - lots of dry humor and lots of great animation! Definitely some laugh-out-loud moments! (If you want some comparison - Greg would like this!)

It's funny - but there's still romance.

There's even a special guest appearance!

Here's the trailer! - Trailer #2 is a little bit of a spoiler.

Another old report card

2011-07-25T11:23:00.007-05:00

A few weeks ago I posted a few school report cards of a couple ancestors. I discovered this one today and decided to post it. It is my own second grade report card from 1948 - thanks mom!

The top part is the front and back (it folds). Notice that the handwritten part says that I had a "grade equivalent of 4.2" - at the end of my second grade year. I was pretty smart way back then! Also - we were graded on nine traits of "Citizenship" - and, of course, I got the top mark in all of those.

In the other section the grading is interesting. It shows how many kids in the class, how many got A's, how many got B's, etc. Then your own grade was circled in red. That really gives some good information! (And you'll see all A's circled - but from the looks of things that really meant that I was not in the bottom quarter or so.) The "Explanation of Marks" isn't exactly accurate - "C" was not "Average", in actuality, "C" (in most cases) was the lowest 5-10%!

The other interesting thing to me are the subjects - Arithmetic, Drawing, and then "Language & Grammar", "Reading", "Spelling & Phonics", and "Writing". Also "Music" for which we were not graded.

This is where I went to school in grades 3-6. The 2nd grade building was behind this one and in the 7th grade I moved to the building visible to the right. In the 8th grade we moved to a new campus.

Zippin' in the heat!

2011-07-24T09:32:00.000-05:00


I don't think I've seen anyone enjoy the ride down more then this little girl. She'd ridden it before and she made three trips down this time!

It was actually pretty nice yesterday morning. In the shade with a breeze - so everyone had fun. Daniel brought a family over last fall and when they had more family in town for a wedding and visit they wanted to bring them over to ride the zip line. So now the guest book has entries from Florida and Washington.

Alex at "Blues Monday" at ZAZUZ Pizza

2011-07-12T14:48:00.001-05:00

Come on in!

Our new Monday dinner. A good pizza at ZAZUZ's in Winnsboro and music. Our A&E buds Gene and Suzanne make this a regular stop too! Alex pretty well led this session!

Have you ever seen a "White-lined Sphinx Hummingbird Moth"?

2011-07-04T12:12:00.003-05:00

They act like a hummingbird but they are a moth. It does have a long proboscis and can feed deep into a flower (Mirabillis here). They zip around like a silent hummingbird. Never knew there was such a thing and when I ran to get the camera I thought I was going to be taking a picture of a strange, lost, little hummer!

Finished except for the shade cloth - and a few replacement boards

2011-07-04T12:06:00.000-05:00

At this point, the pergola is a $300 project and I'm happy with what we have for that. It is a bit like another room. We're at the stage where the little ideas for further improvement start popping up - a rug? - no two matching rugs, replace the existing one? - change out the furniture? - some of it has lumber from the way it was - replace some of that!! etc., etc. I've got shade cloth on order now (part of the $300) but I found a big piece (but not big enough) in the garden shed, leftover from the greenhouse, and tacked it up to see what the change would be - nice! So, a little more wood tomorrow for replacements.

Will finish the pergola tomorrow

2011-07-02T13:56:00.002-05:00

But today it's just too hot to work out there in the afternoon!! I have to rest and rehydrate every half hour or so - but that gives me more time to think about what I'm going to do next and the best way to do it. It's turning out OK! Here are some progress shots. We've noticed already that it makes the deck gazebo more comfortable, particularly in the mornings and early afternoons.

Happy Father's Day!

2011-06-29T15:55:00.002-05:00

It's nice when you go into a store and ask how much is on your gift card and what's the price of the item in your hand - and the answer to both questions is the same! That was the case for the mister system putting out the spray in the pictures above. And it really improves the environment - even in the deck gazebo.

A few weeks ago we were eating under the covered walkway at Brewbaker's Restaurant in Winnsboro and enjoying the atmosphere. A wish changed into a plan within a few days when we decided to build a small pergola for ourselves. We've wanted a better way to use the deck space beside the covered area where we have the table and we want a "living room" sorta space. So I was making plans when the Fathers Day gift cards came in. I've given myself a little challenge to use any gift cards I get for improvements that the family can also enjoy when they are here and this fits that plan.

