Hamilton Pool Preserve

The last time I was at this place I was with my brother, his wife and daughter. That was 2 years ago...Gosh, I miss them. On the day we went, Toby had to work and was not able to go with us.

Since then, I have been wanting to get back there to show Toby paradise. I knew he would love it as much as I did.

So Hamilton Pool Preserve was our destination. Words can't do this place justice so here are A LOT of pictures to tell the story of our day...

The hike to the pool was .25 mile downhill. I'll leave it up to your imagination what the hike back up the hill was like for me...





The Pool itself...












Bear with me. I know I have alot of pics but I was having a hard time choosing my favorites..

I didn't get any further into the pool past my knees. The water was FREEZING and the day was windy and partly cloudy. After Toby and Sum had their feel of swimming in ice we decided to take a hike down to the river...




This is a cool small waterfall tucked back along the trail. Summer and I urged Toby to try and slide down the fall into the little pond below it. Long story made short, Toby managed to get millions of some kind of tiny worm/leech looking things ALL over him. In his shorts, pockets, etc. It took us forever to get those sticky little worm things off of him. I'm still laughing as I remember it...

I had pictures and a video of the whole thing but somehow I lost 1/4 of my pictures after they were downloaded...I guess that's what I get for laughing so hard at someone else's misfortune...



Toby spotted this very large fossil on the way down to the river. We wondered how many people had passed it by and never even noticed it.




Finall the river...If I'm not mistaken I think it's the Pedernalis River...











It was another wonderful day in paradise.

THe Law of Attraction

Skeptical???? Most people are when they hear the terms New Thought Movement as it's so coined. Or if your not familiar with that term try Metaphysical or New Age.

Call it what you will it's all the same thing. For the past few years I have been on a spiritual journey. Don't confuse my term spiritual with religion. What I am talking about has nothing to do with church or idol worship.

I have been on a path...a path to find the substance, that from whence we came. Not something "out there" but that stuff within. You know, like when Jesus said "The kingdom of Heaven is within". Too bad man has taken Jesus teachings and turned them into a self-serving sideshow worthy of idolatry. .....but that's a whole other post...

Well, today I wanted to go to the book store to find a new metaphysical book to read. I used to have a friend who would always jokingly refer to my literature as "weird" books. She was no where near enlightened enough to comprehend the magnitude of what was written in those books, but in her defense we all eventually find our way back to the source even if some of us find it in more arduous ways.

So, back to the bookstore. I was browsing through the "weird" book section and spotted a book entitled The Law of Attraction. I have read many books about the law of attraction...The Secret, Ask and It Shall Be Given, Infinite Possibilities, and Spiritual Economics just to name a few.

I unshelved the copy of the Law of Attraction book. As I pulled it out a single dollar bill fell out of the book onto the floor. Hmmmmm.....strange, so I began to flip through the book searching for more of the green stuff. :-)

What I found tucked inside of the book was a small card that had enveloped the dollar bill. On the outside of the card was a hand drawn heart. The message on the inside of the card read....

Your life is changing in a big and miraculous way.

What a coincidence...or is it called synchronicity??? Yes, my life has slowly been changing in big and miraculous ways for the past few years. I thought about that card and lone dollar bill...what it meant and why I had been the one to receive it.

I finally decided the best thing to be done with the card and dollar bill was to pay it forward. I selected another book in that section that I had a particular affection for. I chose The Secret off the shelf, added another dollar bill to the one that I found and enclosed the money in the card in hopes that another kindred soul will get that special message sent from the Universe.

Isn't that what life is all about anyway?? Passing it on...there is never not enough of anything. If we ALL would share of what we have no one would ever go without anything they need.

Remember the story of Stone Soup??? Let us all share so that we ALL can have...the source is unlimited for those that BELIEVE.

PEACE OUT PEOPLE!!!!

Ronald McDonald House

This afternoon we had a 4-H obligation. Our groups job was to prepare a meal for the Ronald McDonald House residents.

Last week the girls (I say girls because that's what our 4-H group is mostly comprised of..only 1 male) decided on preparing tacos for the families.

The girls...and the one guy, had to prepare the meal in the kitchen of the house. I have to say I was pretty impressed. They prepared the whole meal for 30 people all on their own. The whole meal included a variety of freshly cut fruits, a pie, and taco fixings they prepared all on their own as a group with very little interaction from us moms. Oh, and let me tell you how hard it was for a group of women to be in a kitchen and not feel compelled to work!!

Here are some pics of the activity...







I do want to make note that yes, some of my pics look blurry. Hubby bought me a new camera recently that does not have the little small eye view thingy (whatever you call it) so I need to practice on steadying my hand when I hold the camera out to look at the big view thingy to take shots. I don't mold well as far as technology goes. Luckily I have a tech savvy daughter that it is with me most of the time that helps her mom out with my discrepancies.

After the meal was prepared it was time to go home and prepare our own family dinners. Before we left the "kids" decided to make use of the house playground equipment..




Another successful afternoon.

Camping On Inks Lake

It's been 3 years since our last camping trip...our first here in Texas.

Although I am not a fan of sleeping on the ground, I do love being outdoors listening to the sounds of wildlife and watching the stars before I close my eyes into slumber land.