The pictures are at an early stage of construction which will take a few more days to complete, mainly because of the heat (although the mister will help there too). Then we'll move the lounge and love seat into the area, add a ceiling fan, and train the trumpet vine to cover it and make it shady and cooler. We're also going to reduce the height of the railing on that part of the deck so we can see out without railing in the way (like the lower deck). Looks like a good plan!

Thanks for those Father's Day gift cards!!

2011 East Texas Pond Tour

2011-06-27T10:42:00.000-05:00

Glynda and I spent Saturday morning touring garden ponds in the Tyler/Lindale area. It was one of those self-guided tours and we just drove from site to site selecting the ones we wanted to see. There were some wonderful back yards and it was an enjoyable time. We got to visit with a number of the owners and hear about their experiences with ponds and saw more than one pond where we'd like to go back and spend some time just enjoying it. Got this Monet-like picture of Glynda at one of them.

More from the bunny -

2011-06-22T15:45:00.002-05:00

Beverly said I should try this. Thanks goodness for the tape that's holding me on!

This game ended with an 11th inning walk-off homer by Moreland!
GO RANGERS!

No new emails in the last fifteen minutes:(

A little reading before turning off the lights for the night.

Some morning bird watching. We call the one on the feeder "BJ"!

Whee! - Whee!, Whee! Whee!
(If you haven't seen the Geico commercial - just go on to the next one.)

Death - taxes - and mowing!

Time for a rest in the shade.

Vicki saw the first bunny post this weekend and then I got an email from Beverly who'd just seen it too. Both got some laughs out of it and Beverly asked for more. So it's her fault. A couple of these were her suggestions!

A Zip Line Thank You card

2011-06-21T14:53:00.001-05:00

One of my Master Gardener friends, Nancy Weaver, brought her husband and their three grandkids over for a Zip Line ride last week (just the two boys zipped AND NANCY). Today we received four "Thank You" cards. One from Nancy and an original one from each of the three kids. I liked them all but have posted Reed's card here (the guy in red). He's got the funky stairs about right, the green Tree House, the crow's nest, the table and chairs, Shadow, the zip line itself, and someone on the zip line using the gold colored pulley. You've got it right Reed!

We learned a little bit about American Goldfinches today

2011-06-15T13:00:00.000-05:00

We should have realized this sooner but we consider American Goldfinches to be migratory around here. They look like the photograph just above, they show up in the fall and hang around until March or April. So when we saw a bright yellow bird this morning we weren't sure what it was. It was like the illustration at the top of the post - so it's an American Goldfinch! The deal is that they have a summer plumage and a winter plumage! They're also considered to be non-migratory but, around here, they are - at least the population we see decreases dramatically in the spring and summer. They are very striking in their summer plumage - and that's the answer to the question "Why do our goldfinches look different from the pictures in the books?".

This is how he does it!

2011-06-13T11:54:00.001-05:00

I've gone to great lengths to get a bird feeder that the squirrels can't get to and the most recent is a trolley of sorts. I've got a wire stretched with the bird feeder hanging on it and I move the feeder in and out by some small ropes and pulleys. I've trimmed back some tree branches but he's still been getting in it. I've been told that they can jump eight feet so it's clear at least that far. Then I saw him actually doing it today. He ran away when I came out but, greedy little creature that he is, he ignored me when I came back out with the camera and executed a command performance.

(Next day addendum - Glynda saw him doing a hanging walk today.)

Quitman welcomed home a fallen son today

2011-06-12T13:28:00.002-05:00

Army Sgt. Joshua D. Powell

Died June 4, 2011

Laghman province, Afghanistan

Some more pictures

Do you know what this is?

2011-06-11T08:41:00.004-05:00

I just occurred to me to check this out this morning. It's "The Spread"! And it's a little different. It looks like the barn we built for the horses is gone. I think the "museum" is still there but not sure. There's a swimming pool and I think that's probably an in-ground job. It appears that the house has a new roof and that there's a new structure or two between the house and the barn. (click to make it bigger)

Street View doesn't go down Fenoglio Road. This is the turn-off from Highway 59 coming from Montague.

If you haven't seen this you need to:

2011-06-10T14:49:00.001-05:00

Showing what a great and inspiring organization they are, the Rangers drafted Jonathan Taylor in the 33rd round. This player is from the University of Georgia and is partially paralyzed from an accident in a game when he and a team mate collided. He's not expected to play ball again. Check the link above!

Glynda's First Gig

2011-06-09T15:22:00.000-05:00

She's third from the left

This is at the First Baptist Church in Quitman last Sunday. It's a group that Glynda has been practicing with for quite some time now and they meet every Tuesday at the church. There were eight dulcimers (I cut one off in the picture), a guitar, and a stand-up bass. She got a DVD of the performance and this is a picture of the TV screen as we were watching it.

Old papers from mom

2011-06-02T17:05:00.004-05:00

I was looking for something today that led to digging out an old box I'd never gone through before. There were lots of old papers from stuff mom had kept. There are a number of report cards from my grandfather (Flanders) showing that he attended both Columbian and Colonial Hill schools in Dallas in the 1900's and that he made B's and C's, seldom tardy but absent a couple days each semester, and was basically a good boy. But the oldest document is the one here. It's his mother's (my great grandmother's) report card from North-Western College in Naperville, Illinois, dated December 14t 1878. That's a rare find!! There are a number of things I'll need to scan and get into the genealogy software.

OK - this is pretty funny. After posting the above I started looking at my grandfathers cards. On this one the last two grades in "deportment" are 4.s - that means bad. At the bottom of the card there's a note. It says "If Charles does not stop playing and put his mind to his work, I fear he will fail in June". If you look at the parents signatures on the card, the last one is different and looks very much like it was written by a child and is in pencil!

I'm not sure what the teachers problem was. He was making mostly B's and even got his first A's in Arithmetic. He did drop down to C's in Reading and Writing. I think this is the third grade. Note that the report card is from the Columbian school. That was a James E. Flanders building. Check the link for a picture of it in my JEF online book.

Blossoms we haven't had before

2011-05-25T09:41:00.006-05:00

I'm trying a few new plants this year just to learn more and change up the appearance of the landscaping. Most were started in the greenhouse earlier. Some winners, some losers. But it's been interesting.

Mirabilis, or Four O'clock. The blooms are not open here because it wasn't yet 4:00 when I took the picture.

Cleome - A really interesting blossom. I've got a dozen or so of these.

Datura - no blossom yet but you can see it's almost there. It will be white and trumpet shape and large! I had a low germination rate in the greenhouse and then lost most of the ones I eventually planted in the garden. I can do better next time.

Crinum - This is the first year it's bloomed and it's not completely opened here.

A new zinnia with an unusual color mix.

Cosmos - Suppose to thrive on neglect and I've got two beds outside of the normal watering zone so I'll see how they do. So far - OK!

Richard North Patterson

2011-05-21T11:04:00.001-05:00

Last year a friend suggested that I read a certain novel by Richard North Patterson - don't even remember which one it was but I enjoyed it and have been reading his books ever since. I now have the last one available from the Winnsboro library. Last week I inadvertently picked up a James Patterson that was mixed in and enjoyed that. However it was light reading. It usually takes about a week to read a RNP (reading mostly in the evenings) but I picked up another James Patterson yesterday when we were in town for lunch. I'd finished that before bedtime and had taken time out to watch a Rangers game. Don't know yet if that was good or bad.

Another MMM visit!

2011-05-19T10:44:00.000-05:00

Last week we again entertained the ladies from Morgan's Mercy Mansion in Winnsboro. We had a group of fourteen over last October. Most all of them have moved on now and only one of that group was still there for this visit. They're all facing a crisis at this point in their lives and are going through a program that, while giving them a safe place to stay, requires them to live at the center. They can't leave there unescorted so a chance to come to our place is a welcome change for them. Glynda makes pizzas and dessert and then they go ride the zip lines. All of them rode the Treehouse zip line and about half of them rode the new zip line over the pond. We had perfect weather.

Daniel helps with maintenance at the center and he's the one that arranged the visits. He's also the starter for the rides.

Winnsboro has a Spring Fest too!!

2011-05-07T14:57:00.000-05:00

It's hard to tell what's happening here . . .

. . . so I included this one!

Bottom of the Blue Bell ice cream cone at A&E!