We picked Inks Lake for our first Texas camping experience. There were no regrets to our choice. There were several times on our trip that I thought I had died and gone to heaven. It was absolutely beautiful, refreshing, and bonded us together as a family.

Since I have so many pics I will give a picture summary of our trip.

Here is our camping spot. We were right on the lake.



Summer spent most of her time at the edge of the lake. Someone had left an old cast net down there that she was totally intrigued with.




We had worked up a sweat after we unloaded all our stuff and set up camp so we headed out to explore and take a dip. We ended up at Devil's Waterhole. I don't know why it's called Devil's Waterhole. I have not taken the time to research it....




Not being a fan of deep water, while the "kids" were swimming I decided to take Brandi and do a little exploring on my own. The area was the usual rocky hills so I had to leave Brandi behind below so I could climb the rocks and take some pics from above.





Later on that evening we checked out another swimming area. I spent my time reading a book and taking pics. Something about swimming with millions of fish eggs floating around in the water did not appeal to me...





It had been a long hot day and it was finally time to get back to camp, prepare our picnic style dinner and start an evening fire.



At dusk it was a real cool factor to see the deer grazing so close to our site. You could tell they were very used to being near people and didn't mind us coming close enough for a pic.



Sleep was restful. I awoke several times during the night to see a stray shooting star and hear scurrying nocturnal animals.

We awoke the next morning starving. We had meager amounts of picnic food from the day before left...nothing that would sustain us through our active day. We did a search on the GPS and found a restaurant nearby to have some brunch.

After we ate we came back to the park do to a little hiking along the lake. We didn't hike long before we came upon a cool little waterfall. While Toby and Summer stopped to check out the waterfall I ventured on down the trail a good way to try and get some more pics. I could have walked along that trail forever taking pics but I knew my family was probably down there tapping their foot waiting on me to return.




The waterfall area we found was soooooo relaxing. The water was cool and clear and the sound of the waterfall was serene. Aside from seeing a couple of snakes it was perfect. We did have our eyes peeled for any stray snakes while we chilled in the water.



After we chilled at the waterfall a little while we ventured to the other side of the rock where there was a larger swimming area perfect for Summer. It was deep enough to swim in but yet not to deep that she couldn't stand up. Summer loved the area but it seemed a little snakey to me...even though I never saw a snake on that side.




Poor little Brandi was totally out of her comfort zone the whole trip. She hates water and she definitely hates to walk on a leash. I did have to put her in the water a few times to cool her off. It was so hot she didn't seem to mind.

Here is what she was doing most of the time...watching, waiting, looking forlorn and lost. That's just Brandi for ya.






We were having such a good time and there were still areas of the park we didn't get to see. I wish we could have stayed another night. I look forward to our next camping trip to Inks Lake.

Here are a few miscellaneous pics..

The Crab Bucket

One time a man was walking along the beach and saw another man fishing in the surf with a bait bucket beside him. As he drew closer, he saw that the bait bucket had no lid and had live crabs inside.

"Why don't you cover your bait bucket so the crabs won't escape?", he said.
"You don't understand.", the man replied, "If there is one crab in the bucket it would surely crawl out very quickly. However, when there are many crabs in the bucket, if one tries to crawl up the side, the others grab hold of it and pull it back down so that it will share the same fate as the rest of them."

So it is with people. If one tries to do something different, get better grades, improve herself, escape her environment, or dream big dreams, other people will try to drag her back down to share their fate.

Moral of the story: Ignore the crabs. Charge ahead and do what is right for you....or at best, be the only crab in the bucket.

Lie To Me

Lately I have been intrigued about a series Toby and I have been watching called Lie To Me. I have always been one of those perceptive types that pretty much can sense whether a person in genuine, soulful, deceptive, have ulterior motives, etc. In a sense, I think we all inherently have it.

Even though I do have a radar, I have not always taken heed to my internal warnings.

Anyway, the series was inspired by the scientific discoveries of a real-life psychologist who can read clues embedded in the human face, body and voice to expose the truth and lies in criminal investigations.
Of course, these clues would also show themselves in any other situation where someone felt the need to lie or deceive.

I have been enthralled. Since watching the show I have found myself studying random peoples faces, voices, and body language. I have been so intrigued, I have also began to do some reading online about the practice.

Nobody likes to be lied to or duped...I like the idea of being able to expose deceptiveness. Maybe that makes me a little deceptive myself....maybe my interest comes from the experience of once being married to a compulsive liar.

After watching an episode the other night, I got to thinking about lying in depth. I myself have never been a good liar. I was always one of those people where it was written all over my face if I were even telling a little white lie.

Most the time I would just fess up because it was easier to face the consequences than try to figure out how to tell a lie gracefully.

Matter of fact, even if I think a person does not believe me or is acting accusatory to me, I will appear to be lying just because I think that they think I am lying....if that makes sense.

I would be terrible at police interrogations. I would be one of those people that the police could convince that I committed a murder just by making me feel pressured, even though I would know I was innocent.

So, I was thinking about that. I wonder if even if you feel like someone does not believe you would you still display those same facial expressions and body language?????

I know there have been times I have looked guilty in the past even when I wasn't.

Just something to think about.