Sideline activity during the shoot-out re-enactment on the streets of Winnsboro!

Another A&E person

2011-05-07T14:22:00.000-05:00

When you read a novel you expect to come across some explicit language and you accept it when you do. But it sorta takes on another dimension when you realize that it was written by that nice older lady you were talking to at the adjoining table at Art & Espresso. Of course she writes other stuff too:

(A diverse writer of columns, feature stories, short fiction, novels, screenplays and stage plays, Maryann Miller has won numerous awards including being a semi-finalist at the Sundance Institute for her screenplay, A Question Of Honor. Her work has appeared in regional and national publications, and the Rosen Publishing Group in New York has published her non-fiction books for teens, including the award-winning Coping with Weapons and Violence In School and On Your Streets. A romantic suspense One Small Victory is a June 08 release in hardback from Five Star Publishing, and Play It Again, Sam is a July 08 release from Uncial Press as an e-book.)

Our new house bunny

2011-04-28T10:32:00.003-05:00

Our new house bunny came in an Easter flower basket from Deanna and Cody. He looked photogenic so I took him around the place for a photo shoot!

Easter - my favorite holiday! I seem to get more attention then!

This is me visiting with a couple of my basket buds. They're living on the deck right now.

There were definitely Easter eggs in here on Saturday!


Pancho, the only other house creature, is usually on the bed.

My favorite beer - or at least, one of them.

I'm on the pier at the pond in this one.

I'd never tried this before - pretty fun!

Shadow and me at the Treehouse - a really cool place!

Wow! This new Zip Line is fast!!

Dang that hurt! They did say the landing was the hard part!

Being a house bunny is living the good life - but every now and then I like to "get back to nature".

A Sunday lunch at the Treehouse

2011-04-19T13:36:00.001-05:00

Marilyn and Jim from A&E came over for a Treehouse lunch. Great weather and great company! But I can't use a people picture here because one of the people in the picture had a less then perfect image. A little trail walk after lunch and then coffee and desert on the deck at the house.

Winnsboro Farmers Market

2011-04-16T17:40:00.000-05:00

Actually more than "farmers" here but everything must be locally grown or made.

Hanging baskets of flowers

Homemade jams and jellies - and (like we've done before) if the jelly doesn't set - call it syrup.

My favorite picture of the bunch - the booth next to mine today.

brown and white and brown and white and . . .

There are about sixteen people in this picture and I know half of them from other places.

And this is my set-up from last week - I've sold a total of five now and my marketing demographics tell me that I need to produce more of the sellers. I'm left with mostly cedar now and haven't sold one of them yet!

The market is every Saturday from 8:00 until 12:00, April through October. This morning it was just too darn cold, too windy, not enough customers braving the weather (in spite of a gun show next door) and I had a bad headache - so I came home about 10:00. No sales today and something else on the agenda next Saturday - Springfest!!!

Darn near done!

2011-04-11T17:32:00.003-05:00

Looking better all the time!! I was hoping to post video of Alex riding the new zip line but for technical reasons beyond my control those are not available. In the first test Daniel came very close to landing in the pond - missed it by just 2-3 feet. So we tightened it up a bit and now Daniel clears the pond fine but Alex is the one that comes close now - and no more tightening available (without major efforts). So excuse us if we get all excited if you tell us that you weigh over 220 and you want to ride this thing. We just know something that you don't!

On a more serious note - when we walked to trail early this morning after the heavy rains last night the water in the pond was beautiful - not a word that you can normally come even close to using when talking about the pond, Then we climbed up to the tower and was admiring it from there when a couple of wood ducks landed there and started to swim around. Really nice!

Here's one from the top. You can see the cable running from the upper left. It goes just to the right side of the pier.

A few visual updates on the "Tower Bridge"

2011-04-03T18:39:00.003-05:00

From a couple days ago -

Big honkin handrails!!!!

It's beginning to look almost park-like! It is smoke - stuff burning in the creek bed - including the big tree that took down the test zip line. It's gonna be burning for several days - but it's OK, it's in the creek bed!

Last of three posts today -

2011-03-29T17:26:00.001-05:00

CAT ON A (not so ) HOT (piece of) TIN (that used to be a) ROOF

Sunday was a squirrely day

2011-03-29T17:17:00.003-05:00

Nothing special about that but these are all different squirrels and I took all the pictures at the same time - just stood at the kitchen window and fired away at them - with the camera!

It's been a while since the last one but . . .

2011-03-29T17:04:00.000-05:00

there goes load number three!!

A couple signs of Spring!

2011-03-27T16:32:00.000-05:00

The nest in the chapel now has a couple eggs

A sorta new resident on the road to the Nature Preserve!

Two Wildernest construction projects

2011-03-23T14:57:00.001-05:00

This is the project we've been working on and we're almost to the point of adding the final bracing and hand rails. Then we'll need to redo the Zipline part of it.

This is the other construction project. It's being built on a candle holder in the chapel and the builder-artist has put many more hours into it than we have on our bridge-tower project. It's really very well done and there's a lot of beauty to it.

West Bridge Zipline Tower progress

2011-03-21T17:36:00.001-05:00

This picture was taken from the BOD (overlook deck at the pond), Look carefully at the area in the rectangle formed by the branches in the upper center of the picture. Is that - stairs?? (You might want to double click the picture to make it bigger and then do it again to make it much bigger.)

This is the way it looks from the Orange Trail going toward the Treehouse!

This is looking even more impressive than our original concept! We only worked on this in the afternoon. Alex and Daniel are volunteering their time and talents to building a project at the Master Gardener Wildscape Garden and we worked there in the morning. Goint to do the same thing again tomorrow.

FRUSTRATION!

2011-03-19T16:47:00.001-05:00

My shopping for a Wildernest hiking stick medallion really began last November. After the initial contact with the company that would make them I took a few weeks to get a design in mind. Some mis-communication delayed it a bit more and then they tried several designs before sending me one for approval. It was good but we made some changes and got new art work samples that are back there about two months ago in my blog posts. Then we ordered them and the order was sent to China with about a six weeks lead time. That turned into eight weeks - the last bit in-transit. They send the shipments in bulk to Washington (state) and the individual packages go out from there. I've been watching the progress with my FedEx (Ground) tracking number and it was suppose to arrive today so I stayed at the house all day and about 4:30 the package was delivered!! The design turned out really nice but - the paint color is LIME green - not the Hunter Green that was on the artwork (and there's too much paint on the letters.). So I've sent my complaint email that they'll get Monday morning. Then I guess it will be another 6-8 weeks. As I said in the title - FRUSTRATION!!!

Here comes the West Bridge Zipline Tower!

2011-03-18T15:07:00.005-05:00

The red rope goes from the top of the tall post laying on the ground way in front of you, up to a pulley at the top of the ladder, and then towards you to the pick-up truck not in the picture. It lifted the pole into place easily! Daniel's idea!!

The Zipline deck was ready for the planking when we called it a day!

(Just so you know - I know that zip line is two words, as is tree house, but at Wildernest they are capitalized and they are Zipline and Treehouse. Of course we'll now have West Bridge Zipline and Treehouse Zipline!)

Glynda's first iris blossom!

2011-03-17T18:48:00.001-05:00

This turned out nice! I'm posting it too big but what the heck??

The Orange Trail West Bridge is underway!

2011-03-16T22:17:00.002-05:00

Yes - we've got a lot happening here right now! Alex and Daniel started the Orange Trail West Bridge today!

4:06 PM - First stringer of the new bridge going in. Daniel is standing on the old one.

4:47 PM - Old bridge is gone and both sides of the new bridge are in.

5:41 PM - Daniel driving home the last pier of the new bridge

6:38 PM - The last board of the new bridge going on!

Two hours and thirty-two minutes of work today. But this structure is not finished. This is going to be impressive when it's finished! The zip-line tower part of it goes up tomorrow. And, yes, this did happen the very same day as the removal of the old camper trailer. (See the next post.)

An unexpected project!!

2011-03-16T10:44:00.001-05:00

We came home a few days ago and found Missy. She'd been taking tin off of the part of the old barn roof that had fallen down.

Two days later this is what the barn looks like

This is where the barn was

This is the first load of junk leaving. He got over $300 for it!

This is the camper leaving! There are three more trailers to haul away.

There's still quite a bit of clean-up to do but it's good to be at this stage.

"Pre-Spring" is pretty much yellow here!

2011-03-14T11:39:00.001-05:00

The native jonquils are everywhere!

Daffodils are usually first

Our Carolina Jasmine is blooming more than ever before!

Pansies are best when the weather begins to warm. (We do have other colors of these.)

Johnny Jump-ups (Violas) are there all winter but really shine when the weather warms.

Even the Lime Mound Spirea, that will later be "lime" starts off very yellowish!

What's with this??

2011-03-07T11:11:00.002-06:00

I was looking at this picture of Justin on Facebook the other day and noticed the resemblance to the little picture just to the right of Justin :)

The new Collin County DA calls me "dad"!

2011-03-05T11:06:00.001-06:00

And here I am borrowing his chair for a few minutes before his swearing in ceremony yesterday.

We are very proud of him and his route to this new position and we're proud of the support he's earned from the people of Collin County. It's humbling to know that your son is the man they have elected to keep them safe from crime and from the bad guys and it's gratifying to know that he will do that and do it in a way that maintains the integrity of the person and the office. I know it because I'm bias but also because a lot of people have told me in person and in print that they believe in him and they say that he's the kind of man we all need in public office.

Music of Heather McCready

2011-02-27T10:33:00.004-06:00

We enjoyed a wonderful evening of music at Crossroads last night. This was a top quality performance that could play most anywhere but last night they were here in Winnsboro. Heather McCready is a singer-songwriter and when I attend a concert of a singer-songwriter, I'm happy if there are just a couple songs on the plus side of "just ok" but we both thought all of her songs were well into the plus side and we enjoyed them all. She also has a band with a lot of credentials - and instruments like a cello, a stand-up bass, mandolin, and violin! Give it a Day is the name of her latest CD and is the second song on this link. Just skip the first one and go down to this one.

Rather than rewrite everything I'm just including some of the notice for her Crossroads performance below.

"I’ve always dreamed of being a songwriter,” she said. “It was in my soul. It’s who I am. I’m a writer and a musician. I felt like I was going to burst if I didn’t begin to express myself.” With a crystalline voice reminiscent of Emmy Lou Harris, McCready has released three CDs, “Finally Free,” “Neverland” and “Give It A Day.” She describes her sound as a mixture of Celtic, classical, bluegrass and folk music.

McCready shares co-production on “Give It A Day,” released in late 2010, with Milo Deering, a much-sought after Dallas musician and a member of the popular trio Beatlegras. “I was very impressed with her songwriting and singing,” Deering said in an e-mail. “Heather has a very good harmonic sense and understands how tension and resolution can help convey the emotion in a song. We put that to good use as we worked up string and vocal arrangements.”

In addition to Deering, McCready has a strong roster of talent backing her up in the studio and in live performances.

George Anderson sits in on the upright bass. Anderson graduated from Grand Prairie High School, studied music at the University of North Texas, playing the upright bass in the world-famous UNT One O’Clock Lab Band. He began his professional career as the bassist with the famed Woody Herman Big Band and has played with Ray Charles, Tony Bennett, Marvin Hamlisch, Chuck Berry, Joe Williams, The Coasters, Brook Benton, The Fifth Dimension and Doc Severensen. His 2003 CD “Faces” was nominated for a Grammy in the Best Contemporary Jazz category.

John Landefeld handles the cello for McCready’s band. Landefeld holds a bachelors’ of music degree in cello performance from the Eastman School of Music. In addition to appearances with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and the Dallas Chamber Orchestra, Landefeld has performed with musicians from the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Milwaukee Symphony. Kade Eckhardt, a Sulphur Springs High School cellist, is one of Landefeld’s private students.

Sam Swank, who once served as Olivia Newton-John’s guitarist, is a recent addition to the band."“Milo and I co-wrote on this album, too,” explained McCready. “There is so much of a coming together on it. Where Milo’s talent starts to fade, mine picks up. Where mine drops off the planet, his picks up. We’ve made beautiful music together.”

Some pictures with the macro lens

2011-02-26T15:08:00.002-06:00

I've been taking a few flower pictures using the macro setting on the 28-90 lens. The pictures give the impression that we've got lots of flowers right now but it's still limited to these and just a few more. The little plant at the bottom (and all of its' brothers and sisters) will hopefully be a garden of flowers in a couple months. They are a new variety of Zinnia that I tried last year and really liked - a creamy color in low, compact plants - Dreamland Ivory!

Daniel killed a wild hog on the Red Trail

2011-02-25T17:15:00.002-06:00

Daniel has been leaving bait for a couple weeks and it paid off last night. This guy had his last meal just a moment before Daniel shot him. (My flashlight was shining on his large tusks when Daniel took the picture with his phone camera.) We are guessing that he must have weighed a couple hundred pounds. Don't ask how we do know that his head weighed 25lbs. The hole in the ground where they have been digging for the bait is about four feet deep. How'd you like to meet him on the trail some day. Glad this one is gone but there are a lot more where he came from!

This was in my blog comments for moderation today

2011-02-23T15:51:00.000-06:00

Actually it had been flagged as spam. It was one of the posts about the zip line. So I Googled the translation (Chinese to English) and it says "Really good. I might download. Thank you". So I allowed the comment to post. And since I was posting this I decided to add the below stats. These are blog views for this month only. The multiple counts are probably the same person returning I would think - particularly the Germany and Russia views. .

Treehouse Guests - Some statistics

2011-02-17T17:24:00.001-06:00

I was at the Treehouse and checked the guest book as we often do and realized that it's the middle of February and we haven't had a guest there yet this month. And then the thought - "Would that be a first?"! So - statistics - Yes, it would be a first month with no guests signing in. There was only one last February and there were two in July and two in August. Keeping in mind that not everyone that visits the Treehouse signs the register and that some of the little ones sign it every time they come, and that many of us visit often and never sign (other than the first time), the stats are: 258 visitors to the Treehouse, 159 the first year, 94 last year, and five in January of this year. We've had visitors from 48 different Texas cities, visitors from ten other states, and Brian and Pat visiting from England. So I guess we need to get at least one visitor in the next couple weeks. I think I know who that will be - we've got a couple invitations out.

Interesting!

2011-02-16T10:37:00.002-06:00

I was playing around in Picasa the other day and did this collage - it's a photo of the medallion artwork stacked on the photo that they did the artwork from.

Springfest invitation for family and friends

2011-02-13T10:03:00.001-06:00

Blog for Alex

2011-02-09T10:02:00.001-06:00

Yesterday was a good day for bird pictures

2011-02-05T10:20:00.002-06:00

Several male House Finches on one of the feeders.
The stick hanging out is for picture taking. In many of the shots
below, the bird is perched on this stick.

A couple female House Finches

A male House Finch - I like his quizzical look!

A female House Finch in a nice pose

I saw this one down by the Treehouse. It's a new one for us and I believe
it's an Eastern Towee. There are now 54 species on our property bird list.

Not sure what it is but I like the picture - taken by the Orange Trail East Bridge

Cardinals and Finches at one of the feeders

I just keep photographing Cardinals!

For some reason it's been hard to get a good picture of an American Goldfinch - but got a couple yesterday!


And got a better picture of the Brown-headed Cowbird.

And then came a huge flock of Red-winged Blackbirds!

2011-02-04T10:31:00.001-06:00

Snow day!

2011-02-04T09:11:00.001-06:00

We had about 5-1/2 inches of snow when we woke up this morning - an accumulation of four or five hours of tiny flakes, It had stopped for a while but started again about half an hour ago - larger flakes now. We've got 30-40 birds at a time in and around the feeder. Several Brown-headed Cowbirds showed up today. We haven't seen one of those in a long time.

The ruler has a quarter of an inch at the end before the scale starts

There are over twenty birds in this picture

Not a good picture - but this is the Brown-headed Cowbird

Maybe this is a little anal but -

2011-02-03T14:28:00.002-06:00

. . . if you're retired and have the time to street view it, it can make the book you're reading a bit more interesting. The book says, " A tunnel-like alley called the Passage Saint-Jacques lay between a small pharmacy and several ATM machines. A wrought-iron gate with a security touch pad secured the entrance to the tunnel, and that gate stood in sharp, contemporary relief against the passage's ornate stone arch . . . "

I'm not sure when the book was written or when the Google Street View pictures were taken, but in getting to this point the book said "there was no parking at all on rue de Vesles because of some road construction and repair". Guess what I saw in the Street View picture!

Just finished "Courage and Consequence" by Karl Rove

2011-01-28T22:01:00.000-06:00

I didn't have very high expectations when I started reading this but found it intriguing. I thought it was going to be a Rove auto-biography and it starts out that way but turns into an account of George W. If you felt disappointed by some of the events in the Bush administrations and thought he should have handled this better or different, this book is enlightening. The list of things below is from a review but it's what was coming together in my head as I was deciding that I had to do a post on this. I highly recommend this one!

The facts of his mother's suicide and reports of his father's alleged homosexuality
The accusation that he bugged his own office in Texas
The real story of how George W. Bush defeated governor Ann Richards
The details of Bush's stealth campaign to win the White House in 2000
Why Bush cratered in New Hampshire but prevailed in South Carolina in 2000
How Bush chose Dick Cheney as his presidential running mate
How the Bush campaign managed Bush's DUI
The defection of Vermont Senator Jim Jeffords
The frustrating challenges of Hurricane Katrina
The facts behind Rove's painful three years fending off a federal indictment, and
Why Obama is wrong on healthcare.

OK people!

2011-01-28T15:54:00.000-06:00

I recently added a counter to my blog and now I know that I'm getting about 100 hits a week. The problem is that it's mostly one way. I hardly ever hear from anyone. I used to have the comments as open as possible but I started getting junk in there. Well - it's open again now. Let me hear from you!! If nothing else, just check one of the boxes!

Jim's Blog & Photo Journal

The new stage after five days work

Progress on multiple fronts

JamFest Photo Book

Phone camera photo

Going home from Brewbakers on a rainy Blue Monday night . . .

The fourth of four posters

Happy New Year everyone!!!

Another Poster - This one is for the Winnsboro Farmers Market

We recently found out what breed of cat Shadow is:

World Famous Wildernest Zipline

Merry Christmas!

This is special!

More Photo Elements 9 - This time PhotoMerge Group

Seeker of the Fleece!

Wood County Master Gardener 2012 Spring Conference

Christmas Sharing

Hospitality House Christmas Party!

A young little girl to Jack: "Do you go by Jack so no one will no you are Santa?" Jack: "Yes, how did you know?". :)

More Photo Elements 9

More learning Photo Elements 9

November 2011

Another Reyes record

Is it time yet?

Just finished "Cross Fire"

Another weekend at Crossroads Music Co. & Listening Room!

Wish I had a photo for this one

Blast from the past!

You know you're old and in a small town when

If you love our country you should check out this 2009 video!

Antique Car Parade - One of the "Funnest" Days of the Year in Winnsboro

Lindsey Gail at the JamFest

Wildernest Treehouse JamFest

WilderNest Treehouse JamFest

Two weeks from today is the JamFest!!

The Orange Trail is under there somewhere!

Hummers are getting ready to go south!

Wildernest Treehouse JamFest

It's now what you know . . .

La Madeleine - then and now

So it's like this . . .

Gift cards

More on Aunt Maude's old photographs

Working with Family Tree Maker and some old photographs

Zoe Elizabeth Smith

Day One - Learning Photoshop Elements 9

Old - but still good!

We enjoyed this!!

Another old report card

Zippin' in the heat!

Alex at "Blues Monday" at ZAZUZ Pizza

Have you ever seen a "White-lined Sphinx Hummingbird Moth"?

Finished except for the shade cloth - and a few replacement boards

Will finish the pergola tomorrow

Happy Father's Day!

2011 East Texas Pond Tour

More from the bunny -

A Zip Line Thank You card

We learned a little bit about American Goldfinches today

This is how he does it!

Quitman welcomed home a fallen son today

Do you know what this is?

If you haven't seen this you need to:

Glynda's First Gig

Old papers from mom

Blossoms we haven't had before

Richard North Patterson

Another MMM visit!

Winnsboro has a Spring Fest too!!

Another A&E person

Our new house bunny

A Sunday lunch at the Treehouse

Winnsboro Farmers Market

Darn near done!

A few visual updates on the "Tower Bridge"

Last of three posts today -

Sunday was a squirrely day

It's been a while since the last one but . . .

A couple signs of Spring!

Two Wildernest construction projects

A young little girl to Jack: "Do you go by Jack so no one will no you are Santa?"
Jack: "Yes, how did you know?". :)